Category Archives: Miracles

Introduction

A large body of teaching regarding the interpretation of the Sabbath thus began to emerge before and after the coming of Christ. These interpretations were first preserved and passed on as oral traditions and then later put into writing.

In the third century A. D. a written compilation of the oral traditions of the scribes was completed, which was known as the Mishnah. It contained 63 tractates on various subjects of the Law, requiring about 800 pages in English.[1]

Later Judaism set itself to the task of interpreting these interpretations. These commentaries on the Mishnah are called Talmuds. “Of the Jerusalem Talmud there are 12 printed volumes; and of the Babylonian Talmud there are 60 printed volumes.”[2]

The Law lays it down that the Sabbath Day is to be kept holy, and that on it no work is to be done. That is a great principle. But these Jewish legalists had a passion for definition. So they asked: What is work? All kinds of things were classified as work.

For instance, to carry a burden on the Sabbath Day is to work. But next a burden has to be defined.

So the Scribal Law lays it down that a burden is “food equal in weight to a dried fig, enough wine for mixing in a goblet, milk enough for one swallow, honey enough to put upon a wound, oil enough to anoint a small member, water enough to moisten an eye‑salve, paper enough to write a customs house notice upon, ink enough to write two letters of the alphabet, reed enough to make a pen”—and so on endlessly.

So they spent endless hours arguing whether a man could or could not lift a lamp from one place to another on the Sabbath, whether a tailor committed a sin if he went out with a needle in his robe, whether a woman might wear a brooch or false hair, even if a man might go out on the Sabbath with artificial teeth or an artificial limb, if a man might lift his child on the Sabbath Day.

Medical attention could be given only if a life was in danger. To take some examples—a woman in childbirth might be helped on the Sabbath; an infection of the throat might be treated; if a wall fell on anyone, enough might be cleared away to see whether he was dead or alive; if he was alive he might be helped, if he was dead the body must be left until the next day. A fracture could not be attended to. Cold water might not be poured on a sprained hand or foot. A cut finger might be bandaged with a plain bandage but not with ointment. That is to say, at the most an injury could be kept from getting worse; it must not be made better.^[3]

In his Antiquities, the Jewish historian Josephus reports that it was also because Jews would not defend themselves on the Sabbath that the Roman general Pompey was able to capture Jerusalem. As was the custom in ancient Roman warfare, Pompey began building a high mound from which his troops could bombard the city. Aware that the Jews defending Jerusalem would not oppose him then, the general did all construction work on the Sabbath. “Had it not been for that practice, from the days of our forefathers, to rest on the seventh day,” Josephus wrote, “this bank could never have been perfected, by reason of the opposition the Jews would have made; for though our Law gave us leave then to defend ourselves against those that begin to fight with us and assault us (this was a concession), yet it does not permit us to meddle with our enemies while they do anything else.”

One section alone of the Talmud, the major compilation of Jewish tradition, has twenty-four chapters listing Sabbath laws. One law specified that the basic limit for travel was 3,000 feet from one’s house; but various exceptions were provided. If you had placed some food within 3,000 feet of your house, you could go there to eat it; and because the food was considered an extension of the house, you could then go another 3,000 feet beyond the food. If a rope were placed across an adjoining street or alley, the building on the other side, as well as the alley between, could be considered part of your house.

Certain objects could be lifted up and put down only from and to certain places. Other things could be lifted up from a public place and set down in a private one, and vice versa. Still others could be picked up in a wide place and put down in a legally free place—but rabbis could not agree about the meanings of wide and free.

Under Sabbath regulations, a Jew could not carry a load heavier than a dried fig; but if an object weighed half that amount he could carry it twice. Eating restrictions were among the most detailed and extensive. You could eat nothing larger than an olive; and even if you tasted half an olive, found it to be rotten and spit it out, that half was considered to have been eaten as far as the allowance was concerned.

Throwing an object into the air with one hand and catching it with the other was prohibited. If the Sabbath overtook you as you reached for some food, the food was to be dropped before drawing your arm back, lest you be guilty of carrying a burden.

Tailors did not carry a needle with them on the Sabbath for fear they might be tempted to mend a garment and thereby perform work. Nothing could be bought or sold, and clothing could not be dyed or washed. A letter could not be dispatched, even if by the hand of a Gentile. No fire could be lit or extinguished—including fire for a lamp—although a fire already lit could be used within certain limits. For that reason, some orthodox Jews today use automatic timers to turn on lights in their homes well before the Sabbath begins. Otherwise they might forget to turn them on in time and have to spend the night in the dark.

Baths could not be taken for fear some of the water might spill onto the floor and “wash” it. Chairs could not be moved because dragging them might make a furrow in the ground, and a woman was not to look in a mirror lest she see a gray hair and be tempted to pull it out. You could carry ink enough to draw only two letters of the alphabet, and false teeth could not be worn because they exceeded the weight limit for burdens.

According to those hair-splitting regulations, a Jew could not pull off even a handful of grain to eat on the Sabbath unless he were starving—which, of course, is often a difficult thing to determine and would be cause for considerable differences of opinion. If a person became ill on the Sabbath, only enough treatment could be given to keep him alive. Treatment to make him improve was declared to be work, and therefore forbidden. To determine just how much food, medicine, or bandaging would be necessary to keep a person alive—and no more—was itself an impossible burden.

Among the many other forbidden Sabbath activities were: sewing, plowing, reaping, grinding, baking, threshing, binding sheaves, winnowing, sifting, dying, shearing, spinning, kneading, separating or weaving two threads, tying or untying a knot, and sewing two stitches.

The Sabbath was anything but a time of rest. It had become a time of oppressive frustration and anxiety. The people were sick to death of this system that had been imposed on them by ungodly, worldly legalists, and they were indeed “weary and heavy-laden” (Matt. 11:28).^[4]

(i) To the Pharisee religion was ritual; it meant obeying certain rules and regulations. Jesus broke these regulations and they were genuinely convinced that he was a bad man. It is like the man who believes that religion consists in going to church, reading the Bible, saying grace at meals, having family worship, and carrying out all the external acts which are looked on as religious, and who yet never put himself out to do anything for anyone, who has no sense of sympathy, no desire to sacrifice, who is serene in his rigid orthodoxy, and deaf to the call of need and blind to the tears of the world.

(ii) To Jesus religion was service. It was love of God and love of men. Ritual was irrelevant compared with love in action.

“Our Friend, our Brother, and our Lord, What may Thy service be? Nor name, nor form, nor ritual word, But simply following Thee.”

To Jesus the most important thing in the world was not the correct performance of a ritual, but the spontaneous answer to the cry of human need.^[5]

These things to them were the essence of religion. Their religion was a legalism of petty rules and regulations.[6]

We can hardly be surprised to find a head‑on collision between the scribes and Pharisees and our Lord over the issue of the Sabbath. The gospel writers record numerous occasions when the Jewish religious leaders clashed with Jesus over the interpretation of the Sabbath.

Almost always this resulted from an incident in which are Lord “violated the Sabbath” according to the legalistic teachings and interpretations of the scribes and Pharisees. Such incidents are helpful to us in our study of the Sabbath, for they allow us to see some of the ways in which the Bible was wrongly interpreted, as well as the true interpretation of the Sabbath as given by our Lord. Let us learn from the errors of the Jewish religious leaders, and especially from the divine interpretation of the Sabbath by our Lord.

Our method in this message will be to consider a few of the key “Sabbath texts” in the gospels, and to attempt to learn how the legalistic interpretation of the scribes and Pharisees was in error.

Further, we will compare and contrast the wrong interpretation with the correct interpretation of our Lord. Then, at the end of the lesson we will try to summarize our Lord’s teaching on the Sabbath, and to seek to discover some pertinent principles which are relevant to our lives as Christians. In the next (and final) lesson on the Sabbath we will see how the apostles interpreted the Sabbath and how the New Testament church sought to apply the Sabbath in a new dispensation. For now, let us turn to the gospels of the New Testament to see how our Lord’s view of the Sabbath differed from that of religious leaders of His day.

Matthew 12:1‑14

A seemingly innocent act on the part of our Lord’s disciples precipitated an incident in which the Pharisees challenged the Lord Jesus to defend or denounce His disciples: “At that time Jesus went on the Sabbath through the grain fields, and His disciples became hungry and began to pick the heads of grain and eat. But when the Pharisees saw it, they said to Him, ‘Behold, Your disciples do what is not lawful to do on a Sabbath’” (Matthew 12:1‑2).

Let us begin by gaining a sense of the context, gaining an overview of the passage. These verses describe two separate incidents: (1) the protest of the Pharisees that Jesus’ disciples violated the Sabbath by gathering grain and eating it as they walked through the fields; and (2) the issue raised by the synagogue leaders,[7] knowing Jesus was about to heal the man with the withered hand. The Savior meets Jewish objections in the first instance by citing two incidents in the Old Testament where people were vindicated for technically breaking the Sabbath: David, when he took the sacred shewbread and shared it with his men, and the Old Testament priests, who regularly violate the Sabbath by working at their priestly jobs on this day.

Undaunted by the challenge of the Pharisees, our Lord catches His opponents completely off guard by referring to an Old Testament text which remarkably paralleled this situation: “But He said to them, ‘Have you not read what David did, when he became hungry, he and his companions; how he entered the house of God, and they ate the consecrated bread, which was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those with him, but for the priests alone?’” (Matthew 12:3‑4).

Before looking at the response of our Lord, let us make several important observations about what is happening here that is foundational to an accurate interpretation of this text.

(1) Our Lord was not being accused of wrongdoing here. The issue here is the “harvesting” and “threshing” of grain by our Lord’s disciples. Jesus was being challenged to either condemn the deeds of His disciples or to condone them, thereby opposing the authority and the interpretation of the Pharisees.

(2) While the Torah (the Law of Moses) nowhere condemns such an act, the Halakah (the Jewish collection of interpretations) did.

(3) Amazingly, Jesus granted the assumption that the actions of His disciples was “work” and thus a breaking of the Sabbath.

These three facts provided the Lord with a golden opportunity to avoid the issue of the Sabbath, and to concentrate only on the technical questions involved. Often, Jesus did avoid “creating a scene,” whether it be that of performing a miracle publicly, or that of inciting a dispute prematurely between Himself and His adversaries. Here, Jesus could have referred His critics to His disciples, since He had not gathered any heads of grain for Himself, nor had He eaten any. He could have pointed to the fact that the Torah nowhere called such a minimal effort work, and that this was only the fallacious conclusion of some misguided, knit‑picking scholars. Instead, Jesus chose to let these technical matters go by the boards. He wanted to discuss the interpretation of the Sabbath and His activities which could be construed to be a breaking of the Fourth Commandment. Here is a matter Jesus did want to discuss, and He sidestepped every peripheral issue to get to the heart of the matter.

Bearing these things in mind, notice how skillfully our Lord answered the challenge of the Pharisees. Knowing full well that He would not change the Pharisees’ minds about the disciples’ actions being viewed as work, Jesus allowed the allegation of Sabbath‑breaking to go unchallenged (even though wrong). Our Lord then turned His critics’ attention to an Old Testament event which beautifully paralleled His own situation in critical points. He points to the time when David was fleeing from Saul, accompanied by a few men, and when David and his hungry men took consecrated bread from Ahimelech the priest and ate it (cf. 1 Samuel 21:1-9). Note the common denominators of both incidents, which make the Old Testament case a precedent for our Lord’s actions, along with His followers.

(1) David and the Lord both had followers with them, who participated in their “Sabbath‑breaking”.[8]

(2) Food was eaten to alleviate hunger. Hunger prompted Jesus’ disciples to pluck the grain, just as it necessitated David and his men eating the sacred bread.

(3) Something which was sanctified, set apart for a special use, was profaned by being put to a common use. In David’s case, sanctified bread, set apart for use only by the priests’ was eaten. The Lord’s disciples, too, profaned the Sabbath (which was sanctified) by gathering grain, which was common labor.

(4) There were considerations which justified actions that normally would have been condemned as Law‑breaking.

We can see that the similarities in these two situations are similar enough so that the justification for David’s actions (and, of course, his men) might also vindicate our Lord’s disciples from the charge of Law‑breaking. Let us pay close attention to the argument which our Lord puts forward here, for it is a master‑stroke.

This passage contains a great general truth. Jesus said to the Pharisees, “Have you not read what David did?” The answer of course was, “Yes”—but they had never seen what it meant. It is possible to read scripture meticulously, to know the Bible inside out from cover to cover, to be able to quote it verbatim and to pass any examination on it—and yet completely miss its real meaning. Why did the Pharisees miss the meaning—and why do we so often miss it?

Jesus reminded the Pharisees of a familiar story about David and his companions as they fled for their lives south of Gibeah to escape the jealous and vengeful Saul. When they came to Nob, where the Tabernacle was then located, they asked for food. Ahimelech the priest gave them the consecrated bread of the Presence, which was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those with him, but for the priests alone, because there was “no ordinary bread on hand” in the Tabernacle (1 Sam. 21:4).

The bread of the Presence was baked weekly, and each Sabbath twelve fresh loaves (representing the twelve tribes) replaced the previous ones, which could be eaten only by the priests. On that particular occasion, however, an exception was made on behalf of David and his men, who were weak from hunger. God was not offended by that act, and He did not discipline either Ahimelech or David. The Lord was willing for a ceremonial regulation to be violated when doing so was necessary to meet the needs of His beloved people.

If God makes allowances for His own law to be broken under certain circumstances for the welfare of His people, Jesus said, He surely permits purposeless and foolish man-made traditions to be broken for that purpose.^[9]

(i) They did not bring to scripture an open mind. They came to scripture not to learn God’s will but to find proof texts to buttress up their own ideas. Far too often men have taken their theology to the Bible instead of finding their theology in the Bible. When we read scripture we must say, not, “Listen, Lord, for thy servant is speaking,” but, “Speak, Lord, for thy servant is listening.”

(ii) They did not bring a needy heart. The man who comes with no sense of need always misses the deepest meaning of scripture. When need awakens, the Bible is a new book.

When we read God’s book we must bring to it the open mind and the needy heart—and then to us also it will be the greatest book in the world. ^[10]

First, our Lord assumes that the actions of David and his men are acceptable to the Judaism of His day,[11] and thus, to His adversaries. Nobody wanted to accuse David of wrong‑doing here. Second, if this is so, then the Pharisees granted exceptions to the Law. Third, if Law‑breaking was allowed in some cases, it must be to some higher reason or consideration. What, then, are the reasons for which David could be acquitted, and for which our Lord and His disciples could be as well?

1 Samuel 21, David did not specifically ask for any of the sacred bread, that is all that was at hand. Ahimelech volunteered to give David some of this bread so long as his men had not been defiled. I think that there were three reasons why Ahimelech gave this bread without reservation: (1) Ahimelech did not find the Law so rigid as to prohibit meeting the needs of men under such special circumstances. (2) He believed that David had come from the king. (3) He believed that David had been sent on an important assignment by the king. These considerations led the priest to the conclusion that the prohibition of the Law could be set aside in the case of David and his men. Note well that Ahimelech did not cast aside his obligation to preserve the sanctity of the bread. He did insist that David’s men must be free from defilement. One must assume that if this condition were not met, the bread would not have been given these men. The sanctified bread was not profaned in the process.

Ahimelech had some good reasons for giving David and his men bread. Nevertheless, these were probably not the same reasons the Jewish scholars and teachers had for justifying this act of David. My opinion is that they focused on who David was. Since David was God’s anointed, Israel’s next king, it was right for he and his men to eat the consecrated bread and thus to save their lives. Their motto might have been, “better fed than dead.” David’s men could well eat the consecrated bread because of whom it was they followed. The implications for Jesus’ followers should not have passed them by. Luke, in his account of the same event, adds this statement of our Lord, which presses home the point: “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:5).[12] If for David’s sake (and thus Israel’s) the Law could be temporarily and technically violated, how much more for the sake of his Lord?

These are all good reasons, and may very well be implied in our Lord’s words to the Pharisees. I think, however, that there was one simple reason which our Lord sought to emphasize above all others—David and his men should have been fed the sacred bread because they were hungry and this was the only food available. The hunger factor is clearly stated by our Lord (Matthew 12:1, 3). Certain things were sanctified, set apart by God, to teach the Israelites about sanctification, not to cause them hardship and suffering. Thus, when Law‑keeping would endanger David’s life or the lives of his men, the practice of the Law could be modified (not ignored altogether) to meet the needs of men.

Mark presses this point in his account of the same incident when he records this statement of our Lord: “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). If the Sabbath was made for man’s benefit and not man for the benefit of the Sabbath, then when a particular Sabbath practice posed a hardship on man, it may legitimately, in some exceptional cases, be set aside.[13] How beautifully Jesus turned the tables on His adversaries. It was not He who was unbiblical, they were out of step with the Scriptures.

If the Pharisees thought they had Jesus at a disadvantage in the matter of His disciples’ actions in the grain fields, they were wrong. After the first argument in verses 3 and 4, the Pharisees’ heads must have been spinning, but rather to stop here, suggesting He had but one text in support of His thesis, Jesus struck a second blow, providing yet another precedent for His actions from the Old Testament Scriptures in verses 5‑8:

“Or have you not read in the Law, that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath, and are innocent? But I say to you, that something greater than the temple is here. But if you had known what this means, ‘I DESIRE COMPASSION, AND NOT A SACRIFICE,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:5‑8).

Not only was David vindicated in the Scriptures and by the Pharisees for partaking of the consecrated bread, along with his followers, the priests who ministered in the temple on the Sabbath were justified in “breaking the Sabbath Law” as well. The argument in verse 5 is meticulous. It is not the greatness of the priests which justified their violation of the Fourth Commandment—it was the greatness of the temple, the greatness of the cause or the work in which the were engaged. No Jew needed to be convinced of the greatness of the temple, and thus temple service was a readily accepted justification for the priests working on the Sabbath.

These two cases which our Lord has cited might be used as precedents for His own actions and attitude toward the Sabbath, but He is not content to leave the matter at that. Jesus is no mere equal to David and to the priests, to be covered by the precedent they have set. He is their superior, their Sovereign. Thus, in the closing words of this argument, the Lord Jesus uses this occasion to boldly claim His deity, which not only allows Him to technically violate the Sabbath, it gives Him the freedom to set it aside altogether if He pleases.

As great as the temple might be to the Pharisee, our Lord claims to be “greater than the temple” (v. 6). By claiming as well to be “Lord of the Sabbath” He is also claiming to be greater than David, or any other man. Why was Jesus justified in doing what He did? Because He who is God can do as He pleases. If God established the Sabbath, and man was commanded to imitate Him in resting on the seventh day, then Jesus, as God, can do away with it, working on it if He pleases, and commanding others to do likewise. God can declare the Sabbath and He can disregard it, too.

Verse 7 strikes at the heart of the problem of His adversaries: they have focused on the mechanical, ritualistic, aspects of the Sabbath, and in so doing they have failed to meet its essence, which is mercy and compassion. They have lingered long over the letter of the Law, but they have missed its spirit.

When Jesus cites the words of the prophet Hosea, “I desire compassion, and not a sacrifice” (6:6),[14] He wields a double‑edged sword. In the first place, He stresses the overriding principle of compassion. For David to have fed his men the consecrated bread may have been a technical violation of the Law, but it was an act of compassion, thus complying with the spirit of that Law. The same can be said for the disciples’ eating the grain on that Sabbath day. Second, the context of this quotation serves as a veiled rebuke to the Pharisees, for in Hosea legalism is condemned, and that condemnation is often directed against the leaders of the nation Israel (cf. Hosea 5:1‑2; 6:9).

The Healing of the Withered Hand (Matthew 12:9‑14)

And departing from there, He went into their synagogue. And behold, there was a man with a withered hand. And they questioned Him, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”—in order that they might accuse Him. And He said to them, “What man shall there be among you, who shall have one sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will he not take hold of it, and lift it out? Of how much more value then is a man than a sheep! So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:9‑14).

The situation is quite different here. It is not the actions of the Lord’s disciples which are at issue, but the anticipated healing of the man with the withered hand. The wickedness of the opponents of our Lord is clearly demonstrated in this text. Jesus departed from the previous debate over the Sabbath and, on the Sabbath, enters the synagogue, apparently the one which His opponents from the last encounter normally attended. This is signaled by the designation “their synagogue” in verse 9.

While we are not told all of the details, it seems relatively clear that Jesus saw the man as he entered the synagogue. That man, if he knew who Jesus was, would have petitioned Him to heal him. Jesus must have stopped at the man’s request and the Pharisees knew that a healing was about to take place. They seized this opportunity to raise a question about the legitimacy of healing on the Sabbath. They did this knowing that Jesus would thus have to take a stand on the Sabbath and also would perform the healing, thus deliberately violating the Law as they interpreted it. Jesus was, in their minds, going to end up “between a rock and a hard place.”

