The King's Work Begins - Pt. 1

As we turn a corner and come to our next passage, we find that Matthew does not record some of the events of Jesus’ life that the other Gospel writers record. Between Jesus’ baptism and his return to Galilee which we read of in this passage, Jesus calls his first disciples, he performs his first miracle of turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana, he made a trip to Jerusalem for Passover, he exposed his jealousy for God’s holiness by driving moneychangers from the temple, he had his famous midnight conversation with Nicodemus about being born again, and he had his conversation with the woman at the well in Samaria as he was traveling north. That’s kind of where we pick up this story as we read today.

Read Matthew 4:12-17

The major shift or drama that we see taking place in this passage is the transition from John to Jesus. John and Jesus were not at odds. John was a true Old Testament prophet pointing to the Messiah, and Jesus was that Messiah. Much later in Matthew, we will read and study as Matthew points back to the imprisonment of John and his execution. But for now, the important information for Matthew is that Jesus has started his teaching ministry. John’s insight from John 3:30 had come true.

John 3:30 ESV

He must increase, but I must decrease.”

Even though all four of the Gospel records were written under the inspiration of God, they seem to have different points of emphasis. John is perhaps the most explicit, where he writes in chapter 20, that there were many other works and words of Jesus that he didn’t write down - in fact, too many to write down! But the ones that he wrote were written so that you may believe in Jesus Christ, and that believing you may have life.

Matthew doesn’t give us such an explicit “purpose statement” but he does give us a point of emphasis. We have seen it alluded to in the preaching of John the Baptist, and we see it now here in the words of Jesus.

The passage before us today gives insight into the purpose of Jesus’ teaching and miracle-working ministry. It was not a ministry with a purpose simply to extend benevolence and kindness, it was a ministry with a focus - a central theme or a big idea.

This theme was also alluded to in the temptation of Jesus that we saw last week. What did Satan offer to Jesus if he would simply bow down and worship him? He offered him all the kingdoms of the earth. What did John preach repentance for? Because the Kingdom of God had come near. What did Jesus preach here? Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. All throughout Matthew we will see references, allusions to, teaching on, and proclamation of the Kingdom. Parables of the Kingdom, revelation about the kingdom, prophecies concerning the future of the kingdom, and teaching about the present reality of the kingdom.

Here in this passage, Matthew tells us how Jesus fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah of the coming of a great light - Jesus is that light. And that light reveals truth, the truth, which is good news. The Gospel shines because of the light of Jesus, really, Jesus’ whole life, ministry, death, and resurrection is the Gospel. Jesus is the King, and his light proclaims this truth and good news. His work begins, and centers around, spreading this light of truth. He did it in his words, and he did it in his works. The rest of Matthew is devoted to reflecting and spreading this light.

The light of the gospel dawns with the ministry of Jesus Christ. He is the glory of the good news and the King of the Kingdom.

1. A Transition in Ministry - 12-13

If you can picture a map of Palestine, where Jesus went to be baptized, and probably tempted in the wilderness, was south and east of the Jordan river. Jerusalem is south and west, of the Jordan river. Jesus later traveled north, coming through Samaria, where he met the woman at the well, and nearing his hometown of Nazareth. We are told in Luke 4 that Jesus was rejected in his hometown of Nazareth, even being driven out after his sermon in the synagogue.

If you read that passage, Jesus compares himself to the prophet Elijah, giving similarities about how Elijah was often rejected in Israel, but ministered to those outside. Likewise, Jesus was rejected in his hometown - for “a prophet is not accepted in his own country.”

Luke 4:28–30 ESV

When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff. But passing through their midst, he went away.

All that is wrapped up in Matthew’s words that “leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum by the Sea.”

Capernaum becomes somewhat of a “home base” for Jesus’ ministry. This little city saw a concentrated amount of Jesus teaching and miracles. Later Matthew will ever refer to it as Jesus’ “own city.”

