Whose Child Are You?
Whose Child Are You?
John 8:21–47 When Jesus warns that we’re acting like our father, we’d better wake up.
Like Father, Like Son
John 8 — When Jesus warns that we’re acting like our father, we’d better wake up.
The Jesus Hallmark Forgot
This week, I opened Frederick Dale Bruner’s commentary on John, one of my favorites, to see what he’d say about the rest of chapter 8. One of the first things he tells the reader is that this is the hardest passage to teach in the entire Gospel of John.
I think he might be right.
Part of the difficulty is that the portrait of Jesus in John 8 is not the one we expect. I grew up with one of those Hallmark Jesus paintings hanging in our living room, slowly fading in the sun. Jesus stands in a meadow of wildflowers, children running toward him, a big smile on his face. Or think of the other one we all know: Jesus the shepherd, a cute little lamb draped across his shoulders.
Those are the pictures of Jesus we like. Joyful. A twinkle in his eye. Full of love and grace.
We won’t find John 8 in the greeting card aisle. There is an urgency in Jesus here, a sharpness designed to shock.
Walking In on a Family Argument
I remember being over at a friend’s place more than once when some punishment had to be handed out. Suddenly, the parents are raising their voices, there’s growing conflict, and I’m sitting on the couch thinking, I don’t think I should be here. It’s an inside conversation, and I’m an outsider.
Reading John 8 feels a lot like that. We are walking in on Jesus having it out with the people who should have known better.
Three questions to keep in mind as we proceed:
Who is Jesus talking to?
Who does Jesus think he is?
And what is he asking of us today?
Who Is Jesus Talking To?
These are the religious leaders of Jerusalem. They were the experts in God’s word, the ones tasked with teaching God’s people the words of God. They prided themselves on loving God and following him diligently.
John raises the stakes in verses 30–31:
As Jesus said this, several people believed in him. So Jesus spoke to the Judeans who had believed in him.
— John 8:30–31 (NTE)
Some of the hardest words in this chapter are spoken to people who had, at least on the surface, just become his disciples.
The message Jesus brings in John 8 is the same message he brings everywhere: the only way we are saved is through him. What changes is the tone, and that’s because of who he’s talking to.
Consider John 4: Jesus sits at a well with a Samaritan woman — an outsider socially, relationally, and spiritually. He doesn’t talk to her like this. He says, in effect, You’re thirsty, and I have what you need, and he offers her living water welling up from within.
That’s how Jesus speaks to people on the outside.
To the people on the inside, he sits down in the family room and says, You have gone completely astray, and I need to wake you up.
How Do You Become a Child of God?
The crowd has a lot to say about who they are. We’re Abraham’s descendants (v. 33). We’ve got one father, and that’s God (v. 41). For a couple of chapters now, they’ve been questioning Jesus’ credentials, while resting comfortably on their own. We know the word of God. We’re children of Abraham. How dare you talk to us like that?
This is a perfect example of a key John introduced back on page one:
But to anyone who did accept him, he gave the right to become God’s children; yes, to anyone who believed in his name. They were not born from blood, or from fleshly desire, or from the intention of a man, but from God.
— John 1:12–13 (NTE)
From the start, John has handed us a question: How do you become a child of God?
In one broad sense, every person on earth is a “child of God.” Every human being, Christian or not, is made by God in God’s image and deserves to be treated with the respect and kindness that comes with that. I affirm that completely.
But the Bible also makes a finer point about what it means to belong to God’s family. None of us were born into it. None of us deserve it. I’m not a Christian because my parents were Christians; I’m a Christian because of Jesus Christ. The New Testament is clear that the way anyone enters God’s family is by adoption — by grace alone, in Christ alone.
The crowd in John 8 is living out exactly what John warned us about. Blood: our bloodline makes us God’s people. Will: our effort, our knowledge, our behavior prove it. Jesus calls all of it into question, and flips the table to talk about how you actually become a child of God.
The Slave and the Son
Then he turns to the ones who had just believed in him:
“If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”
— John 8:31–32 (NTE)
They bristle. We’ve never been anyone’s slaves! How can you say we’ll become free?
“I’m telling you the solemn truth,” Jesus replied. “Everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin. The slave doesn’t live in the house forever; the son lives there forever. So, you see, if the son makes you free, you will be truly free.”
