Matthew 11 - CP House Church Summary Review
This past Sunday was our first official house church gathering at the Reed’s. We’re continuing through our Matthew series, looking at the life of Christ, and this week we covered Matthew 11:1-15. There’s a lot going on here where John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he is in fact the Messiah, Jesus affirming it and then giving his commentary on who John is and who He is, by pointing to the Scriptures.
As Nick taught and we had some discussion and feedback to what is in the text, some interesting things were pointed out. First and obvious question is, was John doubting? Maybe as he sat in jail thinking his time was done, maybe even his time on earth, he wanted to know if he accomplished his task. Maybe he was making a point to his disciples and others to show he was successful and Jesus was the Messiah.
It’s meaningful that this interaction with John, through his disciples, comes at this point, because Jesus has already demonstrated that He is the designated future King of Israel. He has already healed blind men (Matt. 9:27-31), a lame man (9:1-8), and leper (8:2-3), restored the dead to life (9:18-26), and preached the good news to the poor in spirit (5:2-12). “Jesus’ answer also echoes passages in the Prophets that describe the future restoration of God’s people and of the entire world to wholeness and peace. In that day, says Isaiah, the deaf will hear, the blind will see, the meek will rejoice, and the poor will praise God (Isa. 29:17–19; 35:6; 61:1–3; Mic. 4:6–7)” [GTB]. Also, He just sent out the 12 disciples in the previous chapter to do the same things (Matt. 10:8) through His power as His ambassadors to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
This confirmation of prophecy of who Jesus is was then followed by confirmation of prophecy on who John was as well. Jesus confirms John was the “messenger” sent before Him to prepare the way (Matt. 11:10; Malachi 3:1), as well as the promised “Elijah” to come before the “great and awesome day of the Lord” (Matt. 11:13-14,Mal. 4:5-6). This would have been quite the encouraging confirmation for John, not only was Jesus the promised Messiah, but that John was the promised Elijah, and he had done his job. It also serves us today as a confirmation, connecting dots between the Old and New Testament Scriptures.
Anothering interesting verse is v6 “And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” It can be hard for those who grew up in church to understand being offended by Jesus, but let’s think about that in their context and in ours today. In their context at the time, Jesus was claiming to be the promised Messiah, the King of Israel, which would eventually get Him killed by the religious leaders manipulating and wielding the power of the government. They didn’t want the Messiah to just help people, especially those they deemed not worthy, they wanted Him to bring not a figurative sword (Matt. 10:34-39), but a literal sword against their worldly enemies. This offense was prophesied as well, that God would give a “stumbling stone, and a rock of offense” to Zion (Isaiah 28:16). Paul and Peter quote this about Jesus and the Gospel, such as Romans 9:30-33 and 1 Peter 2:7-8. A notable passage for thinking through this is 1 Corinthians 1:22–25 (ESV)
22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
This is as true as ever. The way of Jesus, way of the cross, is not a means of power or control, either over the physical world and world kingdoms, or the mental world of worldly wisdom. Laying down one’s life or handing over control as a means of overcoming the world, both physical and spiritual, defies logic, but we do not rely on human accomplishments, we rely on Christ, who has overcome the world (John 16:33), and through Him we are more than conquerors (Rom. 8:37; 1 John 4:4, 5:4; Rev. 3:21, 12:11).
Keeping these things in mind is what Nick’s Bottom Line from Sunday points us to as well: As disciples of Jesus we are called to live out the values, and the way of the Kingdom of God, even as we live in another kingdom. That may be hard and even cause us to suffer violence until Jesus' second coming judgment on the wicked and reward of the righteous.