"It's a Mystery Series!" -- The Secret to Hearing and Seeing the Kingdom -- 10/02/2022
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It's A Mystery! The Parables of Jesus Concerning the Secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven
It's A Mystery! The Parables of Jesus Concerning the Secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven
What is a mystery? In verse 11, Jesus tells his disciples, “The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven have been given to you." The word translated "secrets" is the Greek world "mysterion" from which we get our English word mystery. Mystery, in this case, means a secret that is revealed by God. [1]
Here's a summary of the secrets we will share during the next 8 weeks.
This is a slide
The Secret to Hearing and Seeing the Kingdom (1-17): October 2
The Secret to Kingdom Abundance (18-23): October 9
The Secret of Kingdom Patience (Part 1, 24-30): October 16
The Secret of the Small Kingdom (31-35): October 23
The Mystery of Faith Alone (Romans 3:21-4:8): October 30
The Secret of Kingdom Patience (Part 2, 35-43): November 6
The Secret of Kingdom Treasure (44-46): November 13
The Secret Mission of the Kingdom (47-52): November 20
Why the secrecy? There is within these parables an "open secret." The secrets of the kingdom are open to anyone who has the spiritual ears to hear and the spiritual eyes to see. Yet, because most people in Jesus' day looked for a Messiah, who would provide a military and political solution to the restoration of Israel, they could not see God coming to them in Jesus to provide a spiritual solution to their hard hearts. Which leads us to our passage this morning.
That Same Day . . .
That Same Day . . .
Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake.
That same day had been a tough day for Jesus. The Pharisees and the teachers of the law came to Jesus demanding a sign that he was the Messiah. Jesus condemned them as a wicked and perverse generation.
Jesus showed that their broken relationship with God was the source of their outflow of moral evil, their lack of spiritual insight, and their missing capacity for spiritual leadership. From unfaithfulness to God flows the moral evil that harms God's children and keeps others from entering the kingdom.[2]
Then Jesus' mother and brothers show up to "to take charge of him" because they thought Jesus was "out of his mind."[3]
This prompts Jesus to ask, "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?" Jesus answers his own question by asserting that it is his disciples, those who believe in him, who are his genuine family.
On that same day, Jesus confronted the unbelief of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law. That same day, Jesus bore the grief of the unbelief of his own flesh and blood family, and showed they were dangerously close to being outside the Kingdom. But what about the crowd?
The crowd was a mixture of people, some leaning toward belief in Jesus, other leaning toward following their leaders in condemning Jesus. Others were trying to make up their minds.
On that same day, Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Sitting down was Jesus' cue to the crowd that he was ready to teach, and they came to him. To avoid the pressing crowd, Jesus sat in a boat and taught them.
The traditional location for this teaching is called the Cove of the Parables.
slide image of cove
The land surrounding the cove slopes down like a natural horseshoe-shaped amphitheater, providing environmental acoustics for Jesus’ voice to carry over one hundred [yards] from the boat to [the] crowd.[4]
One study suggests that the natural acoustics would enable a crowd of between 5000 to 7000 people to hear Jesus.[5]
Jesus told the crowd many things in parables. Parables use everyday language and word pictures to express spiritual truth. Here, Jesus tells a story of a farmer sowing seed on various types of soil and what those soils produce or cannot produce.
But that's not what we are going to talk about today. We will go there next week. This morning I want to zero in on the disciples' question to Jesus. This is an unusual situation for Jesus' disciples. Usually, Jesus teaches them and the crowd gets to overhear it, but on this occasion, Jesus addresses the crowd directly. So, the disciples are wondering what's going on. The disciples come to Jesus and ask,
Why Do You Speak in Parables?
Why Do You Speak in Parables?
Jesus' response might strike us as shocking, even disturbing to our culture’s sensibilities. Jesus replied,
Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.
This is not inclusive language. Jesus shows that some people, his disciples, get the secrets of the kingdom, but others do not get these secrets.
Jesus continues:
Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.
Contrary to our culture’s obsession with equity, Jesus clarifies that those who have the secrets of the kingdom, his disciples, will have a spiritual abundance in this life and the next. However, whoever does not have these secrets will lose over time their capacity for the spiritual life that characterizes citizens of the kingdom of heaven.
This is not to say there is not proper place for the principles of inclusion and equity. It is to say, the way our culture conceives and tries to apply those principles is contrary a biblical understanding of how one benefits from the secrets of the kingdom of heaven.
Here, the crowd, those who have not clearly committed themselves to be disciples of Jesus, are those who do not have the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. This crowd is in a much more dangerous situation than they realize, for they have no hope of entering the kingdom of heaven. The longer they go without committing themselves to Jesus, the more diminished any hope of the kingdom becomes for them.
Then Jesus uses the words of the prophet Isaiah to explain why it is the crowd is in this condition. They have ears, but they cannot hear spiritual truth. They have eyes, but they cannot see God at work all around them. They cannot see God when sitting in front of them patiently teaching them face-to-face. Jesus gets to the root of the problem when he says, "this people's heart has become calloused."
