Was Jesus a Liar? | Rapp Report Weekly Wrap-up 0007 | Striving for Eternity

Welcome to The Rapid Pull, daily edition, where we provide a quick biblical interpretations and applications. This is a ministry of striving for eternity.

Jesus Did Not Lie About Not Knowing the Day or Hour

As we wrap up this week, we've been looking at the claims that some people have that Jesus Christ lied. One of the passages that we looked at was the Matthew 24, 36. It's a parallel passage in Mark 13, 32, where he claims that only the Father knows that they are the hour of the end days.

Now, the issue here that we will look at is the fact that he did not lie, but he's using a Jewish idiom. We also looked at John chapter 7, where many people argue that Jesus Christ lied about the fact that he wouldn't go to the festival openly, and yet he did go to the festival.

And we're going to take a look at that passage and see whether the issue is actually whether he was saying that he would go or not, or whether it was the manner in which he went. So as we look at this this week, this is our weekly wrap-up where you have all of our dailies wrapped up once for you to gather, help you to remember, and to get the repetition to hopefully help you in your study.

If you'd like to email us and have us answer your questions, you could do that at info at strivingforeternity .org. Info at strivingforeternity .org. Thank you for listening to the wrap report. Share it with your friends, and I hope that you'll write us a review on iTunes.

Here's to this week's wrap-up. Is Jesus a liar? This is a question we were asked this week, and we're going to deal with a couple of passages of Scripture that people try to use to claim that Jesus is a liar.

Context and Jewish Idiom in Matthew 24 and Mark 13

The first is Matthew 24, 36, and its corresponding passage in Mark 13, 32. In both those passages, what it says is,. And people try to claim that Jesus is telling a lie, because as God, he should know everything.

But in this passage, it sure looks like he's claiming he does not know something. That's the claim, until you know the rest of the story. Because what this actually is, is a Jewish idiom. It is a way of trying to say that only the Father knows, and the Son shouldn't be choosing the date.

The Son should basically be minding his own business. He should be anxiously awaiting for the Father to choose the day. And if you look within the context of both passages, that is exactly what you see.

In the Mark passage, the very next verse says,. And in the Matthew 24 passage, the very next verse says,. We're going to look into this in more detail tomorrow, but what we want to first see is the fact that the context makes it clear that this is not saying that Jesus did not know something, but to expect something.

There is often much confusion in the passage in Matthew 24 and Mark 13, where Jesus claims not to know something. The statement that we see in Matthew 13, 32 says,. What helps us in understanding this, is to understand what a Jewish wedding feast would be.

The Father would have the Son, whose wife he has chosen for him, and the Son would have the responsibility of having to prepare the house. Now the day of the wedding feast would be unknown by the Son, but known by the Father.

When the Father feels the Son is ready, the Son would have been building onto the Father's house a room for He and His Bride, and when the Father decides that it is time, He would at that point tell the Son to go get His Bride.

The Son does not know the day or the hour. This is a Jewish idiom referring to the wedding, when the Son would say that no one knows the day or the hour, only the Father knows. Jesus is using a Jewish idiom, and one of the things in interpreting scripture that we always must do is understand what phrases mean at the time that they were used, and not try to read into them something that we don't know because we don't understand the idiom.

This was a way of telling the people that Jesus was speaking to, to be on guard, to be ready, to be waiting, for you never know when the day or hour would be. In other words, He's not giving them the exact time, He's saying the time could be any time, and like a son waiting for his bride, he should always be ready, always prepared.

That's the meaning. Now many will take this passage in Matthew 24 and Mark 13, where Jesus says that no one knows the day or the hour, only the Father knows, and they'll try to say that Jesus must not be God because here is something He does not know.

And I understand that many people will take this and try to say that in His humanity He did not know something, but in His divinity He did. When the simpler understanding and simpler reading would be to see this as it is, a Jewish idiom to say to always be ready.

A son would have to be ready because he never knows when his father, when he's getting married, would tell him to go get his bride. And he would have no time to prepare, so he has to always be prepared.

If you look at the context of Matthew 24 and Mark 13, you end up seeing that the context makes it clear that Jesus is telling them to be on guard, to be ready, to keep awake, as it says in Mark 13 .33.

The argument that He is saying is as they ask when is the day, when are these things going to happen? When is the coming of the Lord? And instead of saying, oh, it's going to be on this day, which Jesus knows is still far, 2 ,000 years in the future at least, He's saying to them, it's not for you to know.

You should be ready for it could come today. This is exactly what would happen in a father telling his son, go get your bride. He'd have to go get his best man and say, go quickly, and they'd rush ahead, and the bride wouldn't have a chance to prepare.

They had to be always prepared. It was the anticipation, and we as Christians should be anticipating the Lord's coming. Another passage that we were contacted about, asking the question of did Jesus lie, is in John 7.

Jesus Went to the Feast Privately, Not Publicly

We'll start reading in verse 1. After this, Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not go into Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill Him. Now the Jews' feast of booths was at hand. So His brothers said to Him, leave and go to Judea, that Your disciples may see the works You are doing.

For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world. For not even His brothers believed in Him. Jesus said to them, My time has not yet come, but Your time is always here.

The world cannot hate You, but it hates Me, because I testify about its works are evil. You go up to the feast. I am not going to the feast, for My time has not yet fully come. After this saying, He remained in Galilee.

But His brothers had gone up to the feast. He went up, not publicly, but in private. And those last two phrases are important. Not publicly, but in private. Jesus is not lying, because what His brothers wanted Him to do was to go and publicly, openly expose who He was and do the things He claimed to do.

Now He did go, and people think this was a lie. In fact, the issue is not whether He would go or not, but whether He would go publicly or not. That is the issue. We're going to pick this up tomorrow and finish this up.

The Issue Is Public Versus Private, Not Whether He Went at All

As we looked at yesterday, John chapter 7, where many people try to say that Jesus was lying, because He said He wouldn't go to the feast, because His time had yet not come, and then He does go to the feast.

However, the issue was never over whether Jesus went to the feast or not to go to the feast. The issue is that His unbelieving brothers are challenging Him to go to the feast, where all the Jews are, and publicly show Himself.

That's the argument that they say. They say that the things He's doing, He's doing in secret, and no one who seeks to be known would do it in secret. They challenge Him to show Himself to the world. He says His time has yet not come.

He is not going there because of the fact to show Himself to the world, because He knows the Jews will kill Him. Now, obviously, it's not that He was afraid of that, because that is why He came, and He will eventually go, but at the right time.

Everything for Christ was about the timing, and He's saying His time has not come yet. But He did go to the feast, as is expected from a Jewish person. He went to the feast. But the issue is not to go or not to go.

The issue is whether He'd go publicly or privately. His brothers are challenging Him to go publicly and not to be in secret. He ends up going, but as we see in verse 10, after His brothers had gone up to the feast, He also went up, not publicly, but in private.

That's the issue. He did go to the feast. He wasn't lying, because His brothers were asking Him to go publicly, and the text in verse 10 makes it clear that He went privately and not publicly.