Matthew 13-14: Family Matters

Introduction

The last several chapter have focused on more teachings of the Lord. In the last chapter we heard his parables about the kingdom. But now Matthew is going to shift the Lord’s story in a new direction. Up until this point, Jesus’s ministry has been mostly in Galilee. Specifically he’s spent a lot of time in his “home base” of Capernaum.

His ministry is going to shift away from this territory going forward. The reason for this change, as we’ll see, is the rejection of Jesus in his own hometown (Nazareth), and increased pressure from the ruler of that area (Herod the Tetrarch).

However, these rejections will ultimately be the catalyst for two of the most incredible miracles Jesus performed: feeding the 5,000 and walking on water.

13:53-58: No Place Like Home

Jesus decides to head home, perhaps one final time, in an attempt to share the Gospel with those he grew up with.

We aren’t told what Jesus said to them (although Luke tells a very similar story where Jesus claimed to be the fulfilment of Isaiah’s prophecies, this could be the same event). Whatever He said, they were “astonished” by it.

Anyone who’s left their hometown knows that it can sometimes be hard to come back. Especially if you’ve been relatively “successful” elsewhere.

Our family and friends, especially the ones we grew up with, know is better than anyone else. Which means it can be a little bit harder for them to take us seriously.

In our case, they might even remember our “flaws”. Even though Jesus didn’t have any “flaws”, they clearly know who his family was....and it wasn’t anything special.

My family are the most difficult for me to have conversations with about Jesus. It’s just hard. And awkward.

The people of Nazareth had heard the words of Jesus, and seen/heard about his mighty miracles. But it all kind of surprised them. And it seems like it made them a little bit jealous.

Jesus was one of them. And everyone knew Nazarenes were nobody special. So who did Jesus think he was? One of those southerners from Jerusalem and a big fancy teacher now?

They actually insult his family here by asking, “Where did he get this wisdom and power?”

It’s basically like saying, “We know his parents ain’t that smart.” or “His daddy can’t even cut wood straight, no way they had a kid this powerful.”

Here we get some interesting details about the Lord’s earthly family. The fact that He even had family was testimony to his humanity.

They don’t mention Joseph by name (perhaps an insult), but they call Jesus ‘the carpenter’s son’, indicating that this was Joseph’s job. In Mark’s telling of this story they simply call Jesus the carpenter, indicating he took up the family trade.

His mother was Mary.

Jesus had four brothers, and we know their names (!).

Of these four men, James became the most famous. In fact, he became the leader of the Church in Jerusalem. Church history says that he was extremely pious and prayed in the Temple daily, to the point that his knees because “like those of camels”.

Eventually he was tricked by the religious leaders into climbing to the top of the Temple to preach to the people, where they pushed him off and killed him. The early Church believed that this was the catalyst for God’s judgement against Jerusalem that led to its destruction in 72 AD.

The New Testament letter of James claims to have been written by him as well.

The other one of these men that we know is Judas, or Jude. We don’t know much about him, but he apparently was a leader of the church, and he wrote the NT book that we have as well.

Interestingly, one very early church writer mentions that by 80-90 AD, two grandsons of Jude were alive. The Emperor Domitian had ordered that every Jew in the bloodline of David be executed. The two grandsons, among the last known living relatives of Jesus, were brought to the Emperor and admitted their lineage. But after discovering that they were relatively poor and law-abiding citizens (and out of fear of Jesus, apparently), the Emperor let them go and called off the persecution.

Jesus also had sisters according to this passage. But Matthew (and the other Gospels) fail to name them. Why might this be?

In large part, I wonder if it was to protect them. Humans do wicked things to families of powerful people, especially the women. If Jesus really was God, or some kind of powerful deity, as the people believed He was - unfortunately it’s not out of the realm of possibility that people might try to sexually assault his sisters or try to have babies who were related to this God-Man.

The pagan gods and goddesses often had shrine prostitutes who were said to be connected to those deities, so this practice was more common than we might think.

