John 7:25-31
"Now some of them from Jerusalem said, "Is this not He whom they seek to kill?
"But look! He speaks boldly, and they say nothing to Him. Do the rulers know indeed that this is truly the Christ?
"However, we know where this Man is from; but when the Christ comes, no one knows where He is from."
Then Jesus cried out, as He taught in the temple, saying, "You both know Me, and you know where I am from; and I have not come of Myself, but He who sent Me is true, whom you do not know.
"But I know Him, for I am from Him, and He sent Me."
Therefore they sought to take Him; but no one laid a hand on Him, because His hour had not yet come.
And many of the people believed in Him, and said, "When the Christ comes, will He do more signs than these which this Man has done.

Message:
In the presence of Jesus Christ, the Light of the world, all men's hearts are exposed, sin is revealed, and the darkness of the human heart made manifest.
In this chapter which we have been studying, one group after another stands exposed. The Light was shining and it revealed the hidden things of darkness. First, the "brethren" of Christ (v.3-5) are exhibited as men of the world, unbelievers.
Next, "the Jews" (the Judean leaders) display their carnality (v.l5). Then, the miscellaneous crowd, "the people" (v.20) make manifest their hearts. Now, the regular inhabitants of Jerusalem come before us. They, too, make bare their spiritual condition. In sheltering behind "the rulers" they showed what little anxiety they had to discover for themselves whether or not Christ was preaching the truth of God. The common people were no better than the rulers; the Lord's brethren no more believed on Him than did the Jews; the inhabitants of Jerusalem had no more heart for Christ than they of the provinces. Human nature is the same the world over. Truly, "the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the

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image of God; should shine unto them." (2 Cor. 4:4) There are three questions asked in our text.
The first question is found in verse 25. It is asked by a group of people who were knowledgeable about the affairs in Jerusalem. Most of the people did not know of the hostility directed against Jesus by the religious leaders; but some did know of it, and these were puzzled by the fact that Jesus apparently was allowed to go on teaching. Their question was: "Isn't this the man they are trying to kill?" John does not give the answer to this question, but the answer is obvious. "Yes, it is!" Since Jesus is the sinless Son of God, this answer tells us much about the corruption of the human heart.
The second question follows immediately upon the first one as the result of a kind of reasoning by those who had asked it. "Have the authorities really concluded that He is the Christ?" (v. 26). The answer was, "No, they have not"——and that is because they did not wish to know. This answer exposes the truly lost condition of men and women, for none are so blind as those who will not see, or deaf, who will not hear.
"And Jesus said. For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see, and that they which see might be made blind. And some of the Pharisees which were with Him heard these words, and said unto Him, Are we blind also?
Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, WE see; therefore your sin remaineth." (John 9:40-41)
Jesus came into this world for judgment. Whenever a man is confronted with Jesus, that man at once passes a judgment on himself. If he sees in Jesus nothing to desire, nothing to admire, nothing to love, then he has condemned himself. If he sees in Jesus something to wonder at, something to respond to, something to reach out to, then he is on the way to God. The man who is conscious of his own blindness, and who longs to see better and to know more, is the man whose eyes can be opened and who can be led more and more deeply into truth. The man who thinks he knows it all, the man who does not realize that he cannot see, is the man who is truly blind and beyond hope and help. Only the man who realizes his own weakness can become strong. Only the man who realizes his own blindness can learn