The only “hard place” was that in which our Lord’s adversaries would find themselves by the time His argument was concluded. Jesus took a totally different tack in defending His actions here. He answered their question with one of His own. Here, He did not focus on Himself, nor on the Old Testament Scriptures, but on His adversaries and on His ailing friend nearby. He exposes their hypocrisy by comparing what they justified in themselves with what they condemned in Jesus.

Jesus wished to point out the glaring inconsistency of the Pharisees by showing their double standard in interpreting and applying the Law: one set of standards for themselves; another when judging Him. When it came to a mishap endangering one of their own animals, they had no qualms in “laboring” (thus breaking their interpretation of the Sabbath Law) to rescue it from danger (v. 11). If they valued their cattle so much that they would risk violating the Sabbath, could Jesus be wrong in placing a higher value on an ailing man by healing him on the Sabbath?

The Sabbath Commandment was not to be misinterpreted so as to deprive one of the ability to do good to another in need. The compassion in which the Lord delighted in principle (Hosea 6:6), was the compassion which needed to be applied in particular on this Sabbath day—and was, when Jesus commanded that the man stretch out his hand, so as to be healed (v. 13). While good men would have rejoiced (and some surely did), the adversaries of our Lord went out, counseling together as to how to do away with Him (v. 14). Thus, the Law, if given for man’s good, does not command us to do evil by neglecting to do good to those in need.

John 5:1‑18

Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes. … And a certain man was there, who had been thirty‑eight years in his sickness. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?” The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Arise, take up your pallet, and walk.” And immediately the man became well, and took up his pallet and began to walk. Now it was the Sabbath on that day. Therefore the Jews were saying to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not permissible for you to carry your pallet.” But he answered them, “He who made me well was the one who said to me, ‘Take up your pallet and walk.’” They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your pallet, and walk’?” But he who was healed did not know who it was; for Jesus had slipped away while there was a crowd in that place. Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “Behold, you have become well; do not sin any more, so that nothing worse may befall you.” The man went away, and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. And for this reason the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because He was doing these things on the Sabbath. But He answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I Myself am working.” For this cause therefore the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Him, because He not only was breaking the Sabbath, but also was calling God His own Father, making Himself equal with God” (John 5:2, 5‑18).

Time will not permit a thorough study of this text, but we will focus our attention on the highlights of the passage as they relate to the Sabbath controversy. Our Lord not only commanded the man to rise up (thus, to be healed), but also to carry his pallet, his bed (thus, technically violating the Jewish interpretation of the Sabbath Law). Initially, the Jews challenged the healed man for violation of the Sabbath. The man was undaunted, believing that anyone who had the power to heal him also had the authority to tell him to carry his bed. Jesus had silently slipped away from the scene, so that the man had not discovered His name.

Later, Jesus found the man, urging him to sin no more, lest greater evil befall him. It was at this time that the man learned his healer’s name was Jesus, and so he reported this to the Jews. This resulted in the Jews turning their wrath toward the Lord Jesus, persecuting Him for His Sabbath violation. Our Lord’s one sentence response is one of the most profound statements in the gospels: “My Father is working until now, and I Myself am working” (John 5:17). This bold statement indicates a significant change in God’s dealings with Israel, a change so dramatic that it required a response which appeared to be a violation of the Old Testament Law, particularly the Fourth Commandment. Let us consider the nature of this change.

(1) Jesus claimed that the Father is no longer resting, but is at work, even on the Sabbath. The Sabbath rest of God, described in Genesis 2:1‑3, was the result of His having finished the work of creation. The work which God was then undertaking in the coming of Christ was the work of redemption. There is thus a change of program, from that of creation (completed) to that of redemption (in process). If Jesus was right (and He surely was) God was also a Sabbath‑breaker, when viewed according to the former standard of the Fourth Commandment as interpreted by the Jews. David’s men could break the Law by eating consecrated bread because their leader did. Jesus’ followers could “harvest” grain on the Sabbath, if it was right for their leader to do so. And now, Jesus Himself can break the Sabbath because God the Father was doing it.

(2) The keeping of the Sabbath was a sign of the Mosaic Covenant, but this sign was to be set aside, along with the covenant, due to the new covenant which Christ would institute by His redemptive work on the cross.

(3) While obedience to God was once manifested by imitating God in ceasing from labor, obedience to God now required the imitation of God in labor. Since God was at work up to and including that very moment (which was on the Sabbath), imitating God required working on the Sabbath as well.

(4) Jesus here not only identified Himself with God, He identified Himself as God. This is evident from the reaction of the Jews to Jesus’ words:

For this cause therefore the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Him, because He not only was breaking the Sabbath, but also was calling God His own Father, making Himself equal with God (John 5:18).

John 7:21‑24

Jesus answered and said to them, “I did one deed, and you all marvel. On this account Moses has given you circumcision (not because it is from Moses, but from the fathers); and on the Sabbath you circumcise a man. If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath that the Law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with Me because I made an entire man well on the Sabbath? Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment” (John 7:21‑24).

The debate which began in John chapter 5 was not finished, and so the charge of a “violation of the Sabbath” which was leveled against the Lord Jesus there is picked up again in chapter 7. Verses 21 and 23 of chapter 7 point back to the healing of the man at the pool of Bethesda. Jesus gives one further response in verses 22 and 23 which provides yet another argument in His defense with regard to the charge of breaking the Sabbath by the healing of this man.

When the keeping of the Sabbath is to be practiced according to the interpretation of the Pharisees, there was yet another group of Sabbath-breakers which they must reckon with: those parents who circumcised their sons on the Sabbath. From the legalistic point of view of the Pharisees, it was possible for two of God’s commandments to conflict with each other. The Law of Moses required that a new son must be circumcised on his 8th day (Lev. 12:3). If this day happened to fall on the Sabbath, the Jews who condemned Jesus for healing on this day would themselves circumcise their sons on the same day, and without any sense of guilt. Our Lord’s accusers were once again found to be hypocritical, and superficial in their concept of true obedience.

On the surface, circumcising a son on the Sabbath was an infraction of the letter of the Sabbath Law. In reality, circumcising on the Sabbath was keeping the Sabbath in terms of the spirit of the Law. Righteous judgment must look deeper than just at the outward appearance of an act. The Pharisees were being hypocritical, for they judged Jesus according to a different standard than that by which they judged their own actions.

Conclusion

Our Lord’s commentary on the Fourth Commandment is of great importance and relevance to contemporary Christians. Let us explore some of the implications of His teaching on the Sabbath as we conclude this lesson.

The first lesson which we should learn from the Sabbath controversy in the gospels is that the central and foundational issue underlying the controversy is not Jesus’ interpretation, but Jesus’ identity. The Jews sought to put Jesus to death as a result of His defense. The reason was not only because those who opposed Him were put to shame, but because the Sabbath controversy was but further proof that Jesus was God incarnate.

When you read through the gospels carefully, you will discover that at the outset of His ministry Jesus performed miracles on the Sabbath, but that they were not challenged.[15] What caused the change? What made the “violation of the Sabbath” such a heated issue? The answer is this: Jesus had clearly claimed to be God incarnate. The Sabbath controversy was therefore the attempt to prove Jesus a Law‑breaker, thus proving that such a “sinner” could not be God: “Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, ‘This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath.’ But others were saying, ‘How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?’ And there was a division among them” (John 9:16).

The Gospel of Mark illustrates the sequence of events which led to the Sabbath controversy. In 1:21‑28 Jesus cast an unclean spirit from a man in a synagogue in Capernaum on the Sabbath, yet there was no objection raised, only praise. In chapter 2 Jesus first forgave the sins of the paralytic who had been lowered through the roof of the house where Jesus was speaking. The scribes reasoned that only God could forgive sins, and thus that Jesus was making the claim to be God. Thus, in the closing verses of chapter 2 the Sabbath controversy is commenced. The Sabbath issue was but a symptom problem, an attempt to prove Jesus to be a sinner, and not the Son of God. This debate, like countless other debates throughout church history, was not a search for truth but an attempt to squelch the truth.

The identity of Jesus as the Son of God was the heart of the Sabbath issue. Jesus could work on the Sabbath because He was the Son of God (John 5:16‑17), One greater than the temple (Matthew 12:6), and greater than David—Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8). Since God the Father was the Sabbath maker, Jesus, as God, can not only break the Sabbath, He can abolish it altogether. As God, Jesus could work on the Sabbath, and more than this, He could offer men true rest, a rest far superior to the Old Testament Sabbath rest, and surely far better than any rest which the Pharisees had to offer. It is no accident that these verses immediately precede the great Sabbath debate in Matthew’s gospel: “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy‑laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart; and you shall find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My load is light” (Matthew 11:28‑30).

There is only one true rest, my friend, and that is the rest which Jesus Christ gives, the rest of forgiveness of sins, the rest of ceasing from striving to be holy, and of being found holy in Him. I pray that this rest is yours.

Second, we learn that the fundamental difference between the interpretation of Jesus and that of the Pharisees was the difference between the precepts of Scripture and the principles of Scripture. If we are to understand the difference between a precept and a principle, we must first define each of these terms and then differentiate between them.

A PRECEPT IS A SPECIFIC RULE, PRESCRIBING A CERTAIN ACTION UNDER CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES.

A PRINCIPLE IS A GENERAL GUIDELINE, INTENDED TO RESULT IN DIFFERENT ACTIONS UNDER A VARIETY OF CIRCUMSTANCES.

An example of a precept is: “You cannot go to the store with Sally today.” A principle would be: “I don’t like you spending time with Sally, so don’t associate with her.” In the precept, a specific action is prohibited. In the principle, a general course of action is prescribed.

Our children love rules, not because of their restrictiveness, but because of the ease with which we can overcome them. In the case of the precept “You cannot go to the store with Sally today,” our children can spend time with Sally, just so long as they don’t go to the store. They can even go to the store with her, so long as it is not today. Precepts direct our actions in particular; principles guide our conduct in general.

The difference between the Pharisees and Jesus was the difference between viewing the Old Testament only as precepts and understanding it as teaching principles which guide men’s lives in the application of its precepts, and when there are no precepts which apply to our specific predicament. To the Pharisees, the essence of the Fourth Commandment was this precept: Thou shalt not work. To the Lord Jesus, the essence of this commandment was this principle: Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. One could cease from work on the Sabbath (as the Pharisees did) without keeping the Sabbath holy. Contrarily, Jesus (and others, such as the temple priests) could also observe the Sabbath as a holy day by working on it. The Pharisees were so committed to the precept of not working that they neglected—indeed violated—the principle of keeping the Sabbath holy.

The Sermon on the Mount provides us with another example of how our Lord’s method of interpreting the (Old Testament) Scriptures differed from that of the scribes and Pharisees. The Pharisaical method of interpreting the Old Testament commandments looked at them only as precepts, specific rules for specific situations. Where the Old Testament was to general, they added particulars, thus the volumes of Jewish commentaries on the commentaries of the Law.

The Lord did not set aside any of the Old Testament precepts, but He did press beyond the precept to the underlying principle. Thus, the Pharisee could think of himself as a Law‑keeper if he did not kill anyone and did not commit adultery. Jesus sought to show these legalists that they did not go far enough. To the Lord Jesus, anger was murder and lust was adultery, in principle, and thus was sin to be avoided.

Please do not misunderstand me. I am not saying that we should seek to find only the principles of the Bible and forget the precepts. I am saying that we can only properly understand and keep the precepts of the Bible by following the principles of the Bible. Both principle and precept are necessary, but the former takes precedence over the latter.

In distinguishing precepts from principles we are not engaging in mere scholastic calisthenics. This is a very practical necessity for every Christian. Allow me to show you the practicality of differentiating between precepts and principles in two ways. The first has to do with the interpretation and application of the Bible, both of the Old Testament and the New. The second has to do with the vital link between Christian ethics and biblical principles, as well as that between Christian legalism and biblical precept (without biblical principle).

When we come to the interpretation and application of the Old Testament Scriptures, we must do so on the premise that, “All Scripture [specifically the Old Testament is in view here] is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16).

How can we apply the precepts of the Old Testament when they are given to a different people (the Jews), in a different dispensation, and with a culture and lifestyle that is foreign to our own? The answer: by determining the principle underlying the precept. Sometimes that principle is readily evident (as in the case with the Sabbath). At other times, the principle is hidden within the precept. That is why meditation is necessary to understand God’s Law.

On the surface, nothing could seem more irrelevant to the North Dallas Christian than the commandment, “You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing” (Deuteronomy 25:4). As a precept, this commandment would only relate to us if we owned oxen and raised grain. As a precept, therefore, this commandment is irrelevant to today’s Christian. As a principle‑conveying commandment, it has tremendous implications. The ox and the grain are incidental, illustrative of the principle that the one who works ought to benefit from his labor. Paul therefore appeals to this passage when he claims the right to be supported by those to whom he ministers (cf. 1 Corinthians 9:1‑14).

Another Old Testament commandment reads: “You are not to boil a kid in the milk of its mother” (Exodus 23:19; 34:26; Deuteronomy 14:21). The fact that this command is found three times should suggest it has something important to teach us. Since you and I do not raise (or eat) goats, this command has no relevance to us as a precept. The principle underlying it is most relevant to us, as I will attempt to show.

Now no Jew was to feel guilty about drinking goat’s milk. Neither was it wrong to eat a young kid; even when boiled in the milk of another goat. But when a kid was boiled in the milk of its mother, that was going too far. This is because there is a special relationship between the “kid” and its “mother,” the relationship between mother and child (offspring). The milk is the God‑given provision of the mother to sustain and strengthen its offspring. To boil a kid in its mother’s milk is to be insensitive to the relationship of mother, milk, and offspring. The milk which was divinely intended to preserve and promote the life of the kid is being used to destroy that kid (at least from the point of view of the mother goat). How insensitive.

To use that which was designed to preserve life for the purpose of destroying it was forbidden. Every pregnant woman who is considering an abortion should give careful thought to the principle behind this precept about goats, kids, and milk. The uterus of the woman is a place of safety, a means of protecting the child and promoting life and growth, and yet some women go to the abortionist and have them invade their womb and slaughter their child in that place of sanctity and safety. How cruel! How insensitive! How closely this act, in principle, comes to willfully rebelling against God’s commandment.

The distinction between precept and principle is also necessary when we attempt to interpret and apply the teachings of the New Testament to our lives today. The differences between the New Testament world and our own are many, and often we must interpret and apply the precepts of the New Testament in the light of the principle underlying them. For example, this frequently repeated precept is one which few Christians keep: “Greet one another with a holy kiss” (Romans 16:16; 1 Corinthians 16:20; 2 Corinthians 13:12; 1 Thessalonians 5:26; 1 Peter 5:14).

Why do we not do this when it is commanded so often, by so many New Testament writers? Unfortunately we may not obey this precept only out of ignorance or apathy. In studying the history of the church we find that there is a better explanation for the reticence of the church to follow this precept to the letter. Unbelievers often misunderstood what was taking place in the agape or “love feast” of the church (communion). They could only think of this in terms of the sexual indulgence common in heathen orgies. The biblical principle “avoid all appearance of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:22) was thus applied and thus the church chose to abstain from the practice of greeting one another with a holy kiss. The principle underlying this precept can be understood to be something like this: “visibly express your love for one another.” Since the principle of showing affection for one another can be practiced by other means (e. g. a handshake), Christians have felt no guilt about abstaining from “holy kissing,” especially in our western culture. Once again, distinguishing principle from precept can be of great importance to those who truly wish to be obedient to God in spirit and in truth.

Distinguishing between precept and principle will greatly assist us in avoiding that evil toward which conservative evangelicals are pre-disposed: legalism. Legalism is that tendency to strictly observe the rules, but to forget the reasons, to keep the letter of the Law, but not the spirit of it. Legalism is often related to literalism. While we should take the message of the Bible literally, the principle of a particular commandment may extend beyond the literal words. For example, literalism may view the commandment, “Don’t muzzle the ox …” as applying only to oxen and oxen owners. The principle presses us beyond the literal words without suggesting that they should be ignored. It means that taking God’s word seriously means going beyond the literal words to the principle. Legalism is simply literalism gone bad.

In thinking about my understanding and application of the New Testament, in a number of cases it has been my belief that a “New Testament church” is one which follows the precepts of the apostles and the practices of the churches. By and large this is still true. But my study of the Lord’s interpretation of the Old Testament has cautioned me about priding myself in conforming to the precepts and practices of the New Testament without giving serious thought to its principles. For example, the Scriptures have some very specific statements (precepts) about the role of women in the church. I believe that these must be taken seriously. But it is also possible (perhaps not probable, but possible) that following a particular practice found in the New Testament may violate the principle which underlies it.

Let’s take the troublesome New Testament teaching on women’s head coverings in 1 Corinthians chapter 11. Some churches feel (with great sincerity and conviction) that women should have their heads covered in church. Others are not sure this passage requires head covering at all. The principle underlying the precept (whatever it may be) is clear in the text—it is the principle of headship (of the Father over the Son, of Christ over the church, of the man over the woman cf. v. 3). It is conceivable that the imitation of the practice of the Corinthian church could, in our day and time, actually violate the principle which their practice applied. Thus, a legalistic imitation and repetition of New Testament church practices could, in some situations, be a violation of New Testament principles. Particular practices must therefore always be observed in the light of biblical principle, not on the basis of tradition alone.

To those who resist this thought as heresy, let me warn you that the Pharisees resisted the thought that working on the Sabbath could be the godly thing to do. To those who would love to find in my suggestion an excuse to set aside every New Testament practice which is either bothersome or culturally offensive, let me remind you that exceptions to biblical precepts (Old Testament or New) are few and far between, and based on solid, soul‑searching, agonizing, principle‑oriented study. The desire to preserve tradition as well as the desire to abolish it, should be critically evaluated.

Finally, while biblical precepts (positive and negative) provide us with the outside parameters for our conduct, biblical principles are the basis for the ethics which must guide us where precepts cannot.[16] The legalist wants to believe that life is guided by only two factors: WHAT IS COMMANDED, WHAT IS CONDEMNED. The legalist thinks that all of life can be lived with a kind of code book in hand. In any given situation there must be a specific rule (precept) which tells him what to do or what not to do. There is a broad black line between what one can do and what one cannot. Whenever there is no rule for a given situation, a new rule is made. Thus, the legalism of the Pharisees, and the endless rules and regulations of Judaism.

Christian conduct is not always legislated, but is guided by three essential factors: WHAT IS COMMANDED, ETHICS, WHAT IS CONDEMNED. What I must do. What I should do. What I must not do.

We all have difficulty doing those things we know to be right, and avoiding the things we know to be wrong. Paul’s agony in Romans 7 is familiar to every Christian. But there is another agony which Christians must face: the agony of knowing what is the right thing to do when there is no rule, no precept to tell us what we should do.

Those many things which are neither commanded nor condemned (which included Christian liberties—cf. 1 Corinthians 8‑10; Romans 14) fall into the broad category which many would call ethics. Precepts tell us what we must do or not do; principles guide us in discerning what we should do. Principles are therefore absolutely essential to the development of personal Christian ethics.

Many of the most agonizing issues Christians face today are ethical issues. These include: (1) birth control, (2) belonging to a labor union, (3) going on strike, (4) nuclear weapons and their use, (5) going to war/pacifism, (6) capital punishment. In my opinion these and many other questions are ethical issues, which can only be settled on the basis of principle and by the establishment of strong personal convictions (which means, incidentally, that other Christians may come to different convictions). If we learn from our Lord and other biblical writers how to distinguish biblical precepts from biblical principles we shall have the raw materials necessary for developing a system of personal ethics.

May God enable us to apply the lessons which we have learned from our Lord, by His grace and to His glory.

[1] William Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew (Edinburgh: The Saint Andrew Press, 1963), I, p. 126.

[2] Ibid.

^[3] William Barclay, ed., The Gospel of Mark, The Daily Study Bible Series (Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster John Knox Press, 1976), 67.

^[4] John F. MacArthur Jr., Matthew, vol. 2, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1985), 281–283.

^[5] William Barclay, ed., The Gospel of Mark, The Daily Study Bible Series (Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster John Knox Press, 1976), 69–70.

[6] Ibid, pp. 124‑125.

[7] The reader will note that the objectors are not precisely identified. Note, however, that Matthew tells us that Jesus went into “their synagogue” (v. 9), and that “they” (v. 10) questioned. In the light of this and of the overall Sabbath debate in the gospels, I think my suggestion that these were the Jewish leaders has some substance.

[8] Some may feel that David and his men are not guilty of Sabbath-breaking, but, more generally, Law‑breaking. In His own words, Jesus spoke of David’s actions as “not lawful” (v. 4). From the passage in 1 Samuel 21 and the stipulations governing the consecrated bread in Leviticus 24:5‑9 it is possible to infer that the particular day David arrived at Nob may have been the Sabbath. In the first place, the Sabbath was the day when the fresh bread replaced the old (Leviticus 24:8). Thus, the priest would have some available to give David. Secondly, in 1 Samuel 21:5 David uses a “much more” argument to show that “today” his men would be even more certain to be undefiled by contact with a woman.

