John07 Round Two: Jesus Brings Controversy Wherever He Goes

A festival crowd whispers, leaders scheme, and Jesus steps into the temple with a challenge and a promise that won’t let anyone stay neutral. We walk through John 7 as family pressure collides with divine timing, public myths crumble under Scripture, and religious certainty meets the kind of healing that exposes hypocrisy. The result isn’t calm; it’s clarity—truth that confronts and living water that satisfies.

We start with the brothers who push Jesus toward visibility and acclaim, and we name the tension many of us feel: wanting God to fit our timelines. Then we move into the temple where Jesus anchors His authority in the One who sent Him and asks the crowd to judge with right judgment. The Sabbath debate becomes a mirror, showing how the letter without the heart can weaponize religion. Along the way, we address common misconceptions about the Messiah’s origin and trace how prophecy, Bethlehem, and David’s line point to Jesus with precision. Faith doesn’t grow on rumors; it grows on Scripture.

The pressure escalates as guards are sent to arrest Jesus and return stunned by His words. On the festival’s final day, Jesus raises His voice with an invitation that reaches beyond controversy: if you’re thirsty, come and drink. John explains that He’s speaking about the Holy Spirit, promised to those who believe. We explore what living water means for real life—holy desire, steady courage, and a witness that overflows instead of runs dry. Nicodemus makes a brief, brave stand for fairness, and we draw out a final challenge: don’t let past experience set the limits of what God can do; let Scripture lead and let the Spirit make it alive.

If this spoke to you, share it with a friend who’s searching for clarity, subscribe for daily Bible breakdowns, and leave a review to help others find the message. What part of John 7 challenged you the most?

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The More We Dig. The More We Find.

Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation (NLT).
Copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation.
Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Chapters

• 0:00 Setting The Scene In John 7
• 1:52 Jesus And Family Tension
• 5:20 Festival Whispers And Public Debate
• 7:50 Teaching, Hypocrisy, And Right Judgment
• 10:40 Arrest Attempts And Mixed Belief
• 12:40 The Promise Of Living Water
• 14:30 Division, Nicodemus, And Scripture

