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Checkmk.wmf (886 bytes) Just the Facts?

by David A. DePra

Shall Christ come out of Galilee?   Hast not the scripture said
that Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town
of Bethlehem, where David was?   So there was a division among
the people because of Him.   (Jn. 7:42-43)
     Note the situation in John 7. The peole were debating as to
whether Jesus was the Christ. They had heard Him teach and
speak. They saw His many miracles. It was inescapable that
there was something special about this man -- about this very
remarkable man. Could this be the Messiah, the very Christ they
had waited for so long?
     The trouble with this debate was that it degenerated from the
witness of the perfect Son of Man down onto another level: The
facts. And when that happened, the correct facts were missing.
You see, these people knew that the scriptures said that the
Christ must come from Bethehem. That WAS a fact. But then
they made a false assumption: They assumed Jesus was from
Galilee. This was a so-called "fact" which many of them could
not get by. They stumbled over it.
     In a way, you can scarcely blame them. Afterall, Jesus did
come from Galilee. He grew up there. This was widely known.
Futhermore, everyone knew His parents. This compounded the
matter. Some of these people remarked, "When the Christ
appears, will we know where He came from?" So here was
Jesus, preaching and teaching, not fitting the facts as these
people expected the Messiah to fit them. So many of them would
not believe. There was division and arguing about Him.
     Now you would think that Jesus would have simply said to
them, "Look. I am from Bethlehem. I only grew up in Galillee."
But no. Rarely did Jesus try to set them straight on the facts. He
let them go on disputing and arguing.
     Why? Because the facts should give way to the witness.
Imagine the Son of God standing there in human form. He is
completely without sin and void of all human vice. He never sins
once with His mouth, nor by His actions. But I am not moved by
any of that because He just doesn't fit the facts as I expect them?
     What we have here is not a intellectual problem. It is not a
matter of understanding. No. Here we have a MORAL problem.
Rather than an inability to believe, it is a refusal to believe. I
refuse to believe because somewhere I want my own way. And
if I accept Jesus as the Christ, I fear I won't get it.
     Should we ignore the facts? No. Everything that the Bible
says is factual. And all Truth is factual. It wouldn't be Truth
otherwise. We should always seek the Truth and not settle for
less. But we should never set up our present understanding of
the facts as an expectation we demand God meet. No. He won't
meet our demands. He will expect us to "lean not upon our own
understanding," and believe what our heart tells us is the Truth.

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