Category: Matthew

When a Ladybug “Captures” a Rhinoceros (Matthew 26:47-56)

If you read of Jesus’ arrest and betrayal and whimper, “Oh, poor Jesus,” instead of exclaiming, “Wow what a Savior!” you’ve missed the plot. Injustice abounds but that doesn’t nullify God’s sovereignty. Jesus walks to the cross; He isn’t dragged.

The bad guys come with swords and clubs to the one who calmed a tempest with words. They might as well have come with pom-poms and feather dusters. There is no possible equalizer they could’ve had in hand; no weapon of mass destruction that would’ve leveled the playing field. These are mice with twigs in hand thinking they can take the Lion. Judas’ kiss was no kryptonite and seizing Jesus is more silly than handcuffing Superman. This is like a Ladybug clinging to rhinoceros and saying, “gotcha,” and then rejoicing because the rhino happens to be going where the ladybug desired.

Peter is as silly as the soldiers. Jesus doesn’t need his sword. More than twelve legions of angels, a force seventy-two-thousand plus strong, could be given by the Father to the Son to command at once. Jesus used a military term to communicate to Peter that the ladybugs don’t steer the rhino. Everything is happening according to the Scriptures. Jesus the suffering Savior is a sovereign suffering Savior.

The willing sufferer will surely be a willing Saviour. The almighty Son of God, who allowed men to bind Him and lead Him away captive, when He might have prevented them with a word, must surely be full of readiness to save the souls that flee to Him. —J.C. Ryle

Making Vodka Look Like Toddler Juice (Matthew 26:36-46)

With composure, Jesus speaks to Judas of his betrayal, to the disciples of their abandonment, and to Peter of his denial, but when He speaks to His Father of this cup, He falls on His face. What was in this cup? This cup contained far more than Jesus’ physical sufferings and social abandonment and rejection. It wasn’t the Priests’ fists and spit, the soldiers’ whips and mockery, nor the Roman’s cross that Jesus trembled at, but the Father’s cup. What was in this cup? In a word—hell. Listen to how the Old Testament speaks of this cup.

Thus says the Lord YHWH: “You shall drink your sister’s cup that is deep and large; you shall be laughed at and held in derision, for it contains much; you will be filled with drunkenness and sorrow. A cup of horror and desolation, the cup of your sister Samaria; you shall drink it and drain it out, and gnaw its shards, and tear your breasts; for I have spoken, declares the Lord YHWH. Therefore thus says the Lord YHWH: Because you have forgotten me and cast me behind your back, you yourself must bear the consequences of your lewdness and whoring. — Ezekiel 23:32-35

Thus YHWH, the God of Israel, said to me: ‘Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it. They shall drink and stagger and be crazed because of the sword that I am sending among them.’ So I took the cup from the YHWH’s hand, and made all the nations to whom the YHWH sent me drink it: … ‘Then you shall say to them, “Thus says YHWH of hosts, the God of Israel: Drink, be drunk and vomit, fall and rise no more, because of the sword that I am sending among you.” And if they refuse to accept the cup from your hand to drink, then you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the YHWH of hosts: You must drink!’ —Jeremiah 25:15-28

This was the cup we deserved to drink. This is a cup that makes vodka comparatively like Capri Sun. It is a cup no mere man can stomach. Infinite hell was bottled and poured full into this cup, dregs and all. This cup is full of the wrath of God, 100 proof. This is a drink, only God could live through, but only sinful man should drink.

In hell, souls suffer the righteous wrath of a God they hate. On the cross, Jesus bore the wrath of the Father He loves. How much did Jesus love the Father? So much that He took this cup saying, “your will be done.” The cross indeed shouts God’s love for sinners, but more loudly it screams the Son’s love for the Father. But the pain of the cross was deep to Jesus not just because of His love for the Father, but also because of the Father’s love for Him. When you look at the cross with the resurrection, as you always should, then you see that the cross was part of The Father’s plan to glorify the name of Jesus above all names. It is true that God so loved the world that He gave His Son; it is more true that God so loved His Son that He gave Him the world. One of the glorious mysteries of the cross is that while Jesus was bearing the Father’s wrath for our sins He was simultaneously rendering up an obedience that perfectly pleased the Father. How pleased is the Father by Jesus’ obedience? Your saved! The presence of all us unworthies in heaven eternally enjoying the love of God is the evidence of how much the Father loves the Son. The throngs of heaven from every tribe, people, tongue, and nation are the Father telling the son, “I love you this much.”

