I have chosen the Gospel of John as the subject. I pray that these will be a blessing and an edification for the saints.
JOHN 5:44-47
44 How can ye believe, which receive honor one of another, and seek not the honor that cometh from God only? 45 Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. 46 For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me; for he wrote of me. 47 But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?
Earlier in this chapter, the LORD Jesus healed a lame man, and told him to take up his bed and walk. When the religious leadership found him, he told them that it was a man that healed him who told him to take up his bed (on the Sabbath - which was unlawful as no one was supposed to carry burdens on this holy day of rest). For this, the Jews persecuted the LORD and were intent on killing Him!
How very like religion, to desire to kill off any genuine work of GOD! Religion doesn't need the true GOD of Scripture - it's far more accommodating towards a 'God' of their own making (thus breaking the 1st Commandment; EXOD 20:1-3). To make a bad situation worse (in the eyes of the Jewish religious establishment any way) Jesus claimed to be co-equal to the Father (JOHN 5:17) and they wanted to kill Him all the more!
They didn't believe on the One that the Father sent to them, nor the miraculous works that He did (JOHN 14:11):
JOHN 5:38
And ye have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him ye believe not.
Rather than believe in Jesus, and the Father that sent Him, they claimed that they believed Moses and was his disciples, but disdained any that were the LORD's disciple; the man born blind, who was healed of the LORD, was interrogated by the Sanhedrin, and they asked a second time how Jesus healed him:
JOHN 9:27-29
27 He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore would ye hear it again? will ye also be his disciples? 28 Then they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses' disciples. 29 We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is.
Because of this predisposition to approve of their own religious convictions rather than humble themselves and submit to the Word of the LORD, they were disabled from genuine faith in the LORD - "How can you believe . . . ?" the LORD asks.
While they claimed to believe Moses, they denied the crucial truth which GOD imparted to Moses, the Lawgiver of Israel.
In the midst of warning Israel against the religious ways of the pagans, against those who are false prophets, the LORD slips in a few verses on the True Prophet that He would raise up, who is Christ, the Messiah of Israel:
DEUTERONOMY 18:15,18-19
15 The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me [Moses]; unto him ye shall hearken; 18 I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. 19 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.
Like Moses, the LORD Jesus was rejected at first by His brethren, but they will receive Him as Messiah the second time, just as they did Moses (at His Second Advent). This is the theme of the entire declaration of Stephen in ACTS 7.
The religious establishment in the LORD Jesus' day believed that they could attain to the righteousness of GOD by the Law and especially their own interpretation of it, but the LORD put a finer point on the Law, the intended interpretation, that it was not to be kept with mere outward observation, but kept diligently, continually, always in obedience from the heart - something a sinner is not capable of doing, and something that a born again saint is not obligated to: specifically the over 600 Old Testament Laws that were given to the nation of Israel, not the church.
The Law is meant to reveal our sinful condition as a fallen race (1 TIM 1:9); and we saints who born of the Spirit, who walk in the Spirit, fulfill the righteousness that's represented by the Law without keeping all of the ordinances, customs (like circumcision), feasts, etc:
ROMANS 3:21
But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;
ROMANS 8:4
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
But Israel not only missed the Messiah's first advent, but the opportunity to acquire the righteousness that GOD requires apart from the Law:
ROMANS 9:31-32
31 But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. 32 Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone;
For more about this, check out this two-part article from TTUF: Where Are You? Law or Grace - Part One and Part Two.
They receive honor from one another, and fail to seek that honor that comes from the LORD Himself. Who is the person that the LORD will honor?
1 SAMUEL 2:30
Wherefore the Lord God of Israel saith, I said indeed that thy house, and the house of thy father, should walk before me for ever: but now the Lord saith, Be it far from me; for them that honor me I will honor, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed.
PROVERBS 22:4
By humility and the fear of the Lord are riches, and honor, and life.
Those who seek the LORD in truth will find all the above, as well as the LORD above (JER 29:13)!
The self-righteousness and religious spirit obtained from self-justification by means of religion is a breeding ground for pride. The proud can never honor GOD, but despise the righteousness that GOD Himself provides through His Holy Son on the Cross; only the humble receive such righteousness from GOD and therefore honor Him.
The religious will exalt in the religious persuasion of others, especially those who were converted at their hands (GAL 6:12-14). They will honor each other, flatter and exalt one another, all the while denying the exaltation of the Name that is above all names, the LORD Jesus Christ (PHIL 2:9-11).
The LORD told His disciples to "beware the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees" which they came to understand was their false doctrines. Leaven is a symbol for three things: false doctrine, pride and sin in general.
This leaven had fairly well infested Mosaic Judaism in the LORD's day so that the religious establishment held a higher esteem for the writings of rabbis and Talmud than for the Holy Scriptures themselves. They essentially disparaged the writings of Moses, the Holy Scriptures for what the Spirit intended them for, and favored the writings of men instead.
Sounds rather like today, doesn't it?
Unbelief is not simply doubt, it is a willful, deliberate disbelief in GOD's Word that is at its heart, evil. To attribute falsehoods to the declarations of the GOD of Truth is utter rebellion akin to the ranting of the nations found in PSALM 2! Unbelief is a deadly frame of mind, a condition of the heart (PSALM 14:1; 53:1), that will prohibit entrance to the glories of heaven via Calvary and ensure the consignment to the eternal punishments of hell.
Unbelief will impair all that the LORD wants to do in your life (MATT 13:58).
HEBREWS 3:12-13
12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. 13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
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