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to the Bible Breakdown Podcast. Every day, we take one chapter of the Bible, dig deeper, and discover that the more we dig, the more we find. You can find out more at the BibleBreakdown.com. Now let's grow in God's word together. Well hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. Today, John chapter 7. If I were to give this chapter a title, it would be Jesus Brings Controversy Wherever He Goes. There's this idea that is so not true about Jesus, and that is that Jesus just kind of floated through the crowds, and everywhere he went, he just, you know, it's like he just like the Pope, just blessing people, and just everybody was, oh, how precious. That ain't Jesus. Everywhere Jesus goes, he creates controversy because he's the king. He's God. And whatever he says goes, which means you don't get to have your way. And so we're going to jump in that as we talk about our king together. But as always, if you like what we're doing here, make sure that you are, if you're listening to this on YouTube, like, share, subscribe. Let me know in the comments how God is moving in your life. If you're listening to the podcast, I love you so much. Thank you so much for giving your time every day that we can go through God's word together. And I want to know in the comments and on our Facebook group, you can go to Bible breakdown discussion and we can go through this together. But I want to know in this discussion, have you ever found yourself wrapped up in controversy that you didn't intend? It's like you start a conversation and before you know it, there's this controversy flying. Like all of a sudden you realize, oh Lord, I thought we were just having dinner. Now we're having a fuss. You know what I mean? You ever done that before? And I found that I've done that before many times because we tend to figure out that we're not really having the same conversation, right? Using the same words but different definitions. And we're going to see that today in the life of Jesus, that wherever Jesus goes, people are challenging him because Jesus is, he's challenging them in their life and saying, I'm God, follow me. And that's the whole idea of the Gospel of John. If you remember, John was Jesus' best friend. And at some point, John ended up overseeing seven different churches, and we can see them listed in the book of Revelation. And he is writing this gospel, inspired by the Holy Spirit, to these churches to say, make sure you don't miss the message. He was my best friend while he was on this earth. He's now my best friend in heaven. He is God, and this was his message. And I love that idea. He's like, he's just telling the church, man, Jesus is God. You may have 99 problems, but Jesus ain't one of them. And I think that that is so important for us to remember now. Jesus is not our problem, he is our king, and we follow him at his good pleasure. We're going to see him get into this today and just controversy everywhere. He's just controversy with his family, controversy with everybody else, but he never backs up from who he is. He is no, he is nobody's victim. He is the king and he is God. So I want to read this together and just dissect, break down the Bible together. The more we dig, the more we find. So if you have your NLT Bibles open with me, chapter 7, verse 1, here we go. After this, Jesus traveled around Galilee. He wanted to stay out of Judea, where the Jewish leaders were plotting his death. But soon it was time for the Jewish festival of shelters. And Jesus' brothers said to him, Leave here and go to Judea, where your followers can see your miracles. You can't become famous if you hide like this. If you can do such wonderful things, show yourself to the world. For even his brothers didn't believe in him. Jesus replied, Now is not the right time for me to go. But you can go anytime. The world can't hate you, but it does hate me because I accuse it of doing evil. So you go on. I am not going to this festival because my time has not yet come. After these things, Jesus remained in Galilee. Now pause for a moment. Now, there is this situation where Jesus' family doesn't believe in him. Now let's give Jesus' family a little bit of a break because, first of all, Jesus would have really upset the social order at the time, especially in this small backwater country town of Nazareth where they grew up. And all of a sudden he's getting all this attention. He's creating all this ruckus. He's probably getting the attention of not only the Pharisees, but the Romans. And so it's not necessarily they don't they don't believe Jesus because they don't trust him. It's Jesus, you're causing problems for our family, is likely one of the things that may have happened. You know, you have this society where maybe people were no longer doing business with them. They were carpenters by trade. They're no longer wanting to be be part of things. And so he's probably causing a lot of trouble for their family. But here's the amazing thing: the Bible said that after Jesus rose from the dead, he appeared to his family, at least to James, which is one of his brothers. Because what ends up happening is James, the brother of Jesus, becomes one of the early leaders of the church. As a matter of fact, the first leader of the church in Jerusalem wasn't Peter, it was James. James, the brother of Jesus, becomes the first leader of the Jerusalem church, and he is the one who actually wrote the New Testament letter that we now call the book of James. So here's the thing, he totally redeems them in time. So don't hate on Jesus' family too much. Jesus' leaders tried to find him at the festival and kept asking if anyone had seen him. There was a lot of grumbling about him among the crowds. Some argued, he's a good man, but others said he is nothing but a fraud who deceives the people. But no one had the courage to speak favorably about him in public, for they were afraid of getting in trouble with the Jewish leaders. Then, midway through the festival, Jesus went up to the temple and began to teach. The people were surprised when they heard him. How does he know so much when he hasn't been trained? They asked. So, which by the way, it's easy to know it when you wrote it, right? Verse 16. So Jesus told them, My message is not my own. It comes from God who sent me. Anyone who wants to do the will of God will know whether my teaching is from God or merely my own. Those who speak for themselves want glory only for themselves. But a person who seeks to honor the one who sent him and who speaks truth, not lies. Moses gave you the law, but none of you obeys it. In fact, you were trying to kill me. The crowd replied, You're demon-possessed. Who's trying to kill you? Pause. Once again, remember, Jesus, meek and mild, gets up in your business. Okay? Verse 21. Jesus replied, I did one miracle on the Sabbath, and you were amazed. But you work on the Sabbath too, when you obey Moses' law of circumcision. Actually, this tradition of circumcision began with the patriarchs long before the law of Moses. So if the correct time for circumcising your son falls on the Sabbath, you go ahead and do it as to not break the law of Moses. So why should you be angry with me for healing a man on the Sabbath? Look beneath the surface so you can judge correctly. So what Jesus is doing is he's throwing their hypocrisy back at them. They're saying, We are so godly because we obey the letter of the law. And he's saying, Not really. And you're obeying the letter of the law, but you're forgetting why the law even exists. It exists to bring freedom. All right, verse 25. So the people who lived in Jerusalem started to ask each