Understanding Jesus Christ

Recently, each morning before the school day began, I noticed a young student sitting alone outside my classroom door. Talking with her I learned she was a devout Christian, and we prayed together for God’s blessings in our lives. Later that day, I asked her how God had blessed her. She said that a prayer was answered—she wanted one person at the school to understand her. “And that person,” she said, “is you!”

Like my young student, perhaps you have felt like no one understands you or what you are going through. Most of us have at some time or another. During his time on earth, Jesus Christ was perhaps the most misunderstood person who ever lived. In fact, to this day, he still is.

Not Understood as the Son of God

As the Messiah, Jesus has all authority and power under the Father. Philippians 2:10,11 says, “That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Jesus is a man in a new body. God is Spirit and the Creator. As we serve our Lord Jesus Christ, our Father is glorified.

Let’s take a look at a day in the life of Jesus Christ, and see how few understood what he was saying and promising. Yet like today, some believed and were saved by him. In the Gospel of John, we see him as the Son of God. In chapter 5, he made two amazing statements about the authority that his Father gave him. (The following scriptures are all taken from the New Testament in Modern English by J. B. Phillips.)

John 5:25-30:
Yes, I assure you that a time is coming, in fact has already come, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and when they have heard it they will live!
For just as the Father has life in himself, so by the Father’s gift, the Son also has life in himself.
And he has given him authority to judge because he is Son of Man.
No, do not be surprised – the time is coming when all those who are dead and buried will hear his voice
and out they will come – those who have done right will rise again to life, but those who have done wrong will rise to face judgment! 
By myself I can do nothing. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is true because I do not live to please myself but to do the will of the Father who sent me.

As the Son of God, Jesus Christ has the authority to bring eternal life to those who believe. As the Son of Man (Adam), he has the authority to judge all men who are under the curse of Adam’s disobedience. In Christ, born-again believers are free from condemnation and will stand before the reward stand of Christ (II Corinthians 5:10; I Corinthians 3:12-14). Yet, all others will stand someday before the judgment stand of Christ (Matthew 25:32,33; I Corinthians 15:22-24; Acts 24:15).

Let’s see what happened a little while after he declared these amazing truths.

Not Understood by His Own Family

John 7:1-5:
After this, Jesus moved about in Galilee but decided not to do so in Judea since the Jews were planning to take his life.
A Jewish festival, “The feast of the tabernacles”, was approaching
and his brothers said to him, “You ought to leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples can see what you are doing,
for nobody works in secret if he wants to be known publicly. If you are going to do things like this, let the world see what you are doing.”
For not even his brothers had any faith in him.

Like so many others in his home town and province, Jesus’ own brothers did not believe in him at this time. Later, after he was raised from the dead and appeared to many, they believed. They did not show much love in how they spoke to their older brother. “Don’t hide out at home—go out and show the world!” But Jesus saw things spiritually.

John 7:6-9:
Jesus replied by saying, “It is not yet the right time for me, but any time is right for you.
You see, it is impossible for you to arouse the world’s hatred, but I provoke hatred because I show the world how evil its deeds really are.
No, you go up to the festival; I shall not go up now, for it is not yet time for me to go.”
And after these remarks he remained where he was in Galilee.

Even though his immediate family didn’t understand him, Jesus still spoke the truth in love. He told them that they were not exposing the Devil’s schemes as he was doing. Therefore, they were not hated and persecuted as he was. Exercising great wisdom, Jesus waited until his brothers had gone.

Not Understood by the Crowds

John 7:10-13:
Later, after his brothers had gone up to the festival, he went up himself, not openly but as though he did not want to be seen.
Consequently, the Jews kept looking for him at the festival and asking “Where is that man?”
And there was an undercurrent of discussion about him among the crowds. Some would say, “He is a good man”, others maintained that he was not, but that he was “misleading the people”.
Nobody, however, spoke openly about him for fear of the Jews.

The religious leaders inspired such fear that no one spoke openly about the Messiah, God’s only-begotten Son, the savior of the world. The same is true today. Religious leaders of all kinds either speak against Jesus Christ, or they mistakenly make him to be the same as his Father, the Creator. Here in John, some of the crowd thought Jesus was a good man, but others thought that he was deceiving the people. They didn’t understand who he was.

Not Understood by Religious People

John 7:14-19:
But at the very height of the festival, Jesus went up to the Temple and began teaching.
The Jews were amazed and remarked, “How does this man know all this – he has never been taught?”
Jesus replied to them, “My teaching is not really mine but comes from the one who sent me.
If anyone wants to do God’s will, he will know whether my teaching is from God or whether I merely speak on my own authority.
A man who speaks on his own authority has an eye for his own reputation. But the man who is considering the glory of God who sent him is a true man. There can be no dishonesty about him.
“Did not Moses give you the Law? Yet not a single one of you obeys the Law. Why are you trying to kill me?”