That is all very fitting, because Jesus was prophesied in Isaiah 53 as the one who would be “despised and rejected.” He would be cast out by his own people, and minister to others. Psalm 69, which is recognized as a Messianic psalm, speaks of the Messiah being “a foreigner to his own family, and a stranger to his mother’s children.” John tells us in the first chapter of his Gospel that Jesus “came unto his own, and his own people did not receive him.” Of course, in a big picture sense, this is referring to Jesus not simply being rejected in Nazareth, but being rejected largely by his own people Israel. We find then, that this little piece of information about Jesus leaving Nazareth and going to Capernaum is sort of a type, or a foreshadowing, of the rest of Jesus’ ministry.

And this is no coincidence - as we keep reading, we find that this rejection did not take God by surprise, and we see Matthew points out the fact that it was predicted all along.

2. A Fulfillment of Prophecy - 14-16

Matthew makes sure to point out the the city of Capernaum, by the sea, was the territory of the tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali. Those tribes had their inheritance in this very place, west of the Jordan, near the sea of Galilee. This isn’t merely geographical information for Matthew - he tells us for a purpose, the purpose of fulfillment.

Here we come to another one of Matthew’s favorite features - fulfillment of prophecy. He refers back to Isaiah 9, which reads this way.

Isaiah 9:1–2 ESV

But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.

Here, that great prophecy speaking hope for those who were in captivity. But they had not been in captivity to Babylon for years now. How does Jesus fulfil this? Isn’t it too late in time?

Matthew is interested in his readers seeing “the great light” that comes with the ministry of Jesus. The ancient lands of Zebulun and Naphtali were once subjected to plundering, kidnapping, war, and desolation. But here, Matthew tells us, they get to see the greatest light. Not just the light of coming back from captivity physically, but the light of the true light, the Light of the World.

They had been “dwelling in darkness.” But now the light had shone. Darkness is one of the first things we see in Scripture. The universe and the world were in formless darkness, but God gave light, life, and order in creation. Here that theme continues, only now the darkness is not physical, it is spiritual. There is a life, light, and order that only comes from knowing the giver of those things, and Jesus Christ is that one! The whole world is in darkness, but the light has dawned in Jesus.

I want to give you some scripture to think about as you picture Jesus fulfilling this great prophecy.

Proverbs 2:11–13 ESV

discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you, delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness,

Proverbs 4:19 ESV

The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.

1 John 2:11 ESV

But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

Isaiah 5:20 ESV

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!

Matthew 6:22–23 ESV

“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

1 John 1:5 ESV

This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

John 3:19–20 ESV

And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.

John 8:12 ESV

Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

You see, this light that Capernaum saw, it was the true light. This light that Zebulun and Naphtali saw, it was the true light. This light that Matthew is writing about, it is the true light. This light that we see when we read these sacred words of scripture, it is the true light. And it is no abstract, intellectual, ethereal light, the light is a person - a man, the God-man, Jesus Christ. This light of the Gospel was foretold in the Prophets, but it truly dawn in Jesus Christ. He is the light, the glory of the Gospel, the way, the truth, the life.

By quoting this prophecy, Matthew also brings out another thing worth noting. It is written in Isaiah this region of Capernaum where Jesus goes is “Galilee of the Gentiles/Nations.” What does that mean?

Galilee was the name for this region from at least the time of Joshua. It was settled by Zebulun and Naphtali at the time of the conquest. We find through history, however, that these tribes always cohabited the land with many gentile cities.

This comes up in the time of Solomon, where Hiram king of Tyre actually gave 20 gentile cities of “Galilee” to Solomon at the time of building the Temple.

After the Assyrian conquest of the area around 720 B.C., the area became even more populated with Gentiles. When you look at contemporary works of history, we find that in the first century, this region was more than 50% Gentile. So the name “Galilee of the nations” was true in Isaiah’s day, and it was even more true in Jesus’ day.

This is interesting, because even though Jesus came first to his own Jewish people, and even though Matthew is the author with the most distinctly Jewish interest, he points out all these ways in which Jesus’ ministry seems to always be intended for a larger audience. Two things sort of bookend this theme in Matthew - the visit of the Pagan Magi to worship Jesus after his birth, and the recording of the Great Commission at the end of this book which calls for the Gospel to be spread to all the nations.

