Thursday 02 April 2009

Background

Today's passage brings to an almost violent close a fieryexchange of words between Jesus and "the Jews who had believed inhim" (verse 31). Throughout the complex argument there are manyreferences to Abraham, who is a very significant figure from theearly history of Israel (Genesis 11:27 -25:11).

Abraham is the first of the three so-called patriarchs of Israel(Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) and his great faithfulness to God wasonce demonstrated in his willingness to sacrifice his only sonIsaac at the Lord's command (Genesis 22:1-19).The nation of Israel traces its origins to a covenant made betweenAbraham and God, in which Abraham was promised a great manyancestors who would be given a fruitful land of their own (Genesis 17).

The main thrust of Jesus' argument in today's passage is that thetrue heirs of Abraham are not his biological descendents, but thosewho emulate Abraham's great faithfulness to God by putting theirtrust in Jesus himself:

Jesus, not Abraham, is the one whose word will set themfree from sin (verses 31-36).

Jesus, not Abraham, is the one who has been sent to them from Godto speak for God (verses 39-47).

Jesus, not Abraham, is the conqueror of death who the Father seeksto glorify (verses 48-54).

And if all this was not enough to shock his fellow Jews,Jesus then claimed to actually pre-date Abraham (verse58).

To Ponder

John's Gospel suggests that many very uprightpeople became very angry with Jesus because of the claims he madeabout himself. Why do so few peopletoday react strongly to Jesus?

To what extent was CS Lewis right in concludingthat Jesus must be either: divine, demonic or deluded? What do youthink?