A Study of Matthew: I Wouldn't Want to Be In Their Shoes!
Notes
Transcript
Then he began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent.
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you.
And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.
But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.”
At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children;
yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.
All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
We are continuing our study of Matthew 11. In the first half of this chapter, which we looked at last week, Jesus had sent his disciples out on their first solo mission, and he went on to minister in several cities. While he was preaching, some of John the Baptist’s disciples show up. Now, Jesus was functioning as a rabbi, a preacher/teacher, and it was common for people to ask questions for the rabbi to answer. So John’s disciples come on John’s behalf and straight up ask Jesus, “Are you the Messiah?” Jesus responds by telling them to report to John all the things they see him doing, because everything he does lines up with the prophecies concerning the Messiah.
Jesus then turns to the crowd and lets them know that John is not his ministry competition. In fact, Jesus calls John a prophet, comparing him to Elijah, and basically saying he was the one who was prophesied to prepare the way for the Messiah. And then Jesus gets on to the people who look for excuses to not believe the message that John brought and that Jesus is now bringing. “You rejected John because you claimed he was overly religious and weird. You reject MY teaching by calling me a drunken party boy!”
And that is where we pick up today. After denouncing the crowd, Jesus goes on to denounce the cities where he had done a lot of ministry. He calls out the Jewish cities of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, and he compares them to Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom. These cities were all once-great cities who had corrupting influence on the Jews in the past. Jezebel, the evil queen who was married to King Ahab and tried to kill off all the prophets of God in Israel, came from Sidon. Tyre was also very corrupt and rebelled against God. And of course Sodom was famously evil. All three cities were judged by God for their sins. They were well known examples to the Jews of what happens to those who refuse God’s warning.
How would you like to be compared to Hitler? That’s basically what is happening here. Why is Jesus saying this? Because he wants them to know that their place in God’s kingdom is not based on their Jewish heritage.
You remember that God made a covenant with Abraham. Later, God reaffirmed that covenant with Abraham’s son Isaac, and then again with Isaac’s son Jacob, who had 12 sons. From Jacob’s sons and grandsons came the 12 tribes of Israel. Those 12 tribes survived for about 700 years. But then 10 of them completely turned from God, and they were lost to history. By the time the book of Matthew was written, only the tribes of Benjamin and Judah remained. And sadly they were more about their Jewish heritage than about being right with God.
Jesus is again pointing out the bizarre fact that these people he’s preaching to are supposed to be God’s chosen people. They have had the scriptures to teach them about God, and now they have Jesus working miracles and preaching the Gospel. Yet these people are still blind to who Jesus is. They still refuse to repent.
Jesus says that it will be better for the citizens of those wicked cities than it will be for those Jews that were surrounding him at that moment. Why? The citizens of those famously godless cities were not raised in the knowledge of God. Think of Nineveh. It was also a godless city, one that had persecuted the Hebrew people. But when Jonah shared God’s message to the king of Nineveh, he repented, along with his entire city. Maybe it was because someone from the city had witnessed a giant fish appearing near the shore and spitting out Jonah. Whatever the reason, Nineveh heard and repented.
Is it right for God to judge those people who were never heard the gospel message? Yes, because he is perfect and has all the information necessary to make accurate judgment. He sees right into the heart of a man.
But if God has the right to judge those who HAVEN’T heard the gospel, how much more does he have the right to judge those who HAVE heard? Jesus is calling us to live a transformed life—a life that is set apart from the rest of the world. When people look at you, do they see something different? As Billy Graham often put it, if you were arrested for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?
We live in a world that says, “Believe what you want, but don’t push it on me.” So we come to church, sit through the service, and go home. And a lot of people think that’s enough to be able to call themselves Christians. But “Christian” doesn’t mean “church-goer.” It means “follower of Jesus.”
The people that Jesus had been preaching to had been religious all their lives. They knew all the rituals and ceremonies. When they went to services at the synagogue, they knew what to do and say at the right time. But for most of them, those rituals and memorizations affected them as much as a parrot is affected if it learns to quote Shakespeare.
Back in chapter five Jesus said that what we entertain in our heart is just as important as the actions we take. We can look good and wholesome on the outside, and be totally rotten inside.
And the thing is, no matter how hard you try, the real you will come out eventually.
So what are we supposed to do with this? We need to decide today who Jesus is to us. We call him Lord and Savior, but do we really mean that, or do we just want him to smooth things over for us when we get into trouble? We say we want him to forgive us, but do we really mean that, or do we just want him to overlook some things in our lives?
Because asking for forgiveness means that we recognize things in our lives that need to be forgiven. Things that have offended others. Things that have offended God. And I get that we may have certain strongholds in our lives that we still need to get victory over, but we can’t ask for forgiveness and then act like it’s no big deal if we continue in it. If we say that something is no big deal, then we’re also saying that God shouldn’t be offended. That’s the opposite of repentance.
The people Jesus preached to that day heard his words and saw his miracles, but they were unchanged, unrepentant. We often make excuses for our behavior, maybe comparing ourselves to others who are “worse.” “I’m not perfect, but I’m not a Ted Bundy.” Do you remember Ted Bundy, the serial killer? Did you know that, before he died, he had an interview with James Dobson from Focus on the Family? Did you know that he admitted everything he did, talked about all the things he did that led up to becoming a killer, and confessed it all as sin? Did you know that he surrendered his life to Jesus?
Repentance is recognizing what we’ve done that has offended God, and turning away from that. It is admitting “that was wrong, and I was wrong for doing that or thinking that.” And then, with God’s help, we stop doing whatever it is that is wrong.
If we are going to see people come to this church, it will only be because they see something different in us. Something that will make them want to find out what is going on here. This community is filled with decent, relatively moral folks. We need to show them something more. They need to see us as people who have a living relationship with God, and they need to see how that relationship transforms us.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Of these nine characteristics that were just mentioned, how many are you known for? Which of these, if someone heard the description in conjunction with your name, would make people’s eyes roll?
“Patience? That’s not him!”
“Self-control? She has self-control? You’ve got to be kidding?”
What is it that people are seeing in your life that would make them want to come to Jesus? For that matter, if your friends or neighbors were asked if you are a Christian, and how they know it, what would they say?
“Well, I know their family goes to church.” What else?
Please don’t think that I’m trying to beat any of us up or point fingers. I’m convicted over this message too. It’s just that being a Christian is more than belonging to a group or practicing some ritual or knowing what to say. It’s about a heart that is completely submitted to God. A life that is made Holy and set apart by the blood of Jesus and empowered by the Holy Spirit.
If we want to see this church transformed, the transformation starts in us. The church is us. We have to be different.
