The Ministry of Jesus Christ

Matthew 4:12-17

a. Jesus fulfills the message of the Prophets (4:12-16)

b. Jesus preaches the messages of the Prophets (4:17)

2. INTRODUCTION

3. BODY

a. Jesus fulfills the message of the Prophets (4:12-16)

i. Verse 12 begins with Jesus hearing about John’s arrest. We see again the similarity between John the Baptist and Jesus. We hear that John here is arrested similar to Jesus who later is arrested. Another similarity here is the idea that Jesus had been taken into custody. The verb here is the same word for betrayed where in Matthew 26:48, Jesus was betrayed by Judas. We could imagine that John the Baptist was most likely betrayed as well.

ii. It’s interesting that the idea of Jesus withdrawing is the same here as in Matthew 14:13 where Jesus withdraws Himself after hearing that John had been murdered. Jesus was just baptized by John and seeing that he was arrested, he went to hide just incase He also might be arrested. Although this can be true, it doesn’t seem likely because Jesus says His time is not yet here in John 2:4 and 7:6 as well as the hour has come in Mark 14:41. These passages seem to indicate that Jesus knew when His time would come which makes it difficult to say that Jesus ran away in fear to hide. So it seems more plausible that Jesus withdrew to Galilee to begin His own ministry.

iii. With the arrest of John the Baptist, this notes the end of John’s ministry, but also the start of Jesus. We know that John the Baptist was the forerunner, His ministry was to prepare the way for the Messiah. Now that John’s ministry had ended, it marked the beginning of Jesus’s ministry. At the same time, we could imagine that this was unsettling for Jesus.

iv. So as Jesus leaves Nazareth to come to Capernaum, this fulfills a prophecy. The prophecy comes from Isaiah 9:1. Verses 15-16 is interesting because it is not an actual quotation from Isaiah 9:1 but a paraphrase of Isaiah 9:1. It seems to be what verse 14 says, or probably a sermon that Isaiah would preach often to his people.

v. So what would Isaiah’s message be? In its original context the passage concerns a broken people who have suffered Assyrian attack and deportation (2 Kings 15:29; 1 Chronicles 5:26). At this point, God promised deliverance. We see that deliverance in Isaiah 9:6-7 where the son from the house of David will bring salvation (Isaiah 9:4). So as Jesus arrived in Capernaum, this prophecy of a son who would come to deliver His people would fulfill Isaiah 9:6-7 but also Matthew 1:21 and the significance of that comes in 1:25 where due to the fact that Joseph keeps Mary as his wife and that makes Jesus his son, Jesus is now in the family of David and this prophecy is fulfilled.

vi. So what does this all mean together? The prophecies regarding the Messiah, the son who would bring salvation in Isaiah 9 was now being realized by Jesus. I think if we think about this apart from the Old Testament, we don’t understand the significance of this prophecy. You see, the Prophets were continually preaching repentance and restoration. This was the continuous message of the prophets. They were continually preaching repentance and judgment. If Israel was to repent, they would receive restoration. But if they didn’t turn back to God, they would face His judgment.

vii. The book of Amos captures this perfectly. Israel as a nation had become corrupt where the rich took advantage of the poor. The rich had increased their wealth through exploiting the poor and was now in a place where Israel was no longer capable of being righteous. In the words of Amos 5:10, Israel hated truth and honesty. But even through this, in Amos 5, God tells Israel 3 times, in 5:4, 5:6, and 5:14 telling Israel, seek Me that you may live. But we find out, that they don’t seek God so they face destruction and exile.

viii. All through the prophets, this is continually the message. Turn from evil, turn from your unbelief, repent and come to God. But finally, as we saw from Isaiah 9, the son who would bring salvation to His people has finally arrived.

b. Jesus preaches the messages of the Prophets (4:17)

i. The phrase opening in verse 17 is important. “From that time” tells us a lot. This phrase tells us that the time of the Messiah had now come. Just as the Messiah was prophesied by the prophets, this phrase indicates that the Messiah had now come.

ii. Now that the Messiah had come, now His ministry was to begin. Again, the indicator of Jesus’s ministry starting is at the end of John’s ministry. Now that the forerunner had done his job, the Messiah’s ministry starts.

