The King’s Authority

Roger McCort – April 10, 2022 – For Grass Valley Corps ONLINE

Transcript

We are working through the Book of Matthew and we are in Matthew starting at Chapter 8 today.

So if you've got a Bible handy, grab it.

Look to Matthew Chapter 8, start at verse 23. It's talking about Jesus, and it says when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him, and behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being covered with the waves. But Jesus himself was asleep.

And they came to him and woke him, saying, save us, Lord, we’re perishing!

And he said to them, why are you afraid you, men of little faith?

Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the sea, and it became perfectly calm.

And the men were amazed and said, what kind of man is this that even the winds and the sea obey him?

Uh, for those of you trying to follow along, you might notice your words could be a little bit different.

I'm using the new American Standard Bible today, which is a fairly literal translation in the word for word sense.

This is a great place to start a story about Jesus in Matthew.

Remember he's telling a story about the Jesus that he knew and believed in.

He thought Jesus was this wonderful person, this Messiah, this long-awaited savior of the people of Israel and he also believed that Jesus was, in some miraculous, amazing, understandable form, actually God in flesh and he was trying to make sure that everyone was aware of the reasons he believed these things to be true and we are actually starting here at verse 23. We're looking at the middle section of three sets of three miracles each that Matthew has described because he wanted to get lots of evidence out there.

So he he did things in sets of three.

And then he did three sets of three, just to kind of make sure that everyone got the point now.

This story has Jesus doing something. Uh, first he's sleeping during a storm?

Yeah, gotta remember who Jesus, his main followers, were at this time and what he was doing in this boat.

So they'd been in Capernaum, where they had just been doing miracles.

And people have been crowding in because of the healings that Jesus had been doing.

And they really, really wanted to.

See that or be part of that experience and they became so many people and it became all about the healings, but Jesus was always about the teaching and so.

He said that he was his key disciples.

The main people following him look, we're going to go.

Away right?

So they got into this boat.

And take off across the Sea of Galilee.

Now where did he find a boat?

Remember, a number of his followers were fishermen, and this, Capernaum, it's a fishing village.

It is very fishing oriented in most of its economy, and so finding a boat.

Wasn't difficult, in fact, Peter and Andrew also lived in this village and they were were.

Fisherman in their previous life before Jesus called them, they started following him.

So it wouldn't have been difficult to get a boat and they've head out across the sea.

These are experienced sailors, but the Sea of Galilee is known for its tempestuous squalls, things that would blow up and they would terrify even the most experienced of sailor because it was so easy to capsize these small and mid sized boats.

And as they are out there, fighting for their lives in the midst of this storm, trying to make sure their boat stays afloat, Jesus is like curled up taking a nap.

I I love that.

Hey, when tough times come, Jesus says take a nap apparently.

And the people who are with him are panicking and they're.

Like we're gonna die Lord, please wake up you've got to save us.

And he's like, what is it now?

You have so little faith.

And he stands up and he just says to the winds and the wave.

According to one of the other disciples who told the same story, all he says is.

Be still.

And it switches like a light switch from Amazing Storm that is threatening everyone life to glassy stillness, calm skies.

I mean, even if the rain and wind had just turned off, that would have been enough.

For me, but to to.

Completely calm a storm.

To see the waves go from sloshing back and forth and coming over the top of the vessel.

To just being.

Glassy still that would have freaked me out.

And it freaked out his followers and says they were amazed that that's kind of a friendly American translation to say that they were amazed what kind of man is this that even the winds and the sea obey him.

Well, there's an interesting question.

How many people?

How many human beings do you know who can get the winds?

And the sea to obey them.

Yeah, I spent most of this last week out in in Seattle up on the northwest coast of the United States here and looking out over Puget Sound and in a ferry boat.

And there are waves that go by and some were small and somewhere large and not a single one did what I asked it to.

There were a couple of times I'm like OK hold off waves hold off.

I'm trying to get a picture of this thing on the shoreline.

This tide pool, but no the waves came in and washed over it.

Even though I didn't want them to.

And then there was another time when I'm like OK, I want to take pictures of the waves.

Let's get some big ones crashing and crashing and not a single wave came and made a big splash so I didn't get any.

Great wave pictures.

Because the winds and the waves do not obey me.

They obeyed Jesus.

That's the point Matthew is trying to make with this story.

There's a lot of other things we can pull out of here that are important about faith and about being a disciple and about when and we when we should worry and when we shouldn't worry.

But you know what Matthew is trying to tell us something about Jesus here.

What kind of man is this that even the winds and the sea obey him?

Let's go forward in this story.

And let's see how these this is, the first.

Example like I said, there's three examples we're going to see how they line up.

Here's the second one.

