JOHN 7:1 – 52
Bible Study Notes Rev. Betsy Perkins
Disbelief, Disputes and Danger
o What are some reasons that people today are skeptical about Jesus?
Jesus and His Brothers (7:1-10):
o Why was Jesus avoiding Judea and Jerusalem?
o What did the Israelites celebrate during the Festival of Tabernacles?
N.T. Wright, John for Everyone, Part 1, page 92-93
o Why did Jesus’ brothers suggest Jesus go to Jerusalem for the festival?
o What was Jesus’ response? What does he mean by “my time”?
o In what ways might we push our agenda and our timing on God?
o What is the reason people will be against him, according to Jesus?
It is as though, now, the sorrow and anger, the evil and rebellion, of all the world has been concentrated in Jerusalem, so that when Jesus goes to Jerusalem he is facing not only a local and national problem but the problem of the whole world, the world that God loved so much (3:16). The world, of course, doesn’t enjoy being told that it’s radically out of line (7:7); but it cannot at the moment see that the doctor who is diagnosing the disease is also about to provide the remedy. N.T. Wright
Disputes About Jesus (7:11-18):
o What kinds of things were people thinking about Jesus? Why were they “whispering”?
o What did the crowds think about Jesus’ teaching?
o What does Jesus suggest is the best way to know what to make of him and his teaching?
o Whose reputation is Jesus building up, his own or God’s? Whose reputation do we, as individuals and as a church, try to build up?
Moses and the Messiah (7:19-31):
o What law is Jesus referring to in verse 19? Who is he talking to? What does the crowd assume?
o How does Jesus defend his action of healing the man on the Sabbath (ch.5)?
o Are the religious leaders being consistent in their keeping of the Law of Moses?
Underneath all this is Jesus’ regular charge against his contemporaries: that they were using certain aspects of the law to assure themselves that they really were God’s people, even if in fact they broke other aspects of it (vs.19). He makes the charge all the sharper by accusing them of insisting on the Sabbath law on the one hand but being ready to kill him on the other – ready to break one part of the law in order to uphold a different one. How can this be what Moses – or God, for that matter – really intended? N.T. Wright
o What was Moses’ and/or God’s intention in giving His people the law and commandments?
o What is the reason people assume Jesus cannot be the Messiah? How does Jesus respond?
Jesus’ reply is not what we expect. We imagine he’s going to insist that he is the Messiah, and so to insist as well that they don’t know where he has come from. But, as so often in this gospel, Jesus goes deeper than we, or his hearers, expect. He agrees that they do indeed know where he comes from – in other words, that he has come to Jerusalem from Galilee. But, instead of saying, as we might have imagined, ‘But you don’t know where I really come from’, meaning from God, he turns the question round. They are indeed ignorant of something: but their real ignorance is not so much about him, Jesus, but about God. It isn’t that they do know God but aren’t sure if Jesus comes from God; it is, rather, that they don’t even know God, and so naturally cannot associate the Jesus they are seeing with the true God.
o What faulty ideas about God and about the world cause people to reject Jesus today?
Rivers of Living Water (7:32-39):
o How do the people misunderstand what Jesus says about where he is going?
o How does Jesus’ invitation about water fit in with the events of the last day of the Festival?
o How does John help us understand what Jesus meant?
o When does the time of Jesus being glorified come? How does that event prepare us to have the Spirit fill us and flow out from us?
Accusations Against Jesus (7:40-52):
o What does the dispute about where Jesus comes from reveal about what the Jewish leaders and the others in Jerusalem think about Jesus?
o How do the temple guards stand up for Jesus?
o How does Nicodemus stand up for Jesus?
The Accusations Against Jesus Verses
Deceiving people 7:12, 7:47
Demon-possessed 7:20
Breaking the Sabbath 7:23
Being from Nazareth, Galilee 7:27, 7:41, 7:52
8:41
8:48
9:16, 9:24
10:20
18:30
19:12
o Pray for those in danger today because of their faith in Jesus Christ.
In light of this passage and our discussion, what one truth about God and about yourself stand out as something to “take to heart” this week?
Are there steps you will take, by God’s grace, to more fully apply it to your life?
Resources: NIV Zondervan Study Bible, 2015
N.T. Wright, John for Everyone, 2002
Max Lucado, Life Lessons from John, 2018
Joe Boyd, Bible Experiment – Gospel of John (RightNowMedia), 2014
Add Your Comment