Jesus Christ told a great truth here. Those who worry about their personal reputation will use their own limited “authority” to persuade others to their way of thinking. They are more concerned about what people think of them than of what God thinks. But those who want to glorify the Father will speak truly. Look at the response to Jesus’ boldness.

John 7:20-24:
The crowd answered, “You must be mad! Who is trying to kill you?”
Jesus answered them, “I have done one thing and you are all amazed at it.
Moses gave you circumcision (not that it came from Moses originally but from your forefathers), and you will circumcise a man even on the Sabbath.
If a man receives the cutting of circumcision on the Sabbath to avoid breaking the Law of Moses, why should you be angry with me because I have made a man’s body perfectly whole on the Sabbath?
You must not judge by the appearance of things but by the reality!”

Here Jesus clearly exposed their religious hypocrisy. If they say they follow Moses and will cut up a person’s body on the Sabbath (and it wasn’t even Moses, but Abraham, whom God first instructed to circumcise), why wouldn’t these religious people allow Jesus to make a person’s body fully whole on that day? Because they want to control others and maintain their egotistical systems over them. Jesus’ boldness surprised some of the people there.

John 7:25-27:
Some of the people of Jerusalem, hearing him talk like this, were saying, “Isn’t this the man whom they are trying to kill?
It’s amazing – he talks quite openly and they haven’t a word to say to him. Surely our rulers haven’t decided that this really is Christ!
But then, we know this man and where he comes from – when Christ comes, no one will know where he comes from.”

How amazing! They thought they knew where Jesus came from. He was called “Jesus of Nazareth.” But Jesus was the Christ, the Messiah, and had been sent by God.

Not Understood by Religious Leaders

John 7:28-31:
Then Jesus, in the middle of his teaching, called out in the Temple, “So you know me and know where I have come from? But I have not come of my own accord; I am sent by one who is true and you do not know him!
I do know him, because I come from him and he has sent me here.”  
Then they attempted to arrest him, but actually no one laid a finger on him because the right moment had not yet come.
Many of the crowd believed in him and kept on saying, “When Christ comes, is he going to show greater signs than this man?”

Since Jesus was speaking so boldly, the religious leaders wanted to shut him up. They were planning to kill him, but now the people were saying among themselves that Jesus might be the Messiah! They tried to arrest him. Jesus told them that he was beyond their reach, for his Father protected him.

John 7:32-36:
The Pharisees heard the crowd whispering these things about him, and they and the chief priests (of the Temple) sent officers to arrest him.
Then Jesus said, “I shall be with you only a little while longer and then I am going to him who sent me.
You will look for me then but you will never find me. You cannot come where I shall be.”  
This made the Jews say to each other, “Where is he going to hide himself so that we cannot find him? Surely he’s not going to our refugees among the Greeks to teach Greeks?
What does he mean when he says, ‘You will look for me and you will never find me’ and ‘You cannot come where I shall be’?”

Jesus spoke of his upcoming resurrection from the dead and his being seated at the right hand of God. This was promised of the Messiah in the Old Testament scriptures. But these worldly-minded religious leaders thought he was talking about going to those Judeans who were among the Greeks. They couldn’t understand because they were blind to the truth.

Not Understanding the Facts

So many people today like to take a religious or political view because they are convinced that they know what is really going on. They think they have the “facts straight” and can speak authoritatively. But the Devil is the father of lies, and he twists public opinion so that even the facts are not understood.

John 7:37-42:
Then, on the last day, the climax of the festival, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If any man is thirsty, he can come to me and drink!
The man who believes in me, as the scripture says, will have rivers of living water flowing from his inmost heart.”
(Here he was speaking about the Spirit which those who believe in him would receive. The Holy Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus had not yet been glorified.)
When they heard these words, some of the people were saying, “This really is the Prophet.”
Others said, “This is Christ!” But some said, “And does Christ come from Galilee?
Don’t the scriptures say that Christ will be descended from David, and will come from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?”

Here Jesus told some of the greatest truths of all time about the gift of holy spirit that believers would soon receive on the day of Pentecost. Some thought Jesus might be the promised prophet or the Messiah. But some were tricked by their own supposed “facts” to the contrary.

Was Jesus born in Galilee? No! He was born in the city of David, Bethlehem in Judea. He fulfilled everything the Messiah was to do, including where the Messiah was to be born. But these people thought they had the facts straight. They assumed he was born in Galilee. So often today, people believe everything a news commentator says or something they read on the internet.

Understanding the Father

We’ve seen how often Jesus Christ was misunderstood by crowds and religious people. They even got the facts wrong about him. Today we have “Christ in” us and can show the Father’s love the way that Jesus Christ did.

Let’s build bridges of understanding by patiently and kindly teaching God’s Word so that others can understand our Father’s loving heart for us. After all, what is the worth of a soul?