7
“The Time Appointed for Me to Go Has Not Yet Arrived”
1 After these things, Jesus traveled about in Galilee, intentionally staying away from Judea,+ since the Jewish authorities+ there were out to have+ him killed.
2 Now the time+ for the Jewish Festival of Tabernacles was near.+
3 So Jesus’+ brothers said to him, “ˢYou should leave here and go to Judea, so that your disciples can see the miraculous things you’re doing.
4 No one, after all, keeps what he is doing, if+ he wants to become well known,++ out of the public eye.+ If these are the things+ ˢyou are going to do, then reveal yourself to everyone+!”
5 (Not even+ his own brothers, you see, believed in him.)
6 “The time appointed for me to go+ has not yet arrived,” replied Jesus. “For ᵖyou any+ time is right.+
7 The world cannot hate ᵖyou, but it does hate me,+ because I keep telling it how+ wicked its deeds are.
8 ᵖYou go on up to the festival. As for me, I’m not setting out+ for this festival, because the time appointed for me+ to go hasn’t fully come yet.+”
9 And these things having said, he remained in Galilee.
“My Teaching Comes Not from Myself, but from the One Who Sent Me”
10 Now after his brothers had gone up to the festival, then Jesus,+ too,+ went up himself, not openly, but out of the public eye.+
11 The Jewish authorities,+ therefore, kept looking for him at the festival, asking, “Where is that fellow?”
12 There was among the crowds a good deal of whispering+ about him. “He’s a good+ man,” some were saying. Others, though, were saying, “No, he’s deceiving the people.+”
13 No one, however, dared to speak about him openly,+ because they were afraid of the Jewish authorities.+
14 When the festival was already half over,+ Jesus went up into the temple courts and began to teach.
15 Upon hearing him+ the Jewish authorities were astonished. “How in the world+ does this man know so+ much+ when he has never received advanced training from a rabbi?+” they said.
16 “ My+ teaching,” Jesus said to them in response, “comes not+ from myself, but from the one who sent me.
17 If someone delights to do his+ will,+ that person+ will come to know+ the source of my teaching,+ whether it is+ God from whom it comes, or whether it is+ on my own authority+ that I speak.+
18 If+ someone speaks on his own+ authority, he is trying to gain honor+ merely for himself.+ If+ someone is set on bringing honor to the one who sent him, however, this person is genuine,+ and there is in his heart+ nothing false.++
19 Moses has given ᵖyou the Torah, has he not? And yet none of you is heeding its instruction.+ Why are ᵖyou so+ intent on having me killed?”+
20 “ˢYou have a demon+!” the crowd responded. “Exactly+ who is trying to kill you?”
21 “I did that+ one miraculous deed,”+ replied Jesus, “and all of you are so+ shocked.+
22 Moses instructed ᵖyou to circumcise your sons (though technically the rite began not+ with Moses, but with the patriarchs+), and so you go ahead and circumcise them on the eighth day even+ if it happens to fall on a Sabbath.+
23 If circumcision,+ which pertains to only one part of the body, takes priority over the Sabbath without the Torah of Moses being violated, why are ᵖyou so angry with me+ for putting mercy above the Sabbath and making a man’s entire body+ well?+
24 ᵖYou must judge not+ by outward appearances, but with judgment that is just.+”+
25 So then, some of the people of Jerusalem began to say, “This is the man the authorities+ are trying to kill, isn’t it?
26 Well, here he is speaking right+ out in front of everyone, and they aren’t saying a thing to him! Could it be that our leaders have actually+ concluded that this man is the Messiah?
27 But how can that be?+ As for this man, we know where he is from. As for the Messiah, however, when he comes, no one will know where he is from.”
28 Jesus, therefore, while teaching in the temple courts, cried out, “So ᵖyou know me+ and where I am from, do you?+ It is+ not on my own authority+ that I have come; no, the one who sent me is faithful.+ ᵖYou don’t know him.
29 It is I+ who know him, because it is+ from his very presence+ that I have come, and he sent+ me.”
30 At that the authorities+ wanted to have+ Jesus+ taken into custody; yet no one laid a hand on him, because his time+ had not yet come.
31 From the crowd, however, many, many+ people placed their faith in him. They were saying, “The Messiah, when he comes, will he do even+ more miraculous signs than this man has done? Surely not!+”
32 The Pharisees heard the crowd whispering these things about Jesus,+ and so they and the chief priests+ sent some Sanhedrin officers to arrest him.
33 So Jesus said, “It is+ only a little while longer that I will be with ᵖyou, and then I will go back+ to the one who sent me.
34 ᵖYou will look for me but will not find me;+ where I will+ be, ᵖyou will surely not be able to come.”
35 So the Jewish authorities+ said to one another, “Exactly+ where is it that this man is planning to go so that+ we won’t be able to find him? Surely he isn’t planning to go, is he,+ to the Jews dispersed+ among the Gentiles,+ and teach the Gentiles?
36 What did he mean when he said, ‘ᵖYou will look for me but will not find me; where I will be, ᵖyou will surely not be able to come’?”
“If Someone Is Thirsty, Let Him Come to Me”
37 Now on the last+ and most important day of the festival, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If someone is thirsty, let him come to me, and
38 let him drink who puts his faith in me.+ Just as the Scripture has said, ‘There will flow, from within him,+ * water.’ ”+
39 (When Jesus said this, he was talking about the Spirit,+ who would be+ given to those who placed their faith in him. The Spirit had not yet been given, you see, because Jesus had not yet been clothed and exalted in glory.+)
40 Some in the crowd, therefore, when they heard these words, began to say, “This man truly is the Prophet!”
41 Others were saying, “This man is the Messiah!” Still others were saying, “Will the Messiah come from Galilee+? No!+
42 The Scripture says that it is+ from the seed of David and from Bethlehem, the village where David lived, that the Messiah will come, does it not?”+
43 The crowd was sharply+ divided, therefore, because of Jesus.+
44 Some people, though, among the crowd,+ themselves+ wanted him taken into custody. Still, no one laid a hand on him.
45 So, the Sanhedrin officers returned to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t ᵖyou bring him back+ with you?”
46 “No one has ever spoken the way this man does!” replied the officers.
47 “Surely you yourselves+ haven’t been deceived, too, have you?” the Pharisees answered.
48 “Have any of the leaders, or the Pharisees,+ put their faith in him? No!+
49 But as for this rabble+ that knows nothing about the Torah,+ they are under God’s curse+!+”
50 Nicodemus, the man who had gone to see+ Jesus+ before, and who was himself a member of the Pharisee party,+ said to them,
51 “Does our Torah allow us to condemn a person without first hearing what he has to say and finding out what he is doing?+ Absolutely not!+”
52 “ˢYou, too, aren’t from Galilee yourself,+ are you?” they replied. “Study the Scriptures+ and you will see that out of Galilee the Prophet+ does not come+!”