“The dedications”? A time of re-commitment to God. “The temple”? The dedicated place of worship of God Jerusalem AD 30. “Solomon”? The king who built and dedicated the first Temple there around BC 950.
So the Jews surrounded him and were stating to him, “You take our human-life – until when? If you yourself are the Christ, say it to us openly.”
The Jews that day were convinced Jesus was dedicated to their harm. But the opposite was the case.
Jesus replied to them, “I said it to you, and you do not believe. The works which I myself do in my Father’s name, these bear witness about me, but you yourselves do not believe because you are not from the sheep of mine. The sheep of mine hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me and I give them eternal life, and they may never be destroyed – into eternity - and no one is able to seize them out of my hand. My Father, who has given to me, is greater than all such, and no one is able to seize from the Father’s hand. I myself and the Father are one.”
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“Many good works” evidence Jesus’ identity. They resist hat identity to the death. It’s blasphemy and a wrong claim of a man to be God.
Jesus replied to them, “Is it not written in your Law that, ‘I said, you are gods’? If of those same ones he said ‘gods’ - to those to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be undone— are you yourselves stating to the one whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world that, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am a son of God’?”
Jesus maintains his identity. It’s not blasphemy because, in their Scriptures, human beings - “those to whom the word of God came” - are called “gods” by the LORD God. No blasphemy there nor when Jesus repeatedly said “I am a son of God”. What about those whom Jesus called “sheep of mine” who are in Jesus’ hand and in the hand of the Father, and who are given “eternal life”? Are they sons of God as well?
“If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me. If, in fact, I do, even if you may not believe me, believe the works, in order that you may know and may be knowing that the Father in me and I in the Father.”
Jesus maintains his identity. His explanation is interesting. Anyone can claim to have God as Father, but don’t believe anyone whose works do not support that claim. But if that one’s works do support that claim, believe those works of the Father and get to know both Father and Son. Jesus had just given sight to a born-blind-beggar in Jerusalem.
So they were seeking again to arrest him, and he came out, out of their hand, and came away again beyond the Jordan into the place where, at the first, John was baptizing, and there he stayed.
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