— John 8:34–36 (NTE)
They’re saying, Of course we’re God’s children. And Jesus answers, Actually, the way you’re acting makes you look like a slave with no legal right to be in this house. If you sin, you are a slave to sin, not a free child of God. But the Son — the one true Son of God — can make you into a child of God.
“Just Like Your Dad”
How often have you heard parents say Like father, like son, or Like mother, like daughter?
When I was growing up, my dad always had some complicated riddle for my brothers and me. We loved logic puzzles and mind games, and on every road trip, he’d hand us a new one that took the entire eight-hour drive to solve. So now, whenever one of our girls says something extra clever or disappears into a puzzle, Melanie and I look at each other: You’re just like your dad.
On the other side, Melanie and her family are incredible planners. Melanie goes everywhere with everything we could possibly need — a whole bag of snacks and supplies. I, on the other hand, recently took Johnny on a big trip, brought nothing, and it turned into a small disaster. Our girls are Melanie through and through. They make little care packages, and if you look in their rooms, you’ll find drawers stashed with candy and food — just in case.
Remember early in COVID, when we were all sure we were going to run out of everything, and toilet paper was the hottest commodity? I just found out that Penny still has a roll of toilet paper she stashed away in 2020. Just in case.
She’s just like her mom.
And then there are the times one of the kids does something that has Melanie and me looking at each other and thinking, They did not get that from either of us. Where did that come from?
In John 8, Jesus is effectively saying, Let’s talk about family resemblance.
“If you were really Abraham’s children,” Jesus replied, “you would do what Abraham did. But right now you’re trying to kill me — me, a man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God. That’s not what Abraham did.”
— John 8:39–40 (NTE)
You claim to be Abraham’s children, but you don’t act like Abraham. You claim to be God’s children, but nothing you’re doing right now bears any resemblance to God.
There’s a small moment in verse 41 that’s easy to read past. When Jesus says they’re doing the works of their father, they shoot back:
“There wasn’t anything immoral about the way we were born. We’ve got one father, and that’s God.”
— John 8:41 (NTE)
Many scholars hear a note of sarcasm in that line. It seems they know something of Jesus’ origin story. We know it as the virgin birth: Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and Joseph was not his biological father. They clearly don’t believe the whole story, but they know enough to throw it at him. We know Joseph isn’t your real dad. At least we know how we were born.
It’s an insult designed to discredit him, maybe so they don’t have to listen to him. And Jesus turns it right around: You should know where I’m from, because what I’m doing and what I’m saying prove I come directly from God.
“If God really was your father,” replied Jesus, “you would love me, because I came from God, and here I am.”
— John 8:42 (NTE)
This is the answer to the question they keep asking — Who are you? (v. 25). He keeps telling them. I’m the one sent from God. My words are God’s words, because I say what I hear the Father saying. I’m telling you there’s a way to be saved. They just aren’t listening.
Children of Satan?
And then Jesus comes down hard:
“You are from your father, the devil, and you’re eager to get on with what he wants. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he’s never remained in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells lies, he speaks what comes naturally to him, because he is a liar — in fact, he’s the father of lies.”
— John 8:44 (NTE)
I’ll admit it: I don’t like that verse. It isn’t going up on my bathroom mirror. But Christians should still take it seriously. Jesus is talking to the people who should have known better, and he’s saying, Take stock of what you’re doing. Right now you are not acting like a child of God. The family resemblance you’re showing is to someone else.
There are things we do, say, and think that didn’t come from our parents. We didn’t catch them from God. Jesus is saying, You look like someone, and it isn’t me.
Not Them. Us.
Before going any further, we need to be honest about the history of this text, because it has been misused in disastrous ways.
John’s Gospel keeps setting “the Judeans” against Jesus, and here seems to say that they are spawn of Satan. Over the centuries, this passage has been used by Christians to slander the entire Jewish people. Martin Luther had a great many harsh things to say about the Jews late in his life. Far more disastrously, Nazi propagandists quoted John 8:44 directly — even in material written for children — to claim their hatred had God’s blessing.
That conclusion could not be farther from the truth. Jesus was a Jew, sent as the king of the Jews. Every one of his disciples was Jewish. John was Jewish. Whatever Jesus is saying here, it is not a verdict on an ethnicity.
Recall, again, John’s opening page:
He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.