^[9] John F. MacArthur Jr., Matthew, vol. 2, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1985), 285.

^[10] William Barclay, ed., The Gospel of Luke, The Daily Study Bible Series (Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster John Knox Press, 1975), 70–71.

[11] This is indeed interesting, for the account of David’s actions in 1 Samuel reveals some rather dubious deeds, including lying to the priest about the true reason for his appearance and request. If the Jews could see fit to justify David’s actions, in spite of some of his questionable actions, how could they possibly fail to approve of our Lord’s deeds?

[12] Luke cites our Lord’s words, “For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath,” after His first defense, while Matthew saves it until the second. The problem (if any existed) is solved by the fact that Luke wants us to see that this statement was underlying our Lord’s whole defense, not just one part of it. Thus, it is introduced in Luke, “And He was saying to them, ‘The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath’” (Luke 6:5). This was thus an on‑going, repeated thrust of our Lord’s teaching in this confrontation.

[13] I realize that this statement opens a virtual “Pandora’s box” and yet it can hardly be denied that this is what happened in David’s case, cited here by our Lord. Fallen man will of course want to consider an inconvenience a cause for setting God’s commands aside and this is not acceptable. Nevertheless, the fact that God’s laws have exceptions (as in the case of David) means that some circumstances do justify a modification of the application of the Law. This will be even clearer later on in this study.

[14] To fail to grasp the spirit of the Law is thus to fail to know God as He is, for the Law is the expression of God’s character. Thus, the error of the Pharisees was a distortion of the character and attributes of God. Thus, the second line of Hosea 6:6 reads: “And in the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

[15] Carson argues that the real issue with our Lord was not the fact that He worked on the Sabbath: “The fact that Jesus does not suffer public outrage for His exorcism [Mark 1:21‑28; Luke 4:31‑37] cannot escape notice; perhaps no Pharisees were present, and he could have opposed Jesus’ Sabbath practices (cf. Luke 13:10‑17). In what immediately follows, Jesus performs another miracle, one of healing (Mark 1:29‑31, Luke 4:[3]8-39), and again there is no adverse reaction, although it may be argued that the miracle occurred in the privacy of a home.

“The absence of opposition may, however, have a more comprehensive explanation. Up to this point Jesus has been scrupulous as far as the Torah is concerned, and has not clashed even with the Sabbath regulation of the Halakah. The Halakah was designed to put a fence around Torah while still leaving the people free to perform necessary tasks and (in the majority view) acts of mercy. It is doubtful that any consideration was given in the early stages to the legitimacy of Sabbath miracles, since the regulations dealt with work on the Sabbath. If the Halakic comments about healing were intended to govern medical practitioners and the ministrations of relatives and the like, it is hard to see how Jesus committed any offense at all. It appears, then, that Jesus’ Sabbath practices were not reviled by anyone at first, until oppostion began to mount and Jesus Himself was reviled. At that point, the Sabbath legislation was used against Him, and attacks against Him were rationalized on the basis of the Halakah.” D. A. Carson, “Jesus and the Sabbath in the Four Gospels,” From Sabbath to Lord’s Day, D. A. Carson, ed. (Grand Rapids: Academie Books, 1982), p. 59.

[16] The connection between ethics and principles is one that has been pointed out by R. C. Sproul: “Ethics is a normative science, searching for the principal foundations [principles] that prescribe obligations or ‘oughtness.’ It is concerned primarily with the imperative and with the philosophical premises upon which imperatives [precepts] are based.” R. C. Sproul, Ethics and the Christian (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1983), pp. 9‑10 (comments in brackets mine).

17:14–15 When they came to the crowd, a man came to him, knelt before him, and said, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and he suffers terribly; he often falls into the fire and often into the water.” ^N Jesus, Peter, James, and John came down from the mountain and returned to the other nine disciples (Luke 9:37 says this occurred “the next day”), who apparently were with a crowd. Mark explains that a crowd surrounded the disciples and some teachers of the law who were in a heated argument. The nature of the argument is not stated, but we can assume that the religious leaders were arguing with the disciples about their power and authority or about the power and authority of their Master, because the disciples had tried and failed to cast out a demon (17:16).

A man came from the crowd and knelt before Jesus. Respectfully calling Jesus Lord, he asked for mercy on his son, who was an epileptic. Mark gives more detail, for the man explained that he had come looking for Jesus to heal his son who was possessed by an evil spirit, making him unable to utter any sound (also he could not hear, see Mark 9:25). This was not just a case of epilepsy; it was the work of an evil spirit. The demon’s destructive intent is seen in that the boy would often fall into the fire or water.

17:16       “So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him.”  Having heard of Jesus’ power to cast out demons, the father had come to Jesus, hoping for a cure for his son. He brought his son to the disciples to drive out the spirit, an appropriate request since the disciples had been given this power (10:1). The disciples could not drive out the demon, however, even though they had been given power to do so (10:8). Matthew records the failure of the disciples throughout this section (14:16–21, 26–27, 28–31; 15:16, 23, 33; 16:5, 22; 17:4, 10–22). It serves to teach that the power to heal is God’s, not ours. We must appropriate it by faith.

17:17–18 “O unbelieving and perverse generation,”Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you?”  Jesus cried out in exasperation, fed up with unbelief and lack of faith. His unusual words carry a biting rebuke. They parallel Moses’ frustration as intercessor for God’s people (Deuteronomy 32:5, 20) and portray God’s frustration with his people (Numbers 14:11; Isaiah 63:8–10). The disciples had been given the authority to do the healing, but they had not yet learned how to appropriate God’s power. Jesus’ frustration was with the unbelieving and unresponsive generation, including the crowd, the teachers of the law (scribes), the man, and the nine disciples. His disciples merely reflected that attitude of unbelief so prevalent in the society.

 “Bring him here to me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was cured instantly.  Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy (Mark’s Gospel describes how the demon convulsed the boy terribly one last time before leaving, Mark 9:26). Demons are never pleased to be told to leave their human dwellings, yet they have no choice but to submit to the higher authority. As always when Jesus healed, the cure was complete.

17:19–20 Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” He replied, “Because you have so little faith.”  The disciples had been unable to drive out this demon, and they asked Jesus why. They had cast out demons before; why hadn’t this demon responded? Jesus pointed to their lack of faith. Perhaps the disciples had tried to drive out the demon with their own ability rather than God’s. If so, their hearts and minds were not in tune with God, so their words had no power. Their question revealed their error; they centered on themselves (we), not on Christ.

 “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”  Jesus pointed to the disciples’ lack of faith. Jesus wasn’t condemning the disciples for substandard faith; he was trying to show how important faith would be in their future ministry. It is the power of God, not our faith, that moves mountains, but faith must be present to do so. The mustard seed was the smallest seed known. But like the mustard seed that grew into a large garden plant (13:31–32), even a small “seed” of faith is sufficient. There is great power in even a little faith when God is with us. If we feel weak or powerless as Christians, we should examine our faith, making sure we are trusting not in our own abilities to produce results but in God’s. If we are facing problems that seem as big and immovable as mountains, we must turn our eyes from the mountain and look to Christ for more faith. Then, as Jesus promised, nothing will be impossible. It is not the “amount” of faith that matters; rather, it is the power of God available to anyone with even the smallest faith. We cannot fail when we have faith.

Obedience is the one sure characteristic of the surrender of faith. Faith that is not coupled with obedience is a pretense.  Andrew Murray

17:21       “However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”  This verse does not appear in most modern translations because the best Greek manuscripts do not have it. However, it does occur in Mark 9:29, although the best manuscripts there do not have “and fasting.” Jesus explained that this kind [of demon] does not go out except by prayer and fasting and that the disciples had not depended on God’s power through prayer. God’s power must be requested and relied upon in each instance.

Prayer is the key that unlocks and reveals faith. Effective prayer needs both an attitude of complete dependence and the action of asking. Prayer demonstrates complete reliance on God. It takes our mind off ourselves and focuses it totally on God. This helps us deal with difficult situations.^[1]

^[1] Bruce B. Barton, Matthew, Life Application Bible Commentary (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1996), 345–347.

15:21       Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.  Jesus traveled about thirty miles to the region of Tyre and Sidon. These were port cities on the Mediterranean Sea north of Israel. Both cities had flourishing trade and were very wealthy. They were proud, historic Canaanite cities. Jesus withdrew to Gentile territory to evade the opposition of the Pharisees. In David’s day, Tyre had been on friendly terms with Israel (2 Samuel 5:11), but soon afterward the city had become known for its wickedness. Its king even had claimed to be a god (Ezekiel 28:1ff.). Tyre had rejoiced when Jerusalem was destroyed in 586 b.c. because without Israel’s competition, Tyre’s trade and profits would increase.

15:22       Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.” ^N Apparently, a woman had heard about Jesus’ miracle-working power and how he could cast out demons, so she wasn’t going to miss a chance to see him. Mark records that she “fell at his feet” (Mark 7:25; see below 15:25). Matthew called her a Canaanite; Mark described her as a Gentile, a Syrophoenician. Both descriptions are correct. Mark’s designation refers to her political background. His Roman audience would easily identify her by the part of the Empire that was her home. Matthew’s description was designed for his Jewish audience; they remembered the Canaanites as bitter enemies when Israel was settling the Promised Land. Matthew’s Jewish audience would have immediately understood the significance of Jesus helping this woman. Some Bible translations identify her as a Greek. This is also correct because she was a Greek-speaking native of the Phoenician area which had been converted to Greek language and culture after the conquest by Alexander the Great in the fourth century b.c.

The woman called Jesus, Lord, Son of David, showing her acceptance of Jesus’ identity as the Jewish Messiah. She may have been a Greek proselyte. Sometimes Gentiles would convert to Judaism, drawn by the strong moral qualities. This woman came to Jesus on behalf of her daughter, who was tormented by a demon. Obviously this woman was greatly distressed over her daughter’s suffering.

15:23       But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.” ^N Jesus’ silence seems difficult to understand until we read the lesson of faith that he taught both the woman and his disciples (15:24–28). The woman continued to follow after them, and she continued to shout. Finally, the disciples urged Jesus to send her away. This may have meant to get rid of the woman because she was bothering them with her nagging persistence. Or it may have been a request for Jesus to do as she requested, so she would go away and leave them alone. Jesus, always compassionate, would heal the woman’s daughter, but not just to make her stop following them. He had a lesson about faith that he needed to teach this woman. In so doing, he would teach the disciples a lesson as well.

It is possible to become so occupied with spiritual matters that we miss real needs right around us, especially if we are prejudiced against needy people or if they cause us inconvenience. Instead of being bothered, be aware of the opportunities that surround you. Be open to the beauty of God’s message for all people, and make an effort not to shut out those who are different from you.

15:24       He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”  Jesus’ words do not contradict the truth that God’s message is for all kinds of people (Psalm 22:27; Isaiah 56:7; Matthew 28:19; Romans 15:9–12). After all, when Jesus said these words, he was in Gentile territory. He ministered to Gentiles on many other occasions also, but always in Jewish territory (4:24–25; 8:5–13). Jesus was simply telling the woman that Jews were to have the first opportunity to accept him as the Messiah because God wanted them to present the message of salvation to the rest of the world (see Genesis 12:3). While on earth, Jesus restricted his mission to Jewish people. In doing so, he was doing his Father’s will (11:27) and fulfilling the promise God made to Jews in the Old Testament. The restricted mission of Jesus and the disciples echoes the principle recorded in 10:5–6. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel” does not mean Jesus came to the Jews alone; rather, it means that he would go to them first (Mark 7:27). “Sheep” was an affectionate term used often for God’s people in the Old Testament.

Jesus was not rejecting the Canaanite woman. Instead, he was explaining that his activities were limited (in his humanity); thus, he had to focus on his goal. Jesus had only a short time on earth. His mission focused on (but was not limited to) the Jews. Jesus tested (in the sense of “probed, challenged, encouraged”) this woman’s faith and used the situation to teach that faith is available to all people. Matthew alone recorded this interchange. His Jewish audience would have been very interested in Jesus’ miracle to help this Gentile woman.

15:25–26 The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said. He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs.”  Undaunted by Jesus’ apparent unwillingness to respond to her request, the woman came and knelt before him, begging for help.

The answer comes in the language of a parable; therefore, we must not press the details too far. Jesus probably spoke Greek to this woman, for she would not have known Aramaic. He used the word kunarion, referring to a little dog, a household pet. The simple parable meant that the children at the table should be fed before the pets; it would not be right to take the children’s food and give it to the dogs. While it is true that in Jewish tradition Gentiles at times were referred to derogatorily as “dogs,” that probably does not apply here. The Greek word used as a derogatory nickname applied to wild dogs or scavenger dogs, not household pets.

By these words, Jesus may have meant that his first priority was to spend time feeding his children (teaching his disciples), not to take food away from them and throw it to the pets. Jesus was not insulting the woman; instead, he was saying that she must not demand what God had ordained for the Jews. She should wait until God’s appointed time when the Gentiles would receive the Good News of the gospel. The point of Jesus’ parable is “precedence”—who gets fed first? The children do.

He is not a mere teacher of the way, as some vainly imagine—a teacher of a system of morality, by the observance of which we may be saved. But Christ is truly the Way. He is Himself the Way. The soul is saved by Christ Himself. – Charles G. Finney

15:27       She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” ^N Unlike many of the Jewish listeners, this Gentile woman understood Jesus’ parable. Her answer was wise, for she explained to Jesus, by extending his parable, that the children who love the pets often drop morsels of food to them. Not all the Jews accepted Jesus, while some Gentiles chose to follow him. Why couldn’t she have some of those crumbs that the Jews didn’t want? She adroitly pointed out that even the dogs ate with (not after) the children. She did not ask for the entire meal; she was perfectly willing to take second place behind the Jews. All she wanted right then was a few crumbs—or one “crumb” in particular—one miracle of healing for her daughter.

Ironically, many Jews would miss out on God’s spiritual healing because they rejected Jesus, while many Gentiles, whom the Jews rejected, would find salvation because they recognized Jesus.

15:28       Then Jesus answered and said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be to you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed from that very hour.  Jesus was delighted by the faith of the woman. He granted her request because of her humility and persistence. She had made her request in faith that Jesus could perform the healing. His words had been meant to challenge her to greater faith, and she had responded. She understood Christ’s lordship, and she understood the priorities of his mission. No wonder Jesus exclaimed, Great is your faith! On that basis, Jesus healed the woman’s daughter. With his words, her daughter was healed from that very hour. This miracle showed that Jesus’ power over demons was so great that he didn’t need to be present physically, or even to speak any word to the demon, in order to free someone. His power transcended distance.

24 After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax came to Peter and asked, “Doesn’t your teacher pay the temple tax?”

It’s not too surprising that Levi, the tax collector, is the only evangelist to record this odd event. Aside from his interest in this unique method of collecting revenue, why does he include it? After all, it appears to interrupt the story line. But upon closer examination, it actually continues the trend that began in Caesarea Philippi. That is, Jesus is exalted by others but humbles himself. No one reading this story would really expect Jesus to pay temple taxes when he was the Son of God. But he does. This sets up a contrast between Jesus’ self-humiliation and the disciples’ self-aggrandizement in the following verses.

This particular tax was not a legal Roman tax. The Jews, however, expected that each male, between ages twenty and fifty would support the temple each year with two drachma (cf. Josephus, Ant. III. 8.2; XVIII, 9.1). This was based on Exodus 30:11–16; 38:25–26, where God commanded support for the tabernacle. The cost was equivalent to about two day’s wages. Why do they ask for it now? We can only guess that since Jesus missed the last Passover, there was some question about him fulfilling his financial obligation as a Jew.

The tax collectors question Peter, who apparently has distinguished himself as the spokesman of the group. Their question is framed so as to expect a positive reply. It might be better translated, “Your teacher pays the temple tax, doesn’t he?” It is of interest that officially ordained rabbis were exempt from this tax. Since Jesus had not attended their schools, he could not rightly claim this advantage.

Mt 17:25–27 “Yes, he does,” he replied.
When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. “What do you think, Simon?” he asked. “From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?”
26 “From others,” Peter answered.
“Then the sons are exempt,” Jesus said to him. 27 “But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”

We assume Peter’s reply is without Christ’s consent, though we don’t know for sure. Peter may know that Jesus did, in fact, pay this tax before. When Peter goes back into the house, Jesus is the first to speak. Matthew probably wants us to see that Jesus reads Peter’s mind.

He questions Peter with the use of this brief parable which suggests that because of Jesus’ relationship with God, he is rightly exempt from paying the temple tax. But so that he might not offend the Jewish rulers he goes ahead and pays. Not only is Jesus exempt, but so is Peter because he is a disciple of Jesus. But he, too, is to pay the tax. Notice that the coin Peter is to get would pay for both of them.

Apparently, civil disobedience for a follower of Jesus should be reserved for when the individual is asked to disobey a direct command of God (Exod 1:15ff; Dan 3:1ff; 6:10ff; Acts 4:19; 5:29).

Matthew stops short of telling us that Peter goes out and catches the fish. Perhaps we are to understand that he did go catch a fish that had a coin (lit., statēra, = four drachma), in its mouth. Fish are often attracted to shiny objects. And there have been accounts of fish caught in the Sea of Galilee that have swallowed coins. Thus, perhaps Jesus “saw” the fish before Peter caught it and brought the two together.

Mark E. Moore, The Chronological Life of Christ (Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company, 2011), 320–321.

9:32        While they were going out, a man who was demon-possessed and could not talk was brought to Jesus.  Jesus could hardly come or go without someone in need coming to him! This time, as Jesus and his disciples were leaving, a man who was demon-possessed and could not talk was brought to Jesus. The word translated “could not talk” is kophos, which can mean deaf, unable to talk, or both. Such disabilities are not always the work of demons, because Jesus healed many people of illness and disability without casting out demons. Matthew wanted his readers to understand, however, that in this situation a demon was at work. While Jesus was on earth, demonic forces seemed especially active. Although we cannot always be sure why or how demon possession occurs, it causes both physical and mental problems. In this case, the demon made the man unable to talk. (For more on demons and demon possession, see commentary on 8:28–34.)

9:33–34   And when the demon had been cast out, the one who had been mute spoke; and the crowds were amazed and said, “Never has anything like this been seen in Israel.” ^N Matthew avoided detail about the exorcism of the demon (he had already established Jesus’ authority over demonic powers, see 8:16, 28–34) and focused instead on the reaction of the crowd. After Jesus cast out the demon, the mute man was able to speak.

Once again, the ever-present crowds were amazed. They had never seen anything like this. The teachings Matthew recorded in chapters 5–7 established Jesus’ authority; the miracles grouped in chapters 8 and 9 revealed Jesus’ power and divinity. The crowds saw God’s power at work in Jesus and began to realize that he was one of the greatest prophets.

The religious leaders, however, saw something entirely different: But the Pharisees said, “It is by the prince of demons that he drives out demons.”  In these words of the Pharisees, Matthew was showing the full extent of their rejection of Jesus. This chapter has the Pharisees accusing Jesus of four different sins: blasphemy, befriending outcasts, impiety, and serving Satan, the prince of demons. In Scripture Satan is constantly portrayed as the imitator of God, so the Pharisees may have been referring to this belief. They tried to explain Jesus away by saying that he was only imitating God but was really in league with Satan—and that’s why the demons obeyed him.

Matthew showed how Jesus was maligned by those who should have received him most gladly. Why did the Pharisees do this?

(1) Jesus bypassed their religious authority.

(2) He weakened their control over the people.

(3) He challenged their cherished beliefs.

(4) He exposed their insincere motives. While the Pharisees questioned, debated, and dissected Jesus, people were being healed and lives changed right in front of them. Their skepticism was based on jealousy of Jesus’ popularity. The opposition to Jesus was intensifying; Jesus was far too powerful and popular for the Pharisees’ comfort.^[1]

^[1] Bruce B. Barton, Matthew, Life Application Bible Commentary (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1996), 193–194.

When God created man He gave him dominion over the earth. Adam was king of the earth, with full right to rule it under God. He was given authority to name the animals and to care for this incredibly amazing and wonderful creation of the infinite mind of God. As God presented it to Adam, it was a kingdom of great light, life, beauty, harmony, health, happiness, goodness, and glory.

But when Adam sinned and lost his innocence, he also lost his crown and his dominion. Adam’s sin allowed Satan to usurp man’s dominion and to turn the kingdom of light into a realm of darkness. The beauty of God’s creation became corrupted by ugliness, its harmony by confusion and disorder, its health by disease and decay, its happiness by sorrow and pain, its goodness by sin and evil, and its glory by guilt and shame. Sin turned man’s life into the path to death.

