Only Believe

John 2:23-24 ESV

Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people

What if believing in Jesus is not enough? Let that thought or question settle in a little. This passage of John should bring that question to the foreground of your mind. The text is easy to understand on its face. Jesus was doing a lot of miracles and signs and people were believing in him because of those signs. Isn’t that what Christianity is about, believing in Jesus? Yet, Jesus responds by rejecting them. He “did not entrust himself to them”. In chapter six of John’s Gospel we run into another group that believed in Jesus and wanted to make him King, what a noble and worthy goal, yet Jesus fled to the mountain to avoid them, then walked on water during a storm in the dead of night to escape. So, is believing in Jesus enough? Is wanting him to be king enough? These texts tell us that these alone are not enough to be accepted by Jesus.

As I meet people and interact with them I have yet to meet someone who does not think highly of the Jewish carpenter from Palestine. I assume I am not alone in this regard. Even those Muslims that would like to exterminate Christians chose to believe that Jesus was a “good teacher” and is still alive with God in heaven. My conversation with one middle-aged man was far less sophisticated but he had no problem “trusting Jesus”, “believing in Jesus”, or even thanking God for the peaceful feeling he gets sometimes when he prays about an issue he is wrestling with. Jesus has always been there when he needed him even in the dark days of his wife’s adultery. Yet, the Muslim and this middle-aged man are both following a figment of their imaginations.

Even as the Jews of that believed in Jesus, believed him to be the Messiah, they believed he was the anointed one, the son of David. They believed yet, they believed falsely and Jesus was not their savior. They would say they needed a savior and they would want Jesus to be that, look at all the nice things he does. But they didn’t know what they needed saved from. They didn’t know what kind of King Jesus must be. They wanted freedom from the Romans and freedom from want. Freedom from sin and freedom to stop wanting, was not desirable for them.

As our theological depth often stops at “do you believe in Jesus?” we must recognize that a belief in an imaginary historical figure is not salvation. Christian belief is a belief that requires actions and change in our lives. For Jesus to be King of our lives is to let him tell us what must change, through his word, not us tell him what we want, through prayer. Jesus must be Lord of our lives not a genie in the bottle. We open, rustle the pages, and read a few words of incantation to get what we want from God. The text of scripture is given to conform us to him, not bind him to us. Will we take Jesus for ourselves or give ourselves to him? Reading the text, I think that is the fatal flaw of the crowds, they wanted to make Jesus their own, instead of giving themselves to him. Which will you do today?

CORAM DEO