An Unbreakable Word for an Unbreakable God Text: John 10:31-39
Introduction: The Blasphemy Charge
We come now to a point of high confrontation. The air is thick with murder. The Jews have picked up stones, not for building, but for killing. And the charge they level against the Lord Jesus is the highest charge possible: blasphemy. We must understand that our entire faith is built upon a blasphemy conviction. The central event of all human history, the crucifixion of the Son of God, was carried out by men who believed they were defending the honor of God. They were blasphemers executing the Lord of Glory on a trumped up blasphemy charge. This is irony of a cosmic sort.
In our day, we have a low-grade, sentimental view of Jesus. We see Him as a gentle teacher, a moral philosopher, a friend to all. But the men who stood before Him that day did not see Him that way. They saw a threat. They heard His words not as gentle platitudes but as a direct assault on the throne of God. And in a twisted way, they were right. He was assaulting their conception of God, their small, manageable, tribal deity. He was claiming to be God Himself, and for this, they wanted Him dead.
The accusation is this: "You, being a man, make Yourself God." This is the heart of the matter. This is the question upon which everything turns. Is Jesus a megalomaniac, a blaspheming lunatic? Or is He exactly who He claims to be? There is no middle ground. C.S. Lewis rightly pointed out that the category of "good moral teacher" is not available to us. A man who said the things Jesus said was either a lunatic, a liar, or He was Lord. The Jews of His day understood this perfectly. They had no room for a mere prophet who claimed to be one with the Father. They correctly understood His words as a claim to full deity, and so they picked up stones. We, in our sophisticated age, try to blunt the force of His claims, to domesticate Him. But Jesus will not be domesticated. He confronts us with the same choice: either pick up stones or fall down and worship.
In this passage, Jesus does not back down. He does not clarify His statement in a way that would soothe their outrage. Instead, He presses His claim, and He does so by appealing to the unshakeable authority of their own Scriptures. He shows them that their understanding of God, of man, and of Scripture itself is profoundly flawed. He gives them a master class in biblical exegesis, right in the teeth of their murderous intent.
The Text
The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, "I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?" The Jews answered Him, "For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself God." Jesus answered them, "Has it not been written in your Law, 'I SAID, YOU ARE GODS'? If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming,' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'? If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and continue knowing that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father." Therefore they were seeking again to seize Him, and He eluded their grasp.
(John 10:31-39 LSB)
Stones and Accusations (vv. 31-33)
We begin with the immediate, violent reaction of the crowd.
"The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, 'I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?' The Jews answered Him, 'For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself God.'" (John 10:31-33 LSB)
Notice the word "again." This is not their first attempt. Their unbelief has hardened into a murderous resolve. Jesus' response is a classic example of His divine wisdom. He doesn't ask, "Why are you stoning me?" He asks, "For which of my good works are you stoning me?" He forces them to confront the glaring contradiction in their position. His life was a seamless exhibition of divine power and compassion. He healed the sick, opened blind eyes, and cast out demons. These were the very works the Father had sent Him to do. He puts them on the horns of a dilemma: they cannot deny the goodness of His works, yet they are determined to kill Him.
Their answer is telling. They sidestep the question of His works entirely. "For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy." They separate His works from His words, a fatal error. They are willing to concede that His deeds are "good," but they cannot stomach His identity. This is the position of every liberal theologian and every sentimental unbeliever today. They want the ethics of Jesus without the person of Jesus. They want the Sermon on the Mount without the deity of the speaker. But you cannot have one without the other. The works are the visible evidence of the identity. The miracles are not just random acts of kindness; they are signs that point directly to who He is.
Their charge is explicit: "because You, being a man, make Yourself God." They understood His claim in verse 30, "I and the Father are one," as nothing less than a claim to be Yahweh. And according to their law, the penalty for blasphemy was stoning (Leviticus 24:16). They saw themselves as the righteous defenders of God's honor against a human usurper. But their zeal was blind, because the one they sought to kill was the very God they claimed to defend.
You Are Gods (vv. 34-36)
Jesus' defense is not a retreat. It is a brilliant offensive maneuver, driving deep into their own territory: the Scriptures.
"Jesus answered them, 'Has it not been written in your Law, "I SAID, YOU ARE GODS"? If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, "You are blaspheming," because I said, "I am the Son of God"?'" (John 10:34-36 LSB)
Jesus quotes from Psalm 82. In that Psalm, God stands in the divine council and rebukes the corrupt rulers or judges of Israel. He says, "I said, 'You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High. Nevertheless you will die like men.'" God calls these human judges "gods" (elohim) because they stand in His place, exercising His delegated authority to judge the people. They are "gods" in a functional, representative sense. They are men to whom the word of God came, commissioning them for their task.
