Living Water John 7:37-52

UALC Lytham Road Sermon and questions. February 27 | UALC Sermons | Lytham Road Campus - YouTube

1. Reread John 7:37-52. Jesus caused division between people who believed him and people who rejected him. Why do you think he caused such strong reactions?

2. In the sermon this week we learned about traits we might share with the Pharisees who said “no” to Jesus. One trait was the temptation to care too much about outside appearances. How or where in your life do you experience this temptation? How does our culture encourage this obsession with image-management? Why does this draw us away from Jesus?

3. The Pharisees also got tripped up by “categorizing” people. (He would know “what kind of woman she is (Luke 7:39).” Or He eats with “sinners.”) Is this a struggle for you too? What’s the understandable reason we do this? What’s the danger?

Other sources

What does John 7:38 mean? 

"During the Feast of Booths, Israel remembered God's miraculous intervention during their time in the wilderness. As part of the celebration, priests would carry water to the altar in the temple, recalling God's provision of water from the rock (Exodus 17:1–7). On the last, most important day of the festival, priests would circle the altar seven times with a container of water. This is the moment Jesus makes this claim, which began in verse 37. These words continue a theme Jesus has used before, including with the Samaritan woman in Sychar (John 4:10–13), and the people near the shores of Galilee (John 6:35).

Jesus' reference to the Scriptures here probably includes more than one single verse or passage. Proverbs 18:4 and Zechariah 14:8 involve similar themes. Given the priestly ritual's connection to the story of water from the rock, Jesus might have had Psalm 78:12–16 in mind. Likewise, the idea of life, or God's truth, being a stream or spring is common in the Bible. The imagery implies something living, pure, and life-giving (Revelation 22:1–2).

As used by Jesus, this internal spring, or stream, is indicative of the Holy Spirit, which comes to live inside all who come to faith in Christ. This indwelling, however, will not begin until after Jesus' ascension (Acts 2:1–4), a point made in the next verse.  https://www.bibleref.com/John/7/John-7-38.html

Got Questions? Rivers of Living Water

Earlier, Jesus had told Nicodemus that one had to be born of water and the Spirit in order to enter the kingdom of God (John 3:5). Most likely, Jesus’ reference to water here was simply to physical birth, in contrast to spiritual birth (John 3:6). In John 4:10 Jesus tells the Samaritan woman that He could give her “living water.” This was in contrast to the physical water that the Samaritan woman came to the well to retrieve. That physical water would run out, and she would need to continually return to get more. But Jesus offered the woman water that would never run out—water that would become within the believer “a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14). Jesus later would return to this theme when He stood up in public and said, “If anyone is thirsty let him come to Me and drink” (John 7:37). In this way, He was again offering Himself as the water of life and telling all they could come to Him and receive that never-ending life.  https://www.gotquestions.org/rivers-of-living-water.html

Read the hard parts, Living Water

John 7:38 is not an exact quote from the O.T.  Yet it clearly refers to the Holy Spirit, a reference to the Trinity a word not used in Scripture. Author examines Old Testament prophecy. https://readthehardparts.com/rivers-of-living-water-john-7/

This California author finds a social justice message in Galilee reference

This is where my thoughts go when I read John 7. In John 7, Jesus finds himself with a group of people who do not believe in him, who whisper behind his back, who plot to kill him all because they believe that the Messiah could not possibly come from Galilee. The Messiah could not have come from Galilee some say because Galilee was not Jerusalem or Bethlehem. Galilee may have been a place of social dissent and political protest. Some believe the people there engaged in social banditry, taking from the rich to give to the poor. It isn’t clear, but it is suspected that some of this dissent and protest took violent forms. So Jesus could not be the Messiah because the Messiah could not engage in economic, political and social protest.

In the midst of this unrest, Jesus speaks and says, “Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly.” Jesus is saying don’t look at me and where I’m from and draw the wrong conclusion. Don’t assume that I am not the Messiah, do not assume that I don’t have value, don’t assume that I can’t change the world. Jesus continues to challenge us this way today. When we meet someone who doesn’t look like we do, or believe like we do or worship like we do, or that does not have what we have, I hope that we will hear Jesus shouting in our ear, “Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly.” My creation has value, my creation can change the world, and I often use those from the least likely places to teach humanity how to love.

