‘Now You Seek To Kill Me’

I speak what I have seen with My Father, and you do what you have seen with your father.”
They answered and said to Him, “Abraham is our father.”
Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham's children, you would do the works of Abraham.
But now you seek to kill Me, a Man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Abraham did not do this.
You do the deeds of your father. ”Then they said to Him, “We were not born of fornication; we have one Father—God.”
Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me.
Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word.
[John 8:38-43 NKJV]

Jesus says ‘Now you seek to kill me.’ He has said this already, and it is all to do with understanding. Lack of understanding breeds fear and fear is the gateway to a whole heap of troubling spirits. No wonder our Lord says ‘You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.’ [v 44]

He always speaks truth and this is truth without doubt — this is who we are until we get understanding. First we must have knowledge, knowing leads to understanding and with understanding we can have wisdom.

Are we able to listen to Jesus’ word? More than that; listen to what He says with understanding? If I am honest, the answer is that I can miss His truth. Certainly when I am not fully connected in the Spirit, ‘for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,’ [Romans 3:23 NKJV] But, praise Him, we are forgiven when we turn and return to Him.

Do we see though, that when we continually go ‘our own way’, thinking our own thoughts and exclude the Holy Spirit from His guiding passion, we seek to kill Him? It is something we all do. Not meaning to, maybe, but it excludes our Lord from working in us.

Our only hope is in verse 47a ‘He who is of God hears God's words’. A hearing ear — being in tune with the Holy Spirit — is our salvation. Open your heart to Him; ask to be set free again. He will do it.

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God’s seed will always bring forth fruit if it is put in the right conditions.
Man cannot order the seasons or make the seed to grow (cf. Jeremiah 33:20); and we are powerless to make saints.
Our duty is to put the seed into the right place and leave the rest to God.
It would be foolish for a farmer to sow his seed and tell his servants to watch it; he must sow his seed in the right place and then trust in God and Nature, and by and by he will reap his harvest.
So all we can do is to sow the seed of the Word of God in the hearts of the hearers.
[from ‘The Servant As His Lord’ by Oswald Chambers]

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