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to see. Only the man who realizes his own sin can be forgiven.
The more knowledge a man has the more he is to be condemned if he does not recognize the good when he sees it. If the Pharisees had been brought up in ignorance, they could not have been condemned. Their condemnation lay in the fact that they knew so much and claimed to see so well, and yet failed to recognize God’s Son when He came. The law that responsibility is the other side of privilege is written into life.
In our text in John 7, the third question is asked by another group, we’re told who actually believed in Jesus. Their question deals with Christ’s actions and is expressed as follows: "When Christ [that is, the Messiah] comes, will He do more miraculous signs than this Man?" The answer at this point, although John once again does not give it explicitly, is: "No, He will not." Consequently, the conclusion must be that Jesus is the Christ, and that we should believe on Him as the Savior.
Let’s follow our text and observe how these questions arose.
"Is not this He, whom they seek to kill? But lo, He speaketh boldly and they say nothing to Him."
The crowd was surprised to find Jesus preaching in the Temple precincts. Along the sides of the Court of the Gentiles ran two great pillared colonnades or porticles--the Royal Porch and Solomon’s Porch. These were places where people walked and where Rabbis talked and it would be there that Jesus was teaching.
Some of the people well knew the hostility of the authorities to Jesus; they were astonished to see His courage in thus defying the authorities; and they were still more astonished to see that He was allowed to teach unmolested. A thought suddenly struck them: "Can it be that after all this Man is the Messiah, the Anointed One of God, and that the authorities know it? But no sooner had the thought struck them than it was dismissed.
Their objection was that they knew where Jesus had come from. "Howbeit we know this Man whence He is" was their reply. They knew that His home was in Nazareth; they knew who His parents and who His brothers and sisters were; there was no mystery about His antecedents. That was the very opposite of popular belief, which held that the Messiah would appear.

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The idea was that He was waiting concealed and some day would burst suddenly upon the world and no one would know where He had come from. They believed that they did know that the Messiah would be born in Bethleham, for that was David’s town, but they also believed that nothing else would be known about Him. In later years when Justin Martyr was talking and arguing with a Jew about his beliefs, the Jew says of the Messiah: "Although the Messiah be already born and exists somewhere, yet He is unknown and is Himself ignorant of His Messiahship, nor has He any power until Elijah comes to anoint Him and to make Him known." All popular Jewish belief believed the Messiah would burst upon the world mysteriously. Jesus did not measure up to that kind of standard; to the Jews there was no mystery about where He came from.
Then Jesus cried out, as He taught in the temple, saying, "You both know Me, and you know where I am from; and I have not come of Myself, but He who sent Me is true, whom you do not know. But I know Him, for I am from Him, and He sent Me." (Vv. 28-29)
How thoroughly wrong they were! And how this woeful ignorance concerning His real origin must have pained the Lord! Stirred to the very depths of His being, Jesus cried out..."So, you know Me and you know where I am from!" One can also read the exclamation as a question: thus: "So you know me, and you know where I am from?" Either way, the meaning is the same.
Jesus ridicules the very idea that these biased, legalistic, materialistic citizens of Jerusalem would actually know Him and His origin! And when He now says "So, you know me, and you know where I am from!" He means, "That is what you think!" Jesus here employs irony! We must bear in mind that the leaders and some of the Jerusalemites regarded Jesus as a deceiver, an imposter; as one who most certainly could not be the Messiah. The fact that when Jesus spoke these words, He was deeply stirring, so that He cried out, harmonizes beautifully with the idea that what we have here is not a calm statement of fact but an exclamation of the character: "So you know me, and you know where I am from!" In the light of this stinging ridicule it is not too difficult to understand that the persons addressed were anxious to have Jesus arrested.