When Jesus later says, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them. By this he meant the Spirit,” I suspect that he meant those who are thirsty to know how to judge correctly, will have their thirst quenched.

Let’s pray that rivers of living water flow from us, that we judge all of our neighbors correctly. Let’s listen for Jesus’ voice in unexpected places, for rivers of living water to come from our most unfamiliar neighbors.

Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly . . . Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them. By this he meant the Spirit. (John 7:24 and 37b-39a) 

 https://magnifications.org/magnifications/2015/06/05/can-the-messiah-come-from-galilee

The Pharisees react to Jesus' words

The affairs of the temple were carried out by hundreds of Levites, all with specific jobs. There were various classes of priests who administered not only the sacrifices, but others who were gatekeepers, janitors, singers, musicians, and guards who were subordinate to the ruling officers. 7 The guards or officers, when questioned by the chief priests and Pharisees for not doing their job, replied "Never man spake like this man." It was not a small thing to refuse to carry out the orders of the temple rulers. Jesus' preaching was so powerful that these men sent to apprehend him were powerless to do so, being overcome with might of his words and person. The Pharisees were extremely angry and belittled these officers by suggesting they had been deceived by Jesus as were many of the people. The point is clear, these temple officers should have followed their leaders and known better than let Jesus' words sway them. They belittled them by supposing that no Pharisees had believed in him. However, that was not true. Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathaea had believed, but not openly.

They implied that the reason many of the people were believing in Jesus was because they were the ordinary people who did not know the law as the rulers and thus were cursed by their ignorance. Two things are apparent in their statement. First, the Pharisees generally had contempt for the common man who they considered the lower class who did not have the wealth, education and position they enjoyed. As the superior elite of Israel they saw masses as inferior, execrable and worthy of damnation. Second, the Pharisee, chief priests and rulers believed that Jesus was threatening their lucrative position as the rulers in the temple and controller of the temple monies. Jesus warned the people of them in Matthew 12:38-40. Jesus said they loved wearing long distinctive clothing and being addressed with titles. They loved the seats of honor in the synagogues and feast rooms, and worst of all these vile rulers swallowed up the property of helpless widows while they prayed long prayers for them. If you turn on your TV to the religious channels you will see their descendants are around even today. If the people believed Jesus and followed Him, their position and income would greatly suffer. Note that these were the people who opposed Jesus Christ, accusing Him to the people.

 
The Pharisees had just condemned the people because they "did not know the law," but they were conveniently ignoring a principle rule of their law by condemning Jesus before letting Him defend Himself. Jesus had not appeared before the Sanhedrin and thus their condemnation of Jesus was based on second hand information. Also, many thought Jesus was a prophet and some referred to Him as "the Prophet" the one prophesied to come as mentioned earlier. Yet, no one had attempted to apply the rule of law stated in Deuteronomy 18:9-22 which God said was to be used to test if man was truly a prophet of God. These rulers were so incensed by Jesus they were letting their emotions rule their actions. Further, there was widespread belief that Jesus might be the Christ based on His miracles, claims of coming from God the Father, forgiving sin, and statement of His deity. This posed a direct threat to their biblical knowledge and leadership. Throughout the events that followed, the temple officials never followed the law and through illegal trials they condemned Jesus.

They were greatly surprised when Nicodemus, who was the Pharisee who had spoken to Jesus personally, spoke up and defended Him. (John 3) He reminded them of the law they supposedly knew and piously followed. The law of Moses provided that a man must be heard before he could be judged. Therefore their prejudicial judgment of Jesus was clearly illegal.

The Jewish rulers had an open contempt for their fellow countrymen in Galilee. The Galileans were liberal and their society was heavily influenced by Greek culture. The Judean Jews saw themselves as superior to the Galilean Jews because they lived in the city of David, the capital of Israel. Those who were condemning Jesus quickly replied with an insulting question which suggested that Nicodemus was a Galilean, even though they knew he was not. Scornfully they challenged the validity of Jesus' claims by exclaiming... "Search, look for no prophet ariseth from Galilee."