Starts at verse 28.

When they came to the other side into the country of the guardians.

I'm sorry, I've just said the wrong word.

Then the country of the gadarenes.

Two men who were demon possessed met him as they were coming out of the tombs.

They were so extremely violent that no one could pass by that way.

Now let me when we talk about the place that I said the wrong name for the gather.

Means the country of the gathering.

So this is like on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, from where they had been.

So they kind of sailed short distance across the lake through the storm through the column they get over to the other side and the area that they've just gone to is kind of a mixed Jewish and Greek.

Population it's outside of Israel, but it is kind of connected in territory.

The Romans sort of treated the whole area is the same.

This is sort of the area of what would have been called the 10 towns or decapolis.

For those of you who have a fixation on ancient geography, which is probably just me, I'm sorry I don't know why I get bogged down in the maps sometimes, but I think it's interesting they've actually left Israel so they're outside of Israel.

And when they get there, these two men.

Who are possessed by demons? Meet him. They're so violent, no one could pass by that way it says 1st 29.

They cried out, saying, what business do we have with each other son of God?

Have you come here to torment us before the time?

Now there was a herd of many swine feeding a distance from them, and the demons began to entreat him, saying, if you're going to cast us out, send us into the herd of swine.

And he said to them, go and they came out, and they went into the swine.

And the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and perished in the waters and the herdsmen.

Ran away and went to the city and reported everything including what had happened to the demoniacs and behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus.

And when they saw him, they implored him to leave their region.

Oh alright, so there's a ton of stuff going on here too, but we're going.

To try to focus on Matthew's part.

There is a great telling of this story in Luke's gospel. If you really want to read and learn about the demon possessed and all the casting out and the discussion, this is where the whole thing about I am legion. That's all comes in here, but that is not the story Matthew is interested in.

Matthew is interested in what's happening, what Jesus does, and why he does it, and remember he's trying.

To make a point.

And it relates to the story that he just told about.

Of Jesus having control over nature.

So here we're showing Jesus as having control over the supernatural zero.

The idea that people are possessed by demons.

I recognize that a lot of modern folks have difficulty thinking that there might be supernatural external forces that impact us.

In the 1st century world view, there was a distinct difference between someone who was possessed versus someone who had an illness and they recognized differences between epilepsy and seizures, and people who had hallucinations.

And then they also recognized.

This area that they referred to as demon possession.

Now what you decide to do with that, I'm going to just leave there, but whatever it was that had possessed these men.

Whatever demons they were plagued by that had driven them out from society that had kept them in a position where they were violently attacking passersby, where they were the the terror of the neighborhood, because no one could control them.

Whatever it was, that is what Jesus.

Gets rid of and here it says the demon said send us into the pigs instead of.

Well, it doesn't give us and instead here it just says if you're going to cast us out, send us into that herd of swine.

In Luke's story.

The demons make it clear that they believe he's about to cast them into the abyss.

Now there's a whole set of Jewish mythology that ties into this, that I we're not going to go into today in any depth.

But let me let me give you this little piece.

The at the end times there was a belief that.

The end time.

Times God would send all of the rebellious spirits, all the demons, all of the evil focused entities, natural and supernatural, that he would send them all into this bottomless pit.

You know, freefall forever Into Darkness kind of thing.

Cast into space thrown into the Phantom Zone.

Whatever you want to describe it as that's what people believed was going to happen in the end time.

So to have demons say please don't cast us into the abyss, send us into those pigs instead.

It's like saying.

We want to be.

We, uh, not put into our final judgment just yet, so.

That's what you should be picturing here.

Have you come to torment us before the time that's what they're talking about when they say that are you come to send us to the abyss before it is time for final judgment?

No no, please cast us into those pigs instead.

So Jesus says, alright, fine, go into the pigs.

And they go into the pigs and the whole herd rushes down and throws itself into the sea and drowns.

Now for a 1st century person hearing of this kind of story, that would be terrifying because they believed that the C.

B At a Lake B at the ocean.

Whatever the C was representative of the chaos that existed before Creation.

So if you drowned, the thought was that your soul, your spirit, would be trapped underwater for eternity.

And when you get to like the Book of Revelation, if we're studying the Book of Revelation, we'd come across these things where they talk about death and the sea, like there are two separate places for souls to be held, and that's because of the way that people believed in those days, all right.

So what is the point that Matthew is trying to make by telling a story?

Like this well?

It's certainly not that people are going to respond to everything Jesus does by loving him because what happens here at the end of verse 34, the whole city came out to meet Jesus and when they saw him they said, could you please leave, could you?

Could you get out of here?

We're kind of freaked out by what you've just done.

And by the way, you've just.

Destroyed all of our.

