Scripture Reference: John 8
Light and Darkness – Continued
Please read John 8:12-20 for background to this section.
If you have ever flown in a airplane at night, you will notice that you can see pinpoints of light miles away. That is why it was necessary to have blackouts during the war; for the enemy pilots could see the smallest evidence of light and thus find the target. Light bears witness to itself; it tells you it is there.
Perhaps the Pharisees were quoting our Lord’s own words (see John 5:31-35); but He quickly refuted their argument. One of the key words in this section is witness; it is used many, many times. Jesus made it clear that their witness was not dependable because their judgment was faulty. They judged on the basis of externals, mere human judgment, but He judged on the basis of spiritual knowledge. The way they judged the woman taken in adultery proved that they neither understood the Law nor their own sinful hearts.
Since they wanted to use the Law to condemn the woman and trap Jesus, He also used the Law to answer them. He quoted a principle found in Deuteronomy 17:6 and 19:15, as well as Numbers 35:30, that the testimony of two men was required to validate a judgment. Jesus had those two testimonies: He gave witness and so did His Father. We have seen from John 5:37–47 that the witness of the Father is found in the Word of God.
How tragic that these experts in the Law did not even know their own Messiah as He stood before them! They claimed to know the Law of God, but they did not know the God of the Law. They did not have His Word abiding in their hearts (John 5:38), nor did they experience His love (John 5:42). They did not know the Father, and therefore did not know the Son.
Jesus never really answered their question, “Where is Your Father?” The word father is used twenty-one times in this chapter, so Jesus did not avoid the issue but faced it honestly. He knew that their “father” was not God, but the devil! These men were religious, and yet they were the children of the devil!
Their further attempts to arrest Jesus were again thwarted by the Father, for it was not yet our Lord’s hour when He should give His life. When the servant of God is in the will of God, he can have courage and peace as he does his duty.
Life and Death
Please read John 8:21-30 for background to this section.
Jesus had already mentioned His leaving them (John 7:34), but the Jews had misunderstood what He said. Once again, He warned them: He would leave them, they would not be able to follow Him, and they would die in their sins! They were wasting their God-given opportunities by arguing with Him instead of trusting Him; and one day soon, their opportunities would end.
Once again, the people misunderstood His teaching. They thought He was planning to kill Himself! Suicide was an abhorrent thing to a Jew, for the Jews were taught to honor all life. If Jesus committed suicide, then He would go to a place of judgment; and this, they reasoned, was why they could not follow Him.
Actually, just the opposite was true: it was they who were going to the place of judgment! Jesus was returning to His Father in heaven, and nobody can go there who has not trusted the Savior. The reason Jesus and the Jewish leaders were going to different destinations was because they had different origins: Jesus came from heaven, but they belonged to the earth. Jesus was in the world, but He did not belong to the world (see John 17:14–16).
The true believer has his citizenship in heaven (Luke 10:20; Philippians 3:20–21). His affection and attention are fixed heavenward. But the unsaved belong to this world; in fact, Jesus called them “the sons of this world” (Luke 16:8). Since they have not trusted Christ and had their sins forgiven, their destiny is to die in their sins. The Christian dies “in the Lord” because he lives “in the Lord” (Revelation 14:13); but the unbeliever dies in his sins because he lives in his sins.
To Be Continued
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD 
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