Friday 6th October
Read John 7:28-29
“Then Jesus, still teaching in the temple courts, cried out, ‘Yes, you know me, and you know where I am from. I am not here on my own authority, but he who sent me is true. You do not know him, 29 but I know him because I am from him and he sent me.’” (NIVUK)
Although some believers are uncomfortable attributing sarcasm to Jesus, I can’t help but wonder if the best way to read His response to their confident assertion that they ‘know’ Him because they ‘know’ where He is from in just such a way. If it isn’t sarcastic it drips with immense irony. For they think they ‘know’ He is from Nazareth, when He was actually born in Bethlehem, but His true origin is from God. The double irony is that they think they ‘know’ Him but in reality they don’t – for they don’t ‘know’ the One who sent Him.
It is a striking claim indeed. Those who pride themselves most on knowing God are actually the most ignorant. Jesus reveals God fully – yet they can’t recognise Him. Whilst it is not incorrect to assert that God is revealed in the wonders of nature and the infinite heavens, it is incomplete. God is most fully revealed in Jesus because Jesus knows God fully.
