The Theology of Unbelief

John 12:37-50

Main Idea: Jesus explains why the crowds persist in their unbelief in spite of witnessing his many miracles.

1. What Is Unbelief?
2. Why Don’t People Believe in Jesus?

God used George Whitefield in a way seldom seen in this world. He was the main instrument in the spiritual revival known as the Great Awakening, which swept across the United States in the mid-1700s. Whitefield was also good friends with Benjamin Franklin. Their friendship began when Whitefield came to Philadelphia in 1739 and lasted until his death in 1770. During the course of this thirty-one-year friendship, Franklin was the primary publisher of all of Whitefield’s sermons and journals. Forty-five times Whitefield’s sermons were reprinted in Franklin’s newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette, and eight times the sermon filled the entire front page. Franklin published ten editions of Whitefield’s journals and sold thousands of reprints of Whitefield’s sermons.

Their relationship extended beyond a business relationship. On more than one occasion when Whitefield came to Philadelphia, he stayed with Franklin in his home. When some of the religious elite criticized Whitefield in another local paper, Franklin wrote a rebuttal. His support for Whitefield, along with a regular correspondence between the two, continued for the next thirty years. Despite their friendship and Whitefield’s continued presentation of the gospel, Franklin never responded in faith. In his autobiography Franklin wrote about Whitefield: “He used sometimes to pray for my conversion, but never had the satisfaction of believing that his prayers were heard” (quoted in Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin, 113). How do we explain Franklin’s rejection of the gospel? He heard and read hundreds of the sermons of America’s greatest evangelist. He spent hours with him discussing the gospel. He received dozens of letters over the span of thirty years, yet he was unmoved. Why didn’t Benjamin Franklin believe? Why does anyone reject the gospel of Jesus Christ?

As Christians, we have a strong desire to call men and women in faith to Jesus. Because of God’s grace, we understand the joy that comes from a restored relationship with our Creator. Our methods in calling men and women to faith will flow from our understanding of unbelief. If we don’t know the answer to why people choose not to believe, then we’ll constantly be asking the question, Will they believe if we do this? Can we convince them to believe if we try that? Our theology determines our methods.

Though the crowds had seen and witnessed so many of Jesus’s miracles, they persisted in their unbelief. This is exactly what John prepared us for in the opening of his Gospel: Jesus “came to his own, and his own people did not receive him” (John 1:11). This passage answers the two most important questions about unbelief.

What Is Unbelief?

It’s easy to equate unbelief with indecision. Have you ever spoken with one of your children and afterwards turned to your spouse and asked, “Do you believe her?” If you’re not certain, you’ll do some investigating. You may call another child in and get his account of the situation, or you’ll call the same child back in and ask some deeper, more probing questions. In this situation your unbelief is really indecision. You’ll know whether you believe your child when you get more information. That’s not what unbelief means in this context. Their unbelief is not the result of a lack of information. They’ve seen and heard enough to make a well-informed decision. Unbelief is the conscious rejection of God and his Word. That’s how Jesus defines unbelief. John 12:44-50 contains a summary of Jesus’s message in which he emphasizes the close relationship between himself and his Father and between himself and his words. He’s making the point that choosing not to believe in him means rejecting God himself (v. 44).

Belief in Jesus is equivalent to embracing God; to choose unbelief is to willfully reject God. Notice how closely Jesus ties himself to God in these verses:

• To believe in Jesus is to believe in God (v. 44).
• To see Jesus is to see God (v. 45).
• To listen to Jesus is to listen to God (v. 49).

If you fail to turn to Jesus in faith, don’t think you’ll be accepted by God. In fact, if you choose not to believe in Jesus, then God will judge you for your unbelief on the last day (v. 48). These words from Jesus force us to recognize the seriousness of unbelief. There’s no way to stand accepted before God apart from faith in Jesus Christ.

Unbelief is the conscious rejection of God and his Word. Jesus draws a close relationship between himself and his words:

If anyone hears my words . . . The one who rejects me and doesn’t receive my sayings has this as his judge: The word I have spoken. . . . For I have not spoken on my own, but the Father himself who sent me has given me a command to say everything I have said. I know that his command is eternal life. So the things that I speak, I speak just as the Father has told me. (12:47-50; emphasis added)

God always moves and works by his word. Beginning in Genesis 1, God brought forth life by his word. Throughout the Old Testament God’s word has been the pathway to life and blessing. In the New Testament we’re told, “Faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the message about Christ” (Rom 10:17; emphasis added). God has always worked through his word. He has always used his word to call men to life and salvation. Therefore, to believe in Jesus means we accept and embrace the word of God. Unbelief, then, is the rejection of the word of God. It comes in many forms—from outright criticism and denial to neglect and questions about relevance—but the simple truth is that to reject Jesus’s word is to reject his person. You cannot have Jesus without embracing his teaching on everything from false religion to judgment to hell. You can’t pursue a relationship with God apart from Jesus, and you can’t pursue a relationship with Jesus apart from his word.

Why Don’t People Believe in Jesus?

