SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/27/2016 9:44 AM
My Worship Time Focus: The Request
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 7:2-5
Message of the verse: “2 Now the feast
of the Jews, the Feast of Booths, was near. 3 Therefore His brothers said to
Him, "Leave here and go into Judea, so that Your disciples also may see
Your works which You are doing. 4 “For no one does anything in secret when he
himself seeks to be known publicly. If You do these things, show Yourself to
the world." 5 For not even His brothers were believing in Him.”
I have said
in the past how much one can learn from the word “therefore” which is found
over 900 times in the Word of God, that is in the NASB95 version. You have to go back and see what went on to
understand what the therefore is there for.
In this case it goes back to what is in verse two, where we learn of “the
feast of the Jews, the Feast of Booths.
While listening to my Bible on DVD this morning I was in the book of
Nehemiah and there is a great revival in that book in chapters 8-9 and in
chapter eight the remnant who had returned from Babylon celebrated the Feats of
Booths and Nehemiah writes that it had not been celebrated like that since the
days of Joshua. The Feast of Booths was
one of the required feasts that all males were to go to Jerusalem to celebrate,
so we know that Jesus would go in order to keep the Law. This feast is celebrated in our September/October
months depending on which day it falls, and it is a celebration of how the Lord
kept Israel while they were wondering in the wilderness for those 40 years and
had to live in tents. Let us take a look
at Nehemiah 8:14-17 “14 They found written in the law how the LORD had
commanded through Moses that the sons of Israel should live in booths during
the feast of the seventh month. 15 So they proclaimed and circulated a
proclamation in all their cities and in Jerusalem, saying, "Go out to the
hills, and bring olive branches and wild olive branches, myrtle branches, palm
branches and branches of other leafy trees, to make booths, as it is
written." 16 So the people went out
and brought them and made booths for themselves, each on his roof, and in their
courts and in the courts of the house of God, and in the square at the Water
Gate and in the square at the Gate of Ephraim. 17 The entire assembly of those
who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in them. The sons of
Israel had indeed not done so from the days of Joshua the son of Nun to that
day. And there was great rejoicing.” We
find here a good description of this feast.
Now we want
to make sure as we read the verses in our SD this morning that we understand
that Jesus had half brothers, that Mary and Joseph had other children,
including sons and daughters who grew up with Jesus. Mary is not God, Mary is not a perpetual
virgin. These verses are speaking of
Jesus’ physical half brothers two of them are NT writers in Jude, and also James
and James became the head of the Jerusalem church as seen in Acts chapter 15.
Jesus’
brothers wanted Him to continue to perform His miracles openly on the grand
stage that Jerusalem would provide during this feast they would go up to. Now remember that none of His brothers
believed in Him, and their belief probably came after the resurrection. John MacArthur writes on the comments of His
brothers “Their comments appear to have had a dual motivation. First, they may have wanted to see Jesus
perform miracles, so they could decide for themselves whether or not His works
were genuine. Second, they were probably
expecting a political Messiah, like the crowd Jesus fed (6:14-15). Thus, in their minds, the acid test of Jesus’
messiahship would be at Jerusalem (the political center of Israel), and not in
Galilee. If the ruling authorities at
Jerusalem signed off on Jesus, His brothers would also accept Him as the
Messiah.” When we look again at verse
four then what MacArthur wrote makes more sense. ““For no one does anything in secret when he
himself seeks to be known publicly. If You do these things, show Yourself to
the world."” It seems that they
wanted Jesus to be something of which He is not, like someone performing on a
stage to prove He was the Messiah, when as we learned earlier from chapter six
it was the words that He spoke that will convict people of who He is, and not necessarily
the works. Oh the works can show He is
the Messiah, but if you don’t believe the Words He speaks then the miracles
will mean nothing to you as far as having eternal life.
John
footnotes their unbelief in verse five “For not even His brothers were
believing in Him.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I may desire that Jesus do something for me
as I pray to Him, but if it is not His desire to do it, if He knows that it
will not be in my best interest to answer yes to that prayer, then I will have
to trust Him with what He has for me to do without that answer. Jesus’ brothers wanted Him to do something
that He was not going to do and in the end it was best for them that He did not
do what they wanted Him to do.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Learn to love the Lord more,
to also get to know Him better.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Tarsus” Acts 22:3).
Today’s Bible question:
“Who, when in trouble, consulted a woman with a familiar spirit at
En-Dor?”
Answer in our next SD.
4/27/2016 10:22 AM
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