other, Isn't this man they're going to try to kill? But here he is speaking in public and they're doing nothing to him. Could our leaders possibly believe that he is the Messiah? But how could he be? If we know where this man comes from, when the Messiah comes, he will simply appear and no one will know where he comes from. Pause again. This is the reason why it's so important to read the Bible for yourself. This is incorrect. They were assuming the Messiah was simply going to appear and no one's going to know where he's going to come from. That's not what the Bible said. As a matter of fact, the Bible actually says exactly where he is going to be born. If you remember, if you ever read uh the book of Matthew and the book of Luke, uh especially the book of Luke, the Bible says that when wise men came from the east to find where Jesus was, they were able to ask, Hera was able to ask some of the local scholars. And they said, Oh yeah, he's going to be born somewhere around Bethlehem. We already know that. So if you actually read the Old Testament, these people or heard the Old Testament, they would have known he doesn't appear. They say exactly where it was. And the problem still persists today. We don't read the Bible. And so then we get confused about what the Bible is supposed to say. That's why it's so important to read the Bible. Okay, verse 28. When Jesus was teaching at the temple, he called out, Yes, you know me, and you know where I come from, but I am not here on my own. The one who sent me is true, and you don't know him, but I know him because I come from him, and he sent me to you. Then the leaders tried to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him because his time had not yet come. Many among the crowds of the temple believed in him. After all, they said, would you expect the Messiah to do more miraculous signs than this man has done? When the Pharisees heard that the crowds were whispering such things, they and the leading priests sent temple guards to arrest Jesus. But Jesus told them, I will be with you only a little longer, then I will return to the one who sent me. You will search for me, but you will not find me, and you cannot go where I am going. The Jewish leaders were puzzled by this statement. Where is he planning to go? They asked. Is he thinking of leaving the country and going to the Jews and other lands? Maybe he will even teach the Greeks. What does he mean when he says, You will search for me, but not find me, and you cannot go where I am going? On the last day, the climax, the finale of the festival, Jesus stood and shouted to the crowds, Anyone who is thirsty, come to me. Anyone who believes in me may come and drink. For the scriptures declare, rivers of living water will flow from his heart. And when he said this, living water, he was speaking of the Spirit, who would be given to anyone believing in him. But the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet entered into his glory. Now, of course, remember, the Apostle John, inspired of the Holy Spirit, is writing this gospel after the day of Pentecost. So what he's saying is that Jesus was going to die, he was going to rise again, and as he ascended into heaven, Acts 2 tells us that the Holy Spirit descended and remains with the church even till today. But Jesus is already prophesying that this is going to happen. Verse 40. When the crowds heard him say this, some of them declared, Surely this man is the prophet we've been expecting. Others said, He is the Messiah. Still others said, But he can't be. Will the Messiah come from Galilee? Pause. Answer is yes, read your Old Testament. For the scriptures clearly state the Messiah will be born of the royal line of David in Bethlehem, the village where the king was born. Yes, that's what happened. So the crowds were divided about him. Some even wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. When the temple guards returned without having arrested Jesus, the leading priests and Pharisees demanded, Why didn't you bring him in? We have never heard anyone speak like this, the guards responded. Have you been led astray too? The Pharisees mocked. Is there a single one of us rulers or Pharisees who believe in him? This foolish crowd follows him, but they are ignorant of the law. God's curse is on them. Then Nicodemus, pause. Remember, Nicodemus is from John chapter 3, the guy who came in secret to see Jesus at night. This is the same one. Then Nicodemus, the leader who had met with Jesus earlier, spoke up. Is it legal to convict a man before he is given a hearing? He asked. They replied, Are you from Galilee too? Search the scriptures and see for yourself. No prophet ever comes from Galilee. Then the meeting broke up and everybody went home. There's this old phrase I used to know that said, We can't do that, we've never done it before. And that seems to be the same phrase that the Pharisees are using. There can't be a prophet come from Galilee. We never had one before. Well, who cares what you've had before? What does the Bible say? The Bible prophesied, the Old Testament prophesied again and again and again about where Jesus was going to come from, where he was going to be born. And if they'd even done a cursory investigation into the life of Jesus, they would have seen that he was fulfilling all of the Old Testament prophecies. But they weren't doing that, were they? They were just judging what they wanted to see. And when they didn't see what they wanted to see the way they wanted to see it, they denied Jesus. We can't hate on them too much, because if I'm honest, I've done that before myself. I have looked for what I wanted to see. I've wanted Jesus to line up with my thoughts, my ideas. I've wanted the Bible to line up with what I wanted it to line up with instead of taking God's word as it is, even when it disagrees with me, because I'm not always right. That's why we need objective truth so that we can we can deny ourselves and go after what is truly true. And that's what I love about Jesus is he loves us enough to tell us the truth. Even though everywhere Jesus goes, he creates controversy. And that maybe in your own life, you could look at this because the overall idea of the Gospel of John is that Jesus is God. We may have 99 problems, but Jesus ain't one of them. And he gives us life. And so what about this chapter gives you life? I know for me it is that I can trust Jesus. I can trust him even when he moves in a way that I don't expect. Even if he moves in a way I've never seen before, I don't automatically say that can't be God because I've never seen that before. Rather, I say it might be God. Does God's word line up with it? Because that's the truth of God's word, is that God's word leads us. If you remember from yesterday, it always points to him. Let's pray together. We've been listening so much about what God has to say to us. Let's celebrate and talk to him, and then we'll be done for today. Father, thank you so much. Your word is true. Your word is honest, your word is good. You lead us to life and all things. Thank you, Jesus, for messing around with all these fools and telling them the truth because that reminds me that you ever you're never going to stop messing around with me, too. That even when I say weird stuff and when I get out of whack sometimes, you're going to continue to lead me in truth as well. And I celebrate that today. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Don't forget, John 20 says, These things are written that you may continue to believe that Jesus is God and that by believing in him, you will have life by the power of his name. I love you. God bless you. I see you tomorrow for John chapter eight.