Yet almost as soon as man fell, God promised He would some day use man to restore the kingdom of earth to its beauty and goodness and to restore man himself to his rightful dominion over it. The Lord declared that the seed of the woman would bruise Satan’s head (Gen. 3:15), and from that point on the Old Testament is filled with increasingly more explicit promises about the Lord’s great plan of redemption and restoration.

God promised to send a King to restore the kingdom and to reestablish the rule of God and to destroy sin and its consequence, death. Disease, hardship, sorrow pain, disappointment, and every other evil would be destroyed. Again and again the prophets tell of His coming as the Anointed One, the great King of kings, the destroyer of sin and death, the Healer, and the Righteous Ruler. The Jews knew Him as the Messiah (Greek, “Christ”), who would one day establish His eternal kingdom of righteousness; and earth, like heaven, would forever be under the perfect rule of God.

The gospels present a dazzling preview of Jesus’ coming eternal kingdom. When He was transfigured on the mountain, the veil of His flesh was pulled back to reveal before the eyes of Peter, James, and John a glimpse of His divine majesty, a microcosmic display of His eternal reign in majestic glory (Matt. 17:2).

The climax of Jesus’ divine preview came at Pentecost, as the outpouring of His promised Holy Spirit fulfilled the prophecy of Joel that “‘it shall be in the last days,’ God says, ‘That I will pour forth of My Spirit upon all mankind’” (Acts 2:16-17; cf. Joel 2:28). Throughout His entire ministry Jesus displayed a series of glimpses of the ultimate power He will demonstrate when He establishes His thousand-year rule on the present earth and then His eternal rule in the new heaven and the new earth.

As Matthew continues to present the third set of miracles that demonstrate Jesus’ claim to messiahship (begun with the dual miracles of 9:18-26), he shows Jesus’ power to restore sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf.

In raising Jairus’s daughter from the dead, the Lord demonstrated His ultimate power over death. And because death is the ultimate and inescapable penalty of sin, Jesus’ power over death also demonstrated even more than did His power to heal disease that His claim to forgive sin (9:2-6) was not empty.

In healing the woman with the hemorrhage (9:20-22), and now healing the blind and the deaf men, He continued to demonstrate His power over the physical evils and corruption that sin produces. Through the miracles of restoring sight to blind eyes and sound to deaf ears the Messiah again affirmed His ability not only to restore life to a body but also to restore life and function to any of its individual parts.

Healing the Two Blind Men

And as Jesus passed on from there, two blind men followed Him, crying out, and saying, “Have mercy on us, Son of David!” And after He had come into the house, the blind men came up to Him, and Jesus said to them, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?” They said to Him, “Yes, Lord.” Then He touched their eyes, saying, “Be it done to you according to your faith.” And their eyes were opened. And Jesus sternly warned them, saying, “See here, let no one know about this!” But they went out, and spread the news about Him in all that land. (9:27-32)

When He left Jairus’s house in Capernaum after raising his daughter from death, Jesus passed on from there and two blind men followed Him, seeking deliverance from their great affliction. In this brief account we are shown a number of truths about these two men: their condition, their cry, their confrontation, their conversion, the command to them, their contrariness, and their commitment.

The Condition of the Men

Blindness was common in ancient times, as it still is in most underdeveloped parts of the world. The fact that Jesus healed more cases of blindness than any other kind of disease reflects its pervasiveness. Unsanitary conditions, infectious organisms, blowing sand, accident, war, malnutrition, and excessive heat all combined to make blindness a constant danger. Many infants were born blind because of various diseases suffered by the mother during pregnancy, and many others became blind a few days after birth by being exposed to venereal disease, especially gonorrhea, as they passed through the birth canal.

It was not uncommon for blind people to associate with others who were blind, and it is possible that these two blind men had been companions in darkness for many years.

THE CRY OF THE MEN

As they followed after Jesus, these men were continually crying out to the Lord, hoping somehow to gain His attention amidst the noise and confusion that usually accompanies a large group of people. Because they could not see Jesus, they could only guess as to how close to Him they might be.  (from which comes crying out), basically carries the idea of shouting or screaming with great intensity, and the word had a broad range of application in New Testament times.

It is used of the unintelligible babbling of a deranged person such as the demoniac of Gadara (Mark 5:5) as well of the shouts of the children in the Temple who were praising Jesus (Matt. 21:15). It is used of the Lord Himself on the cross, as He “uttered a loud cry, and breathed His last” (Mark 15:37). It is used in Revelation 12:2 of a woman screaming in the pains of childbirth.

The two blind men were crying out to Jesus in great anxiety and desperation and were determined to be heard over the hubbub of the crowd, knowing He was their only hope of deliverance from their afflictions What they said as they cried out indicates they had both the right knowledge about Jesus and the right attitude toward Him.

The right knowledge about Jesus The fact that the blind men addressed Jesus as Son of David indicates they acknowledged Him as the Messiah, because Son of David was one of the most common Jewish titles for the promised Deliverer.

It was a royal title, denoting His lineage from the family of the great King David and His right to reestablish and rule over the coming kingdom of God.

As mentioned above, the first Old Testament promise of God’s great Deliverer declared that He would be a man, the seed of woman. Later in the book of Genesis God reveals that the Messiah would be a descendant of Abraham (Gen. 12:3), specifically through his son Isaac (21:12) and his grandson Judah
(49:10).

Through the prophet Nathan, the Lord told David, “When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, who will come forth from you, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him and he will be a son to Me; … And your house and your kingdom shall endure before Me forever; your throne shall be established forever” (2 Sam. 7:12-14a, 16).

When the angel Gabriel announced Jesus’ birth to Mary, he said of Him, “He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and His kingdom will have no end” (Luke 1:32-33).

In his beautiful Spirit-directed song of praise and prophecy, Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, exulted, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He his visited us and accomplished redemption for His people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of David His servant” (Luke 1:68-69).

When he registered in Caesar’s census, Joseph took his expectant wife Mary with him “to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David” Luke 2:4.

Again and again the New Testament declares Jesus to be the promised descendant of David who would deliver God’s people and establish His eternal kingdom (John 7:42; Acts 2:29-30; Rom. 1:3; 2 Tim. 2:8; Rev. 5:5; 22:16).

The multitudes who threw down their garments and branches before Jesus as He made His triumphal entry into Jerusalem sang, “Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest!” (Matt. 21:9). To call Jesus the Son of David was to proclaim Him the Messiah, the Christ—as the unbelieving and envious Jewish leaders well knew (See Matt. 22:42).

Every Jew who heard the blind men call Jesus the Son of David recognized it as a clear confession of their belief in His messiahship. Publicly and boldly they affirmed Jesus as the promised Deliverer of Israel, and they came to Him seeking their own deliverance.

The right attitude toward Jesus. The cry of the blind men also reveals they had the right attitude toward Jesus. They pleaded, have mercy on us, by which they may have acknowledged their need not simply for physical help but for forgiving mercy.

It seems reasonable to suggest that they felt a spiritual need that only Jesus could meet, and they came to him in hungering humility, openly throwing themselves on His grace. They knew they were undeserving of the Lord’s help, but they also must have known that “the Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger and great in lovingkindness,” that He “is good to all, and His mercies are over all His works” (Ps. 145:8-9). They heeded the call of Joel to “return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness” Joel 2:13.

These two men came to Jesus not only with a right understanding of His great worthiness but also with a right understanding of their own great unworthiness. That is the attitude of heart that the Lord honors and accepts. Again it is made clear that the person who comes before God declaring his own goodness is rejected by Him, whereas the one who mourns over his sin and humbly cries out, “God, be merciful to me, the sinner!” is justified by the Lord (Luke 18:10-14). The blind men came to the right person, because Jesus Christ was mercy incarnate.

Jesus was the most merciful human being who ever lived. He reached out to the sick and healed them. He reached out to the crippled and gave them legs to walk. He healed the eyes of the blind, the ears of the deaf, and the mouths of the dumb. He found prostitutes and tax collectors and those that were debauched and drunken, and He drew them into the circle of His love and redeemed them and set them on their feet.

He took the lonely and made them feel loved. He took little children and gathered them into His arms and loved them. Never as there a person on the face of the earth with the mercy of this One. Once a funeral procession came by and He saw a mother weeping because her son was dead. She was already a widow and now she had no child to care for her. Who would care? Jesus stopped the funeral procession, put His hand on the casket, and raised the child from the dead. He cared. (Kingdom Living Here and Now [Chicago: Moody Press, 1980], p.107).

In behalf of himself and his fellow Israelites, Daniel prayed expectantly to God, “We are not presenting our supplications before Thee on account of any  merits of our own, but on account of Thy great compassion” (Dan. 9:18).

Jeremiah declared, “The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Thy faithfulness” (Lam. 3:22-23).

The writer of Hebrews tells us that Jesus was “made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest” (Heb. 2:17).

Paul reminds us of “the surpassing riches of [God’s] grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:7) and that “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy” (Titus 3:5). Ours is a God of mercy, for healing and for saving.

It is interesting that Jesus at first showed no response to the pleas of the two blind men. They continued to cry out as the entire crowd moved along with Jesus and the disciples, and He let them keep pouring out their hearts as they persistently demonstrated their determination. He tested their faith, letting it run to the extremity that proved its sincerity.

Although we are not told specifically, the house to which Jesus went was possibly Peter’s, where Jesus probably made His home while He was in Capernaum (see 8:14). After a demanding day of teaching and healing, Jesus finally went to one of the two places that could be considered His earthly home after He began His ministry. The other was the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus in Bethany. Our Lord endured three years of almost total lack of privacy. Not only were His disciples His constant companions, but throngs of people followed Him wherever He went.

The Confrontation of the Men

It was not until after He had come into the house that the blind men came up to Him. They somehow managed to keep up with Him and then followed Him into the house where He was staying. Each of the healings recounted in chapter 9 involved such persistence. The paralytic and his friends were so intent on getting to Jesus that they actually tore a hole in the roof of the house and lowered the afflicted man to Jesus’ feet. The synagogue official continued to seek Jesus’ help even after his daughter was dead, and the woman with the hemorrhage was determined to take hold of the tassel of His robe in order to be healed. In each case Jesus led the persistent seekers to affirm faith in Him.

Now He asks the two blind men pointedly, Do you believe that I am able to do this? The question seems strange and almost cruel in light of the obvious determination of these men, who, in spite of their great handicap, had managed to follow Jesus for a considerable distance while contending with a great multitude of sighted people who also wanted to be with Him.

The men had already acknowledged Jesus’ messiahship by continually addressing Him as Son of David; and because Jesus knew their hearts, He was already aware that their faith in Him was genuine. His asking them about their faith must therefore have been for the purpose of drawing out a more complete public confession.

Such a confession Jesus drew out of the blind men, and it became a public testimony to others of what is required for salvation. Yes affirmed their belief that He was able to do what they asked of Him, and Lord affirmed their belief that He was the divine Messiah, the coming Savior long promised by the prophets.

The men’s testimony also separated them from those who expected the Messiah to be a merely human political and military deliverer who would throw off the yoke of Rome and set up an earthly kingdom like that ruled by their ancient King David. Their testimony also affirmed the belief that Jesus was more than a highly competent and charismatic human leader.

More than that, their testimony pointed to His being above all a spiritual leader, whose first concern was delivering individuals from their bondage to sin. Though Jesus’ compassion for physical suffering was great, His compassion for lost souls was immeasurably greater.

His healing of diseases was first of all to demonstrate both the compassion and power of God for the purpose of establishing His divine credentials as God’s promised Messiah—in order that men might be convinced to trust in Him as their spiritual Savior. He healed bodies for the infinitely greater purpose of saving souls.

As discussed in the previous chapter, the gospels make clear that faith was not necessarily present in all cases of physical healing. The majority of Jesus’ healings were performed apart from the mention of any sort of faith. Some healings, such as that of the centurion’s slave, were performed without the afflicted person so much as seeing Jesus. Others, such as the raising of Jairus’s daughter and Lazarus, were performed on those who were already dead when Jesus’ power did its work in their bodies.

Without the fanfare or superficial drama so common with self-proclaimed faith healers, Jesus simply touched their eyes, saying, “Be it done to you according to your faith.” According to your faith signifies that the extent of Jesus ministry to these men was based on the measure of their personal faith in Him.

In light of their confession and of Jesus’ specific mention of their faith, it seems certain that more than their eyes were opened. Their trust in Jesus Christ likely brought salvation as well as healing. He gave them spiritual life as well as physical sight.

THE COMMAND TO THE MEN

At this point Jesus sternly warned them, saying, “See here, let no one know about this!” Jesus was not simply making a suggestion. Sternly warned is an intensified form of an already strong verb and could even carry the idea of scolding (See Mark 14:5).

Jesus’ reason for this command was not, as some suggest, to keep His miracle-working power from becoming known. He had already performed hundreds of public miracles and had become famous for them. His miracles were meant to be publicized, because they demonstrated His divine messiahship.

Nor was the command given to keep this particular miracle from becoming known for some reason. Relatives and friends of the men would have known of the miracle the instant they saw the men. And because of His fame as a miracle worker, they would immediately have concluded that Jesus was the healer.

Obviously Jesus had another reason for commanding the men’s silence. The best explanation seems to be that He did not want His messiahship proclaimed prematurely. As already noted, the men’s calling Jesus the Son of David was a clear acknowledgment of His messiahship—and it was a title He did not reject and that His act of healing in fact confirmed.

Because Jesus did not develop His ministry through the Jewish establishment or come wielding the political-military power that many Jews associated with the Messiah, Jesus’ messiahship would not be accepted by most Jews, especially the leaders. It was the very affirmation that He was indeed the prophesied King of the Jews that ultimately brought His crucifixion. But now was not the time for that truth to be spread abroad. He did not want to stir up premature opposition or encourage revolutionary Jews to begin rallying around Him as if He were a political deliverer.

It may also have been that Jesus commanded the men to be quiet in order not to overemphasize the miracle-working aspect of His ministry. Although His miracles were an essential part of His divine work, many people had come to see Him only as a great human healer and nothing more. Jesus chided the multitude who searched Him out after He miraculously fed the five thousand near Tiberias, telling them plainly, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves, and were filled” (John 6:26). Most people did not perceive Jesus’ miracles in their intended purpose as “signs” of His messiahship but simply as a supernatural, perhaps even magical, means of gaining a free meal or some other temporary physical benefit.

And perhaps Jesus told the two men not to broadcast their healing in order that others might draw their own conclusions about His messiahship. If they had boldly called Him by the messianic title Son of David before they were healed, how much bolder their declaration must have been after they received their sight by the touch of His hand! When John the Baptist was imprisoned and sent His disciples to ask Jesus, “Are You the Expected One, or shall we look for someone else?” Jesus did not answer directly, but rather said, “Go and report to John what you hear and see: the blind receive sight and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them” (Matt. 11:3-5). Jesus was concerned that especially the Jews, as God’s chosen people, accept His messiahship on the basis of His fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, not simply on the basis of hearsay or mere verbal claims.

The Contrariness of the Men

Despite Jesus’ strict command to the contrary, the two men immediately went out, and spread the news about Him in all that land. Most believers need to say more about the Lord, not less. But for His own important reasons at this time, Jesus had ordered these two men to say nothing about what He had done for them; and yet they disobeyed. Because it was disobedience of the Lord, what they did was wrong; but it was a kind of sin that only a grateful, overflowing heart could commit. The men could not resist the overwhelming desire to tell everyone of their wonderful deliverance and of the Lord who delivered them.

THE COMMITMENT OF THE MEN

The translation As they were going out, behold, a dumb man, demon-possessed, was brought to Him suggests that other people brought the dumb man to Jesus while the two former blind men were leaving. But another possible rendering is: “As they went out, behold, they brought to him a dumb man” (KJV).
The idea is that the two men themselves came across another needy person as they were leaving and immediately brought him to Jesus for healing. If this was the case, they evidenced genuine commitment to Christ by bringing others to Him.

The dumb man may have been a friend of the two blind men, who perhaps had acted as their eyes while they acted as his voice. In that case, the first thing they did after being healed and saved themselves was to bring their friend to Jesus for healing and salvation.

 Dumb often included the idea of deafness (see Matt. 11:5), because inability to speak is frequently caused by inability to hear. As with blindness, deafness was common in the ancient world. Accidents and disease caused loss of hearing, and foreign matter could collect in the ear wax and
become a breeding ground for infectious organisms that eventually destroyed hearing. In this man’s case, however, dumbness was caused by being demon-possessed, and when he was delivered from the demon he was delivered from deafness.

(21:1-14) Introduction: The average reader would conclude that John completed his book with the dramatic testimony of Thomas (John 20:28-31), and the reader would wonder why John added another chapter. The main reason is the Apostle Peter, John’s close associate in ministry (Acts 3:1). John did not want to end his Gospel without telling his readers that Peter was restored to his apostleship. Apart from the information in this chapter, we would wonder why Peter was so prominent in the first twelve chapters of the Book of Acts.

John had another purpose in mind: he wanted to refute the foolish rumor that had spread among the believers that John would live until the return of the Lord (John 21:23). John made it clear that our Lord’s words had been greatly misunderstood.

I think John may have had another purpose in mind: he wanted to teach us how to relate to the risen Christ. During the forty days between His resurrection and ascension, our Lord appeared and disappeared at will, visiting with the disciples and preparing them for the coming of the Spirit and their future ministries (Acts 1:1-9). They never knew when He would appear, so they had to stay alert! (The fact that He may return for His people today ought to keep us on our toes!) It was an important time for the disciples because they were about to take His place in the world and begin to carry the message to others.

Jesus proved the great reality of His resurrection body. He showed that He really did arise from the dead. Death had been conquered and men could now live forever.

1. Jesus showed Himself (v.1-3).
2. Jesus stood on the shore—bodily (v.4).
3. Jesus possessed supernatural knowledge (v.5-8).
4. Jesus showed the reality of the surroundings (v.9).
5. Jesus showed that He could see, speak, hear, and feel (v.10-11).
6. Jesus showed that His body was real (v.12-13).
7. Conclusion: Jesus’ resurrection was affirmed (v.14).

We Are Fishers of Men—Obey Him (John 21:1-8)

The Lord had instructed His disciples to meet Him in Galilee, which helps to explain why they were at the Sea of Galilee, or Sea of Tiberias (Matt. 26:32; 28:7-10; Mark 16:7). But John did not explain why Peter decided to go fishing, and Bible students are not in agreement in their suggestions. Some claim that he was perfectly within his rights, that he needed to pay his bills and the best way to get money was to go fishing. Why sit around idle? Get busy!

Others believe that Peter had been called from that kind of life (Luke 5:1-11) and that it was wrong for him to return. Furthermore, when he went fishing, Peter took six other men with him! If he was wrong, they were wrong too; and it is a sad thing when a believer leads others astray.

By the way, it is interesting that at least seven of the twelve disciples were probably fishermen. Why did Jesus call so many fishermen to follow Him? For one thing, fishermen are courageous, and Jesus needs brave people to follow Him. They are also dedicated to one thing and cannot easily be distracted. Fishermen do not quit! (We are thinking, of course, of professional fishermen, not idle people on vacation!) They know how to take orders, and they know how to work together.

Whether Peter and his friends were right or wrong we cannot prove. but we do know this: their efforts were in vain. Had they forgotten the Lord’s words, “For without Me, ye can do nothing”? (John 15:5) They toiled all night and caught nothing. Certainly, Peter must have remembered what happened two years before, when Jesus called him into full-time discipleship (Luke 5:1-11). On that occasion, Peter had fished all night and caught nothing, but Jesus had turned his failure into success.

Perhaps Peter’s impulsiveness and self-confidence were revealing themselves again. He was sincere, and he worked hard, but there were no results. How like some believers in the service of the Lord! They sincerely believe that they are doing God’s will, but their labors are in vain. They are serving without direction from the Lord, so they cannot expect blessing from the Lord.

After His resurrection, our Lord was sometimes not recognized (Luke 24:16; John 20:14); so it was that His disciples did not recognize Him when, at dawning, He appeared on the shore. His question expected a negative reply: “You have not caught anything to eat, have you?” Their reply was brief and perhaps a bit embarrassed: “No.”

It was time for Jesus to take over the situation, just as He did when He called Peter into discipleship. He told them where to cast the net; they obeyed, and they caught 153 fish! The difference between success and failure was the width of the ship! We are never far from success when we permit Jesus to give the orders, and we are usually closer to success than we realize.

It was John who first realized that the stranger on the shore was their own Lord and Master. It was John who leaned on the Lord’s breast at the table (John 13:23) and who stood by the cross when his Lord suffered and died (John 19:26). It is love that recognizes the Lord and shares that good news with others: “It is the Lord!”

With characteristic impulsiveness, Peter quickly put on his outer garment (“naked” simply means “stripped for work”) and dove into the water! He wanted to get to Jesus! This is in contrast to Luke 5:8 where Peter told the Lord to depart from him. The other six men followed in the boat, bringing the net full of fish. In the experience recorded in Luke 5, the nets began to break; but in this experience, the net held fast.