— John 1:11 (NTE)
That’s the thread that runs through the whole book. The light of the world comes to his own people, and, surprisingly, his own people don’t receive him.
Which means that when the church reads this passage today, the first application has to be us. My first instinct should not be to ask, Who out there is rejecting the light? It should be to turn the light on myself. If I claim to be a child of God, this passage is speaking to me. The first Christians who read John’s Gospel would have heard it that way immediately: This is about us. We’re the ones who should know better. We’re the ones who have said yes to Jesus, who study his word, who try to teach it faithfully.
Why Would Jesus Be This Harsh?
Last week, I used an image that I think gets at the register Jesus is speaking in. Imagine we’re all sound asleep in a big house in the dead of night, and suddenly someone is running down the hallway banging pots and pans, shouting Fire! Fire!
We have two options. We can wake up — as hard and uncomfortable as that is — and get out of the house. Or we can roll over and grumble, Who is that fool? It’s the middle of the night. Go away.
That’s the exchange happening in John 8. Jesus is saying, The house is on fire, and I’m trying to save you. Right now is the time. There’s still a chance. Believe in me. And they’re saying, Get out of here, you crazy man. We’re trying to sleep.
When the house is on fire, you don’t gently tap someone on the shoulder and ask if they’d mind stepping outside. You shout.
Every so often, those of us who have said yes to Jesus need exactly this kind of wake-up call. Are there ways I’ve fallen asleep? Ways I’ve forgotten who Jesus is and what he’s called me to? Sometimes he runs down the hallway yelling fire. Sometimes he throws a bucket of ice water on us.
Practice Asking: Whose Child Am I?
I think there’s a reason why this chapter is not the tone of the entire Bible — too much, and we might head down a darker path. But there are times when we need to stop and seriously remember: What I’m doing right now looks like I’m a child of the devil. But I’m not. I’m a child of God.
Looking back. Think over just this past week. What actions did I take, what thoughts did I let settle in my mind, what words actually left my mouth, that bear no family resemblance to God? Where did I look like I belonged to somebody else?
Looking ahead. Before you walk into a meeting, a conversation, or a hard moment at home, stop and ask: Whose child am I, really? Before you publish that next post online, or walk into work grumpy and resentful: If I go through with what I’m about to do, whose family will I look like?
We’re standing at a fork in the road, deciding: am I going to act like my Father in heaven, or like the other father I don’t want to be associated with?
Make Your Home in His Word
I don’t want to leave this family room without pointing out the grace embedded in the middle of this hard conversation. Look at what Jesus does not say. He doesn’t hand anyone a list of hoops to jump through to prove they’re a child of God. He doesn’t say, Get your life in order. Prove yourself. Make yourself perfect.
He starts with urgency — you’re dying, and I don’t want you to die — because he came so that no one would perish. The warning is harsh, but the goal is always to save.
And then the heart of the gospel in this passage is one simple invitation: If you remain in my word.
Make your home in the word of God, and let the word of God make its home in you. That’s it. Jesus takes us back to the relationship at the core of our faith.
The tragedy of this scene is that he’s speaking to people who refuse that invitation. If they had made their home in God’s word, they would have recognized Christ and loved him. That they don’t is the proof that they haven’t.
I think of my own relationship with my children. Never once am I waiting for them to do a bunch of things to please me, to earn their place in our home. I simply want to be with them. I want them to grow into what it means to be a part of our family.
The invitation stands. At the center of our faith is not a performance but a relationship of love, intimacy, and grace. Jesus came so that we could become children of God — not by our blood, not by our will, but by the will of God, as we trust him and receive his grace.
Come and follow Jesus.
A Prayer for Our Week
Father, we confess that we don’t always look like your children. We have spoken words, carried thoughts, and made choices this week that bear no resemblance to you.
Wake us up. Thank you for loving us enough to shout when the house is on fire. Forgive us, and make us free through your Son.
Teach us to make our home in your word, and to let your word make its home in us, until the family resemblance is unmistakable. In Jesus’ name, amen.
This week:
- Look back. Name one moment from the past seven days that bore no family resemblance to God, and bring it to him.
- Look ahead. Before one conversation, meeting, or decision this week, stop and ask: Whose child am I?
- Read John 8:31–32 each morning. Ask Jesus how you can make your home in his word today.
