JOHN 2:23-25 BELIEVING IN JESUS

23 Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name. 24 But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all men. 25 He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man.

A sign of any sort has no inherent meaning. Both the power and the meaning of a sign are only found in the entity to which the sign points. Just as your friends and family would think you had lost your mind if you pulled up to the highway sign that reads Monmouth Beach and declare that you are at the beach, to believe in the miracles without considering the miracle worker would be foolish. But in this passage, St. John tells us that many people saw the miracles and “believed in his name.” Yet “Jesus would not entrust himself to them.” The problem appears to be that they believed in him as the purveyor of miraculous works rather than believing in him because of the signs. They were too hung up on what he could do for them in their present life-situation to be able to see that the signs indicated one who was greater than Moses or Elijah. Because of that, Jesus did not teach them about the true work of the Messiah as the suffering servant. Even the disciples were not given that teaching until they spontaneously proclaimed him the Messiah through Peter (Mark 8:31).

When we first come to faith in Jesus it is most often through the witness of another person, usually based on what Jesus has done for us. As we grow in our faith we experience Jesus more and more in our lives and we learn about what he can do in our lives. A mature faith no longer looks to Jesus for what he has done, is doing, or will do, but for who he is. It is when we can praise Jesus because he is God, the Incarnate Word and the eternal Son that we arrive at the point where we are truly open to his fuller revelation of himself. It is at that point that we believe in him with our entire life, and Jesus truly becomes much more than our Savior; he is our Lord.

Thank you Jesus for meeting me where I was, but not being willing to leave me there. You have reached out to me through my need for assurance and self-fulfillment. Grow my faith from a matter of need fulfillment to the place of knowing you. Help my faith to develop beyond the need for proof so that it may rest in who you are. Allow me to know you more fully every day of my life. Amen.