John 10:31-42
THE Jews... picked up rocks to stone Jesus. Jesus answered them, "I have shown you many good works from My Father. For which of these are you trying to stone Me?" The Jews answered Him, "We are not stoning You for a good work but for blasphemy. You, a Man, are making Yourself God." Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, "You are gods" If it calls them gods to whom the word of God came, and scripture cannot be set aside, can you say that the one whom the Father has consecrated and sent into the world blasphemes because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? If I do not perform my Father’s works do not believe Me; but if I perform them, even if you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may realize [and understand] that the Father is in Me and I am in the Father." [Then] they tried again to arrest Him; but He escaped from their power.
He went back across the Jordan to the place where John first baptized, and there He remained. Many came to Him and said, "John performed no sign, but everything John said about this Man was true." And many there began to believe in Him.
The WORD
If there was one thing that set Israel different from the various nations around it, it was Israel’s strict monotheistic faith. God is One and Only. This is proclaimed in the daily recitation of the Shema: "Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength" (Dt 6:4).
Jesus’ claim that He is the Son of God, and, therefore, enjoys the prerogative that belongs to God alone, is naturally a great concern among the Jews. This claim of Jesus challenges the very cornerstone of the Jewish faith. God cannot have a Son in the manner of pagan deities. God’s "Son" can only be a human being who enjoys His special love and protection – like Israel as a people, like a king of Judah who was of Davidic lineage, and like a judge or prophet to whom the word of God came.
Using rabbinical practice of citing scriptural passage, Jesus says that the judges of old were called elohim ("gods") and "sons of the Most High" (Ps 82:6) for being the vehicles of the word of God. He has a greater right to the title "Son of God" because the Father sends Him to bring the message of salvation. The prophets of old were made "holy" by consecration. Jesus, the Word-Incarnate, is the Consecrated One, the Holy One of God, by being divine from the beginning: "And the Word was God" (Jn 1:1).
SOURCE: "365 Days with the Lord," ST PAULS, 7708 St. Paul Rd., SAV, Makati City (Phils.); Tel.: 895-9701; Fax 895-7328; E-mail: publishing@stpauls.ph; Website: http://www.stpauls.ph.
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