What Sign Do You Show Us? -John 2:18-22

John 2:18-22 ESV
So the Jews said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “It has taken forty- six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he was speaking about the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

The Jewish leaders had not seen a sign showing that He was from God. They were not present at the wedding, but they would not have believed if they had been. This would be plain enough in the coming days. They could not see Him because they were so focused on themselves.

Jesus obliquely answers the question with a reference to His upcoming resurrection. Their focus and religion is based on the temple. Jesus tries to redirect their attention to the God Who once dwelled in that place. Their temple is but a shadow of the true temple. The light of the true temple stands before them, but darkness inside their hearts prevents them from comprehension of that light.

Notice that Jesus says "He" will raise the temple. Elsewhere we are told this was done by the power of God and that He was raised by the Holy Spirit. This serves as confirmation that Jesus is a member of the Holy Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

John tells us that the disciples would realize that both Scripture and Jesus were saying the same thing, the truth of God. He begins his gospel with the fact that Jesus is the word of God and is God. In Revelation we are told He is the faithful and true witness, the beginning and the end. "And they believed the Scripture and the word Jesus had spoken."


Matthew 12:38-40
38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” 39 But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

Romans 8:11
If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

1 Corinthians 15:3-7
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.