Writing these is an experience in humility. I labor and agonize over what I add and stress that I do not distort His message. I am now thankful for the opportunity that it is made available to many and in that I am thankful also that I become much more humbled. I pray God blinds you to my ignorance and shines His light of truth and that we may always be humbled by what we do not know and our responsibilities as His disciple.
With that the responsibility got too much for me so I choose to use the words of J.C. Ryle to better expand the meanings of this text. May God bless the readings of His word.
Jhn 7:40 Many of the people therefore, when they heard this saying, said, Of a truth this is the Prophet.
Jhn 7:41 Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee?
Jhn 7:42 Hath not the scripture said, That Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was?
Jhn 7:43 So there was a division among the people because of him.
- How do you reconcile a God of peace with the division among the people (Mat 10:24-25)?
- Is there anything to be taken from the Many who thought Him a prophet to the others that saw Him as Christ?
“These verses show us, for one thing, how useless is knowledge in religion, if it is not accompanied by grace in the heart. We are told that some of our Lord's hearers knew clearly where Christ was to be born. They referred to Scripture, like men familiar with its contents. And yet the eyes of their understanding were not enlightened. Their own Messiah stood before them, and they neither received, nor believed, nor obeyed Him. A certain degree of religious knowledge, beyond doubt, is of vast importance. Ignorance is certainly not the mother of true devotion, and helps nobody toward heaven. An "unknown God" can never be the object of a reasonable worship. Happy indeed would it be for Christians if they all knew the Scriptures as well as the Jews seem to have done, when our Lord was on earth! But while we value religious knowledge, we must not think it enough to know the facts and doctrines of our faith, unless our hearts and lives are thoroughly influenced by what we know. Heart-knowledge, we must always remember, is the one thing needful. It is something which schools and universities cannot confer. It is the gift of God. To find out the plague of our own hearts and hate sin--to become familiar with the throne of grace and the fountain of Christ's blood--to sit daily at the feet of Jesus, and humbly learn of Him--this is the highest degree of knowledge to which mortal man can attain. Let any one thank God who knows anything of these things. He may be ignorant of Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and mathematics, but he shall be saved.” JC Ryle