But  while on the cross the Son tasted only bitter wrath, so that we might taste sweet salvation. Jesus turns a cup of wrath into a cup of salvation, but He must first drink it and let it come to us through His own veins.

Now He gives to His people ‘the cup of salvation’ (Psalm 116:13) these two cups, one so bitter, the other so sweet, stand side by side: the one cup necessitated the other. One cup was emptied that the other might be filled to overflowing. The first cup guaranteed the second. Both cups are precious and bear the hallmark of sovereign grace. ‘what shall I render to the LORD for all His bounty to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the LORD…’ (Psalm 116:12,13).—Frederick Leahy

No Recipe Failure (Matthew 26:17-30)

“It’s the holidays; what’s the plan?” Jesus doesn’t respond with a frazzled, “I don’t know, what do you guys think?” Jesus tells them to go into town and that they’ll find a certain man.

The first major conflict of the War of Independence went down in New York. General Washington watched as 400 British ships filled the harbor. Washington was courageous but indecisive. He wasn’t sure where the enemy would strike. He divided his forces against a superior foe and lost. Jesus may be sorrowful over the cup, but He never gives any indicator that He is uncertain about strategy. There isn’t a hint of strategy stuttering, analysis paralysis, or war plan waffling here. Everything is going according to plan.

The disciples make preparations for the Passover, but they are preparing this Passover the way a cooking student would prepare a meal. When the student shows up to class, preparations have been made for their preparation. The recipe, the utensils, the appliances, the ingredients are all there ready for them. The disciples are preparing a Passover meal as part of Jesus’ preparing the Passover meal.

Every Passover up this point was a dress rehearsal with a stand-in cast. The curtain is about to lift on the true one time showing of the climatic act of the drama of the universe. Jesus is both the Host and the Fare of the true passover. He is the Priest who offers up the Lamb, and the Lamb offered up. He has prepared the meal perfectly. There will be no recipe failure. Perfect bread broken for us; perfect wine poured out for us. All according to the recipe.

According to Script (Matthew 26:1-16)

“When Jesus had finished…”

When Jesus finishes speaking of returning in glory, He then says it is time for Him to be humiliated. After speaking of a judgment He will bring, He reminds the disciples that He is off to be judged. Jesus is saying that everything is going according to plan.

Jesus was no sailor adjusting for wind. He is the God of the wind and the sea. The cross isn’t some improvised plan B during an intense field operation. Jesus didn’t just recently have an epiphany with a sudden courageous resolve. The cross wasn’t just en route to the throne, it was the road. And it was the only road. Jesus here is saying, “I’ve got them where I want them.” Imagine a quarterback readying for the Super Bowl turning to his teammates saying, “Well, it’s victory time, so I’m off to their locker room to let them break my arm.” The King turns to His knights saying, “Victory is certain. Here is the plan: I’m going to let the dragon eat me.”

Christ never so effectually bruised Satan’s head, as when Satan bruised his heel. The weapon with which Christ warred against the devil, and obtained a most complete victory and glorious triumph over him, was the cross, the instrument and weapon with which he thought he had overthrown Christ, and brought on him shameful destruction. Col. 2:14,15. ‘Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances,—nailing it to his cross: and having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.’ In his last sufferings, Christ sapped the very foundations of Satan’s kingdom, he conquered his enemies in their own territories, and beat them with their own weapons as David cut off Goliath’s head with his own sword. The devil had, as it were, swallowed up Christ, as the whale did Jonah—but it was deadly poison to him, he gave him a mortal wound in his own bowels. He was soon sick of his morsel, and was forced to do by him as the whale did by Jonah. To this day he is heart-sick of what he then swallowed as his prey. —Jonathan Edwards

Jesus is no improv actor. Everything is going according to Script.