Unfortunately the people did not see Jesus as a “hometown hero”. He made them uncomfortable. He made them angry. In a way, their response symbolizes the response of most Jews even to this day. Hence the Lord’s solemn saying, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household.”

Because of their unkind welcome, and lack of faith, Jesus performed minimal miracles there. Mark says “no mighty miracles”, but adds that Jesus did perform some healings - minor in the grand scheme of things.

Does Jesus require faith to perform miracles? No. It’s not like His miracles are a car and faith is their fuel.

However, it seems like Jesus isn’t interested in performing miracles for those who aren’t really interested in Him in the first place. His miracles always seem to take place in an atmosphere of faith. In this case (and many others), where the atmosphere is hostile, he isn’t going to inflame the tensions with big shows of force.

Jesus doesn’t need us to be “wowed” by Him. He wants us to be interested and trust him, with or without the miracles. And when we do trust him, the miracles usually come.

Besides, why perform miracles if people are just going to question them anyway? Just a few chapters back we see the people questioning whether or not the miracles were from the devil. These people seemed no different. Let’s make sure we don’t become like them.

It’s truly a shame that these people’s inability to look past their neighbor’s perceived weaknesses (or success), caused them to miss out on something incredible.

14:1-12: The Death of John the Baptist

It wasn’t just at home that Jesus was rejected. His popularity has grown throughout the entire region and even garnered the attention of the ruler there - Herod the Tetrarch.

This Herod was one of the sons of Herod the Great (who tried to kill Jesus as a baby). He had two brothers....also named Herod. The Tetrarch’s full name was Herod Antipas.

When Herod the Great died, he had his kingdom divided up into three sections for his sons. Herod Archelous was given the territory of Judea (southern Palestine), and Herod Antipas and Herod Philip (from our story today) were each given smaller pieces of the northern land.

In reality, none of these kings had a ton of power. They were “kings” of the Jews, inasmuch as the Romans allowed them to be. The Herods weren’t even Jewish themselves, but claimed to be.

Between Antipas and Philip, Antipas was the one in charge of Galilee and most of the territory that Jesus grew up and lived in. He’s the Herod mentioned today’s text.

The fact that Herod had now heard about Jesus does tell us something about his fame in the region. It would be kind of like some guy from Saginaw, Missouri getting the attention of the governor.

Keep in mind, Jesus had been trying to minimize his popularity. He routinely told people not to talk about him. But it’s impossible to talk about Jesus once we’ve experienced His power.

What Herod says is actually quite strange, and almost illogical. He thinks that Jesus is…John the Baptist, risen from the dead?

If Herod had really been caught up to speed, he would have known that Jesus and John were performing their respective ministries at the same time. So it’s impossible for them to be the same person.

Second, John never performed any miracles (John 10:41 “And many came to him. And they said, “John did no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true.”” ). Herod seems to think that, having been raised from the dead, John was given great power.

There seems to be a hint of fear, and guilt, in this statement. Herod had killed John against his better judgement - and now it seems that he think John might have come back from the dead with great power. You know what people do with great power? They use it to get revenge on those who hurt them. If this was really John, Herod probably realizes that John could be coming for him next.

Matthew then fills us in on why Herod is having these thoughts. He killed John the Baptist, and we are told how the story happened.

It started when Herod had John arrested. Now we already knew that John was in prison - a few chapters back, he sent his disciples to ask Jesus some questions. But we didn’t know why John was in prison. Now we do.

Herod had done it for his wife, Herodias. Why? Because their marriage was a scandal. Herodias was actually the wife of Herod’s (half) brother Philip.

Here’s the even weirder part of this whole story. Herodias was actually a granddaughter of Herod the Great - she was a niece to both Herod Antipas and Philip!

Outside of Scripture, the Jewish historian Josephus tells us what all went on with this whole gross and tragic affair.

Herodias first married Philip, and they had a daughter named Salome (probably the daughter in this story). Herod Antipas married a foreign princess. But eventually him and Herodias fell in love and she left Philip.