It is their hard hearts, their rebellious hearts toward God that make it impossible for them to believe that Jesus' words are God's word to them, that Jesus' works are God's work among them, and that Jesus is himself God.
Unbelief blocks the flow of grace
Unbelief blocks the flow of grace
Jon Bloom, co-found of Desiring God.org, puts it this way:
Faith is the channel through which God’s graces of salvation and sanctification and spiritual gifts all flow. Unbelief obstructs the channel and therefore inhibits the flow of God’s grace.[6]James, the brother of our Lord, wrote in his epistle,
If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. (James 1:5–8, NIV)
James is clear. The person who does not have faith, a person who cannot believe, should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.
The flow of God's grace to us cannot reach us in that area, issue, or relationship in which we lack faith. But worse, if we have a total lack of faith in Jesus, the flow of God's saving grace will not reach us.
Matthew tells us that when Jesus visited his hometown of Nazareth, "he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith"[7]
The First Secret of the Kingdom is Belief in Jesus as God
Jesus contrasts his disciples to the unbelieving crowd telling them,
But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear.
Jesus is saying, you understand the secret of the kingdom because you believe in me. Because you believe in me, you can hear my words as the Word of God, and you can see me as God.
To show you I'm not making this up that the disciples really believed that Jesus was God among them, let's look at a few Scriptures.
use slides for each scripture
When Jesus walked on water and calmed the storm,
Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”
When Jesus told Nathaniel that he saw him under the fig tree before Philip called him,
Then Nathanael declared, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.”
When Jesus asked busy, worried Martha at the tomb of her brother Lazerus, "Do you believe that I am the resurrection and the life and that the one who believes in me will live even though they die?" Martha confessed,
“Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”
When Jesus asked his disciples, "Who do you say that I am?"
Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
When Jesus told Thomas, stop doubting and believe.
Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
How Does the Secret of Belief Help Us Experience Jesus?
How Does the Secret of Belief Help Us Experience Jesus?
It is only through belief that we come to see and hear Jesus for who he really is. It is through our belief in him we are born again by the Holy Spirit into the spiritual life that ensures our citizenship in the kingdom of heaven and our eternal life. Jesus said,
John 11:25 (NIV)
I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die.
It is by belief in Jesus, we find in God's Word spiritual life, comfort, instruction, and guidance. Jesus said,
The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life.
By belief in Jesus, we can see God at work all around us. Jesus said,
John 4:35 (NIV)
Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.
As we close, I ask you to close your eyes and let me guide us in a prayer of application, asking God to help us experience Jesus more deeply through the secret of belief.
settle in as let yourself relax in the presence of God.
begin by telling Jesus in your own words how much you love him. It can be as simple as saying, "I love you Jesus, I love you Lord and just repeating that a few times."
now ask Jesus to show you an area, an issue, a relationship in your life where your lack of belief in him is blocking the flow of his grace to you in that area of need.
ask the Lord to heal your belief in him concerning that need.
as you ask for healing, is the Lord showing you any posture of heart or action he would like for you to take regarding your need? Will you intend now to adopt that posture of heart or take that action?
Jesus loves you more than you can image. He wants to speak with you. He wants to show himself to you. Dane Ortlund in Gentle and Lowly wrote, "Jesus doesn't simply meet us at our place of need; he lives in our place of need . . . . Christ does not cringe at reaching out and touching dirty sinners and numbed sufferers. Such embrace is precisely what he loves to do. He cannot hold himself back."[8]
Now hear the words of Jesus Christ our Lord,
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28, NIV)
Prayer
Jesus, we come. We come, Jesus, out of our bondage, sorrow, and night. We come out of our sickness, out of our want, out of our sin. Out of our shameful failure and loss, Jesus, we come. Out of our storms, out of our distress, our of our unrest and pride, out of ourselves and into your love, into your freedom, into your gladness, into your healing, and into your rest, Jesus, we come to you. We believe in you and we love you. Thank you for receiving us as we are and working in us by the power of the Holy Spirit to make us more and more like you. Amen.
1. Michael Scott Robertson, “Divine Revelation,” in Lexham Theological Wordbook, ed. Douglas Mangum et al., Lexham Bible Reference Series (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2014).↩︎
2. 2022-07-24 Are you my mother? A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign 39-45.↩︎
3. Mark 3:21↩︎
4. Charles R. Page II, Jesus and the Land (Nashville: Abingdon, 1995), 85; Pixner, With Jesus Through Galilee According to the Fifth Gospel, 40. Cited in Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew, The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 2004), 473.↩︎
5. “The Acoustics and Crowd Capacity of Natural Theaters in Palestine.” Biblical Archaeologist, 1976. Vol. 39. Num. 4). Cited in Ferrell's Travel Blog https://ferrelljenkins.blog/2014/11/06/cove-of-the-sower-from-land-sea-and-air/↩︎
6. Bloom, Jon. "All Who Belive Battle Unbelief." (January 9, 2021 2021). Accessed 9/30/22. https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/all-who-believe-battle-unbelief.↩︎
7. Matthew 13:58↩︎
8. Ortland, Dane C. Gentle and Lowly : The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers. Crossway Books, 2021.↩︎