John 8:39-47
In the movie, “Liar Liar”, Jim Carrey plays a man cursed to always tell the truth. Your first thought about this premise might be, ‘that doesn’t sound too bad. Truth telling is generally a good thing to do—he’s basically being cursed to be virtuous’. But that’s why the movie is so sidesplittingly hilarious! The amount of trouble Jim Carrey’s character gets into for giving his honest thoughts is hysterical. The humor in this movie highlights a troubling reality. Our society doesn’t just endure lying, it subsists on it. As the movie implies, one man telling the total truth is enough to disrupt everything around him and ultimately ruin his life. [NGR2] Jesus speaks along the same lines in John 8:39-47, where He speaks to the “Jews who believed Him”. Although these people are moved to follow Jesus and ‘believe’ Him, they are unwilling to accept the fact that the world they know is built on lies. Although they would like to think they have God as their Father, they’re hearts are miles away from the heart of God.
Upon a first reading, this passage can look pretty hopeless for these people, and consequently for us readers. Jesus isn’t exactly ‘seeker-friendly’ when He says, “you are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires”. But remember the context; again and again Jesus has offered them a way out, saying for example, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (v. 12). Jesus’ point is not simply to accuse, but to convict. The problem for these ‘believing Jews’ isn’t that they’re skeptical of Jesus as the solution—they haven’t even gotten that far yet—they’re skeptical of the problem!
If sin were an ocean, we would be living on the ocean floor. A lifeline to the surface is our only hope, but if we don’t even acknowledge that we’re wet, how can we be expected to have the urgency to seize hold of the lifeline—that is, following Jesus. In “Liar Liar”, most of the ‘lies’ which make up the main character’s daily life aren’t what we would typically call lies. They are “white-lies”, or tiny compromises which are far more insidious than any barefaced lie. Even in the most virtuous society, a compromise of truth can easily slip by unnoticed; often times we don’t even notice we’re adding to the intricate network of lies which make up our everyday experiences. In fact, this network can become so complex and pervasive that we don’t even notice it’s there, although we feel the pain it brings. Misunderstandings, chronic-skepticism, anxiety, the consistent feeling that something is wrong. This is not just a human psychical phenomenon, it’s a satanic plot running from Genesis 3 to now.
The believing Jews in this passage believed since they were genetically descendant from Abraham that meant they were children of God. But, just like everyone else, they were born into a world of sin, being manipulated from their first steps to do the will of Satan. We have a deep-rooted sin nature, and that doesn’t go away when we ‘decide to believe’. Our sin nature is overcome only when our lifeline to the Father is restored, when we submit ourselves in act—not just in word—to obeying Jesus’ commands.
Ask yourself today, does your belief in Jesus simply rest on a confession of faith? A creed or a logical formula? Or does it rest on a living and active experience of the Father’s will working through you. Jesus doesn’t just want his followers to have a ‘blessed intellectual assurance’ of salvation, He wants us to experience the ‘blessed experiential assurance’ as well. Not in spontaneous emotions, but in a real lifestyle of obedience and empowerment from God, just like Jesus experienced. If Jesus’ words seem hard to apply to your life right now, spend some time in prayer, praying for opportunities to obey and the strength and energy to do so. Remember that obedience to Jesus is not the way to the good life, it itself is the good life of the Christian, who participates with the Spirit in bringing the Kingdom to earth as it is in heaven.