The foreign princess Antipas had married, got angry at this and returned to her father who was a king. That king waged war against Antipas, and defeated him. Eventually the Romans stepped in to save his skin.

This loss was so devastating to Herod, that according to Josephus, the Jews believed that it was Herod’s punishment for executing John the Baptist.

As an aside, that foreign king was King Aretas, who is mentioned by Paul in 2 Corinthians 11:32 “At Damascus, the governor under King Aretas was guarding the city of Damascus in order to seize me,”

Not only was that whole arrangement messed up, it was also against the Law of Moses. Leviticus 18:16 “You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother’s wife; it is your brother’s nakedness.” Leviticus 20:21 “If a man takes his brother’s wife, it is impurity. He has uncovered his brother’s nakedness; they shall be childless.”

Since the Herods weren’t really Jewish, they didn’t particularly care about the Law, hence why the entire family was known for their wickedness. But John the Baptist was still intent on holding them accountable. If they were going to pretend to be Israel’s kings, they better act like it.

What happens when sinners get called out on their sin? They either repent, or retaliate. Herod and Herodias did the latter. Except Herod wasn’t dumb. He may have wanted to kill John, but like any good politician, he knew this would rile up the people (who actually believed John was a prophet).

Mark adds the interesting note in Mark 6:20 “for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly.”

And so we start to see why Herod felt guilty after killing John. He might have been angered by his words, but they apparently had cut to his heart a little bit.

Our enemies may not like us, but it’s important that we live in such righteous and holy ways that they are at least intrigued by what we have to say.

Despite wanting to keep John in limbo - imprisoned, but alive - Herod’s pride, and some alcohol, got the best of him when he threw a birthday party for himself.

The party itself showed that the Herods weren’t very Jewish. The Israelites didn’t really celebrate birthdays. It was very much a Greek thing.

Interestingly, the only other time a birthday party is mentioned in Scripture is when Pharoah had a party way back in Genesis 40. That party also didn’t end well - at least for Pharoah’s baker!

We don’t know how old Herodias’ daughter was. But it wouldn’t have been a surprise to have a young girl dancing provocatively for Herod and his (creepy) guy friends. Because he couldn’t pass up the chance to look cool in front of his friends, he promised her “anything”.

If he had been a little more sober, and a little less weird, he probably would have realized this was a trap by Herodias to get John the Baptist killed. This story sounds a lot like the king who was tricked into throwing Daniel into the lion’s den.

I think it says a lot that the king “was sorry”. But apparently not sorry enough to overcome his own ego. “because of his oaths and his guests”. As much as he might have liked John, the king couldn’t risk being embarrassed on his birthday.

And so, John the Baptist was beheaded and his head gruesomely placed on a platter. Josephus tells us that John was in prison in that same castle where the party was being held, making for a quick death sentence.

We’re left with the closing note that John’s disciples were able to take his body and bury it before telling Jesus.

In verse 13 we’re told that “when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a desolate place by himself.”

It’s easy to connect this action with Jesus having been told about John’s death. But it might actually be more connected with Herod’s statement in verse 2 about being confused by Jesus’ identity.

In either case, either due to mourning the death of his relative, or new pressure from the king, Jesus was “pushed” out of the region and he tried to get away for a little while.

Conclusion

Ministry is hard. Unfortunately, sometimes family can make it harder. For a variety of reasons. Jesus was no stranger to this. Earlier in the Gospel we saw he had to deal with the direct distraction of his family trying to “reel him in”, and today we saw where his entire hometown rejected him. That can be really demoralizing. But it’s also another way in which we know Jesus was “just like us.”

We also saw that Jesus lost loved ones, like John the Baptist. Getting the call that you’ve lost a loved one is never easy. I think it had a real impact on Jesus, too. Not only did he lose John, but it also indirectly led to him having to leave the region to avoid persecution. As we’ll see next week, Jesus didn’t even get a break when he tried. And that’s what it means to truly serve people.

Even when we are bruised, broken, hurting, and just want to be left alone, I think we still need to try and be like Jesus when he was in those same situation. He saw the crowds “and had compassion on them”.