Pigs or caused them to be destroyed?

Now, pig farming wasn't supposed to be happening inside of Israel again.

We're outside of Israel.

But there's a mixed Jewish and non Jewish population over here, so there's people who are doing things that, according to their customs and traditions and the Covenant of Moses, they weren't supposed to be doing, which is.

Making bacon so.

By the way, thank you God for bacon and the fact that I live in a culture where I can eat it all right.

I don't know if that's appropriate or not, but anyway.

What is Jesus able to do here that relates to that first story?

Well, in the first story in the Storm, Jesus has demonstrated that he has authority over nature.

Well in this.

Story Jesus has demonstrated he has authority over the supernatural.

So first authority over the natural second authority over the supernatural.

What people have that kind of power?

None of us who has that power.

What is Matthew trying to tell us?

He's trying to make this connection to hey, I believe Jesus is God and This is why I believe it.

First he demonstrated miraculous power over the natural.

Then he demonstrated miraculous power over the supernatural.

And then there's more.

Let's get to the more Chapter 9.

Remember the chapters and verses got added in later, and so people broke the story in places that it probably shouldn't have been broken sometimes.

And this is one of those spots because First Jesus got into the boat, then he sailed across, got out of the boat.

Did some stuff over there and look at verse 9 or Chapter 9 verse one.

Getting into a boat.

Jesus crossed over the sea and came to his own city, so he's gone over there.

He's done the thing with the demons and the pigs and now he's coming back home.

O crossed over the sea, came back to his own city, so he's back in Capernaum, verse 2.

And they brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed, and seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, take courage, son, your sins are forgiven.

And some of the scribes said to themselves, this fellow blasphemes in Jesus, knowing their thoughts.

Said to them.

Why are you thinking evil in your hearts?

Which is easier to say?

Your sins are forgiven or to say get up and walk.

Well, so that you may know that the son of man has authority on Earth to forgive sins.

Then he said to the paralytic, get up, pick up your bed and go home.

And he got up and he went home.

But when the crowds saw this, they were awestruck and glorified God, who had given such authority to men.

So what's happening here?

A lot of people get hung up on the fact that Jesus healed the paralyzed guy, but that is not at all what Matthew is trying to get us to see here.

That is not at all what Jesus did that was important here, by the way.

They brought him a paralytic, lying on a bed.

So this poor guy, he's been paralyzed.

He was on a mat.

They carried him.

If you read this story like in the Book of Mark, you'll see that they in order to get this guy to Jesus, they actually dug a hole in the roof of the house that he was staying at, which was made out of mud and sticks.

And they they.

Ripped open the roof and they lowered the guy down on his mat because there were so many people around Jesus they couldn't get to him any other way and Jesus saw all the effort they were going through to get their friends to him and he looked at that man and he said your sins are forgiven.

Who can forgive sins?

Only God can forgive sins.

This is what Matthew is trying to get us to see.

And Jesus, knowing that this is ridic, mean that look what people the soonest he said.

Your sins are forgiven.

Look what they said.

Said to themselves, this fellow blasphemes, because only God can forgive sins.

If you are a person who says, I forgive your sins, well, it.

There's this.

Ancient Jewish idea.

This practice that existed at the time you could forgive the sin of another person against you, but you can't forgive them for sitting against someone else.

You can't forgive them for sinning against God.

You can't forgive them for anything except what they have done directly.

To you, Jesus may very well have been saying, I forgive you this in for tearing a hole in this roof to get to.

Me if it was his house.

But that's not what he's saying when he says your sins are forgiven, he's saying all of them.

He's not talking about just one little thing.

He's not talking about any one little thing, and quite frankly, at this point, your sins are forgiven when Jesus has forgiven his sins.

This guys.

He's healed, he's fixed.

That's it.

That's what he needed right there.

He's still paralyzed, but he is healed.

Did do you follow?

The scribes the.

These are the teachers of the law, the the the Sadducees often.

Recognize that he has just offered blanket forgiveness and they're like, whoa, whoa, only God can do that.

How dare you even say something like that?

And Jesus says.

What's easier is it easier for me to say your sins are forgiven, or for is it easier for me to say, get up and walk?

Well, you know what if in order to prove that I can do the.

One I have to do, the other let me do the other so that you will see so that you will know that I can do the thing that I just did so that you will know that I can forgive sins.

Let me heal this man's paralysis and he says get up. Pick up your bed and go home and the guy gets up, picks up his bed and goes home.

And when the crowds saw this, they were awestruck.

Because what just happened and it's not the healing that is caught them out.

It is the forgiveness.

Forgiveness of sins throws us all for a loop.

And look at the response of the people.

They're awestruck.

The message goes out.