We ought to rejoice in this - not that Jesus’ own people rejected him, but that it has always been part of the plan to include us Gentiles. We are not part of God’s chosen people by birth or nation, but we are grafted in and chosen by His Grace. Now, we ought to have an eye to the promises that there is a believing Jewish remnant who will one day come to faith, but now our mandate and commission is to proclaim the light of Jesus to every tribe, tongue, and nation - and we rejoice that Jesus has made a way for us in the Gospel! For to each of us who receive His word, “we have seen a great light” and “on us a light has dawned.”

3. A Proclamation of Authority - 17

We will see some more of the specific details of Jesus’ ministry next week, but I want to finish here in verse 17 for today. Matthew tells us that “from that time Jesus began to preach...”

Weeks ago, we talked about how Matthew orders his writing around narrative and discourse, narrative and discourse. That is, he tells us about some things that Jesus did, and then he gives us a section of teaching. In a couple weeks, we will start studying one of the most significant portions of Jesus’ teaching that we have, the Sermon on the Mount. But this little snippet of Jesus’ teaching is primary, and central, to his whole message.

John proclaimed this in the desert to prepare the way for Jesus, and now Jesus proclaims the same thing - Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. We talked a lot about repentance where we saw this message from John. Repentance is not our good works, otherwise the scribes and pharisees would have had repentance nailed down. Repentance is a fundamental change in disposition toward God, and here, like for John, it is because of the Kingdom of God.

The idea of the Kingdom is, by far, the most prominent in Matthew. He uses the word 55 times in his writing. The theme of the Kingdom is perhaps one of the most mysterious and, maybe, misunderstood themes in all of scripture. I remember in my Sophomore year in college having to write a “position paper” on what the Kingdom of God meant, and if the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven were different. It was a pretty large class, and I really feel badly for the professor who had to read all those papers.

The Gospels use the terms “Kingdom of Heaven/Kingdom of God” interchangeably. There really is no reason to try to introduce some significance into the different uses of the term. I said before, the most likely reason that Matthew prefers “Kingdom of Heaven” is because Jewish author’s often used substitutes for God’s name in order to never be guilty of blaspheming the name. But even Matthew is not totally consistent on this. The primary evidence that these things are interchangeable is that Jesus used them interchangeably.

Matthew 19:23–24 ESV

And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”

To add to that, sometimes scripture writers use simply “the kingdom” or “Kingdom of the Father” or “Kingdom of Christ” without any clarification or obvious reasons in context to define them differently.

But the main question that plagues all of us is this: what is the Kingdom? What is the meaning? The Bible seems to speak of the kingdom in many different facets, many different lights. I want to read a quote from George Ladd in his book, “The Gospel of the Kingdom”

The Gospel of the Kingdom: Scriptural Studies in the Kingdom of God Chapter I: What Is the Kingdom of God?

The Kingdom is a present reality (Matt. 12:28), and yet it is a future blessing (1 Cor. 15:50). It is an inner spiritual redemptive blessing (Rom. 14:17) which can be experienced only by way of the new birth (John 3:3), and yet it will have to do with the government of the nations of the world (Rev. 11:15). The Kingdom is a realm into which men enter now (Matt. 21:31), and yet it is a realm into which they will enter tomorrow (Matt. 8:11). It is at the same time a gift of God which will be bestowed by God in the future (Luke 12:32) and yet which must be received in the present (Mark 10:15).

Now, when we read something like that, at first it only adds confusion to the topic. If the Kingdom is all these things, how can we ever make sense of it? What significance does it really have for us?

We alluded to this when we looked at John’s message, but I firmly believe a key to understanding all this is the definition of the word Kingdom.

What do you think of when you think Kingdom? For instance, I grew up in Groton, which is in the southern tip of Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom. England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland are known as the United Kingdom. We think of the Kingdom of Denmark or the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and what do we think of when we think of all these things? We think of land - an area, a region.

Second to land, we think of Subjects. People are part of Kingdoms, under the rule of a king.

But I would suggest that these ideas are a barrier to understanding the theme of Kingdom in the Bible. The primary definition of Kingdom in both Hebrew and Greek in the Bible is not a land or a place, and it is not people or subjects, the first and biggest meaning of the word Kingdom is really kingship. That is, rulership, authority, sovereignty, reign.