In a good story, the villain’s plotting cannot outdo the author’s plot. All of man’s rebellion can do nothing but accomplish God’s plan. Efforts to rebel against God are more futile than a character in a book trying to rebel against the author. The villain wants to kill the hero, so does the Author, but whereas one means to take life, the other means to unleash it. A good story is being told, the very best one, and no evil can ruin it.

The Sheep’s Wool (Matthew 25:31-46)

When Jesus separates the sheep and the goats pronouncing judgment upon them, neither one is shocked by the destination, but the reasoning given. The sheep are blessed for the ministered to Jesus in His need, whereas the goats are cursed because they failed. But we shouldn’t mistake this for saying the sheep merited their destination.

The decisive grounds upon which the sheep and goats are divided is that one is comprised of sheep and the other of goats. The deeds of mercy act as an outer mark that identifies the sheep. They are the evidence, not the grounds. Some similar language about those who eat sheep may help.

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits. —Matthew 7:15-20 (ESV)

The eating of sheep does not make one a wolf; the being a wolf means an appetite for sheep. The bearing of good fruit does not make one a good tree; the being a good tree means bearing good fruit.

The King/Shepherd says, “All sheep may enter,” and then He turns to you and says, “Come, for you are covered with wool.” The wool didn’t make you a sheep. The last thing any sheep will say on that day is, “I got in by the wool on my baaack, baaack, baaack. Yes this wool, I did it.” If so, an interrogation would commence. “Were you always a sheep? Who then transformed you into a sheep? Who gave you the only food, and water (the Spirit and the Word) that then can cause such wool to grow? Who gave you health and life so that the wool could grow? Who protected you and led you beside still waters so that the wool could grow?” The Shepherd gets all the credit. When He says, “Come for you are full of wool,” He is saying, “Look at what I did. See. This one is mine.”

What is the distinctive wool specifically mentioned here are a mark of those who are the Good Shpeherd’s? Love for the church. Shouldn’t we as Christians love all who are destitute? Certainly. Is that the point of this text. By no means. “The least of these,” are “my [Jesus’] brothers.” This language echoes Matthew 10:40-42 and Matthew 18 where the “little ones,” are Jesus’ little ones, His disciples.

One evangelical pastor wrote a popular book titled They Love Jesus but Not the Church. He had some legitimate criticisms of the church, but he missed it with his title. You cannot love Jesus and not love the church. If you fail to love the church, you do not love Jesus. You are a goat.

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. …If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. —1 John 4:7-8, 20-21

Steward Kings (Matthew 24:14-30)

God created man a slave, yet, a king. Man is a vassal king, a king under the Emperor. God created man. God gave man everything man has. God named man. God commanded man. God is God. Man is man. God is king. Man is slave. Yet, God turns to man as man’s King and says to him with full and rightful authority, “have dominion.”

Man is made in the image of God. Lots of hypothesizing goes on as to what the imago Dei consists in but I think the Genesis 1 is really quite clear. One of the things spelled out for us there is that the King made a king. This incorporates so many of the imago Dei theories.

Man has dominion. This is why man’s plummet (fall seems too trite a word) impacts creation. As goes the king, so goes his kingdom. But, man’s role was secondary. We little kings cannot curse this earth more than the King can bless it. The second Adam’s rule has a glory that surpasses all that the first Adam’s destroyed. It is His rule that transforms ours, so that we more truly image Him forth with sincere hearts.

Every man, from the lowest to the highest, is a king. Some men have smaller realms, others have bigger ones, but we are all kings. Yet, we are slaves always. Sinners don’t mind the king role so much. Adam was aiming for more of that. The slave part is the rub. Man is to rule the little domain he has been given for a little time as a steward king of the eternal Emperor of the cosmos.

From your career to your hobbies, from your driving to your bedtime hour, from your public persona to your virtual one on Facebook, from your clothes to your innermost thoughts and dreams, from your wish list to your owned possessions, from your leisure to your labor, from your television viewing to your reading, from your app choices to your courting choices, from your casual encounter to the children you raise—all, no exceptions, not one square inch, not one spare second are yours. All are gifts entrusted to you to use for His glory.