iii. So how does Jesus start His ministry? Jesus began to preach and say exactly what John the Baptist said. Jesus calls people to repentance. Why? For the kingdom of Heaven is at hand.

iv. John had preached the same message but Jesus was repeating this for a reason. John was pointing towards the Messiah who would come, but from verses 15-16, we can clearly understand the Messiah had come through Jesus. So with that in mind, from that time, Jesus was preaching the Kingdom.

v. There is a little difficulty from Matthew 4:17 with Mark 1:14-15. In Mark, it says that Jesus says the time is fulfilled and He calls people to repent and believe in the Gospel. Based on Mark 1:14, it says that after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came and preached the Gospel of God, then called people to believe in the Gospel. The difficulty here is that in Matthew’s account, there is no mention of believe in the Gospel.

vi. So what can we take away from this? The first point is the preaching is not different. What Mark highlights and Matthew highlights are different because of people’s takeaways. Even if 2 people listened to the same sermon, not all points will come out the same. Why? Because of the way people process the sermon. But what is the same? The topic of repentance. Mark and Matthew both capture the essence of John and Jesus’s preaching. It is that one must repent. Borrowing Matthew 3:8, one must bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

vii. The focal point of Jesus’s ministry is that the kingdom of Heaven was at hand, meaning the Kingdom of Heaven had arrived, through the coming of the Messiah. If that were true, repentance is required.

viii. There are two texts that help us capture what John the Baptist is saying. Galatians 5:22 and 1 John 1:6-7.

ix. In Galatians 5:22, it speaks of the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is speaking of the fruit that God is bearing in the life of the believer. Let’s think about this through a tree through John’s example in Matthew 3:10.

x. If we are all trees, the fruit of the Spirit will grow in us as we keep with repentance. Again, this doesn’t mean everyone will bear the same exact fruit, but the point is, all true believers in Christ will bear fruit. What kind of fruit will we bear? Galatians 5:22 tells us what types of fruit we will bear. The point that Paul makes here in Galatians 5 is that all true believers will bear fruit if the Spirit resides in them. He will cause that fruit to grow. How? Through repentance and walking in the Spirit.

xi. The second text that helps us understand what it means that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand is explained in 1 John 1:6-7.1 John 1:6-7 help us to understand what it means to bear fruit keeping with repentance. Bearing fruit here is speaking of fruit growing after a seed has been planted. God has sown the seeds of new life in us. The means in which the seeds grow is through repentance. John is telling us in 1 John 1:6 that if we say we have fellowship with Him, if we by the words of John in 1:1-3 what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, and touched with our hands, John is bringing to the surface what fellowship is. It is not merely knowing things about the person. But it is to see and know the actual person.

xii. So our sanctification in the words of 1 John 1:6-7 is dealing with knowing the person of Christ and having seen Him, if we still walk in darkness, then we are liars and we do not practice the truth.

xiii. If we understand what John is saying correctly, if we say we know this person and we believe in this person for our salvation yet continue in sin then we are liars. What does this mean? Our sanctification is directly related to the person of Christ. If we have seen and we have touched and have met Him, it is not merely some idea or a statement, but rather a real person, and we still walk in darkness, we are liars.

xiv. The statement that John is telling us is, if we have been given all the evidence, and everything has been proven, yet we still deny it, we are liars. It is not that God doesn’t exist, but rather, we are liars.

xv. On the other hand, if we have fellowship with Him and we live according to what He has told us to do, because we trust in His words and we believe who He says He is, then we have fellowship with one another, and Jesus continues to cleanse us from all sin. Why? Because we can continually go to Him and ask Him to forgive us. But if He isn’t a real person, we can’t be forgiven because only He can forgive.

xvi. This is exactly what Jesus is telling us when He tells us here in Matthew 4:17 that the kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Jesus is telling us that the Kingdom of Heaven is here because He has come. Our path to forgiveness from our sins is here only through the person of Christ.

xvii. This is what separates everything religion in the world with Christianity. Christianity teaches that salvation is found in the person and work of Christ. No other religion teaches this. Every other religion teaches what we must do. Christianity tells us what God has done. I pray that we would see the greatness of salvation through the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

4. CONCLUSION