This is the harder question to answer. In spite of overwhelming evidence that substantiated the claims of Christ, why did most Israelites not believe? The answer is multidimensional. Unbelief is not due to intellectual deficiency or a lack of knowledge. Unbelief is the response of a heart in rebellion against God. At the 2007 Shepherd’s Conference Mark Dever said, “Unbelief never involves the mind alone; it is a spiritual state.” Unbelief is the rebellious response of a man’s heart. No amount of external pressure or coercion can ever make a person believe. That’s why Christianity is not a religion that spreads by the sword. We could make people utter some form of a confession, but forced profession would be worthless, powerless, and empty. Unbelief stems from the heart of man.

Any study of unbelief must begin by acknowledging the sinfulness of man. Bishop J. C. Ryle wrote,

The prevalence of unbelief and indifference in the present ought not to surprise us. It is just one of the evidences of that mighty foundation-doctrine, the total corruption and fall of man. How feebly we grasp and realize that doctrine. We only half believe the heart’s deceitfulness. (Quoted in Pink, John, 688)

John assigns the guilt of unbelief to man. Even the way he phrases verse 37—“Even though he had performed so many signs in their presence, they did not believe in him” (emphasis added)—makes clear they are culpable for their persistent refusal to believe in Jesus. The responsibility for rejecting Jesus as Savior falls squarely on the shoulders of unbelievers. They consciously reject salvation found only in Jesus Christ (cf. 3:19-20).

The depravity of man is not the only reason John provides for their unbelief. He says their unbelief is necessary in order to “fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet” (v. 38). Their unbelief and rejection of Jesus were part of his substitutionary suffering for those who would believe. The first passage from Isaiah that John quotes is 53:1, where we find a detailed prophecy about how Jesus would suffer and die in the place of sinners. It was necessary for some to reject him so he could take his place on the cross and die the death we deserve. Jesus needed to die. He came to die. He did not come to earth to be cheered, accepted, and embraced by everyone. If that had happened, he never would have fulfilled the ultimate purpose of his coming: to die the brutal death of a criminal. John is showing how the unbelief of the Jews fulfills Isaiah’s prophecy.

This raises a difficult, even troubling, question. If their unbelief is necessary to fulfill the prophecy of Jesus’s rejection, is John saying that God planned their unbelief? The short answer is yes. No matter your view of God’s sovereignty, there’s no way you can get around the next few verses. Not only did they not believe, but John also says, “They were unable to believe” (v. 39). Why? John answers this difficult question by going back to Scripture, as we should. The reason they could not believe was God had blinded their eyes so they couldn’t see and hardened their hearts so they couldn’t understand and receive his healing.

This isn’t the first time we hear about God’s hardening hearts and man’s inability to believe. Moses, in one of his final charges to Israel, told them,

You have seen with your own eyes everything the Lord did in Egypt to Pharaoh, to all his officials, and to his entire land. You saw with your own eyes the great trials and those great signs and wonders. Yet to this day the Lord has not given you a mind to understand, eyes to see, or ears to hear. (Deut 29:2-4)

This same language is picked up in Isaiah 6. God gives Isaiah the task of sharing his word with the children of Israel and says that Isaiah’s message to them will be like this:

Keep listening, but do not understand; keep looking, but do not perceive. Make the minds of these people dull; deafen their ears and blind their eyes; otherwise they might see with their eyes and hear with their ears, understand with their minds, turn back, and be healed. (Isa 6:9-10)

John says the unbelief of the Jews is the continued fulfillment of the words of Isaiah. They do not believe because God has not called them to believe. In fact, he has hardened their hearts even more than they already were. You could translate John 12:39 as: “They were powerless to believe” or “It was not possible for them to believe.” What we see here are two interwoven truths in John’s explanation of unbelief.

First, belief is not possible without God’s direct work in man’s heart. John Calvin explains: “Faith is not born in the ordinary human faculties but is a unique and rare gift of God” (John, 310). We see this clearly in John’s quotation of the end of Isaiah’s first prophecy: “To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” (v. 38). God must reveal himself. God must take the initiative in salvation. God calls men to Jesus and saves them.

The second truth we see is that God can for his own purposes choose to harden those whom he chooses to harden (Rom 9:14-18). For his own reasons God chose to harden the already sinful, hard hearts of the Jews. We cannot completely understand God’s purpose in calling some to faith and not others, but we submit to his authority and recognize the Potter has the right to mold the clay however he sees fit. We are given a little glimpse as to God’s purpose in hardening the Jews. The book of Acts ends with several Jews coming to speak with the apostle Paul while he was imprisoned in Rome. He preached a sermon to them that went from morning until evening. The reaction was mixed: some believed, some didn’t, and a number were uncertain. Paul quoted Isaiah 6:10 about God’s hardening the hearts of the Jews, and he gives us a glimpse as to why: “Therefore, let it be known to you that this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles; they will listen” (Acts 28:28). In the case of the Jews, one reason God confirmed them in their rejection and unbelief was that he was going to spread the gospel to the Gentiles. God has a plan. He’s in control, and whatever he chooses to do in a person’s heart is wise and just.