Getting all Dressed up for Nothing (Matthew 25:1-13)

“Of course that guy is out,” we say of the wicked servant (Matthew 24:48-51), but the ten virgins cause us to think much more soberly. They cause us to think like the disciples. When Jesus warned that one of them would betray Him, none responded, “I know, that guy!” Instead they asked, “Is it I?” When we look at the five foolish virgins we are graciously startled that “be ready,” isn’t a message for them. “Watch!” isn’t a command for outsiders, but a message for those “inside” the church, for those who think they will be inside the feast, for those who think they are inside the ark of Christ protected from the flood waters of God’s wrath.

The wicked slave played a slave of the master, but proved himself to be an enemy. The wicked slave despises Jesus’ coming, whereas foolish virgins are deceived concerning his coming. The veneer is different, but the same kind of rotten wood meant for the fire underlies both. The wicked don’t sing, “We’ll Work till Jesus Comes,” but drunkenly belt, “We’ll Party while Jesus Is Gone.” They don’t so much believe in Jesus’ return as His absence. The virgins keep themselves pure for the party. They don’t party with the drunkards like the wicked slave, but they don’t party for the wrong reasons. Underneath all the religiosity is still a heart that loves something else.

To illustrate let’s switch back from the wedding entourage to the bride herself, for that is what the ten virgins show us. Theologians  speak of the visible and invisible church. The visible church is the church as man sees it, wheat and tares. The invisible church is the church as God sees it. In other words, there is the church as she appears, and the church as she truly is. The reasons we have ten virgins instead of one bride is to prevent this metaphor from making the bridegroom sinful by polygamy, or from getting weird with a bride with split personalities and then further from being gruesome as the bridegroom splits his bride in two keeping only the desirable part. Jesus has one true bride and some girls are getting all dressed up for nothing. Many a bride have been ecstatic on their wedding day for it to be borne out later that their joy had nothing to do with the bridegroom. She loved the idea of herself of being married, or of stability, or of status, or an idea of her husband that was not her husband. But Jesus’ true bride is no gold digger, no trophy-husband seeker, no self-glorifying status seeker. She does not think that the day of His return is her day, but rejoices that it is all about Him.

The Bridegroom is no fool. Fools can fool others, even themselves, but they cannot fool Him.

While the Teacher is Out (Matthew 24:36-51)

Just like Noah’s days, right? Well, yes, and no. Chicken Little-prophecy pastor says things will be deplorable, just like in Noah’s time, when Jesus returns. But Jesus does not say they were gluttonously eating, drinking till sloshed, and giving in homosexual marriage. They were simply eating, drinking, and marrying. These are normal things, existence things, life things. These are things one does when they don’t expect the apocalypse to knock on their door tomorrow. The point isn’t the evil of Noah’s times, but the unexpectedness. The point of Matthew 24:36-25:30 isn’t to give you a sign (evil days) so that you can know when Jesus will return. The point is to give you a slap in the face to wake you from your slumber so that you live as though that Jesus will return.

Evangelical Christians confess Jesus’ coming, but do they believe it? Though everyone of us falls into slumber, where is the emphasis? The wicked slave didn’t doubt the master’s return, but he believes in his delay. Many believe in Jesus’ delay, not Jesus’ return, and there is a mammoth difference between the two. One loves, one hates. The Rabbi is out of the room. Do you act as one who loves His absence or His presence?

Old Testament Ears (Matthew 24:15-35)

Eschatologically I am an amillennialist and partial preterist. Is that clear enough? My point exactly. To understand, you have to know the language behind the language. Have you ever had a foreign exchange student give you a puzzled look when you say that something is cool? They know what cool means, but they don’t know what cool means. They don’t know the language behind the language.

This is why I feel many go awry when looking at Biblical prophecy. They read backwards from the 21st century instead of forwards from the 1st century. They listen with Left Behind ears more than Old Testament ears. Apocalyptic literature is drenched and dripping with imagery and metaphors from the ocean of the Old Testament. I’m afraid that we are reading the New Testament with the wrong code key.

Jasper Fforde has written a series of books about a British literary detective set in a futuristic 1980’s time period. Someone has made a means to enter your favorite books. A villain now posses this technology and is capturing beloved characters. If the character is captured from a first edition, he disappears from all subsequent editions. The books are fun, anyone can understand them, but they are much more enjoyable if you have read the books mentioned.