Jesus' argument is an argument from the lesser to the greater, what the rabbis called a qal wahomer argument. It goes like this: "If your own Scriptures, which you claim to uphold, can refer to sinful, mortal men as 'gods' simply because they are bearers of God's delegated word of authority, how can you possibly charge Me with blasphemy?" This is a masterful stroke. He is not saying He is a "god" in the same sense as those judges. Far from it. His point is that the term itself is not automatically blasphemous when applied to someone other than the Father.
And then He drops in a parenthetical thunderclap: "(and the Scripture cannot be broken)." This is one of the most potent statements in all the Bible about the nature of Scripture. It means the Scripture is inviolable, infallible, and utterly authoritative. It cannot be set aside, argued around, or dismissed. Every word is binding. Jesus' entire argument rests on the integrity of this one word, "gods," in one verse of the Psalms. He is teaching us that our doctrine of Scripture must be as high as His. If we believe the Scripture can be broken, if we think it contains errors or can be culturally dismissed, then we have no foundation for our faith at all.
Having established this from their own Law, He then draws the stunning contrast. If those fallible men could be called gods, what about Him? He is the one "whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world." He is not just a man to whom the word of God came; He is the Word of God who became a man. He was set apart by the Father from all eternity for this unique mission. If the title was permissible for them, how can it be blasphemy for Him, the unique, consecrated, sent-from-heaven Son of God, to claim that title in its fullest and most literal sense?
Believe the Works (vv. 37-38)
Jesus then returns to the evidence He first presented: His works. He provides them with two pathways to belief.
"If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and continue knowing that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father." (John 10:37-38 LSB)
This is an eminently reasonable and fair challenge. He invites them to judge Him by the evidence. "If my works do not align with the character and power of God the Father, then you are right to reject me. Do not believe me." He is willing to be tested. The works He performed, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, raising the dead, were precisely the works that the prophets foretold the Messiah would do. They were the works of God.
But then He offers a second path. "Though you do not believe Me, believe the works." He is saying, "Even if you have a personal prejudice against Me, even if you stumble over my words, you cannot deny the evidence of what I have done. Let the works themselves persuade you." The miracles were not an end in themselves. They were signposts pointing to a deeper reality. What reality? "So that you may know and continue knowing that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father."
This brings us back to the central claim. He is not just a prophet from God; He is God. He and the Father have a relationship of mutual indwelling. They are distinct persons, yet they are one in essence, will, and action. To see the works of Jesus is to see the works of the Father. To know Jesus is to know the Father. The works are the irrefutable testimony to His divine union with the Father. He is not asking for blind faith. He is asking for a faith that looks at the evidence and draws the necessary, logical conclusion.
An Elusive Grasp (v. 39)
The confrontation ends not with repentance, but with another attempt on His life.
"Therefore they were seeking again to seize Him, and He eluded their grasp." (John 10:39 LSB)
His argument did not persuade them. It enraged them. Why? Because unbelief is not primarily an intellectual problem. It is a moral problem. Their issue was not a lack of evidence. Their issue was a love of their own sin and their own authority. Jesus had exposed their hypocrisy, challenged their power, and called them to repent. And for this, they hated Him. His logic was unassailable, His works were undeniable, and so their only remaining recourse was violence.
But they could not seize Him. He "eluded their grasp." This was not a lucky escape. This was a demonstration of sovereign control. They could not touch Him until His hour had come. He was not a victim of their rage; He was the author of the divine timetable. He would lay down His life, but He would do so willingly, at the appointed time, according to the determinate counsel of God. Their inability to lay a hand on Him was yet another sign of His divine power, a sign they were too blind to see.
Conclusion: The Unbreakable Christ
So what does this confrontation mean for us? It means everything. First, it establishes the absolute, unbreakable authority of the Word of God. Jesus built His defense of His own deity on the grammatical and lexical integrity of a single word in the Psalms. If that is how the Lord regards Scripture, then that is how we must regard it. We are not to sit in judgment over it; we are to sit under its judgment. It cannot be broken.
Second, it confronts us with the non-negotiable deity of Jesus Christ. He is not one prophet among many. He is not a good teacher to be admired. He is the eternal Son of God, one with the Father, dwelling in the Father as the Father dwells in Him. His works prove His identity. To reject His deity is to reject the clear testimony of both His words and His works. It is to call Him a blasphemer, and to side with the men holding the stones.
Finally, it shows us the nature of true faith. True faith is not a leap in the dark. It is a reasonable trust based on sufficient evidence. Jesus says, "Believe the works." Look at what God has done in Christ. Look at the empty tomb. Look at the transformation of the disciples. Look at the growth of the church against all odds for two millennia. The works of the Father, done through the Son, continue to this day. And these works testify that the Scripture cannot be broken, and that the Christ to whom it testifies is indeed the Son of God. He is the unbreakable Word, the foundation of an unbreakable Scripture, and the Savior of all who will abandon their stones and believe.