John 12:37-39 - Therefore they could not believe

12:37

John now talks about the unbelief of the people. We must appreciate that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah, He is the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies. Yet the Jews, on the whole, did not believe in Him. This would seem to present a problem. Right at the beginning of his gospel John said that Jesus came to His own people, but they did not receive Him (Jn 1:11). So this unbelief of the Jews has been a theme of John throughout his gospel. This unbelief persisted despite Jesus doing many miracles. Today there is a belief among some that if only we had more miracles then more people would believe. Now miracles are good. Jesus did miracles, the apostles did miracles, miracles do happen. They can deepen faith, but there is no guarantee on this matter.

12:38,39

John now cites a couple of sections from the Old Testament, showing that this unbelief was foretold by the Bible. The first quote comes from Is 53:1. Paul cites the same verse in Rom 10:16. So the unbelief was foretold, we then get in 12:39 “Therefore they could not believe”. We should note that the text here is not merely saying that this was a fulfilment of Scripture (which it was), but that it had to happen that way. At the same time we should note that in the Bible predestination and human responsibility go together, as we find in this passage. In our limited human thinking we conclude that one excludes the other, if God predestined things then there is no human responsibility, conversely if there is human responsibility (often spoken of as freewill) then God cannot be sovereign. Both of these statements are flawed and result from our looking at things from a purely human perspective. The Bible sees no problem, therefore neither should we.