John 7:1-5
In the United States, Thanksgiving Day is set aside each year. I have special memories of the times the Wooderson families gathered at grandpa’s and grandma’s farm. We had a great feast. We thanked God for the blessings He had given us. In the early days, Thanksgiving Day was a harvest festival. It was a time to thank God for an abundant harvest.
The Festival of Tabernacles was also a time of thanksgiving. According to Josephus, a first-century A.D. Jewish historian, the Festival of Tabernacles was the most popular of the three principal Jewish feasts.
7:1 –After these things… it was approximately six months after Passover. Jesus wasn’t willing to leave Galilee and go into Judea. Jesus knew the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem wanted to find Him and kill Him (Read John 7:25 & 30).
7:2 –Now the feast of the Jews, the Feast of Booths, was at hand. Known also as the Feast of Tabernacles, Tents, or Ingathering it was an especially important celebration. Jews from various parts of Palestine and the Jews of the Dispersion (those who lived outside Palestine) attended the festival in Jerusalem. Thanksgiving was given to God for his deliverance of the Israelites from Egyptian captivity.
7:3 – Jesus had four half-brothers, James, Joses, Simon, and Judas (Read Matthew 13:5; Mark 6:3)”, but they were not his half-brothers in the spiritual sense. John 7:3 says, His brothers, therefore said to Him, “Depart from here, and go into Judea, that your disciples also may see your works which you do. John 7:4 explains their reasoning.
7:4 –For no one does anything in secret. It was widely believed, “if indeed you are the Messiah, go to Jerusalem, for that is the appropriate place to manifest yourself publicly to Israel as the Messiah and invite them to recognize you… when the Messiah came, He would make himself publicly known in some spectacular way, (it seemed incredible to his half-brothers), that anyone who believes himself to be the Messiah should deliberately avoid publicity. (I think His half- brothers thought), no one who aims at being a public figure will remain in… obscurity… as Jesus had now done for a year” (F. F. Bruce). The Apostle John saw a deeper meaning, And I, if I (Jesus) am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself (John 12:32). Jerusalem was the place where Jesus was crucified on the Cross and three days later, he arose from the dead.
7:5 –For even his brothers didn’t believe in Him. It wasn’t until after the resurrection of Jesus that his half-brothers believed in Him (Read Acts 1:10-14). Jesus, in His resurrected body, appeared to James, His half-brother (Read 1 Corinthians 15:3-7).
DO YOU KNOW THE TWO HALF-BROTHERS OF JESUS WHO ARE THE AUTHORS OF A BOOK IN THE NEW TESTAMENT?
JAMES IS THE AUTHOR OF “JAMES,” AND JUDAS IS THE AUTHOR OF “JUDE.”
-All of the Scripture passages Are Based on the World English Bible (WEB).
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