Joh 8:21-23 | KingComments | STEP | In spite of all their attempts to seize Him, the Lord continues to speak to them. He knows that they will only be given the opportunity to seize Him when the time has come according to the Father’s plan. Then He will give Himself into their hands as well. Now He still speaks to them to testify of His Father and to denounce their evil. He tells them that He is returning, back to the Father. That this will happen through their wicked actions, is not an issue in this Gospel. All initiative lies with Him. Once He will have left, they will seek Him. He will have disappeared inexplicably. They will seek Him as they sought Him after the wonder of the loaves ( ), but without faith and driven by purely human motives. They will seek Him as Messiah, but won’t find Him because He doesn’t meet their expectations. Therefore, they will die in their sin, for there is no life outside of Him. Their death will eternally separate them from Him. Where He will go, they cannot come because of their persistent unbelief and they will never come once they die in their sins. He goes to heaven, to His Father, but they have their interests on earth and have no interest whatsoever in heaven or His Father. Again the Jews speculate about the meaning of the Lord’s saying that He is going somewhere they cannot go ( ). This time they suggest the possibility that He might then commit suicide. Behind His words, man’s foolishness seeks all possible absurd explanations that are all equally far from the truth. Any such explanation shows the utter darkness of their thinking. There is not the slightest bit of truth in it. The Lord responds to their foolish assumption by pointing to the source where they reason from and the source where He speaks from. They are from below, that is to say, they belong to below and have no connection with heaven. Because they are from below, they belong to the world and think like the world, they carry the character of the world and breathe the atmosphere of the world. They have no part in and understanding of what is from above. He is from above ( ), He belongs to heaven and to the Father, where He came from. He has no connection whatsoever with the world ( ). Because of that radical separation that exists between them and Him, both in origin and in character, and therefore have no part in Him in any way, they will die in their sins. Believing in His Person as the ‘I am’, as it literally says, is the only way to change their destiny and the destiny of every human being. The ‘I am’ is Yahweh ( ) and that He is. He is the Son of God, God revealed in the flesh. ‘I am’ refers to His eternal nature as the Son of God. He is the true God. This statement does not allow mixing with anything else. It is either for or against Him. He who believes in Him as the ‘I am’ has life. He who does not believe in Him, dies in his sins, because outside Him there is no salvation.

‏ John 8:21-23

He Who Does Not Believe Dies in His Sins

In spite of all their attempts to seize Him, the Lord continues to speak to them. He knows that they will only be given the opportunity to seize Him when the time has come according to the Father’s plan. Then He will give Himself into their hands as well. Now He still speaks to them to testify of His Father and to denounce their evil. He tells them that He is returning, back to the Father. That this will happen through their wicked actions, is not an issue in this Gospel. All initiative lies with Him.

Once He will have left, they will seek Him. He will have disappeared inexplicably. They will seek Him as they sought Him after the wonder of the loaves (Jn 6:24), but without faith and driven by purely human motives. They will seek Him as Messiah, but won’t find Him because He doesn’t meet their expectations. Therefore, they will die in their sin, for there is no life outside of Him. Their death will eternally separate them from Him.

Where He will go, they cannot come because of their persistent unbelief and they will never come once they die in their sins. He goes to heaven, to His Father, but they have their interests on earth and have no interest whatsoever in heaven or His Father.

Again the Jews speculate about the meaning of the Lord’s saying that He is going somewhere they cannot go (Jn 7:34-36). This time they suggest the possibility that He might then commit suicide. Behind His words, man’s foolishness seeks all possible absurd explanations that are all equally far from the truth. Any such explanation shows the utter darkness of their thinking. There is not the slightest bit of truth in it.

The Lord responds to their foolish assumption by pointing to the source where they reason from and the source where He speaks from. They are from below, that is to say, they belong to below and have no connection with heaven. Because they are from below, they belong to the world and think like the world, they carry the character of the world and breathe the atmosphere of the world. They have no part in and understanding of what is from above. He is from above (Jn 3:31), He belongs to heaven and to the Father, where He came from. He has no connection whatsoever with the world (Jn 17:14).

Because of that radical separation that exists between them and Him, both in origin and in character, and therefore have no part in Him in any way, they will die in their sins. Believing in His Person as the ‘I am’, as it literally says, is the only way to change their destiny and the destiny of every human being. The ‘I am’ is Yahweh (Exo 3:14) and that He is. He is the Son of God, God revealed in the flesh. ‘I am’ refers to His eternal nature as the Son of God. He is the true God. This statement does not allow mixing with anything else. It is either for or against Him. He who believes in Him as the ‘I am’ has life. He who does not believe in Him, dies in his sins, because outside Him there is no salvation.