WE left our study last week rejoicing in the fact that many put their faith in Jesus. (v.30). We struggled with the question of what faith in Jesus meant, and that many people of all sorts of different persuasions say they believe in Jesus. We also found questions rising in our minds about the statement I made in last week's notes that even many in the visible church, both clergy and laity, may still be in darkness. The verses we are now looking at enlarge our understanding of these things.

Our verses straight away give us shock and disappointment. Jesus turns to the Jews who said they believed on him, and tells them that only if they hold to his teaching will they be his disciples truly. He tells them that his teaching, the truth, will set them free. Immediately we find that the reality of their faith is challenged because they show that these words of Jesus are not palatable to them.

Plainly set before us here is the sombre fact that people can have faith and belief in Jesus, and yet this faith is not real faith. In other words it is not the faith of a real disciple and is not what is called a faith that brings salvation.

Throughout this passage Jesus lays stress on the truth. The truth is what sets us free. He emphasises that the truth is his teaching in its completeness, and faith in this truth in its true meaning.

Evidently these Jews were prepared to believe Jesus was the Messiah. However from our passage we can see they had not thought through the implications of Christ as Messiah, and found themselves almost immediately questioning and resenting the teaching of Jesus, and by this showed that their faith was not the faith that was a freeing and delivering faith.

Jesus seeks to explain the need for being freed, and the bondage of not being free.

Jesus speaks of sin enslaving us (v.34). Sin makes us into slaves, and so if we are living in the midst of the family we still don't belong to the family. We have to be sons and daughters to belong to the family, and enjoy the privileges of the family. Translating this into being members of the church, Jesus is pointing out that people can say they believe and join the church, but can still not be free, and so still be slaves under sin, and Satan. Jesus speaks of the Jews still having Satan as their father, even though they claimed God was their Father. (v.41,42).

Jesus tells these Jews that only the Son can set people free. Jesus plainly is speaking of himself, and stressing that his truth fully and completely accepted only can set us free from slavery to sin and Satan.

When the Jews claimed that Abraham was their father – that their origin stemmed from Abraham, Jesus again emphasises the need for embracing the truth completely by affirming that a person can only have Abraham as their father if they believed and behaved as Abraham did. Abraham received by faith the truth completely as it had been revealed to him, and his faith was in the truth of his seed, the Messiah, who was to come, through whom he would find salvation and eternal membership of the family of God (Hebrews 11:8-19).

The inadequacy of the faith of these Jews who professed to believe in Jesus was shown in the fact that they were angry with Jesus for making belief in the truth essential to salvation and discipleship, and in their heart wanted to kill Jesus. (v.40). These Jews did not really face the fact of wanting to kill Jesus, but Jesus saw into their hearts.

Not to accept the truth as it is in Jesus and as taught by Jesus is an indication that a person is still enslaved by Satan, and Satan is still their master. (v.44).

We can't truly say we believe in Jesus and love him if we do not accept the truth as he taught it, and this means that God is not our Father. (v.42).

The evidence that a person is still enslaved by sin and Satan is found in their attitude to the truth. If they question the truth in some way like these Jews, or refuse to receive the truth, then this raised questions as to the reality of their claim to believe in Jesus. Jesus makes this clear at the end of our passage when he says “He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.” From the previous verse it is plain that believing in God is believing in the truth Jesus taught.

It is the truth that sets us free from sin and Satan – that is brings us into salvation and the gift of eternal life. (v.32). When Jesus says that real freedom is found in himself (v.36) this plainly means that only in believing in Jesus and his work for us can we be saved.