Jesus called the disciples and us to be “fishers of men.” This phrase was not invented by Jesus; it had been used for years by Greek and Roman teachers. To be a “fisher of men” in that day meant to seek to persuade men and “catch” them with the truth. A fisherman catches living fish, but when he gets them, they die. A Christian witness seeks to catch “dead fish” (dead in their sins), and when he or she “catches” them, they are made alive in Christ!

Now we can understand why Jesus had so many fishermen in the disciple band. Fishermen know how to work. They have courage and faith to go out “into the deep.” They have much patience and persistence, and they will not quit. They know how to cooperate with one another, and they are skilled in using the equipment and the boat. What examples for us to follow as we seek to “catch fish” for Jesus Christ!

We are indeed “fishers of men,” and there are “fish” all around us. If we obey His directions, we will catch the fish.

(21:1-3) Jesus Christ, Resurrection: Jesus showed Himself. Note four things.

1. The words “after these things” refer to the proof of Jesus’ resurrection already recorded (John 20:1-31).
2. Seven disciples were together. They were apparently in some home continuing to hide for fear of the authorities.
3. Peter went fishing to meet the need for food. Note that the others decided to join him and that they went under the cover of darkness and off on some lonely strand of beach (John 21:3, 9-14). In the sovereignty of God, the small band of men needed to learn a glorious lesson, so God was setting the stage for them to receive the lesson.
4. They caught nothing, and it was in this that they were to learn the much needed lesson: self-sufficiency is inadequate. They could no longer do anything on their own. They must know the risen Lord, and they must depend upon the risen Lord. They could not provide for themselves in their own strength; they must know that the Lord is really risen, and they must learn to depend upon Him.

Jesus took this experience of catching nothing and taught the disciples that He had truly risen. It was He in the resurrected body. He was truly the Risen Lord, and it was He upon whom they must depend from now on.

(21:4) Jesus Christ, Resurrection: Jesus stood on the shore—bodily.

1. His presence was immediate, sudden, unexpected.
2. His presence was bodily, that is, His body stood there. It was morning, so the disciples saw a person just as they would see any other person standing on the seashore. There was no thought of a vision, hallucination, or spirit. They saw a person on the seashore and thought nothing strange about it. Note: they did not know it was Jesus, not at first sight.

(21:5-8) Jesus Christ, Knowledge of: Jesus possessed supernatural knowledge. Jesus knew where the fish were. Remember the disciples had been commercial fishermen before their call to serve the Lord. Jesus was teaching that He, the risen Lord, was the same Lord who took care of them before the crucifixion; therefore, He would take care of them now. But there was one significant difference that they must learn. The resurrection increased His care and added much more to their salvation. He, the risen Lord, was the sovereign majesty of the universe who could use His sovereign knowledge to provide all things for His dear children (cp. Matthew 6:25-34).

Now note: John knew immediately that it was the Lord. However, it was the miracle of knowing where the fish were, the Lord’s supernatural sovereign knowledge, that told John.

The response was exactly what it should have been. Peter clothed himself and jumped into the lake and swam to shore. The other disciples followed in the boat.

We Are Shepherds—Love Him (John 21:9-18)

Jesus met His disciples on the beach where He had already prepared breakfast for them. This entire scene must have stirred Peter’s memory and touched his conscience. Surely he was recalling that first catch of fish (Luke 5:1-11) and perhaps even the feeding of the 5,000 with bread and fish (John 6). It was at the close of the latter event that Peter had given his clear-cut witness of faith in Jesus Christ (John 6:66-71). The “fire of coals” would certainly remind him of the fire at which he denied the Lord (John 18:18). It is good for us to remember the past; we may have something to confess.

Three “invitations” stand out in John’s Gospel: “Come and see” (John 1:39); “Come and drink” (John 7:37); and “Come and dine” (John 21:12). How loving of Jesus to feed Peter before He dealt with his spiritual needs. He gave Peter opportunity to dry off, get warm, satisfy his hunger, and enjoy personal fellowship. This is a good example for us to follow as we care for God’s people. Certainly the spiritual is more important than the physical, but caring for the physical can prepare the way for spiritual ministry. Our Lord does not so emphasize “the soul” that He neglects the body.

Peter and his Lord had already met privately and no doubt taken care of Peter’s sins (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor. 15:5), but since Peter had denied the Lord publicly, it was important that there be a public restoration. Sin should be dealt with only to the extent that it is known. Private sins should be confessed in private, public sins in public. Since Peter had denied his Lord three times, Jesus asked him three personal questions. He also encouraged him by giving a threefold commission that restored Peter to his ministry.

The key issue is Peter’s love for the Lord Jesus, and that should be a key matter with us today. But what did the Lord mean by “more than these”? Was He asking, “Do you love Me more than you love these other men?” Not likely, because this had never been a problem among the disciples. They all loved the Lord Jesus supremely, even though they did not always obey Him completely. Perhaps Jesus meant, “Do you love Me more than you love these boats and nets and fish?” Again, this is not likely, for there is no evidence that Peter ever desired to go back permanently into the fishing business. Fishing did not seem to compete with the Savior’s love.

The question probably meant, “Do you love Me—as you claimed—more than these other disciples love Me?” Peter had boasted of his love for Christ and had even contrasted it with that of the other men. “I will lay down my life for Thy sake!” (John 13:37) “Though all men shall be offended because of Thee, yet will I never be offended!” (Matt. 26:33) There is more than a hint in these boastful statements that Peter believed that he loved the Lord more than did the other disciples.

Many commentaries point out that, in this conversation, two different words are used for “love.” In His questions in John 21:15-16, our Lord used agape, which is the Greek word for the highest kind of love, sacrificing love, divine love. Peter always used phileo, which is the love of friend for friend, fondness for another. In John 21:17, Jesus and Peter both used phileo.

However, it is doubtful that we should make too much of an issue over this, because the two words are often used interchangeably in the Gospel of John. In John 3:16, God’s love for man is agape love; but in John 16:27, it is phileo love. The Father’s love for His Son is agape love in John 3:35 but phileo love in John 5:20. Christians are supposed to love one another. In John 13:34, this love is agape love; but in John 15:19, it is phileo love. It would appear that John used these two words as synonyms, whatever fine distinctions there might have been between them.

Before we judge Peter too severely, two other matters should be considered. When answering the first two questions, Peter did affirm his agape love when he said, “Yes, Lord!” The fact that Peter himself used phileo did not negate his wholehearted assent to the Lord’s use of agape. Second, Peter and Jesus undoubtedly spoke in Aramaic, even though the Holy Spirit recorded the conversation in common Greek. It might be unwise for us to press the Greek too far in this case.

In spite of his faults and failures, Peter did indeed love the Lord, and he was not ashamed to admit it. The other men were certainly listening “over Peter’s shoulder” and benefiting from the conversation, for they too had failed the Lord after boasting of their devotion. Peter had already confessed his sin and been forgiven. Now he was being restored to apostleship and leadership.

The image, however, changes from that of the fisherman to that of the shepherd. Peter was to minister both as an evangelist (catching the fish) and a pastor (shepherding the flock). It is unfortunate when we divorce these two because they should go together. Pastors ought to evangelize (2 Tim. 4:5) and then shepherd the people they have won so that they mature in the Lord.

Jesus gave three admonitions to Peter: “Feed My lambs,” “Shepherd My sheep,” and “Feed My sheep.” Both the lambs and the more mature sheep need feeding and leading, and that is the task of the spiritual shepherd. It is an awesome responsibility to be a shepherd of God’s flock! (1 Peter 5:2) There are enemies that want to destroy the flock, and the shepherd must be alert and courageous (Acts 20:28-35). By nature, sheep are ignorant and defenseless, and they need the protection and guidance of the shepherd.

While it is true that the Holy Spirit equips people to serve as shepherds, and gives these people to churches (Eph. 4:11ff), it is also true that each individual Christian must help to care for the flock. Each of us has a gift or gifts from the Lord, and we should use what He has given us to help protect and perfect the flock. Sheep are prone to wander, and we must look after each other and encourage each other.

Jesus Christ is the Good Shepherd (John 10:11), the Great Shepherd (Heb. 13:20-21), and the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4). Pastors are “under-shepherds” who must obey Him as they minister to the flock. The most important thing the pastor can do is to love Jesus Christ. If he truly loves Jesus Christ, the pastor will also love His sheep and tenderly care for them. The Greek word for “sheep” at the end of John 21:17 means “dear sheep.” Our Lord’s sheep are dear to Him and He wants His ministers to love them and care for them personally and lovingly. (See Ezek. 34 for God’s indictment of unfaithful shepherds, the leaders of Judah.) A pastor who loves the flock will serve it faithfully, no matter what the cost.

Jesus showed the reality of the surroundings. Note the land and fire, the fish and bread. He was showing that He was the same Jesus who had always been with them. He was not a figment of their imagination, not a vision, not even a spirit. He was in a body just like the body they had always known.

(21:10-11) Jesus Christ, Resurrection: Jesus showed that He could see, speak, hear, and feel. He instructed the disciples to gather in the fish, instructing them just as He always had. They obeyed, even to the point of counting the fish. Jesus was heaping proof upon proof, giving the disciples indisputable evidence of His resurrection.

(21:12-13) Jesus Christ, Resurrection: Jesus showed that His body was real. He invited them to eat and He ate with them, just as He always had. Again, the point is that they must know it was Jesus. The risen Lord was the same Jesus who had walked and lived with them, the only difference being that He had risen from the dead in a perfected and glorified body.

Note: the disciples knew beyond question that it was the Lord. Humanly, it was not supposed to be; a dead man arising from the grave was impossible. The physical and material world knew nothing but corruption and decay, sin and death. But seated there eating with them was Jesus. He had risen from the dead and come back to life again. They knew that death was now conquered and that man could now live forever (John 20:31).

They knew just what Jesus wanted them to know. They knew the great reality of His resurrection body and the great reality of His sovereign majesty and care for them in conquering death.

(21:14) Jesus Christ, Resurrection: Jesus’ resurrection was affirmed by John. Remember why John was writing.

“But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name” (John 20:31).

We Are Disciples—Follow Him (John 21:19-25)

Jesus had just spoken about Peter’s life and ministry, and now He talks about Peter’s death. This must have been a shock to Peter, to have the Lord discuss his death in such an open manner. No doubt Peter was rejoicing that he had been restored to fellowship and apostleship. Why bring up martyrdom?

The first time Jesus spoke about His own death, Peter had opposed it (Matt. 16:21ff). Peter had even used his sword in the Garden in a futile attempt to protect his Lord. Yet Peter had boasted he would die for the Lord Jesus! But when the pressure was on, Peter failed miserably. (You and I probably would have done worse!) Anyone who yields himself to serve the Lord must honestly confront this matter of death.

When a person has settled the matter of death, then he is ready to live and to serve! Our Lord’s own death is a repeated theme in John’s Gospel: He knew that His “hour” would come, and He was prepared to obey the Father’s will. We as His followers must yield ourselves—just as He yielded Himself for us—and be “living sacrifices” (Rom. 12:1-2) who are “ready to be offered” (2 Tim. 4:6-8) if it is the will of God.

Earlier that morning, Peter had “girded himself” and hurried to shore to meet Jesus (John 21:7). The day would come when another would take charge of Peter—and kill him (see 2 Peter 1:13-14). Tradition tells us that Peter was indeed crucified, but that he asked to be crucified upside down, because he was not worthy to die exactly as his Master had died.

But Peter’s death would not be a tragedy; it would glorify God! The death of Lazarus glorified God (John 11:4, 40) and so did the death of Jesus (John 12:23ff). Paul’s great concern was that he glorify God, whether by life or by death (Phil. 1:20-21). This should be our desire as well.

Our Lord’s words, “Follow Me!” must have brought new joy and love to Peter’s heart. Literally, Jesus said, “Keep on following Me.” Immediately, Peter began to follow Jesus, just as he had done before his great denial. However, for a moment Peter took his eyes off the Lord Jesus, a mistake he had made at least two other times. After that first great catch of fish, Peter took his eyes off his Lord and looked at himself. “Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” (Luke 5:8) When he was walking on the stormy sea with Jesus, Peter looked away from the Lord and began to look at the wind and waves; and immediately he began to sink (Matt. 14:30). It is dangerous to look at the circumstances instead of looking to the Lord.

Why did Peter look away from his Lord and start to look back? He heard somebody walking behind him. It was the Apostle John who was also following Jesus Christ. Peter did a foolish thing and asked Jesus, “What shall this man do?” In other words, “Lord, you just told me what will happen to me; now, what will happen to John?”

The Lord rebuked Peter and reminded him that his job was to follow, not to meddle into the lives of other believers. Beware when you get your eyes off the Lord and start to look at other Christians! “Looking unto Jesus” should be the aim and practice of every believer (Heb. 12:1-2). To be distracted by ourselves, our circumstances, or by other Christians, is to disobey the Lord and possibly get detoured out of the will of God. Keep your eyes of faith on Him and on Him alone.

This does not mean that we ignore others, because we do have the responsibility of caring for one another (Phil. 2:1-4). Rather, it means that we must not permit our curiosity about others to distract us from following the Lord. God has His plan for us; He also has plans for our Christian friends and associates. How He works in their lives is His business. Our business is to follow Him as He leads us (see Rom. 14:1-13).

Jesus did not say that John would live until His return, but that is the way some of the misguided believers understood it. More problems are caused by confused saints than by lost sinners! Misinterpreting the Word of God only creates misunderstanding about God’s people and God’s plans for His people.

However, there is a somewhat enigmatic quality to what the Lord said about John. Jesus did not say that John would live until He returned, nor did He say that John would die before He returned. As it was, John lived the longest of all the disciples and did witness the Lord’s return when he saw the visions that he recorded in the Book of Revelation.

As John came to the close of his book, he affirmed again the credibility of his witness. (Remember, witness is a key theme in the Gospel of John. The word is used forty-seven times.) John witnessed these events himself and wrote them for us as he was led by the Holy Spirit. He could have included so much more, but he wrote only what the Spirit told him to write.

The book ends with Peter and John together following Jesus, and He led them right into the Book of Acts! What an exciting thing it was to receive the power of the Spirit and to bear witness of Jesus Christ! Had they not trusted Him, been transformed by Him, and followed Him, they would have remained successful fishermen on the Sea of Galilee; and the world would never have heard of them.

Jesus Christ is transforming lives today. Wherever He finds a believer who is willing to yield to His will, listen to His Word, and follow His way, He begins to transform that believer and accomplish remarkable things in that life. He also begins to do wonderful things through that life.

Peter and John have been off the scene (except for their books) for centuries, but you and I are still here. We are taking His place and taking their place. What a responsibility! What a privilege!

We can succeed only as we permit Him to transform us.

By nature God is forgiving. The Old Testament abounds with teachings about His forgiveness. David declared, “For Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive, and abundant in lovingkindness to all who call upon Thee” (Ps. 86:5).

In another psalm he reminds us that God pardons all our iniquities (Ps. 103:3). Daniel said, “To the Lord our God belong compassion and forgiveness” (Dan. 9:9).

God described Himself to Moses as, “the Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger; and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin” (Ex. 34:6-7).

Micah extolled the Lord, saying, “Who is a God like Thee, who pardons Iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of His possession? He does not retain His anger forever, because He delights in unchanging love. He will again have compassion on us; He will tread our iniquities under foot. Yes, Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” Mic. 7:18-19.

The Old Testament also abounds with examples of His forgiveness”

• When Adam and Eve committed sin, God forgave them.
• When Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob sinned, God forgave them.
• When Moses sinned God forgave him.
• When Israel under the judges and under the kings repeatedly sinned, God forgave her. Israel’s history is a history of God’s forgiveness.

Likewise the New Testament pictures God as supremely the God of forgiveness. That is the essence of the gospel: God’s divine and gracious provision for the forgiveness of man’s sin. In Christ, Paul says, “we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:7; cf. Col. 1:14).

John assures us that, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” and that our “sins are forgiven [us] for His name’s sake” 1 John 1:9; 2:12.

No matter how severe the sin, God can forgive it. The worst conceivable sin would be to kill God’s own Son—and that while He was on earth for the very purpose of providing salvation from sin and the way to everlasting life. Nothing could possibly be more heinous, vicious, and wicked than that. And, of course, killing Him is exactly what men did to the Son of God.

Yet, while hanging on the cross and about to die, Jesus prayed and affirmed the forgiving mercy available to His executioners, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). The degree of sin does not forfeit forgiveness, because even killing the Son of God was forgivable.

Nor does the volume of sin end the possibility of mercy. A seventy-year-old profligate who has lived a life of debauchery, stealing, lying, profanity, blasphemy, and immorality is just as forgivable as a seven-year-old who has done nothing worse than normal childhood naughtiness.

Nor does the particular kind of sin cancel grace. In Scripture we find God forgiving idolatry, murder, gluttony, fornication, adultery, cheating, lying, homosexuality, covenant breaking, blasphemy, drunkenness, extortion, and every other kind of sin imaginable.

He forgives self-righteousness, which is the deceiving sin of thinking that one has no sin. He even forgives the sin of rejecting Christ; otherwise no one could be saved, because before salvation everyone, to some degree, is a Christ rejecter.

There is no forgiveness of even the smallest sin unless it is confessed and repented of; but there is forgiveness of even the greatest sin if those divine conditions are met.

The rejection of Jesus as Messiah and King gradually escalated as His ministry continued. As we have seen, first there was doubt, then criticism, then indifference, culminating in open rejection.

The religious leaders of Israel then added blasphemy against the Holy Spirit to their rejection of Christ. Although their animosity would continue to spread and intensify, this blasphemy was the epitome of its expression.

For centuries God’s people had longed for the Messiah, their divine Deliverer. The hope of every godly prophet and teacher of Israel was to live to see Him; and every Jewish girl dreamed of being His mother. Yet when He arrived He was denied and rejected.

In 12:22-32, Matthew details five features of the climax of that rejection: the activity of Jesus in healing a seriously afflicted man; the amazement of the crowd over the miracle; the accusation against Jesus because of the miracle; Jesus’ answer to His accusers; and the anathema His accusers brought on themselves.

(12:22-30) Introduction: the opposition to Christ reached its height in this event. Christ was scorned and diabolically attacked. He was blasphemed, not only accused, but charged with being of the devil. Again He kept calm and remained level-headed and went about proving that He was of God, the true Messiah. He answered the monstrous charge by giving four logical and irrefutable arguments.

1. Jesus proved His Messianic power (v.22-24).
2. Argument 1: a divided allegiance destroys (v.25-26).
3. Argument 2: denying Him is inconsistent and illogical (v.27-28).
4. Argument 3: a strong man has to be bound before his property can be taken (v.29).
5. Argument 4: neutrality is impossible—one is either with Christ or against Christ (v.30).

(12:22-24) Jesus Christ, Messiah: Jesus proved His Messianic power.

1. The proof: a devil-possessed man (blind and dumb) was healed. Note three things.
2. The man was “brought to Jesus.” Family or friends cared enough to bring him. How desperately some people need family and friends who care enough to help them.
3. Jesus had compassion on the most evil, on a man thought to be so evil that he was “possessed with a devil.” The devil made the man both blind and dumb, yet Jesus had compassion upon him. His compassion reached out even to the most evil person.
4. Jesus has the power “to deliver and heal” immediately. The one necessity is coming or being brought to Him.

Christ’s very purpose for coming to earth was to conquer Satan and break his power over men. In some cases Satan’s power was imagined; in other cases it was real (and still is). When a man is held in bondage by anything, Christ cares and craves to deliver the man  A man without Christ is “blind and dumb” to the things of God.

2. There are two reactions to Jesus’ Messianic power.
3. The people were amazed. They wondered in hope, “Is this the Son of David, the promised Messiah?” They thought He might be, yet they were not quite sure. He was not doing the things they had been taught the Messiah was to do. He seemed to have no concern for political and national affairs. He had neither mobilized an army nor led an uprising against the Romans as the Son of David. Contrariwise, He was demonstrating compassion and love for needy persons who were destitute in spirit and hurting in body. He was proclaiming a message of personal salvation instead of national deliverance.

Such behavior was so different from what they had always believed and been taught. He claimed to be the Messiah; He even claimed to be the Son of God. They wanted to believe; they even hoped, but they just were not sure.

1. The religionists (Pharisees) denied Jesus. When they saw the people turning to Jesus, they did two things: (a) they set out to shatter the people’s hope and belief lest they lose their own position and hold on the people, and (b) they charged Jesus with being from the devil and possessing the power of the devil.

The people were open to the possibility that Jesus might be the Messiah, but the religionists were not. Why? Why are some minds and hearts open and others closed to Christ? Too often the difference has to do with peer acceptance, reputation, pride, wealth, possessions, fame, power, livelihood, public esteem, applause, praise, position (1 John 2:15-16; cp. 2 Cor. 6:17-18).

