As I reflect on this passage, I feel as if I’m sitting at Jesus’ feet, learning from him. Then, just like when I (will) attend summer writing conference in little more than a week, I need quiet time to reflect on how to apply what I’ve heard. My friend Janet McHenry is busily writing prayers. While I wait for her new book (release date in the future), I pulled Richard J. Foster’s Prayers from the Heart from the shelf to peruse. The study I enjoyed with a small women’s group this spring focused on Prayer and Listening. Perhaps God is leading us to a summer quiet place, to sit at his feet and receive nourishment for our souls. 
Read John 7:14-16.
- But then, (four) days in to the feast, Jesus went to the temple to teach.
- Those who heard wondered with admiration or astonishment1 at his teaching.
- They assumed he hadn’t gained his knowledge from books.2
“After three days they found [Jesus] in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. … ‘Why were you searching for me?’ he asked. ‘Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?’” (Luke 2:46-47, 49).
- Even Jesus pointed to the Father as his teaching authority. If Jesus did, how much more we should accept only teaching rooted in God and his Word!
*How can we follow Jesus’ example and rely on God as our teaching authority?
*How might it look to learn from a position completely rooted in God’s Word?
Read John 7:17-19.
- How can we discern Truth? Choose to do God’s will.
- In this sentence, this might refer to one who chooses to act to please God.3
- Such a person will receive and gain knowledge to know the source of Jesus’ teaching.
“He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8).
“Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).
- Truth is concerned with the honor of the One who was sent, NOT our honor!
“To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, ‘If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’” (John 8:31-32).
“I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).
- Jesus asked questions to make them think and reflect on their inner heart truth.
- The one who lives in God’s Truth lives a true, sincere, upright, and honest life.
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me [Paul], or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you” (Philippians 4:8-9).
- Keeping God’s law requires ongoing action, habits, and practices that follow the Father’s commands. “Keep” as used here also can mean not yet completed: even if we did everything we know to do, we’d practice it again tomorrow.
“The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever” (Isaiah 40:8).
- Can anyone say they have kept the Law Moses set before the Israelites?
“We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6).
“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
- One day, I experienced a slight, a perceived injustice. That evening, a book title came to mind, Robert Benson’s That We Might Perfectly Love Thee. We can’t even perfectly love each other, much less God.
“Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’” (Matthew 22:37-39).
- Jesus summed up the law – the original ten commandments and all man’s added interpretations – into only two commandments, and we cannot even keep those.
*Based on Jesus’ description, how can we claim to be a person “of truth”?
*How does God’s Word instruct us in this passage?
*How can Paul’s words help us develop a heart of truth?
*How might it look to perfectly love God?
Read John 7:20-24
- The crowd accused Jesus was one step beyond delusional, claiming he was demon-possessed.
- This is the first such accusation of several.
- Jesus strongly rebuked them.
- They followed the Law concerning circumcision, which wasn’t specifically ordained in the ten commandments Moses brought to Israel.
- The law concerning circumcision also doesn’t specifically say, “unless it is the Sabbath!” (Genesis 17:10-13, Leviticus 12:3)
- Even though they harmed a part of a boy, they judged Jesus for healing someone’s whole body.
- They interpreted “on the Sabbath” as obviously breaking the Law without considering Jesus’ actual action: healing.
“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? … If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:9, 11-12).
- He instructed them to judge by the inner heart intent, not only outward appearances, a judgment which may be unfavorable.
- By going beyond external appearance, they would follow God, his Word, and his will.
“… The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7).
*Why do you think Jesus healed on the Sabbath?
*What does it mean to judge by the inner heart intent?
- Spiros Zodhiates Th.D., The Complete Word Study Dictionary New Testament (AMG Publishers, 1992), 719.
- Zodhiates, 381.
- Zodhiates, 721.
- Zodhiates, 372.