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These same people who were so certain that Jesus could not be the promised Messiah, regarded Him as a self-appointed prophet. Hence, in refutation Jesus says, "But I have not come of my own accord; on the contrary, He who sent Me is the Real One, and Him you do not know. Instead of having come of His own accord, Jesus was the divinely commissioned One, having been sent by the Father, as is taught in many passages of the Fourth Gospel (5:30; 8:28; 12:49; 14:10). Moreover, the people must not think that the Sender is a mere figment of the imagination, a subjective notion; on the contrary, He is the Real One, but He is the very One whom the people do not know, although they imagine that they know Him well. When Jesus here declared of the Father, "He that sent Me is true (Real One), He looked back, no doubt, to the Old Testament Scriptures. God had been "true" to His promises and predictions, many of which had already been fulfilled; yea, their very rejection of His Son evidenced the Father's veracity.
"But I know Him; for I am from Him, and He hath sent Me" (7:29).
There is some doubt about the correct reading, whether this be "I am FROM Him" or "I am WITH Him." However, the context clearly shows that the question that was in the minds of all was this: "WHO IS JESUS, AND WHERE IS HE FROM?" The One who came from God was at one time (and in a sense is ALWAYS) WITH Him. And because the Son was with the Father and came forth from Him, He knows Him thoroughly.
"All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."(Matt. 11:27).
It mattered everything to Jesus that God had sent Him.
It was this that gave Him assurance in the face of the hostility of so many people who might have been expected to be genuine servants of God, the leaders, especially the religious leaders of the nation that rejoiced to be "the people of God." But while they might reject Him, He rejoiced in the nearness of Him who sent Me," of whom he now says that He "is true."
Goodspeed translates this "someone who is very real." The "reality" of the "truth" of God was very important, but these people did not know God. Because they did not know God they did not know Christ.

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These words of Jesus led to different reactions. Some decided that Jesus had gone too far and that He should be arrested (v.30). John says "therefore," which shows that this was the consequence of what Jesus had just said. He does not tell us in what the attempt to arrest Him consisted, nor who did this. He simply says "they sought" to arrest Him, but in Jerusalem the only people with the power to bring about an arrest were the Romans and the temple authorities. There is no question of Roman might at this point, so it must be the priests and their allies. John makes it plain that there was strong hostility and that Jesus’ enemies were prepared to take action.
The attempt, however it was made, was completely unsuccessful. Not a hand was laid on Jesus. As we do not know exactly who was trying to make the arrest or how they went about it, we cannot know what went wrong with the attempt. But we do know that basic reason for the failure—Jesus’ hour had not yet come." John is clear that Jesus had come to discharge a divinely given mission. He must do what was necessary to bring about the salvation of sinners, and in due course that would mean dying for them. But that death would be at the time and in the way God planned it. Puny tyrants would not be able to interfere. Till the time came for Jesus to die, nobody could prevent Him from going about His business in the service of God! Of course, when His "hour" came, nothing would be able to prevent Him from going forward to death either. In the will of God, it was not yet time for Jesus’ enemies to succeed. "And many of the people believed in Him, and said, "When the Christ comes, will He do more signs that these which this Man had done?"
These people were more open-minded...they had probably for the most part not known Jesus and perhaps even not known of Him before they went up to Jerusalem for this feast. But they were ready to listen to Him and to watch what He did. The result...they believed! This does not necessarily indicate true, living faith, however. They probably were ready to accept Jesus as the political Messiah of their dreams. They based their attitude upon the miracles which they had seen or about which they had been hearing such glowing reports. They expected that Messiah at His coming would perform miracles (Isaiah 35:5,6: Matt. 11:2-5) and that He would restore the kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6).

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In light of what Jesus has been doing they are ready to accept Him as being this kind of a Messiah. We have titled our message: WHO HAS DONE MORE THAN JESUS? I would like to extend that thought by asking this quest ion...WHO WILL EVER DO MORE THAN JESUS?
"God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds. Who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." (Hebrews 1:1-3).
Jesus Christ alone brings to mankind the full revelation of God, and through Him, He alone enables men to enter into the very presence of God.
The writer to the Hebrews contrasts Jesus with the prophets who had gone before. He says that the revelation of God which came through the prophets had a variegated grandeur which made it a tremendous thing. From age to age the prophets had spoken, always fitting their message to their age, always seizing that facet of truth which was relevant to the men to whom they spoke. But at the same time, that revelation was fragmentary, and had to be presented in such a way that the limitations of the time would understand. No prophet had grasped the whole round orb of truth; but with Jesus it was different. He was not a fragmentary revelation of God, He was the full revelation of God! He was God in human flesh, God Incarnate! In Him God displayed not some facet of His truth; God displayed Himself full revealed to men. The prophet had had to use human methods to transmit his part of the truth of God. Again, it was different with Jesus. Jesus revealed God by being Himself! It was not so much what He said and did that shows us what God is like. It is what He is! The prophets grasped part of the mind of God; but Jesus was the mind of God. The writer to the Hebrews said that Jesus was the CHARACTER of the very being of God, he meant that Jesus is the exact image and expression of God, that just as if you look at the impression, you see exactly what the seal which made is like, so if you look at Jesus you see exactly what God is like.