Obstinate unbelief is serious, critically serious. In every generation there are those who cling to their unbelief despite witness after witness. The evidence of the Lord’s presence in lives builds up to an undeniable point, yet they still persist in unbelief. They attribute any change in a human life to the power of the mind or to some psychological power of suggestion or to human faith. And they attribute any change in natural events to a fluke in nature or to an unexplainable and yet unknown or undiscovered cause. They will attribute the unexplained to anything just to keep from having to confess Christ and to surrender themselves to Him.

Jesus’ answer was to give four logical and irrefutable arguments for His Messiahship. The open heart and honest mind must admit four arguments.

The Activity

Then there was brought to Him a demon-possessed man who was blind and dumb, and He healed him, so that the dumb man spoke and saw. (12:22)

The man had multiple problems. He was demon-possessed … blind and dumb, and possibly also suffered deafness, so often associated with inability to speak. But the fact that Jesus healed him was not unique. He had healed hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of people who were demon-possessed, blind, dumb, and deaf; and many of those had more than one affliction, just as this man did.

As was often the case, this healing demonstrated in one act Jesus’ dominion over both the spirit world of demons and the physical world of disease. He undeniably possessed the power to heal every kind of disease, to cast out any kind and any number of demons, and even to restore life to the dead. He had performed thousands of instantaneous, total, permanent, and verifiable healings. His supernatural powers could no longer be questioned, either by the common multitudes or by the more educated and skeptical religious leaders.

Yet most of the sin-blinded people remained ambivalent about Jesus’ identity and the source of His great power. They knew that miracles would be proof signs of the Messiah; but they also expected Him to come with royal fanfare and with military might. But instead of regal robes, sovereign authority, a throne, trumpets, swords, horses, chariots, and a mighty army, they saw a Man of compassion, gentleness, and humility—with a following of twelve nondescript disciples and a multitude of hangers-on whose loyalty could hardly be counted on.

Because Jesus did not appear to be a conqueror or a king by their definition, the people would not accept His being the Messiah. They had chosen to be selective about the Old Testament predictions of the Messiah. His predicted coming in power and glory to defeat the foes of Israel and set His people free was easy for them to be excited about. His predicted coming in meekness and humility was not.

The scribes and Pharisees had been dogging Jesus’ footsteps for some time and were already convinced He was an enemy of Judaism—so much so that they even collaborated against Him with the Herodians, who normally were their arch foes (Mark 3:6). The religious leaders were no longer merely skeptical and resentful but had become adamantly hostile to Jesus. It would be over a year before Jesus would be crucified, but the irrevocable decision to destroy Him had already been made (Matt. 12:14).

Jesus therefore seems to have performed the particular healing on this occasion especially for the benefit of the Pharisees, forcing them to make their verdict concerning Him public. Before their eyes they saw a man become immediately and dramatically delivered of three great afflictions, and he now stood before them in sound mind and spirit and both spoke and saw. The miracle was incontestable.

The Amazement

And all the multitudes were amazed, and began to say, “This man cannot be the Son of David, can he?” (12:23)

Although many people among the multitudes present that day had doubtlessly seen Jesus perform many miracles of healing, they were especially amazed by this one. To be amazed means to be totally astounded, beside oneself with amazement and wonder. One writer suggests that “it means to be literally knocked out of your senses,” and another that “it means to be out of your mind with amazement. In ways that we may not fully see from the narrative, this particular miracle was unusually overwhelming, as if Jesus meant to intensify its demonstration of supernaturalness.

Although it comes down on the negative side of probability in their minds, the very question the people began to ask among themselves—This man cannot be the Son of David, can he?—reveals that they recognized such miracles as possible messianic signs. Son of David was one of many scriptural titles for the Messiah (see 2 Sam. 7:12-16; Ps. 89:3; Isa. 9:6-7), and for the people to consider whether Jesus could be the Son of David was a query related to His being the Messiah. That was the title later ascribed to Jesus by the crowds who welcomed Him into Jerusalem as their Messiah and King (Matt. 21:9; cf. v. 5).

The Accusation

But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, “This man casts out demons only by Beelzebub the ruler of the demons.” (12:24)

The fact that the multitudes were seriously wondering if Jesus might be the Messiah drove the Pharisees to panic, and they unwittingly reacted with the foolish accusation that Jesus cast out demons only by Beelzebul the ruler of the demons. These Jewish religious leaders, of whom the Pharisees were always the most zealous and vocal, could not tolerate the thought that this man who denounced them as unrighteous hypocrites and trampled on their human system of traditions could be the prophesied and long-awaited Deliverer of Israel.

Matthew’s telling us that Jesus knew their thoughts (v. 25) indicates that the Pharisees were some distance from Jesus, perhaps on the fringe of the crowd or standing outside as Jesus ministered within a house. Their intent was to poison the minds of the people against Jesus by answering their question about Him with a resounding no. They said, in effect, that He was the antithesis of the Son of David. He was the servant of Beelzebul the ruler of the demons.

They had only one option. Because Jesus’ power was indisputably supernatural, because the only two sources of supernatural power are God and Satan, and because they refused to recognize Jesus as being from God, they were forced to conclude that He was an agent of Satan. He must serve the ruler of the demons, for whom Beelzebul (or Beelzebub) was a popular title, derived from the name of an ancient Canaanite deity (See chapter 9 of this volume for a discussion of the name Beelzebul.)

The Answer

And knowing their thoughts He said to them, “Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then shall his kingdom stand? And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Consequently they shall be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can anyone enter the strong man’s house and carry off his property, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters. (12:25-30)

Although the Pharisees were speaking to the crowd beyond Jesus’ hearing, He nevertheless knew their thoughts. Mark tells us that some scribes from Jerusalem joined the Pharisees in accusing Jesus of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebul, and that Jesus “called them to Himself and began speaking to them in parables” (3:22-23). They would not confront Him directly with their accusation, but He confronted them directly with its absurdity, its prejudice, and its rebelliousness.

Jesus Christ, Deity—Messiah, Proof of—Division: the first argument is that a divided allegiance destroys. This is a universal truth. Division leads to separation and ruin. A divided kingdom, city, or house cannot stand. It fights and destroys itself. Satan is not going to empower anyone to deliver people from evil—not time after time as Jesus was doing. Satan would destroy his kingdom and rule over lives. Jesus was arguing that it was an absolute impossibility that He had come from anywhere other than from God Himself. “What fellowship…hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Cor. 6:14-15).

Christ was saying that His works and power had to be of God. They could not possibly be of Satan nor of any source other than God Himself. Three things show this.

1. His works were too numerous (John 21:25).
2. His works were too supernatural—too immense and beyond any known human power—to be explained by any source other than the power of God Himself.
3. His works were too good, too virtuous, and too effective in delivering men to be from any source other than God.

Christ did not come to build up the kingdom of darkness and of Satan. The only dealings He had with Satan were twofold.

1. Christ broke the power and fear of Satan over lives.
2. Christ destroyed the works of Satan as the arch rebel against God.

Note the strong lesson on division. No body of people can survive division. A divided people cannot stand. Too many people within churches have ignored the lesson: “If ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another” (Galatians 5:15; cp. 1 Cor. 1:10f).

The Accusation Was Absurd

“Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then shall his kingdom stand?” (12:25b-26)

Jesus first showed His accusers that their charge was a logical absurdity. It is axiomatic that a kingdom divided against itself would soon be laid waste by self-destruction. The truism also applies to any city or any house. If one or the other becomes divided against itself, it obviously shall not stand.

Applied to the spirit world, the principle is just as clear: If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall his kingdom stand? Outside of the Trinity, Satan is the most intelligent being in existence, and he certainly does not assign his forces to fight against each other and internally destroy his own program.

It is true, of course, that evil is destructive by nature, and that destruction often includes self-destruction. Satan is the father of hatred and lies, and where such things rule there is confusion and inconsistency. There can be no true harmony within or among evil beings. Just as God is the Lord of order and harmony, Satan is the lord of disorder and chaos, whether he chooses to be or not.

It is also true that although Satan is brilliant, powerful, and able to move from place to place with seemingly instantaneous speed, he is nevertheless not omniscient, omnipotent, or omnipresent. And the supreme deceiver is supremely self-deceived, especially in thinking he can overpower God and usurp His kingdom.

And it is further true that Satan often disguises himself as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14). In that role he may pretend to cast out a demon by restricting its power over the possessed person in order to give the impression of a cleansing. That sort of supposed exorcism has been common throughout the history of the church and is practiced today by various cults, false healers, and exorcists.

Even Satan’s demons may on occasion act inconsistently and in conflict with him and each other. But despite the disorder of his kingdom, his creaturely limits, his false exorcisms, and demon confusion, Satan does not cast out Satan, and he is not divided against himself. There is no harmony, trust, or loyalty in his kingdom, but he tolerates no disobedience or division. It was therefore preposterous to accuse Jesus of casting out demons by the power of the ruler of demons.

(12:27-28) Jesus Christ, Response; Works—Denial: the second argument is that denying Jesus is inconsistent and illogical.

1. Why are His claims and His works denied while the claims and works of others are accepted? There were those who “cast out devils” in Jesus’ day; there were exorcists who practiced the casting out of demons.
2. There were those who cast out devils in Christ’s name, yet they did not follow Him (Mark 9:38).
3. There were Jewish exorcists who travelled about using the name of Jesus in a magical way (Acts 19:13f).
4. There were exorcists who were unfaithful to Christ (Matthew 7:22).

Jesus was saying that to deny Him was inconsistent and illogical. The good works of other men were acknowledged, yet His good works were denied and attributed to evil. His works were the greatest works ever performed for men, and they far outnumbered the works of any man (John 21:25). How could His power and His works be of evil and the works of others be of good? His works were bound to be of God. If His works were the good works of God, then His claim to be the Messiah was bound to be true, for God would not give His power to a liar and a deceiver.

There is only one logical and consistent conclusion: His works are of the Spirit of God. This points to a critical fact: His claim is true. He is the Messiah and the kingdom of God has come to men. Any other position is illogical and inconsistent.

2. Christ’s works are a sign of His Messiahship. His works are a sign that God’s Spirit rests upon Him and that God’s kingdom has come to man.

Christ pulls no punches in this argument. He is very clear and pointed: all unbelievers are inconsistent and illogical in their unbelief.

If we ascribe good works to others and say that they are blessed by God, why do we not do the same with Christ, especially when He did so many great works with such phenomenal power? Why do we not say that He is of God and blessed as no other person is blessed by God? Some do profess such. Why then do so many say His claim to be the Savior is not true?

Christ is saying that such a position is illogical and inconsistent, for God could not bless a liar and a deceiver—especially with such supernatural and phenomenal power.

The Accusation Was Prejudiced

And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Consequently they shall be your judges. (12:27)

Second, Jesus showed that the Pharisees’ accusation was also prejudiced, revealing the corrupt, wicked bias of their hearts. Sons was often used as an epithet for disciples or followers, as in the common Old Testament expression “sons of the prophets” (See, e.g., 2 Kings 2:3). Certain followers or sons of the Pharisees cast out demons, and the Jewish historian Josephus reports that they used many strange, exotic incantations and cultic formulas in their rites.

Luke tells of a group of seven brothers, sons of a chief priest named Sceva, who practiced exorcism. When they and other Jewish exorcists heard of the apostles’ great success in casting out evil spirits, they decided to try a new formula—exorcising in “the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, ‘I adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preaches’” (Acts 19:13-14). The fact that they thought the mere use of certain words and names would accomplish the exorcism proves their magical orientation.

The demon, however was not the least affected, and he responded by saying to the seven men, “I recognize Jesus, and I know about Paul, but who are you?’ And the man, in whom was the evil spirit, leaped on them and subdued all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded” (vv. 15-16).

Jesus pointed out the Pharisees’ extreme prejudice by showing that they approved the exorcisms attempted by the sons who were part of their religious establishment. They would never have claimed that those activities were ungodly, much less satanic. Yet when Jesus not only cast out every sort of demon but also healed every sort of disease, they accused Him of being in league with the devil.

The Pharisees’ response reflects the basic response of every person who intentionally rejects Jesus Christ. They did not reject Him for lack of evidence but because they were biased against Him. Their own deeds were evil and they could not handle the intimidating reality of Jesus’ righteousness; they were children of darkness and could not tolerate His light (John 3:19). They were not looking for truth but for ways to justify their own wickedness and to destroy anyone who dared expose them.

To put His opponents further on the spot, Jesus suggested that the Pharisees let their exorcist sons be their judges. The implied suggestion was that they ask those practitioners by whose power they cast out evil spirits. If they said, “By Satan’s power,” they would condemn themselves and the religious leaders who supported them. But if they said, “By God’s power,” they would undercut the Pharisees’ accusation against Jesus.

(12:29) Jesus Christ, Destroys Satan—Satan: the third argument is that a strong man has to be bound before his property can be taken. Satan is the strong man; Christ is the invader who enters Satan’s house to free those imprisoned by Satan. Note: Christ is arguing that He is far from being in alliance with Satan; He is actually in opposition to him. He is entering the “evil house” or domain (territory) of Satan and taking his (human) goods. He is turning men “from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sin” (Acts 26:18). God “delivers us from the power of darkness” (Col. 1:13).

When did Christ invade Satan’s house and bind him?

1. Satan was bound somewhat during Jesus’ temptations in the wilderness. For the first time in history, Satan confronted Someone whom he could not lead away from God. After the wilderness experience Satan was set back, His power shaken. The Man Christ Jesus had withstood the heaviest barrage of temptation ever launched. Satan was bound to sense the impending binding that was to come.
2. Satan was bound even more as He confronted Jesus throughout His life with temptation after temptation (Matthew 16:23). Jesus stood fast, resisted and overcame the temptations, conquering and binding Satan more and more each time.
3. Satan was bound dramatically after Jesus’ Garden of Gethsemane experience. Jesus was tempted to take another route other than the cross, yet He obeyed God perfectly.
4. Satan was bound in a completed sense at the cross. Christ had secured perfect righteousness—He had never sinned. Therefore He was the Ideal Man, the Perfect Man. As the Ideal Man His righteousness and death could stand for and embrace all men who would place their lives into His keeping. Satan’s house of evil and sin was broken, completely broken.
5. Satan shall be bound climactically and forever at the end of time. Both the earth and the heavens shall be made anew and established forever in perfection—established without Satan and his “evil house” carrying on their evil work. (Cp. 2 Peter 3:3-18.)

The Accusation Was Rebellious

But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can anyone enter the strong man’s house and carry off his property, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters. (12:28-30)

The third, and basic, reason behind the Pharisees’ accusation was their rebelliousness against God. Jesus had dispelled the foolish charge that He worked under Satan’s power, and the only remaining possibility was that He cast out demons by the Spirit of God.

If He did His work by the Spirit of God, then His miracles were of God and He had to be the Messiah, “the Son of David,” just as the multitudes had considered (v. 23). Every religiously literate Jew knew that the prophets predicted that just such signs would accompany the Messiah’s coming (Isa. 29:18; 35:5-6). They also knew that the Messiah was to be Israel’s supreme and eternal King (Ps. 2:6; Jer. 23:5; Zech. 9:9). “Therefore,” Jesus was saying, “if I am the Messiah, I am also the coming King, and if I am the King, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.”

Or how can anyone enter the strong man’s house and carry off his property, Jesus continued, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder the house. Could not the Pharisees see that everything Jesus said and did was opposed to Satan? Jesus healed sickness and disease, which were brought upon mankind by sin, which, in turn, was brought and promoted by Satan. Jesus raised people from death, which was also a consequence of sin and indirectly the work of Satan (cf. Heb. 2:14-17).

Jesus cast out demons, which, as He had just pointed out, was in obvious opposition to Satan. He even forgave sins—something Satan neither would nor could do—and verified His authority to forgive sins by His power to perform miracles (Matt. 9:5-6). Every detail of what He taught and did corresponded to the teaching of Old Testament Scripture. And although the scribes and Pharisees often charged Jesus with opposing and violating their man-made traditions, they could never convict Him of committing sin or of teaching falsehood (John 8:46).

Jesus used the figure of a thief who planned to rob a strong man’s house while the strong man was there. The thief knows that unless he first binds the strong man he has no chance of being successful and, in fact, risks being arrested and seriously beaten in the process.

Jesus’ point was this: “Haven’t I demonstrated before you and all of Israel My power over Satan and his kingdom of evil, darkness, and destruction? Haven’t I demonstrated beyond all doubt that My authority is higher than Satan’s? Haven’t I cleansed people of every kind of disease and freed them from every kind of demonic control and oppression? Haven’t I demonstrated My authority over both sin and death? Haven’t I rescued souls from hell? Who could have such power and authority but God Himself? Who but God could enter the very house of Satan and successfully bind him and carry off his property? I have shown you that I can defeat Satan and a legion of his demonic hosts at will. How could I be any other than your divine Messiah?”

The death blow to Satan was inflicted at the cross and will be actualized in the future; but even before that ultimate victory Christ repeatedly demonstrated His unlimited and unhindered power to thwart and bind Satan. Christ also committed that power to His disciples, and when the seventy returned from their mission, Jesus “said to them, I was watching Satan fall from heaven like lightning’” (Luke 10:18). Satan is presently still powerful, but His power is limited, his doom is sealed, and his time is short.

Jesus next made clear to the Pharisees that there is no neutral ground as far as relationship to Him is concerned. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters. It is not necessary to oppose Christ in order to be against Him; it is only necessary not to be with Him. Nor is it necessary to actively interfere with His work in order to be one who scatters; it is only necessary to not gather with Him. The person who does not belong to God is the enemy of God (Rom. 5:10); the person who is not a child of God through Christ is a rebel against God.

There are only two possible relationships to Jesus Christ, and therefore to God: with or against. It is both spiritually and rationally impossible to accept Jesus as a kind man, a good teacher, and a great man of God—and nothing more. Only God has the right to claim for Himself the honor and authority Jesus claimed for Himself; and only God has the power over disease, sin, demons, Satan, and death that Jesus both claimed and demonstrated.

(12:30) Neutrality: the fourth argument is that neutrality is impossible. A person is either with Christ or against Christ. This could be a picture of a shepherd or a farmer. Each is involved in gathering—the one gathering sheep and the other gathering the harvest. Each also can become guilty of scattering—the one scattering the sheep and the other scattering the harvest.

Christ says two things.

1. A person stands with Him, believing and trusting Him, or else a person stands against Him in unbelief and distrust.
2. A person works with Him in gathering others, or else works against Him by scattering others.

Note two significant facts.

1. Neutrality is impossible. There are only two sides: with Christ or against Christ.
2. Refraining from evil is not enough. A person must gather with Christ. A person must constantly be doing good. If we do not gather, we scatter.

The Anathema

Therefore I say to you, any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whoever shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age, or in the age to come. (12:31-32)

Few passages of Scripture have been more misinterpreted and misunderstood than these two verses. Because of their extreme seriousness and finality, it is critical to understand them correctly

Jesus first stated that any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men. Although blasphemy is a form of sin, in this passage and context the two are treated separately—with blasphemy representing the most extreme form of sin. Sin here represents the full gamut of immoral and ungodly thoughts and actions, whereas blasphemy represents conscious denouncing and rejection of God.

Blasphemy is defiant irreverence, the uniquely terrible sin of intentionally and openly speaking evil against holy God or defaming or mocking Him (cf. Mark. 2:7). The Old Testament penalty for such blasphemy was death by stoning (Lev. 24:16). In the last days blasphemy will be an outstanding characteristic of those who rebelliously and insolently oppose God (Rev. 13:5-6; 16:9; 17:3).

But even blasphemy, Jesus says, is forgiven, just as any other sin is forgiven when it is confessed and repented of. An unbeliever who blasphemes God can be forgiven.

Paul confessed that, “even though [he] was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor,” he was nevertheless “shown mercy, because [he] acted ignorantly in unbelief; and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant, with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus.” (1 Tim. 1:13-14) “Christ Jesus came into the world,” the apostle continues, “to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all” (v. 15). Peter blasphemed Christ with curses (Mark 14:71) and was forgiven and restored.

Even a believer can blaspheme, since any thought or word that sullies or defames the Lord’s name constitutes blasphemy. To question God’s goodness, wisdom, fairness, truthfulness, love, or faithfulness is a form of blasphemy. All of that is forgivable by grace. Speaking to believers, John said, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” 1 John 1:9.

There is one exception, however: blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. Even the person who blasphemes Jesus, who dares to speak a word against the Son of Man … shall be forgiven. Son of Man designates the Lord’s humanity, which He experienced in His time of humiliation and servitude during the incarnation. A person’s perception may not allow him to see more than the Lord’s humanity, and if he only misjudges at that level and speaks against Him in His humanness, such a word against the Son of Man can be forgiven.

