Because of this, the rumour spread among the brothers that this disciple would not die. But Jesus did not say that he would not die; he only said, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?”
It is easy to see how the early church could have misunderstood the words of Jesus and come up with the conclusion that John would not die until Christ came back, but they had misconstrued Christ’s words and intentions and John was determined to set the record straight. Notice that even though John has the habit of slight variation when statements are repeated, here he quotes the statement of Jesus exactly as in the previous verse.
This error of the early church would have been one they would have welcomed quite readily which made it all too easy to believe. We are the same as they and often believe what we want to be true. They must have thought that although Jesus was gone into heaven, at least His beloved disciple would be here until His return to bless and lead the church. We are the ones, however, who rely too much on men and programs and methods. God is quite capable of carrying on a work even if the leader is removed or the methods changed. Our trust needs to be in Him and not in men or the way things have always been done.