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In closing, consider with me the works, the signs that Jesus did that prove His divinity, His Messiahship. The works and signs that Christ did stand for the most significant realities we can ever face! What Christ has done is directly related to who He is. It is the uniqueness of His person that determines the efficacy of His work. As John Calvin (1509—64), for one, argued only He who was simultaneously true God and true man could obey God on our behalf:
"Accordingly, our Lord came forth as true man and took the person and name of Adam in order to take Adam's place in obeying the Father, to present our flesh as the price of satisfaction of God's righteous judgment, and, in the same flesh, to pay the penalty that we had deserved. In short, since neither as God alone could He feel death, nor as man alone could He overcome it, He coupled human nature with divine that to atone for sin He might submit the weakness of the one to death; and that, wrestling with death by the power of the other nature, He might win victory for us."
A less that human Christ could no more be the Savior of human beings than a less than divine Christ could be the true revelation of God. Who Christ is determines what He can do.
An isolated consideration of Christ's person is impossible since He can be known only in connection with His holy work. The two constitute but one message:
"Jesus said to him (Thomas), "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also, and from now on, you know Him and have seen Him."
Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.
Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, "Show us the Father?
Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority, but the Father who dwells in Me does the works.
Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves. (John 14:6-11)

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The concern to preserve the unity of Christ’s person and work is evident in some of the classic discussions of Christology. Irenaeus (130-200) in his major work AGAINST HERESIES, Book V, developed in his recapitulation theory, the Pauline idea of Christ as the second Adam, obeying God where Adam has disobeyed. He passed through all the stages of human life, sanctifying each in turn. As Adam was the head of the race which was now subject to death, so Christ instituted a new redeemed humanity. The disobedience of Adam enacted on a tree was remedied by Christ’s obedience on the tree. The incarnation underlies it all. Christ became what we are so as to make us what He is! His incarnation is in order to bring about our redemption. At the same time, our redemption could not have taken place had not the Word become truly human. Incarnation and atonement are both necessary and mutually defining.
That crowd two thousand years ago referred to in our text asked a very important question...WHO WILL DO MORE THAN THIS MAN? The answer...NO ONE!
"Christ Jesus...who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal to God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond-servant, and coming the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." (Philippians 2:6-11)
2 Corinthians 8:9
"For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich."
The Philippian passage which we have just quoted is in many ways, the greatest and most moving passage Paul ever wrote about Jesus. The essence of it is in the simple statement Paul made in the 2 Corinthian passage we have just referred to.
In the Philippian passage, Paul is pleading with the Christians in Philippi to live in harmony, to lay aside their discords, to shed their personal ambitions and their pride and their desire for prominence.