When a person rejects Christ with less than full exposure to the evidence of His deity, he may yet be forgiven of that sin if, after gaining fuller light, he then believes.

It was hard even for the disciples to keep clearly in mind that their Teacher was indeed the Son of God. He ate, drank, slept, and became tired just as they did. Not only that, but many of the things He did simply did not seem to reflect God’s glory and majesty. Jesus continually humbled Himself and served others. He took no earthly glory for Himself, and when others tried to thrust it on Him, He refused to receive it—as when the crowd wanted to make Him king after He miraculously fed the five thousand (John 6:15). It was even more difficult for those outside Jesus’ inner circle to appreciate His deity. Even when He performed His greatest miracles, He did so without fanfare or flare. Jesus did not always look or act like even a human lord, much less like the divine Lord.

But to misjudge, belittle, and discredit Jesus from the vantage point of incomplete revelation or inadequate perception was forgivable, wrong as it was. As already mentioned, the apostle Paul had himself been an ignorant blasphemer of the Lord Jesus Christ of the worst sort and a fierce persecutor of His church. And many of those who had denied and rejected Christ during His earthly ministry later saw the truth of who He was and asked forgiveness and were saved.

But the blasphemy against the Spirit was something more serious and irremediable. It not only reflected unbelief, but determined unbelief—the refusal, after having seen all the evidence necessary to complete understanding, even to consider believing in Christ. This was blasphemy against Jesus in His deity, against the Spirit of God who uniquely indwelt and empowered Him.

It reflected determined rejection of Jesus as the Messiah against every evidence and argument. It reflected seeing the truth incarnate and then knowingly rejecting Him and condemning Him. It demonstrated an absolute and permanent refusal to believe, which resulted in loss of opportunity ever to be forgiven … either in this age, or in the age to come. Through this age (all of human history), such rejection is unforgivable. The age to come implies that through all of eternity there will be no forgiveness. In the age of human history and in the age of divine consummation, no forgiveness.

Scripture is clear that during His ministry on earth our Lord was submissive to the Father (John 4:34; 5:19-30) and empowered by the Spirit (Matt. 4:1; Mark 1:12; Luke 4:1, 18; John 3:34; Acts 1:2; Rom. 1:4). Peter said that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth “with the Holy Spirit and with power” Acts 10:38.

Those who spoke against the Holy Spirit were those who saw His divine power working in and through Jesus but willfully refused to accept the implications of that revelation and, in some cases, attributed that power to Satan. Many people had heard Jesus teach and preach God’s truth, as no man had ever taught before (Matt. 7:28-29), yet they refused to believe Him. They had seen him heal every kind of disease, cast out every kind of demon, and forgive every kind of sin, yet they charged Him with deceit, falsehood, and demonism. In the face of every possible evidence of Jesus’ messiahship and deity, they said no. God could do nothing more for them, and they would therefore remain eternally unforgiven.

For penitence they substitute hardening, for confession plotting. Thus, by means of their own criminal and completely inexcusable callousness, they are dooming themselves. Their sin is unpardonable because they are unwilling to tread the path that leads to pardon. For a thief, an adulterer, and a murderer there is hope. The message of the gospel may cause him to cry out, “O God be merciful to me, the sinner.” But when a man has become hardened, so that he has made up his mind not to pay any attention to the … Spirit, … he has placed himself on the road that leads to perdition. (William Hendriksen, The Exposition of the Gospel According to Matthew [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1973], p. 529)

Through Isaiah, the Lord pictured Israel as a vineyard He had carefully planted, cultivated, and tended. He built a tower in the middle of it, representing Jerusalem, and a wine vat in it, representing the sacrificial system. “Then He expected it to produce good grapes, but it produced only worthless ones.” “What more was there to do for My vineyard that I have not done in it?” God asked. “So now let Me tell you what I am going to do to My vineyard: I will remove its hedge and it will be consumed; I will break down its wall and it will become trampled ground. And I will lay it waste; it will not be pruned or hoed, but briars and thorns will come up. I will also charge the clouds to rain no rain on it” (Isa. 5:1-6). After the people had been blessed with every blessing and had every opportunity but still turned their backs on God, there was nothing left for Him to do but turn His back on them.

During Jesus’ earthly ministry, the unbelieving Pharisees and all the others who blasphemed the Spirit cut themselves off from God’s mercy, not because it was not offered but because it was abundantly offered yet rebelliously and permanently rejected and ridiculed as satanic.

Within forty years, God would destroy Jerusalem, the Temple, the priesthood, the sacrifices, and the nation of Israel. In 70 a.d. the Romans razed Jerusalem, utterly destroyed the Temple, slaughtered over a million of its inhabitants, and all but obliterated nearly a thousand other towns and villages in Judea. His own chosen people had said no to Him, and He said no to them.

To unsaved Jews who had heard the full gospel message and had seen its evidence in supernatural power, and to all who would come after them with similar exposure to the truth and the biblical record of miraculous evidence, the writer of the book of Hebrews gave a stern warning: “How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard [that is, the apostles], God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will” (Heb. 2:3-4).

Later in the letter an even more severe warning to those who reject with full revelation is given: “For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame.” (Heb. 6:4-6)

The generation immediately after Christ was on earth was ministered to by the apostles, enlightened by their teaching, and given proof of the truth of the gospel by their miracles. That generation had evidence equivalent to that of those who heard and saw Jesus in person. They had the highest possible revelation from God, and if they refused to believe in the face of such overwhelming evidence, there was nothing more God could do for them.

They did not blaspheme; they simply turned away. The guilt of the Pharisees who added blasphemy to unbelief was greater than that of those who saw the same evidence and disbelieved but did not speak against the Holy Spirit. But the rebels in both groups left themselves no future but hell.

There comes a time when God turns out the lights, when further opportunity for salvation is forever lost. That is why Paul told the Corinthians, “Now is ‘the acceptable time,’ behold, now is ‘the day of salvation’” (2 Cor. 6:2). One who rejects full light can have no more light—and no forgiveness.

At this point, Matthew condenses his narrative. This has two results. First, it looks as if the cleansing of the temple took place on Sunday afternoon, while Mark clarifies that it took place on Monday. Second, he makes it look like the cursing of the fig tree and the lessons drawn from it took place at the same time. Again, Mark clarifies that there was a twenty-four hour interval between the two.

Mark’s twenty-four hour interval is valuable not just for understanding the chronology, but also the theology of this passage. You see, Jesus curses the fig tree on Monday. The disciples don’t notice it until Tuesday. Between these two events, Jesus cleanses the temple. Thus we understand that the withered fig tree is a symbol of Israel’s future. It is kind of like an enacted parable.

Mk 11:12-14 with Mt 21:18-19 ¹²The next day [early in the morning^MT] as they were leaving Bethany [on his way back to the city,^MT] Jesus was hungry. ¹³Seeing in the distance [by the road^MT] a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. ¹⁴Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard him say it. [Immediately the tree withered.^MT]

Early on Monday morning Jesus hikes two miles back to Jerusalem for some unfinished business in the temple. Jesus shouldn’t have been hungry yet. Jews normally only ate two meals a day: 10 a.m. and 6-7 p.m. It was still too early for “breakfast.” Perhaps in all the excitement of the previous day Jesus missed his supper. That would not be the first time Jesus missed a meal because of business (Mk 3:20; 6:31).

Up ahead, off to the side of the road, Jesus notices a fig tree in full leaf. Passover time was unusually early for fig trees to leaf out. But normally, with the leaves came the green buds which would mature into figs. They are bitter but edible. Jesus goes to the tree looking for the fruit that its leaves promise. But he finds nothing but leaves.

Jesus has been criticized for expecting figs before their time. After all, “It was not the season for figs.” That criticism misses the point. The leaves promise there will be green fruit. But there isn’t. What’s worse, without the green fruit now, there will be no figs later.

Jesus has also been severely criticized for using his divine power to destroy an inanimate object in a fit of anger.^10-12 This too misses the point. Jesus isn’t wreaking vengeance on a deceitful tree. He is using this opportunity to teach his disciples a valuable lesson, especially in light of what he is about to do in the temple. To Jesus people are more valuable than things. He places more value on teaching his disciples than on an inanimate object. This same lesson was to be learned at the loss of 2,000 pigs in Gerasa. Besides, this tree is unproductive. It is taking up space on God’s good earth without doing its job. It is absurd to picture nature weeping the loss of its valued comrade through the whimsical anger of Jesus. It is a useless tree.

It has the appearance of a fruit-bearing tree, but it is not. So Jesus curses this unproductive tree as he is about to curse this unproductive nation. The disciples hear him. There is no way they could have predicted from his words—“May no one ever eat fruit from you again”—how immediate and severe the demise of this poor tree will be. Matthew says that it withers immediately. Within twenty-four hours, when they pass this spot again, they will notice that it has withered from its roots (Mk 11:20). Now that is “immediate” in any arborist’s book!

Verse-by-Verse Study

On Monday morning of Passover week Jesus rode into the city on a donkey colt to a Messiah’s welcome and was acclaimed the Son of David, as the people shouted hosannas and placed clothes and palm branches on the road before Him (Matt. 21:1-11). On Tuesday He came into the city again and cleansed the Temple of the sacrifice merchants and moneychangers (vv. 12-17). Now on Wednesday, He entered Jerusalem for the third time since coming up from Jericho.

From Mark we learn that the encounter with the fig tree involved two successive days. Jesus cursed the fig tree on the morning He entered Jerusalem to cleanse the Temple, and it was on the following day, Wednesday, that the disciples noticed that the tree was “withered from the roots up” (Mark 11:14, 20). Matthew condenses the two events into one account, which He mentions only in regard to Wednesday.

In light of Jesus’ just having been hailed by the populace as Israel’s great Messiah and King, His cleansing the Temple and cursing the fig tree were of special and monumental significance. The cleansing of the Temple was a denunciation of Israel’s worship, and the cursing of the fig tree was a denunciation of Israel as a nation. Instead of overthrowing His nation’s enemies as the people anticipated He might, the newly-acclaimed King denounced His own people.

It was inconceivable to Jews that their Messiah would condemn them instead of deliver them, that He would attack Israel instead of Rome. That is why the accolades of the triumphal entry were so short-lived, turning in a few days to cries for Jesus’ death. He had conclusively demonstrated what both His words and His actions had testified all along—that He had not come as a political—military Messiah to free Israel from Rome and set up an earthly kingdom. When that truth finally dawned on them, whatever else Jesus did became irrelevant to most Jews. They had no use for such a Messiah and certainly no use for such a King. By joining their leaders in calling for Jesus’ death, the people would declare in essence what Jesus had predicted in the parable of the nobleman: “We do not want this man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14).

Jesus’ cursing of the fig tree was not nearly so powerfully dramatic as the cleansing of the Temple, but it was equally significant.

Jesus destroyed the fig tree. Why? Some have said such destruction is out of character for Christ. He would never destroy a tree for not bearing fruit. Why did Jesus destroy the tree?

• He destroyed it for the same reason that He angrily ran through the temple casting out all who bought and sold.
• He destroyed it for the same reason that He lashed out at the Pharisees for being hypocritical (Matthew 23:13-39).
• He destroyed it for the same reason that He cast the evil spirits into a herd of swine, killing them (Matthew 8:28-34).
• He destroyed it for the same reasons that He became indignant (angry) with the disciples for keeping little children from coming to Him.
• He destroyed it for the same reason that He deliberately demanded uncompromising loyalty despite family or personal needs (Matthew 8:18-22; Matthew 10:34-39).

Why did Jesus act with such force in destroying the tree? For the same reason He acted with such force in all of the above. Jesus always acted either to teach man or to save and help man. In destroying the fig tree, He was teaching man a much needed lesson.

The lesson: the Messiah has absolute power over all the physical universe. The unfruitful among men (symbolized in the fig tree) do not have such power. Contrariwise, He alone has such enormous power. He alone has the power to judge and to determine fruitfulness and unfruitfulness, life and death, salvation and condemnation. He alone laid down His life; no man took it from Him (John 10:11, 15-18, esp. John 10:18).

Remember this was Jesus’ last week. It was Tuesday, just three days before He was to be killed by unfruitful men. Jesus had to do all He could to prepare His disciples for His onrushing death and for all they were to bear through the ensuing years. He had only two days left, so He had to undergird them all He could. He was hungry and He saw a fig tree full of leaves. He walked up to pluck some fruit, but He found no fruit. He saw an object lesson in the event—a lesson that could be uniquely used in teaching and preparing the disciples.

In destroying the tree Jesus was showing the disciples (in an unmistakable way) that He had absolute power over all the physical world, even the power to keep from being killed. He was not dying out of weakness, not dying because He was not the Messiah, not dying because of the plots and intrigues of men.

Men may be judging Him to be unfruitful and unworthy of life, but He was not dying because of them. He was dying because the death of God’s Son was the way of salvation (John 3:16; 2 Cor. 5:19-20; 1 Peter 2:24). He was not being judged by unfruitful men or events; rather, unfruitful men and events were being judged by Him upon the cross (1 Peter 2:24; cp. Ephes. 2:13-22).

Very simply put, Jesus was picturing that He was truly God’s Son with omnipotent power, picturing it in a way that we can never forget. He had the power to save Himself and to destroy the unfruitful men who would take His life. But He of course could not—not then. Right then He was sent into the world to die for men and to save men, including the very ones who were judging and condemning Him to be unfruitful and unworthy of life. However, the day is coming when He will judge the unfruitful just as He judged the fig tree. But that day is out in the future, for the present He was to save men.

Note: the lesson of power through prayer and faith was the lesson Christ drew from His action (Matthew 21:20-22).

1. Jesus lodged in Bethany (v.17-18).
2. Jesus’ great power over the physical world (v.19).
3. Jesus’ great source of power: faith, not doubting (v.20-21).
4. Jesus’ promise of power to the disciples (v.22).

Jesus returned to Jerusalem despite the threat to His life. He returned because it was God’s will. He would not be stopped from doing God’s will. So it should be with us. We should never allow opposition and threats to stop us from doing God’s will. Note that like Christ, Paul did not shirk from God’s will, from setting his face toward Jerusalem despite the bonds and trials that awaited him there (Acts 21:13-15).

The Predicament

Now in the morning, when He returned to the city, He became hungry, And seeing a lone fig tree by the road, He came to it, and found nothing on it except leaves only; (21:18-19a)

Jesus lodged in Bethany, which was a suburb of Jerusalem. It lay about two miles east of the great city. Bethany was the home of Lazarus, Mary, and Martha. Jesus stayed with the family when ministering in and around Jerusalem. We must remember that Jesus apparently had no home of His own, which was partly due to the fact that His immediate family did not believe in Him (John 7:1-5, esp. John 7:5). He Himself had said, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20). The only housing He had was the homes of others such as Mary and Martha (John 11:1f; cp. Luke 11:1f; Luke 10:38-42; Luke 19:29f; John 12:1f).

As noted above, the morning refers to Wednesday, the day after the cleansing of the Temple and two days after the triumphal entry. Jesus returned to the city of Jerusalem after spending the night in Bethany as He had been doing, doubtlessly with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus (see Mark 11:11).

It seems certain that Jesus’ hosts would have prepared breakfast for Him had He wanted it, but He may have gone out very early to pray on the nearby Mount of Olives, which He often did, and had no time to return to Bethany to eat. Or it may have been that He had eaten breakfast many hours earlier and that His intense prayer and His climbing the Mount of Olives rekindled His hunger. In any case, He became hungry. Although He was the Son of God, in His incarnation Jesus had all the normal physical needs characteristic of human beings. Therefore, when He saw a lone fig tree by the road, He hoped to find fruit on it to eat.

Fig trees were common in Palestine and much prized. It was not uncommon for them to grow to a height of twenty feet and equally as wide, making them an excellent shade tree. When Jesus called him to discipleship, Nathanael was sitting under a fig tree, probably in his own yard (John 1:48). Before the Jews had entered the Promised Land, the Lord described it to them as “a land of wheat and barley of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey” (Deut. 8:8). Through Zechariah the Lord promised His people that at Messiah’s second coming, He would “remove the iniquity of that land in one day” and “every one of you will invite his neighbor to sit under his vine and under his fig tree” (Zech. 3:9-10). A favorite place for people to gather was under a fig tree

Just as the presence of the fig tree was a symbol of blessing and prosperity for the nation, its absence would become a symbol of judgment and deprivation. Largely because of the many conquests of Palestine after the rejection of Christ, the land became greedy denuded and barren. Some invaders used the trees to build their war machines and others simply to fuel their fires. When lumber trees were gone, fruit and shade trees were cut down. During one occupation the rulers began taxing according to the number of trees on a piece of property with the predictable result that many landowners cut down some of their remaining trees in order to lower their taxes.

Normally a fig tree produced fruit before it sprouted leaves. Therefore when Jesus found nothing on it except leaves, He was disappointed, because a tree with leaves should already have had fruit. Fig trees bore fruit twice a year, the first time in early summer. In the much lower elevation and much hotter climate of Jericho, some plants and trees were productive almost year round. But in April, a fig tree at the altitude of Jerusalem would not usually have either fruit or leaves, because, as Mark observes, “it was not the season for figs” (Mark 11:13).

Nevertheless, if the tree produced leaves early it should have produced fruit early. Whether because of too much or too little water, the wrong kind of soil, disease, or other reason, it was not functioning as it was supposed to.

Jesus used many subjects from nature—birds, water, animals, weather, trees, flowers, and others—to illustrate His teaching. On this occasion He used a barren fig tree to illustrate a spiritually barren nation. The illustration was a visual parable designed to portray the spiritually degenerated nation of Israel.

Jesus had great power over the physical world. He demonstrates His great power by three acts. These same acts are applicable to a human life.

1. His expectation: fruit. The tree looked healthy and full of leaves. It was time for Him to feast, and He had the right to expect fruit on such a mature looking fruit tree. It professed fruit.
2. His disappointment: no fruit. The tree had life; it was living. It had the sap to produce a rich foliage of leaves and it was professing fruit, but it had none. Its very purpose was to bear fruit, but it did not. It failed at three points.
3. It had an empty profession.
4. It had an unfulfilled purpose.
5. It deceived instead of served.
6. His absolute power over the physical world demonstrated. Christ demonstrated that He has the right and the power to execute judgment as He wills. He can deliver or He can destroy. His disciples needed to have this lesson fresh on their minds. His omnipotent power, the enormous power available to them, would encourage them as they experienced His death and as they faced the trials that lay ahead of their own witness. (See note—^ Matthew 21:17-22.)

The fig tree is a clear picture of hypocrisy, of false profession. If a tree is living, it is expected to bear fruit. That is its purpose for living. If it does not bear fruit, it is useless and good for nothing but to be cut down and burned (cp. Luke 13:7). Note another fact: the more alive a tree is, the fuller it appears and the more fruit it is expected to bear. If we give the appearance of righteousness, then God expects us to bear righteousness.

There are two times in particular when Christ looks for fruit within a person.

• There are the times of deep sensitivity wrought by life’s great trials and great opportunities. These times cause a person to think of God, of his need for God, and of his obligation to use his life for good (for example, feeding, clothing, and giving to others). Christ expects us to bear fruit in a very special way during these times: to turn to Him in trial and to help and bear witness when great opportunities arise.
• There will be the time of eternal judgment. There is a day coming at the end of the world when Christ will judge all men, both believers and unbelievers. Fruit will be expected.

Christ has absolute power over the universe. He did not die at the hands of men. He died purposefully for the sins of the world just as God willed. He had the power to keep from dying, but He chose to lay down His life for the sake of men (Romans 5:8).

There is no question, the cursing of the fig tree shows the enormous power of Christ to do three things. (1) It shows the power of Christ to deliver His disciples out of great trial. (2) It shows the power of Christ to determine when His disciples should depart out of this world (cp. 2 Tim. 4:6-8). (3) It shows the power of Christ to judge and condemn. The great day of His wrath is not yet come (Rev. 6:17), but the day will come. When the day does come, then all unfruitfulness of men shall be judged by His absolute power. (Cp. the parable of the fig tree, Luke 13:6-9.)

Some things will doom us: hypocrisy, false profession, uselessness, purposelessness, and no fruit. The cursed fig tree symbolizes all this.

The Parable

and He said to it, “No longer shall there ever be any fruit from you.” And at once the fig tree withered. (21:19b)

Because the fig tree was barren when it should have had fruit, Jesus said to it, “No longer shall there ever be any fruit from you.” With those words He pronounced the tree’s doom. It was under a divine curse (see Mark 11:21) and would be perpetually unproductive. In Matthew’s account it appears that the fig tree withered instantly. But as already noted, although the tree may have died at once, the withering was not evident until the next morning when Jesus and the disciples passed by it again and saw it “withered from the roots up” (Mark 11:20).

The fig tree represented spiritually dead Israel, its leaves represented Israel’s outward religiousness, and its lack of fruit represented Israel’s spiritual barrenness. As Paul later described his fellow Jews, they had “a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge” (Rom. 10:2), a form of godliness but no godly power (cf. 2 Tim. 3:5).

