“Divergent opinions”
Meditation – Thursday, April 10, 2025[
John 10:19-42 (Forward, p. 71) CEV p. 1115
Today’s passage sounds all too much like the political debates presently taking place in many parts of the world today. Seldom today do you find a country where the strong majority of the populace is united in the same opinion on anything, much less a party or a candidate.
This was certainly true with the people of His day and Jesus. Just after His discourse on the shepherd and his sheep, we read that ‘the people took sides because of what Jesus had told them’ (verse 19). Some folks figured that He was crazy, that He had a demon in Him, while others suggested that no one with a demon could say these things or give sight to a blind man.
Later on, we read of an episode where Jesus got into trouble with the crowds for His claim to be the Son of God, to be one with the Father. Here the crowds were quite ready to stone Him! Or, at very least, to arrest Him. But Jesus ‘escaped’ and went to a place beyond the Jordan. And here, interestingly enough, people sought Him out and put their faith in Him. Quite a change, and quite a divergence in opinion.
So, you might well wonder: what might explain this? I would suggest time, time given over to mulling over what Jesus has said and done and reflecting on it. Nicodemus, for instance, came to see Jesus by night (see John 3: 1-21) and, as far as we know, never came to a decision just then. But, we do know that by the time Jesus died, he was securely in Jesus’ camp (see John 19: 39). I’m thinking that it was that interval of time, a time of thought and reflection, that did the trick.
To me, this opens up a wonderful and encouraging possibility in terms of our impact and effect on other people. We may be frustrated by the seeming lack of results in our lives, that we really don’t seem to have
touched many other lives for good, either by what we have said or what we have done. But maybe we have only planted the seed: there is still time for it to germinate, grow, and produce results. It doesn’t seem that Jesus’ life had instanteous results, and maybe ours won’t either. So, it just means that we keep on trying, even if we don’t see anything coming of it. Sure, there will be divergent opinions, just as there is about almost everything, but some, some might have just been touched by our words or actions and chose to believe in Jesus, to trust Him and go His way. You just never know!
Forward notes: “Many of them were saying, ‘He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why listen to him?’” (verse 20).
“In John 10:16, Jesus says that no one takes his life from him: ‘I lay it down of my own accord.’ The leaders who are challenging Jesus don’t understand what he is saying, but instead of asking questions and engaging in conversation, they are quick to dismiss him as one plagued by a demon. The misunderstandings, tensions, and divisions that are rife in our world and in our church often lead us to accusations of madness, and in the midst of those arguments, we lose sight of what binds us together. I am convinced that seeking and embracing the love of God and the peace that passes all understanding will assuage the heated nature of these tensions.
“As we move toward Holy Week, I wonder how long it will take for those tensions and divisions to subside and for the people of God to recognize that love is the law. How many times can one see the body of Christ hanging on a tree before one comes to an understanding of how in his mind Jesus really was.”
Moving Forward: “Has there been a time in your life when love as the law has soothed you?”
A concluding note: Today’s Forward Day by Day meditation has given me much to ponder, namely whether all of us, including those in the church, are necessarily united by a bond of love. I wonder whether, at times, other, more personal motivations, motivations like fear or ambition or anger or a personal agenda, might get in the way and sully, and maybe even eclipse, the love that should be there. There certainly have been far too many
church meetings that I have attended where the conversations do not seem to be motivated by love.