Whatever we do, we must not assign blame to God. D. A. Carson helps us put God’s hardening in its proper perspective:

God’s judicial hardening is not presented as the capricious manipulation of an arbitrary potentate cursing morally neutral or even morally pure beings, but as a holy condemnation of a guilty people who are condemned to do and be what they themselves have chosen. (John, 448–49)

At some point we reach the end of our human understanding, and we are left to trust the goodness of God and recognize our finite comprehension of his way and plan. We need to affirm both truths John reveals in this passage, acknowledging that the Bible never pits divine sovereignty against human responsibility.

In Isaiah 6 God tells Isaiah his message would be about deaf ears and darkened hearts—which is discouraging—but if you keep reading, you find something hopeful. In verse 11 Isaiah asks God, “Until when, Lord?” He’s asking, “How long will I preach a message that simply serves to harden the hearts of those who hear it?” The Lord’s answer begins with the word until. Until! That means the hardening is temporary. God will call people to faith in him. That hope motivates evangelism. The sovereignty of God over belief and unbelief gives us confidence to share the gospel. If you don’t think God is sovereign, why pray for those who don’t believe? We need to see that God is God, and we are not. As God, he has the authority and power to give faith to whomever he chooses.

If God is sovereign over belief and unbelief, then it’s his prerogative to determine who will and will not respond to the gospel. We see Peter preach, and three thousand get saved. Paul saw hundreds, even thousands, turn in faith to Jesus, and we think God has also called us to preach the gospel. Yet God also used Moses and Isaiah and Ezekiel to share his message. If we judged them numerically, we’d consider them failures. The real question is, Can we continue to be faithful even if it appears that what we are doing is failing? Can we persist in sharing the gospel even if it takes us—like it took Adoniram Judson, the Baptist missionary to Burma—six years to see someone converted?

What we can’t do is use this passage as an excuse not to share the gospel. That would be sin. A lack of evangelism is laziness. A lack of fruit in evangelism is not. Our goal needs to be biblically informed methods and a Christ-centered, theologically accurate understanding of the gospel. We leave the results up to God.

Not everyone in our passage rejects the gospel. In the summary of Jesus’s message, he promises that those who believe in him will not remain in darkness (v. 46) but will have eternal life (v. 50). Belief in Jesus is not a sentimental salve for our guilt-ridden consciences.

• It’s deliverance from the kingdom of darkness.
• It’s redemption from the penalty of death.
• It’s enjoyment of the new life—the life God intended for us.
• It’s confidence in our renewed and restored relationship with the Creator.
• It’s the bedrock of our souls and the source of lives of good works.

Genuine belief brings radical, complete, and lasting transformation of the whole person from the inside out.

There is one final group of people who seem to fall somewhere between belief and unbelief. They believe in Jesus—in some way—but are unwilling to confess that belief (v. 46). We might think they’re merely shy or immature, but verse 43 tells us what motivates their decision. They love the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God. What a stark contrast from the genuine belief of Isaiah, who saw the glory of God and placed his faith in Jesus Christ (v. 41). These silent, pseudo-believers are drawn to Jesus in some sense, but they value earthly applause more than Jesus, revealing a shallow, empty faith.

Jesus has no secret followers. The New Testament never mentions this category. God calls those who believe to be baptized, join a church, and participate in the Lord’s Supper—all public expressions of a new internal reality. If you think you can be a secret follower, then you’re deceived (v. 47). Jesus goes on to say that the Father will judge them on the last day. Some listen to the Word but do not follow it. They are Sunday Christians. They may come by after the service and thank the preacher for the message, but they do not obey God’s Word. They do not follow Jesus Christ.

John wrote his Gospel to help us believe. He didn’t provide us with an excuse for unbelief. This teaching on unbelief follows Jesus’s pleading words to “believe in the light” (v. 36). This passage is about God’s power to save, so trust him to save. Ask him to save. Tell people he can save. The most rigid unbelief shatters like glass when God swings his mighty hammer of grace. God is sovereign over unbelief, which means unbelief must bow before him. Unbelief cannot say no when God says yes. Someone’s unbelief may seem like a roadblock too big to navigate, but God is bigger than unbelief. Trust him, pray to him, share the gospel, and then see the roadblock crumble as his grace sweeps in.

Reflect and Discuss

1. What is unbelief?
2. Can you have belief in Jesus apart from accepting and believing the Word of God?
3. How is unbelief a spiritual state rather than a mental one?
4. How does John make clear that the unbelief of the people is not for lack of evidence or signs from Jesus?
5. Why was the people’s unbelief necessary?
6. How does Acts 28:28 shed light on why God would not open the hearts of many Jews to believe in Jesus?
7. When you come to a challenging problem in Scripture, what do you do?
8. What two truths do we see in John’s explanation of unbelief?
9. How is election itself an example of belief in God’s goodness and purposes?
10. Could this passage be used to excuse Christians from evangelism? Why or why not?