Idols Blind our Sight

If you follow my SermonCast, or attend at Immanuel than you know as of late I have been in the Gospel of John chapter 9.  We have learned many practical life lessons from this passage.  

I want to draw your attention to verse 28.

 And they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses.

(John 9:28 ESV)

They were drawing the line in the sand.  As they draw this line they bring up Moses.  This comes up a lot in scripture,  and we need to know what it means.  When they say Moses they mean two things…

1.  The man Moses

2.  The writings of Moses

Like here sometimes they mean both.  Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. It is called the Pentateuch,  It was also called the Torah. 

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

When they say, “We are disciples of Moses”, they mean we are followers of those five books. 

This is sad because Jesus would tell them in John 5:39 that they search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, but it is the scriptures that speak of Jesus!

What is more is that they probably have Isaiah 42 memorized and yet they still could not recognize Messiah.  Isaiah 42:7 says that the Messiah will open the eyes of the Blind. 

The bells should have gone off. The alarm should have been ringing.     Here is the deal:  They were studying a book but it was not penetrating their heart. They had theoretical knowledge without practical application.   

Here is a real statement of truth:

Theoretical knowledge without practical application is dangerous.

So they searched those books and those books spoke about the man who was before them but they could not see it because they where blind themselves

So the reference to Moses  was at times “the scriptures” and sometimes they were talking about “the person, Moses.”

They had wrongly elevated Moses, so much so that when Jesus comes to them as God in the flesh they fail to see what God is doing, and who HE is because they had so put the person of Moses up so high he had become an idol to them.

They could not get off the idea of all he did.  Moses was the man who had brought them light.  The children of Israel were led by a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night.   Moses had brought that light.

Moses also had given them water.  He struck and later was told to speak to a rock and in so doing brought forth water for the people to drink.   So Moses was light and water.  And Moses had given them bread.   He brought Manna every day for them to eat.

Then along comes Jesus Christ who says:

            I am the light of the world

            I am the living water (And)

            I am the bread of life

Jesus did not say he had those things but that he was those things.

This challenged the religious posture of the day.   He was challenging their false assumptions.  Instead of humbling these men it made them mad. 

I think it is possible that Jesus wants to challenge our false assumptions today.

What are some of the false assumptions that you are holding onto today?