If we look at Jesus’ teaching on the Kingdom, and we will see a ton of it in Matthew, and we try to define Kingdom as either a place or a people, we will be utterly confused. Take a couple of scriptural examples.

Psalm 103:19 ESV

The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.

If the word Kingdom there means a place or subjects, how does that make sense? It’s not the place or people, it is the kingship.

Psalm 145:11 ESV

They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom and tell of your power,

For this example, understand that as part of poetry, David is speaking in parallels. So Kingdom and power are parallels, two words describing the same idea. If kingdom meant place or people there, it wouldn’t make sense.

But a parable of Jesus makes this really clear as well.

Luke 19:11–12 ESV

As they heard these things, he proceeded to tell a parable, because he was near to Jerusalem, and because they supposed that the kingdom of God was to appear immediately. He said therefore, “A nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and then return.

Now, how can a person go somewhere, receive a kingdom, and then return? Did he bring back a big chunk of land with him? Did he bring back a big group of people? No, he wasn’t lacking a land or people - he was receiving a commissioning, an authority.

So if Kingdom means rulership, authority, or reign, how does that clarify things for us?

Well, it brings a lot of significance to Jesus’ and John’s call to repentance. If they are saying, “the kingdom of God is coming near” meaning “God’s authority to rule and reign” then that makes the call to action much more powerful! God’s authority is drawing near, primarily in the person of Jesus, and that demands a change!

This also helps us in many other places. We are called to receive the kingdom of God. What does that mean? Are we to receive a place? Are we to receive the church? No, we are to receive or recognize his authority.

When we pray after the Lord’s Prayer and we say, “thy kingdom come, thy will be done” we are not praying for a physical throne to come down from heaven, we are praying for God’s rulership and authority to be recognized and submitted to on earth as it is in heaven.

When the Bible speaks of entering into God’s eternal kingdom, what that means is that while God’s authority and rule are very real now, we don’t experience the fulness of that blessing - but one day we will! So we enter into, accept, and receive his kingship now by faith - one day we will experience it in full.

How is this a proclamation of authority? Because the proclamation of the Kingdom is just that - it is proclaiming the authority of the King! The authority of the king to bless and to curse. The authority of the king to rule and to reign. The authority of the King, in the case of King Jesus, to save all who come to him by faith.

I want to close with some basic thoughts to remember as we see the term “kingdom” in Matthew. You’ll see them as fill-in-the-blanks in your outline.

The Kingdom of God/Heaven...

…is the reign of the King.

Remember, while God’s kingdom extends to places and people, it is primarily God’s rulership, his authority, his kingship. Jesus is that king, which is why the author of Hebrews quotes Psalm 45 about Jesus and says, “your throne, O God, is forever and ever!”

… is both already and not yet.

In Matthew we will see plenty of references to future aspects of the kingship of Jesus, and we don’t experience the fulness of that now. But more than that, jesus speaks about His kingdom being present, actual, here and now. If his authority and reign are real now, it calls us to action! First to repentance and faith, and then to obedience. In fact, all of the sermon on the mount, really, is a treatise on what life looks like in light of the kingship of Jesus.

Right now the authority of God is seen mostly in his people, but the book of Revelation tells us that One day, the “kingdoms of the world will become the kingdom of our God and of Christ. That is, one day there will be no lesser “kingships.” No earthly kingdoms to be divided and ruled by men - the authority both real and experienced will be Christ’s alone.

… is most visible in the words and works of Jesus.

If Jesus is king, then his kingship or kingdom is most visible in what he says and what he does. How did he close his walk of earthly life? He told his followers, “all authority in heaven and on earth is given to me. Go, therefore, and teach all nations.”

The kingdom of god is clear and visible in the life and light of Jesus Christ. We often talk about building that kingdom, living for the kingdom, seeking the kingdom - we do all these things inasumuch as we reflect Jesus life and Jesus teaching. We don’t need to reinvent Jesus’ reign - His is King forever! May we reflect his kingship to a world that is walking in darkness. That is, after all, the big picture for us.

Our eyes have been opened - darkness has turned to light - chaos has turned to order, because of the King.