Fruit is always an indication of salvation, of a transformed life in which operates the power of God. People’s right relation to God is evidenced by the fruit they bear. “A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit,” Jesus said (Matt. 7:18). In the parable of the soils, the good soil is proven by the fact that it yields a crop—sometimes a hundredfold, sometimes sixty and sometimes thirty but always a crop (Matt. 13:8). The good soil, Jesus went on to explain, is the person in whom the seed of God’s Word takes root and grows. It “is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit” (v. 23). Using another figure involving fruit, Jesus said, “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit” (John 15:5). Fruit is always the manifestation of true salvation.

Jesus’ point regarding the fig tree was that Israel as a nation had an impressive pretense of religion, represented by the leaves. But the fact that the nation bore no spiritual fruit was positive proof she was unredeemed and cut off from the life and power of God. Just as fruitfulness is always evidence of salvation and godliness, barrenness is always evidence of lostness and ungodliness.

Empty religion almost invariably has many outward trappings in the form of clerical garments and vestments, ornate vessels, involved rituals, and other such physical accoutrements. It is also typically characterized by repetitious prayers, cited by rote and offered at prescribed times, or else by spontaneous prayers that are wordy ostentatious, and self-glorifying. Such were the meaningless repetitions of the pagans (Matt. 6:7) and the self-righteous prayer of the Pharisee who Jesus said was actually praying to himself (Luke 18:11).

This incident was not the first time Jesus had used an illustration of a barren fig tree. On an earlier occasion He said that for three years the owner of a certain fig tree had failed to find fruit on it and therefore instructed his vineyard-keeper to cut it down. But the keeper pleaded with the owner, “Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in fertilizer; and if it bears fruit next year, fine; but if not, cut it down” (Luke 13:6-9).

Presumably the request was granted. Here, too, the fig tree depicts Israel’s barrenness, and the owner’s willingness to wait for the tree to bear fruit represents God’s patience before bringing judgment. Our Lord makes no specific comparison of that three years to the three years of His ministry but it was three years after Jesus first presented Himself to Israel as her Messiah that the people declared their final rejection of Him by putting Him to death.

Some forty years later the curse on the nation of Israel, illustrated by Jesus’ curse on the fig tree, was fulfilled. At that time, God allowed the Romans to sack Jerusalem and raze the Temple, destroying both the nation and its religion, because Israel had not borne any fruit, as it has not to this day.

In cleansing the Temple, the King’s message was that Israel’s worship was unacceptable, and in cursing the fig tree it was that Israel as a nation was condemned for its sinfulness and spiritual fruitlessness. Those messages of doom the people would not tolerate.

They had not accepted John the Baptist’s call to repentance in preparation for the coming of the kingdom or his declaration that the Messiah was coming with “His winnowing fork… in His hand [to] thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and [to] gather His wheat into the barn [and to] burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matt. 3:1-12). Nor had they accepted Jesus’ same call to repentance or His command to come to God in humble contrition and a genuine hunger and thirst for righteousness (4:17; 5:3-12). They were now even more ill-disposed to accept His word of judgment.

When the Lord delivered Israel out of Egypt He declared, Now it shall be, if you will diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all His commandments which I command you today the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you will obey the Lord your God. Blessed shall you be in the city and blessed shall you he in the country. Blessed shall be the offspring of your body and the produce of your ground and the offspring of your beasts, the increase of your herd and the young of your flock. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out. (Deut. 28:1-6)

But the Lord also declared, It shall come about, if you will not obey the Lord your God, to observe to do all His commandments and His statutes with which I charge you today that all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall you be in the city and cursed shall you be in the country. Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Cursed shall be the offspring of your body and the produce of your ground, the increase of your herd and the young of your flock. Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out. (vv. 15-19)

Through Isaiah, the Lord reminded Israel that He had nurtured and cared for her like a man who plants a vineyard in the best of soil and gives it the best of care and protection. But the vineyard produced nothing but worthless fruit, and the man declared that he would remove its protective hedges and walls, let it be laid waste and become choked out by briars and thorns. He would not even allow it to receive rain. “The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,” the prophet explains. “And the men of Judah His delightful plant. Thus He looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, a cry of distress” (Isa. 5:1-7). Then follows a long series of woes, or curses, describing the calamities God’s people would suffer because of their unfaithfulness and spiritual barrenness (vv. 8-30).

The Principle

And seeing this, the disciples marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither at once?” And Jesus answered and said to them, “Truly I say to you, if you have faith, and do not doubt, you shall not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it shall happen. And all things you ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive.” (21:20-22)

When the disciples passed the cursed fig tree the next morning and saw that it was “withered from the roots up” (Mark 11:20), they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither at once?” A diseased tree might take many weeks or months to die, and even one that had been salted, either by accident or from maliciousness, would take several days to die. For the fig tree to wither overnight was to do so virtually at once.

At that point the Lord moved from the visual parable of the fig tree to another truth He wanted to teach the disciples. The principle taught in the parable was that religious profession without spiritual reality is an abomination to God and is cursed. The principle Jesus was now about to teach related to the disciples’ marveling about how quickly the fig tree withered. They knew why it withered, because they heard Jesus curse it; they just could not understand how it could wither so fast. The Lord took the opportunity to teach them about the power of faith joined to the purpose and will of God, which can do far more than instantly wither a fig tree.

In response to their bewilderment, Jesus answered and said to them, “Truly I say to you, if you have faith, and do not doubt, you shall not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it shall happen.”

Jesus obviously was speaking figuratively. He never used His own power, nor did the apostles ever use the miraculous powers He gave them, to perform spectacular but useless supernatural feats. It was precisely that sort of grandiose demonstration that He refused to give to the unbelieving scribes and Pharisees who wanted to see a sign from Him (Matt. 12:38).

(21:20-21) Power—Faith: the demonstration of Jesus’ great power did just what He had wanted. It stirred the disciples to marvel and question. In amazement they asked, “How did the fig tree immediately wither away?” (This is a better understanding of the Greek.)

Jesus had them just where He wanted them: they were asking about His great power. He wanted to teach them that He had absolute power over the physical world and that the same power was available to them in the future as they served Him. He had demonstrated His absolute power; now they were asking about the source of that power.

Note how Jesus shared the source of His power. He said in essence, “Here is the source of my power, and the same power source is available to you.” He was explaining the source of His power in the second person which makes it applicable to all His disciples. He was answering their question about His power, but He was doing it in such a way that they would know the same power was available to them.

What is the source of Christ’s great power? Or, we may ask, what is the source of great power for the disciple of Christ? It is three things.

1. Faith (Hebrews 11:6).
2. Not doubting at all. This means never having a thought as to whether a thing can be done or not. It means not hesitating, not wondering, not questioning, not considering, not being concerned at all. Realistically, only God Himself could ever know whether or not something would happen—know so perfectly that no wondering thought would ever cross His mind. What Christ is after is that we grow in belief and trust. He wants us to believe that all things are possible through Christ who strengthens us (Phil. 4:13).
3. God’s authority: given to those who speak the Word. Note the phrase “Shall say”. The power of Christ came from the authority of God. All He had to do was say, that is, speak the Word and it was done. That is the very point He is making to us. If we believe, not doubting, then we stand in the authority of God. We may say, that is, speak the Word and it shall be done.

Jesus had already performed countless miracles of healing, many of which they probably had witnessed. And He performed many more such miracles that they could easily have witnessed. But the sign they wanted was on a grand scale, one in which fire would come down from heaven or the sun would stand still as it had for Joshua. The literal casting of a mountain… into the sea would have been just the sort of sign the scribes and Pharisees wanted to see but were never shown.

The phrase “rotor up of mountains” was a metaphor commonly used in Jewish literature of a great teacher or spiritual leader. In the Babylonian Talmud, for example, the great rabbis are called “rotors up of mountains.” Such people could solve great problems and seemingly do the impossible.

That is the idea Jesus had in mind. He was saying, “I want you to know that you have unimaginable power available to you through your faith in Me. If you sincerely believe, without doubting, it shall happen, and you will see great powers of God at work.” At the Last Supper Jesus told the Twelve, “Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it” (John 14:13-14). The requirement for receiving is to ask in Jesus’ name, that is, according to His purpose and will.

Jesus was not speaking about faith in faith or faith in oneself, both of which foolish and unscriptural ideas are popular today. He was speaking about faith in the true God and in God alone, not faith in one’s dreams, aspirations, or ideas of what he thinks ought to be. “You ask and do not receive,” James warns, “because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures” (James 4:3).

“This is the confidence which we have before Him,” John says, “that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us” (1 John 5:14). Mountain-moving faith is unselfish, undoubting, and unqualified confidence in God. It is believing in God’s truth and God’s power while seeking to do God’s will. The measure of such faith is the sincere and single desire that, as Jesus said, “the Father may be glorified in the Son.”

True faith is trusting in the revelation of God. When a believer seeks something that is consistent with God’s Word and trusts in God’s power to provide it, Jesus assures him that his request will be honored, because it honors Him and His Father. When God’s commands are obeyed He will honor that obedience, and when any request is asked in faith according to His will He will provide what is sought. To do what God says is to do what God wants and to receive what God promises.

When the disciples asked Jesus why they were unable to cast out the demon from a young boy “He said to them, ‘Because of the littleness of your faith; for truly I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, “Move from here to there,” and it shall move; and nothing shall be impossible to you’” (Matt. 17:20). Jesus was not commending small faith. It was the littleness of the disciples’ faith that prevented their success in casting out the demon. He rebuked them for having small faith that stayed small, but exhorted them to have faith that, though it begins small, continues to grow. The point of the mustard seed illustration is not in its smallness but in its growing from smallness to greatness. In the same way the virtue of mountain-moving faith is its growth from smallness to greatness as God blesses and provides.

(21:22) Prayer: Jesus’ promise of power to us is through prayer and faith. Christ drives home two striking points.

1. His promise is comprehensive: “all things.” It is all inclusive, much beyond the sphere of what we can ask or even think (Ephes. 3:20).
2. His promise is conditional: “in prayer, believing.” We have to pray and believe to receive.
3. Prayer is to be constant. The person who receives answers from God knows God personally. He is in constant, unbroken fellowship and sharing with God. A person cannot come every now and then to God and expect answers. This is not what Christ means.

1. Believing is, of course, essential. Mark says it well: “Whosoever shall say…and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass” (Mark 11:23).

Mountain-moving faith is activated by sincere petition to God. “All things you ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive,” Jesus explained. The parables of the friend who asked his neighbor for a favor at midnight and of the widow who petitioned the unrighteous judge (Luke 11:5-8; 18:1-8) both teach the importance of persistent prayer. Persistent prayer is the prayer that moves mountains, because it is truly believing prayer.

Whatever our finite minds may lead us to think, there is no inconsistency between God’s sovereignty and mans faith, because God’s Word clearly teaches both. It is not the believer’s responsibility to fathom God’s inscrutable ways but to obediently follow His clear teaching. Persistent prayer that is believing God’s Word cannot be inconsistent with the operation of God’s own sovereign will, because in His sovereign wisdom and grace He commands such prayer and obligates Himself to honor it.

The believer who wants what God wants can ask from God and receive it. The Christian young person who truly wants what God wants for his life will have it. The woman who truly wants what God wants for her family will have it. The pastor who truly wants what God wants for his ministry will have it.

God’s will for His children does not, of course, always involve things that are pleasant to the flesh or the things one might naturally prefer. His will for His children includes their willingness to sacrifice, suffer, and die for Him if necessary. For the believer who seeks God’s will, it is never a matter of succeeding or failing, of prosperity or poverty of living or dying, but simply of being faithful (see 1 Cor. 4:2). Therefore Paul declares, “If we live, we live for the Lord, or if we die, we die for the Lord; therefore whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s” (Rom. 14:8).

When the church is impotent, as so much of it is today it is because so many Christians are impotent. And Christians are impotent because they are not persistent in praying for what God wants, believing He will provide it. God desires His children to ask and keep asking, to seek and keep seeking, to knock and keep knocking, and it is through that persistence that He promises to bless. He guarantees that they will always receive, always find, and always have the door opened to them (Matt. 7:7).

God does not build His church or build up His people by better ideas, better programs, or better methods, although such things can have a place in His work. God promises to truly reveal His power only through faithful believers who, in persistent prayer, seek only His will.

(17:11-19) Introduction: this passage teaches two powerful lessons, one on how to have needs met and the other on gratitude.

1. Jesus went toward Jerusalem (v.11).
2. The lesson on need: ten lepers are healed (v.12-14).
3. The lesson on gratitude (v.15-19).

(17:11) Jesus Christ, Purpose: Jesus went toward Jerusalem. His face was set to fulfill His purpose on earth: to die for man.

Between Luke 17:10 and 11, the events of John 11 occurred as the Lord Jesus made His way to Jerusalem. At the border of Samaria and Judea, Jesus healed ten lepers at one time, and the fact that the miracle involved a Samaritan made it even more significant (see Luke 10:30-37). Jesus used this event to teach a lesson about gratitude to God.

The account begins with ten unclean men (Luke 17:11-13), all of whom were lepers (see the comments on Luke 5:12-15). The Jews and Samaritans would not normally live together, but misery loves company and all ten were outcasts. What difference does birth make if you are experiencing a living death? But these men had hope, for Jesus was there, and they cried out for mercy. The word translated “master” is the same one Peter used (Luke 5:5) and means “chief commander.” They knew that Jesus was totally in command of even disease and death, and they trusted Him to help them.

The account continues by referring to nine ungrateful men (Luke 17:17). Jesus commanded the men to go show themselves to the priest, which in itself was an act of faith, for they had not yet been cured. When they turned to obey, they were completely healed, for their obedience was evidence of their faith (see 2 Kings 5:1-14).

(17:12-14) Need—Cleansing—Faith—Perseverance—Prayer, Answer: the lesson on need—ten lepers are healed. There were five things that led to their need being met.

1. There was desperation. The men had leprosy, the most feared disease of that day. They met Jesus as He was entering the city, coming in from a long journey. The lepers had no idea where He was going: He could have been heading for an important meeting, or He could have been tired and exhausted, or He could have had no time for interruptions; but the lepers did not care. They were so desperate they would interrupt Him no matter what.

One thing is basic to having a need met: a sense of desperation. When we sense a need so desperately that nothing can stop us from reaching Jesus, our needs will be met.

2. There was humility. Note: they “stood afar off.” They respected the law which demanded they stand at least six feet away from a person. These lepers were, of course, many yards away from Jesus because of the large crowd following Him. They showed a great respect for the law by remaining on the outskirts of the crowd. On other occasions those seeking healing had ignored the law, bursting through crowds and running up to Jesus. Jesus was bound to note their humility and their acknowledgment of being unclean.
3. There was a cry for mercy. Note two things.
4. They called Jesus “Master.” The Greek word for “Master” is not Rabbi, the Teacher; but it is epistata, which means the Chief, the Commander, the Overseer, the One who has the power to meet needs. Note: the need is not for instruction (Rabbi), but for healing; and by healing, they meant both the cleansing of their physical bodies and the spiritual sin which had caused their disease. The Jews always connected leprosy with sin, so this is definitely what they meant. They recognized Jesus to be the Master who could cleanse both the body and spirit, who could give them both healing and forgiveness of sins.
5. They cried out for mercy. They did not ask only for physical healing; they asked for spiritual healing, for the forgiveness of sins as well. They cried out for mercy upon all of their being.
6. There was perseverance. Jesus did not notice them immediately. He ignored their cry in order to test them. They needed to cry and cry for mercy in order to show their sincerity and to build up their sense of need. These two things are important to note. God does not always answer our prayers immediately. Sometimes we need to learn to trust Him more or to build up a greater sense of need and desperation. Forcing us to seek and knock and persevere does both. Once God answers our prayer, we learn to trust Him more. There is another crucial matter as well. Forcing us to stay on our knees and to persevere in prayer day after day keeps us in His presence. Deep concentrated prayer provides some of the sweetest communion and fellowship ever experienced, and such communion and fellowship is what God is after.
7. There was believing and obeying. Jesus did not heal the lepers immediately. There were things they had to do, instructions that had to be obeyed to have their needs met. They were to obey the law, go to the priest and report that they had been cleansed. If they obeyed the law and believed the Lord’s Word (promise of cleansing) they would be cleansed. Now note: they were cleansed “as they went.” This was a great legacy of faith to leave for succeeding generations (cp. Hebrews 11:7f). Think about the great belief they had in Jesus’ word and power!

They had to strike out for the temple to be inspected and pronounced cleansed—and they were not even healed yet! While they were obeying the Jewish law of cleansing they were to be healed (Leviticus 14:1f).

(17:15-19) Gratitude: there are five points to note on the lesson of gratitude.

1. All the lepers were blessed and should have been thankful. This was true of the ten lepers, and it should be true of every man. Every one of the ten should have turned back and given thanks. They had all been blessed by Christ. Note they had all…

•  recognized their need.
•  shown humility.
•  cried for mercy.
•  persevered.
•  believed and obeyed.

Their need had been met: they had all been healed. They now needed to turn back and give thanks and show appreciation.

2. One did give thanks. Note what he did.
3. He glorified God immediately. He shouted at the top of his lungs with the loudest voice possible. He witnessed for God. God had cleansed him and he wanted all to know the great mercy and love of God.
4. He worshipped Jesus. Note that he fell down on his face at the feet of Jesus. This was both humility and recognition of the power of God in Christ, two essentials for true spiritual cleansing (salvation, Luke 17:19).
5. He was a Samaritan, the most despised and rejected of the men.
6. Most did not give thanks. They kept going about their business at hand. They did not stop what they were doing nor return to the Lord to give thanks. But note something: they did return to their former world, the lives they used to live. There is a lesson in the behavior of the lepers. Christ expects us to return to Him continually, to return, glorify, and worship Him as the Source of our power and strength for life.
7. The most rejected was the most thankful. Note the word “stranger” (allogenes, Luke 17:18). It means that he was a “stranger from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world” (Ephes. 2:12). He had felt his need more keenly and deeply. He knew he needed to be saved, genuinely saved—spiritually as well as physically. Despite the fact that he had never known the real promises of God and that he had been without God in this world, he now knew God. His heart just broke forth to give glory to God. Jesus had saved him from so much.
8. The thankful man shall be the one truly saved—spiritually. The verb “made whole” (sesoken) is literally “has saved you.” The man was clearly whole in body. This could be easily seen, but one could not see the spiritual and inward cleansing. Jesus was telling the man that his sins were forgiven; He was giving the man the assurance of salvation.

Now note an important question. Had the nine been spiritually cleansed as well as physically cleansed? Or was it lack of being spiritually cleansed that kept them from returning to give thanks? Or was Jesus just giving this man a strong assurance of salvation?

We are not told, but one crucial factor is known. This man, the grateful and thankful leper, was the man who received assurance of being cleansed and of having his sins forgiven. The others did not. They failed in being grateful and thankful.

Another important fact to note is this: gratitude and praise bring assurance to the heart. It stirs Christ to speak to the human heart, giving assurance of acceptance and cleansing.

You would have expected all ten men to run to Jesus and thank Him for a new start in life, but only one did so—and he was not even a Jew. How grateful the men should have been for the providence of God that brought Jesus into their area, for the love that caused Him to pay attention to them and their need, and for the grace and power of God that brought about their healing. They should have formed an impromptu men’s chorus and sung Psalm 103 together!

But before we judge them too harshly, what is our own “GQ”—“Gratitude Quotient”? How often do we take our blessings for granted and fail to thank the Lord? “Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men!” (Ps. 107:8, 15, 21, 31) Too often we are content to enjoy the gift but we forget the Giver. We are quick to pray but slow to praise.

The next time you sing “Now Thank We All Our God,” try to remember that Martin Rinkhart wrote it during the Thirty Years’ War when his duties were most difficult. He conducted as many as forty funerals a day, including that of his own wife; yet he wrote those beautiful words as a table grace for his family. In spite of war and plague around him and sorrow within him, he was able to give thanks to the Lord from a grateful heart.

Luke’s account closes with one unusual man (Luke 17:15-19). The Samaritan shouted “Glory to God!” and fell at Jesus’ feet to praise Him and give thanks. It would have been logical for him to have followed the other men and gone to the temple, but he first came to the Lord Jesus with his sacrifice of praise (Ps. 107:22; Heb. 13:15). This pleased the Lord more than all the sacrifices the other men offered, even though they were obeying the Law (Ps. 51:15-17). Instead of going to the priest, the Samaritan became a priest, and he built his altar at the feet of Jesus (read Ps. 116:12-19).

Every child of God should cultivate the grace of gratitude. It not only opens the heart to further blessings but glorifies and pleases the Father. An unthankful heart is fertile soil for all kinds of sins (Rom. 1:21ff).