'Ye know whence I am'

It was a week ago this morning that I was out real early, power-walking in the woods (swinging three-pound weights in each hand) and fell as hard as I ever remember falling while going downhill on a rain-soaked wooden trail.

It was like I hit a banana peel and my head hit so hard my glasses flew a full four feet behind me. No concussion, thank goodness, but the wind was knocked out of me (a new experience) and it took several minutes before I stopped gasping for air.

My upper back took the worst of the blow. I could barely walk, but I had no choice. I’ve been on a steady diet of Aleve ever since and now, a whole week into it, my back aches in more places and my neck is giving me trouble too. My shoulder blades feel the worst. I guess it’s going to be awhile still.

What really stinks is exercise is my way of bolstering my mood (having no job or friends to hang out with, etc.) Also, going to the gym was my big outing for the day, giving me a chance to be around other people, etc.

Well, at least I am able to sit at my desk (finally) without being too uncomfortable. Don’t know what I’d do without those painkillers, though. I just make the slightest “wrong” move and there’s a twinge—here, there and then over there and then back to the other side.

So, able now to get back to my editing as I look toward finishing this writing project of mine and returning to Chicago this fall.

*****

Here’s a little something I picked up listening to a CD in my car yesterday and I have another article coming later today—now that I’m “back” at it:

In John 7, Jesus, in the temple as He taught, answered the Pharisees by saying, “Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am: and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not.
[29] But I know him: for I am from him, and he hath sent me.”

Jordan explains, “In verse 27, the Jews say, ‘Howbeit we know this man whence he is: but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is.’ There’s the spiritual ignorance that they’re trying to display there.

“They say, ‘We know where Jesus came from. He was born in Bethlehem. We go check the tax records, where Joseph went back to, we know where He’s from. We know about Him. But when the Messiah comes, nobody’s going to know where He comes from.’

“The implication there is, ‘Jesus can’t be the Messiah because we know where He came from; we’re not going to know where the Messiah came from.’ Now, is that right?

“Verse 42 says, ‘Hath not the scripture said, That Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was?’

“They know he’s going to come from Bethlehem. When He was born, the wise men went to Jerusalem looking for Him, you know, that’s the city of the great king, but He wasn’t there. He’d already settled in Nazareth.

“But when they asked Herod where He was going to be born, Herod got the rabbinical scholars together and they gave a testimony to the deity of Christ without even knowing it!

“They quoted Micah 5:2 and said, ‘Look, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years ago, Micah said He’s going to be born in Bethlehem,’ not knowing that He’d already been born there and that they’re giving historical testimony to the validity of the prophetic statement about when He’s going to be born.

“I mean, there’s a bunch of rabbinical Jews giving testimony to the trustworthiness of God’s Word and the fulfillment of it in the birth of Christ, and they don’t even know about it yet! I mean, the Lord’s got that sense of humor to do that kind of thing.

“So this is all just a bunch of hypocrisy. It’s just pride of heart. They say, ‘We know who it is.’ They’ve rejected Him.

*****

“Notice in that verse 28, ‘I am come from him.’ He’s saying, ‘I used to be up there with Him, and I’ve come down. I used to be up there in heaven with Him and He sent me down here.’

“God sent forth His Son. That’s a clear statement by Christ claiming pre-existence. See that? The first verse in the Book of John, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’

“John the Baptist says, ‘There’s one who’s coming after me who was preferred before me because he was before me.’

“Paul says in Colossians 1 that He created all things and He was BEFORE all things. Christ knows the Father. When He says there, ‘I know Him,’ come with me to Matthew 11:27: ‘All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.’

“I mean, that thing in chapter 7 when He says, ‘I know him and am from him,’ that is absolute certainty based on an intimacy of knowledge. ‘I know the Father,’ and by the way, no man knoweth of the Father unless I reveal it to him.’

“Christ’s saying, ‘Anybody who knows anything about the Father is indebted to me because no man knows the Father except the Son and He to whom the Son reveals Him.’ That is, you can never know the Father except through the Son.

“Now, THAT’S why they hate Him and that’s why they want to kill Him. It had nothing to do with a bunch of ceremony breaking because they broke the Sabbath! They didn’t care about that and they would have excused it if they wanted to support Him.

“The reason they wanted to kill Him is because He said, ‘You can’t get to God except through me. Your religion won’t get you anything. You got to go through me.' He’s taking away all they had and replacing it with Himself.

“What’s He’s done is He’s gone to Jerusalem and stuck the ice pick right in their eye. You remember He did that back in John 5? He healed that guy on the Sabbath day, knowing that He was going to get that reaction. Doing what? Demonstrating the difference between religious, ceremonial, external performance and Him—the life.”