John 10:31-42 (ESV)

³¹ The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. ³² Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?” ³³ The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” ³⁴ Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? ³⁵ If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— ³⁶ do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? ³⁷ If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; ³⁸ but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” ³⁹ Again they sought to arrest him, but he escaped from their hands. ⁴⁰ He went away again across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing at first, and there he remained. ⁴¹ And many came to him. And they said, “John did no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true.” ⁴² And many believed in him there.

Jesus had just declared to the Jews around him that he and the Father were one (10:30). In response, the Jews picked up rocks to throw at him and kill him. They claimed they weren’t going to stone him for what he did, but for what he said. Jesus reminded them that even in the Old Testament human beings were called “gods.” In Psalm 82, God, the ultimate judge, appointed mere men to act as judges on earth, and they were termed “gods.” These men were supposed to judge rightly for the Lord, but they failed. Some see the nation of Israel as a whole represented by these judges or “gods.” Whether men or the nation, although none were actually God, they acted as his representatives on earth. Jesus taught that these people weren’t stoned for being “gods,” so again, why were the Jews so upset with him? If other people were called gods in the Scripture, why were the Jews so angry that he called himself the Son of God? The answer is that they thought Jesus was a man who made himself out to be God (v. 33). The reader of John’s Gospel must realize that the converse is instead true: Jesus was and is God, who made himself a man. He wasn’t an ordinary man, but truly God in the flesh. Of course he should be called God! The Jews had things reversed.

Jesus explained that if he truly was who he claimed to be, then they were the ones committing blasphemy, and they would incur the judgment of God. Jesus further explained that the Scripture cannot be broken, because it is the word of God. The Jews recognized this as true, and they were unable to argue with what the word of God declares. They understood the Scripture’s inerrancy, or inability to be wrong. Even if it is difficult to understand or tough to apply, because it contains the truth that God desires to reveal to humanity about himself, us, and our relationship to him, we cannot afford to treat it lightly, cast it aside, or ignore the laws and principles it illuminates. The word of God is a lamp to our feet and a light to our paths in this dark world. Make sure you spend time daily in the Scripture. Meditate on it, memorize it, and apply it to your life. Heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord will remain forever.