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He wants them to have in their hearts that humble, selfless desire to serve, which was the essence of the life of Christ. His final and unanswerable appeal is to point to the example of Jesus Christ!
WHAT MORE CAN ANY ONE DO THAN JESUS?
This Philippian passage tells us that Jesus, being in the form of God, came to this earth to die on a cruel cross and then was highly exalted and given a name which is above every name and is now the One which every person who has ever lived will someday bow before Him and confess that He is Lord to the glory of God!
Jesus..."being in the form of God: He was by nature in the very form of God. Two words are most carefully chosen to show the unchangeable Godhead of Jesus Christ. The word which the Authorized Version translates BEING is from the Greek verb HUPARCHEIN which is not the common Greek word for BEING. It describes that which a man is in his very essence and which cannot be changed. It describes that part of a man which, in any circumstances, remains the same. So Paul begins by saying that Jesus was essentially and unalterably God!
He goes on to say that Jesus was in the FORM of God. There are two Greek words for FORM which are MORPHE and SCHEMA. They must both be translated FORM, because there is no other English equivalent, but they do not mean the same thing. MORPHE is the essential form which never alters; SCHEMA is the outward form which changes from time to time and from circumstance to circumstance.
Let me give you example. The MORPHE of any human being is humanity and this never changes; but his SCHEMA is continually changing. A baby, a child, a boy, a youth, a man of middle age, and old man always have the MORPHE of humanity, but the outward SCHEMA changes all the time.
Now, the word that Paul uses for Jesus being in the FORM of God is MORPHE; that is to say, His unchangeable being is divine. However His outward SCHEMA might alter, He remained in essence divine!
WHAT MORE CAN ANY ONE DO THAN JESUS? Nobody can do what Jesus did because Jesus Christ was God...in human form.
And He became incarnate for a particular task. "And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross." (Philippians 2:8) Christ became man specifically to die for our sins and to rise for

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our justification so also His death for sin required His being human.
"Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people" (Hebrews 2:14-17)
"The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14).
Paul writes to the Christians in Rome these words:
"For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so He condemned sin in sinful man." (Romans 8:3).
1 Timothy 3:13: "Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great. He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed on in the world, was taken up in glory."
Jesus Christ completed His divine mission successfully because of who He was! If He was not God He could not have revealed the Father. If He was not human He could not represent us, nor could He have rendered human obedience to God, nor suffered the penalty of divine justice for the sins of the human race. If He were not God He would not have the strength to save us. If He were not human he would not have the human experience to save us. If He were not one integrated person but instead some kind of schizoid, God could in no sense be said to have identified Himself with us in our suffering. We would instead be left with a hollow Saviour and a God aloof and detached from us at the point of our greatest need!
WHO COULD DO MORE THAN JESUS? NO ONE!

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Jesus Christ is unique!
He alone is God incarnate. Fully human, He is simultaneously one with God in status and personal identity. Thus, His work 'for us and our salvation' is complete and utterly effective.
God's eternal purpose in election focused in Him, and we were chosen in Christ before the creation of the world. God's covenant was made in Christ, and all God's promises come to expression in Him!
He is the sole mediator between God and humanity. In Christ, God is our God; in Christ, we are God's people. As prophet, Christ spoke the word of God during His earthly ministry since He was and is the Eternal Word; through His appointed apostles, He speaks to us today in Holy Scripture.
As our High Priest, His death on the cross atones for our sins and brings all who trust Him into a living relationship with God as His own children.
Raised from the dead, 'He sits at God's right hand 'til all His foes submit' (Isaac Watts).
He is King, renewing the cosmos and ruling His Church. When He returns, His believing Church will be raised to serve God in the life of the world to come!
Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father!
JESUS CHRIST ALONE HAS FULFILLED THE SCRIPTURES. All the prophecies concerning the coming Messiah was completed in Christ.
Millions have been convinced that Jesus Christ is God manifest in human flesh and He alone has the answers to life's deepest problems.
Jesus launched the only great and lasting social changes the world has ever seen! At the time of Christ's coming, the world was a place of great cruelty and hopelessness. Christ alone has inspired men, not only to do, but to persevere in the doing of that which we call social concerns and actions.
Jesus Christ has liberated the souls of millions!
Charles Wesley wrote a song about this glorious change in man: Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and in nature's night; Thine eye diffused a quickening ray, I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
WHO CAN DO MORE THAN JESUS?   NOBODY!