Origin & Authority
Where you are from shapes you. The terrain, the climate, and, of course, the people. The culture of your provenance shapes you. You speak a certain language and have a particular accent because of your culture. The history of that culture molds you, fitting you into a “story” (a metanarrative) that shapes how you relate to the world around you. Origins are integral to who you are.
The culture may be as small as your family. From the womb, they begin speaking to you, and you learn a language and relate to the others and the world around in that language. You share mannerisms and speech patterns. You have physical features that make it clear that you are a part of that family.
The same is true regionally. In America, Midwesterners have clear accents that can then be broken down into smaller regions. Stereotypes are created about you by what region you are from, which are sometimes more and sometimes less true. Southerners are known by their accents, lives centered around food, and religious devotion to sports. People assume that because I am from South Louisiana originally, I like crawfish and am Cajun. Only one is true. I love crawfish, but I’m not Cajun (though I have the gift of interpretation for those who don’t understand the accent. Why did they have subtitles for Swamp People?)
Though we can’t know everything about an individual by his home, our knowledge of the person begins by understanding where he is from.
The Jewish crowds at the Feast of Tabernacles in John 7 wonder about Jesus’ claims to be the Christ and how those claims jibe with where he is from. At one point in the Feast, the crowd said that when the Christ comes, no one will know where he is from (Jn 7:27). Believing that the Messiah would suddenly appear seems to have been a common view among some Jews. Maybe it was a poor reading of Malachi 3:1 where the Lord suddenly appears in his Temple. There were also extra Scriptural books that spoke of the hiddenness of the Messiah until it was time for redemption and the inauguration of the kingdom. Jesus can’t be the Christ because they know where he is from: He’s the son of Joseph and Mary and grew up in Nazareth in Galilee (cf. Jn 7:41).
As the people question Jesus’ origins while he is teaching at the Temple, he cries out that they, indeed, do know him and where he is from. As is common in the Gospel of John, Jesus’ words have layers of meaning. Yes, they know that he grew up in Galilee. They know him and his family. His brothers are there at the Feast. But they also know his ultimate origin: He is from the Father. Since at least John 5, Jesus has been “calling witnesses” in Jerusalem to his claims of being the Christ, the Son of God. By the words that he has spoken and the signs that he has done, they know that he is who he says he is. Their problem is not information. They don’t want to accept what he is revealing to them about God the Father, the God whom they say they worship, but Jesus says they don’t know (Jn 7:28).
If Jesus’ origin is really in the Father, that means he is revealing “the culture” of the Father; he is revealing who the Father truly is. Of course, John has already told us in his introduction that this is precisely what Jesus does. The Son is in the bosom, the heart, of the Father, and he “declares” him. Jesus expounds the truth about the Father. If you know Jesus, you know everything about where he comes from … or better, who he comes from. The people obviously don’t like what Jesus is revealing because they try to seize him (Jn 7:30).
People don’t reject Jesus because of a lack of information or proof. They know who God is and that he is revealed in Jesus (cf. Rom 1:18-23). The problem is that they don’t like Jesus and what he demands. People don’t want to give up the lies about sin and submit to Jesus as King. They refuse to see reality. They refuse to see God and the world for who and what they are.
Unbelief is not ultimately an information problem. It is a hatred problem.
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