“Then they tried to seize Him. Yet no one laid a hand on Him because His hour had not yet come.”, John 7:30 HCSB
- Nothing happens outside of the will of God. He either makes or allows everything that happens to happen, even though we don’t understand many things that happen. Part of this has to do with humans have free will.
We Have Free Will to Worship and Obey God or Not
““Therefore, fear the Lord and worship Him in sincerity and truth. Get rid of the gods your fathers worshiped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt, and worship Yahweh. **But if it doesn’t please you to worship Yahweh, choose for yourselves today the one you will worship: the gods your fathers worshiped beyond the Euphrates River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. As for me and my family, we will worship Yahweh.””**, Joshua 24:14-15 HCSB
“Jesus answered them, “My teaching isn’t Mine but is from the One who sent Me. **If anyone wants to do His will**, he will understand whether the teaching is from God or if I am speaking on My own.”, John 7:16-17 HCSB
“No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. God is faithful, and He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation **He will also provide a way of escape so that you are able to bear it.”**, 1 Corinthians 10:13 HCSB
- So we all do have free will and so with that comes the results of bad choices but I believe many bad things happen outside of our free will. It’s hard to understand why God allows those things to happen but He does. The good news is that He is completely in control, which is why they couldn’t lay any hands on Jesus at that time.
“However, many from the crowd believed in Him and said, “When the Messiah comes, He won’t perform more signs than this man has done, will He? ” The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about Him, so the chief priests and the Pharisees sent temple police to arrest Him. Then Jesus said, “I am only with you for a short time. Then I’m going to the One who sent Me. You will look for Me, but you will not find Me; and where I am, you cannot come.” Then the Jews said to one another, “Where does He intend to go so we won’t find Him? He doesn’t intend to go to the Dispersion among the Greeks and teach the Greeks, does He? What is this remark He made: ‘You will look for Me, and you will not find Me; and where I am, you cannot come’? ””, John 7:31-36 HCSB
- One kind of disconnect that the Jews had with Jesus at this time was that Jesus often spoke about spiritual things but the Jews would try to understand what He said without taking spiritual things in to account. I believe that is why the Jews were thinking that perhaps Jesus was going to the Dispersion (whatever that was) among Greeks.