I don’t so much want to labor to convince you of my eschatological position (eschatology is the study of last things), as of my hermeneutic (hermeneutics is the science/art of interpreting texts) that brought me to that position. The first rule of hermeneutics is that Scripture interprets Scripture. This means that the best way to read your Bible, is to read your Bible—again, and again, and again, and again. When you do this, you are much more likely to hear phrases like, “the abomination of desolation (cf. Daniel 11:31),” and “the sun will be darkened (cf. Isaiah 13:9-10),” and “coming on the clouds, (Daniel 7:13-14),” the way the Bible intends you to. Superior to any longing for you to agree with my position, is that it be said of both of us what C.H. Spurgeon said of John Bunyan:

Oh, that you and I might get into the very heart of the Word of God, and get that Word into ourselves! As I have seen the silkworm eat into the leaf, and consume it, so ought we to do with the Word of the Lord—not crawl over its surface, but eat right into it till we have taken it into our inmost parts. It is idle merely to let the eye glance over the words, or to recollect the poetical expressions, or the historic facts; but it is blessed to eat into the very soul of the Bible until, at last, you come to talk in Scriptural language, and your very style is fashioned upon Scripture models, and, what is better still, your spirit is flavored with the words of the Lord.

I would quote John Bunyan as an instance of what I mean. Read anything of his, and you will see that it is almost like the reading the Bible itself. He had read it till his very soul was saturated with Scripture; and, though his writings are charmingly full of poetry, yet he cannot give us his Pilgrim’s Progress—that sweetest of all prose poems — without continually making us feel and say, ‘Why, this man is a living Bible!’ Prick him anywhere—his blood is Bibline, the very essence of the Bible flows from him. He cannot speak without quoting a text, for his very soul is full of the Word of God. I commend his example to you, beloved.

Are We there Yet? (Matthew 24:3-14)

When examining Matthew 24 too many want to get to the answer before they know the question. We do this because we want our question answered. We look for the answer we want now knowing the question they asked.

An underage child asks to take the car for a spin. You answer no, but their sibling assumes a no to their brother means a yes to them. One asks the wrong question because everything must be about them, the other hears the wrong answer because everything must be about them. I think the disciples are the first brother; they asked the wrong question. They assume that the destruction of the temple must mark the end. We are the second brother. We hear the wrong answer because everything must be about us. But if we really listen to Jesus’ answer it will set us all straight because everything is about Him.

Some self-proclaimed prophecy pundits will tell you that you need to have your Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other when studying prophecy. I say that this is an arrogant and foolish notion. Andrew Perriman gives far better advice.

We will try to read forwards from the first century rather than backwards from the twenty-first century. One of the reasons why the apocalyptic language of the New Testament can be so puzzling to the modern interpreter is that we cannot help but read it retrospectively and with the advantage, which more often than not turns out to be the disadvantage, of hindsight. It is rather like words written on a glass door. Once we have gone through the door, the text is reversed and becomes difficult to decipher. To make sense of it, we must at least imagine how it must have appeared from the other side of the door as it would have been viewed by those for whom it was written.

When you do this I believe you will see that what is being spoken of in vv. 4-14 happens before the destruction of the temple in AD 70. If you stumble on v. 14 look at Romans 16:26-27 and Colossians 1:6 and give it another read. When we read the text such that it is not all about us, it is then that it becomes most helpful for us. In humbling us, we are helped.

When we read the text rightly I believe there are two major lessons the Spirit intends for us to learn. 1. Keep calm. The end is not yet. Do not be alarmed. These things must take place. Jesus is in control. 2. Carry on. The same Jesus who says that these bad things must happen, says that the good gospel will be proclaimed to the ends of the earth. Jesus is still in control, and the proclamation on the gospel is still his plan. Keep calm, and carry on.

I don’t care what your position is regarding the when of Matthew 24:4-14, if the result is a fearful, hopeless, laziness, you’re doing it wrong. Likewise, I don’t so much what you position is, if the result is a confident, hopeful, work-fulness, you’re getting it mostly right. You’re getting it right in the biggest ways.

To the kids in the back seat asking wrongly and listing wrongly, whining, “Are we there yet?” Jesus says, “I’m driving, stop fretting, we will get there when we get there. Keep calm and carry on.”