12:34
The people were confused by His words. Note that their response clearly shows that they knew He was claiming to be the Messiah. The teaching they had on the Messiah was that He would reign forever. Remember also that “being lifted up” would not have been associated with crucifixion by the crowds (unless this was a colloquial phrase for crucifixion). They seem to take it as meaning “taken away from them”. The common understanding of God’s plan and God’s actual plan were rather different. Likewise, today the common conceptions of what Jesus is about are usually well off the mark.
12:35
The people were trying to fit Jesus into their old thinking. What they should have been doing was listening to Him and learning from Him. We need to do the same. Whenever we try to fit Jesus into our everyday thinking, or common conceptions we will go sadly astray. We need to look at the Bible and let God’s word change and renew our thinking. The people did not know where they were going. Likewise, many who pontificate on Jesus do not know what they are talking about.
12:36
Jesus calls on them to put their trust in the light. In saying this He is talking about Himself, remember He has said “I am the light”. So we see again the emphasis on Jesus and on our learning from Him. I know I have just said this in comments on the previous verse, but I will say it again because it is so crucial. We go to Jesus to receive from Him and to learn from Him, we do not go to Him to see how we can fit Him into our mould.
Having said this Jesus left and hid Himself from them. This is something we see often on John, and in the synoptic gospels as well. Jesus was very careful that He was motivated and guided by His Father, and not by pressure from men or from popular acclaim. We need to be careful that we do likewise. This is part of the reason why it is so important that we spend time alone with God, in prayer, worship and Bible study. We need to make sure that our primary source of input is the Holy Spirit.
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