In verse nine, it says as Jesus went on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting in a tax collectors booth and he said to him, follow me and he got up and he followed him.

And then it happened that, as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, Matthews House, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and his disciples.

And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, why is your teacher eating with tax collectors and sinners?

But when Jesus heard this, he said.

It's not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.

But go and learn what this means.

I desire compassion and not sacrifice, for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.

Now Jesus is quoting.

When he says I desire.

Compassion or mercy.

And and not sacrifice or another translation says I desire mercy more than sacrifice.

He's quoting from the Old Testament from things God has said.

That's one of the amazing things about Jesus is 95% of the stuff he said isn't original. He's just quoting God from the Old Testament. He's essentially quoting himself is the point Matthew is trying to make.

So we're told because I'm connecting all of this to one.

This one story here Jesus says.

Your sins are forgiven and then.

He spends his time with people who need their sins forgiven.

Says I'm not here to fix the righteous 'cause you're already righteous.

You don't need anymore, and the Pharisees they were again they were.

This group of people who tried to live the holiest lives they could in order to bring God.

Had to them because it was their belief that if everyone lived a holy life then God would bring the end times and that would be when God could be reconciled on Earth with humans and and that's what what we're all looking forward to this whole end times thing.

You know whether you believe we're going to a garden or the gardens coming to us.

We are looking to be back with God the way we were at the beginning of creation.

That's the hope.

Why are you eating with tax collectors and sinners?

Jesus, it's not those who are healthy who need a physician.

It's those who are sick.

And then he reminds them of this thing.

God has said I desire mercy more than sacrifice God wants.

To forgive people and have them go on the right path, none of us can fix anything that's happened before.

All we can do is live our lives from this point forward.

And that's what God wants us to do.

He wants us to say alright from this point forward, I.

Am going to do the best I can.

To live the life that you created me to live, it's not about I need to be a different person or I need to be a better person sometimes.

Maybe you do need to be a better person, sometimes you don't.

What you need to do is say God built us to live in community as a family all together.

How do I do that?

What is the best thing I can do to do that?

Well, how do I listen to the things that God has taught over?

The centuries to.

Lead me into this community.

This family so that I can be.

Part of his

So that can be part of this.

Royal family Jesus told us we could all be in.

So Jesus says this thing about I desire compassion, not sacrifice, and then Matthew clumps in one one last piece to tie into this story about Jesus authority.

It starts in verse 14, says the disciples of John came to him, asking.

Why do we and the Pharisees fat?

But your disciples do not fast.

Jesus said to them, the attendants of the bridegroom cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they?

But the days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them.

And then they will fast, but no one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch pulls away from the garment, and a worse tear results.

Nor do people put new wine in old wineskins, otherwise the wineskins burst and the wine pours out, and the wineskins are ruined, but they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.

There's again, there's a ton of stuff in here, but I want to focus just on the thing.

That Matthew is trying to convey.

Matthew is trying to convey.

A authority in these three miracles, there's a a natural.

A experience where Jesus demonstrates he controls nature, the wind, the waves, the storm.

There is a supernatural experience where he demonstrates he controls these unseen forces, the supernatural, the unexplainable at the time and probably now unexplainable things that happen beneath the surface.

And he's demonstrating he has the authority of God.

To reach out.

And to forgive even things that people saw as unforgivable.

And this story that he tells about fasting.

About a bridegroom.

He's essentially saying, look, you don't go to a wedding celebration and then starve yourselves and cry.

You go to a wedding celebration to eat cake and celebrate this joyful occasion so you know eventually bridegroom leaves, and then you can go ahead and have a bad day.

But for this moment.

You want to be in love with your family.

You want to celebrate the things that they are doing in this marriage and this this wedding.

And this thing about patches on.

Old garments and wine, and wineskins.

Is essentially saying look you can't take the old thing.

And slap the new on it that you have to think in new terms.

If you put wine in a wineskin and it's part of the fermentation process, it stretches that.

So if you put new wine into an old wineskin, it's going to blow it up, because it's already been stretched.

It's already had that that.

Pressure put on it and it won't work.

If you put a patch of unshrunk cloth.

Off on an old garment, so you've got you know this favorite shirt you've worn forever and it's got a hole in it and you're going to put a little patch on it where you get this new piece of fabric and you slap it in there.

And then you run it through the dryer and it shrinks and you've had it cut to just that size.

Well, it's going to shrink your garment isn't 'cause your your shirts already been run through the dryer 100 times?

This is just one more and you put that patch on it shrinks and it just rips a bigger hole because it tears away from its stitches.

You can't pour new stuff into old ways.

The ways of the Pharisees, the ways of the disciples.

Of John, they were the old ways.

And Jesus isn't saying those were bad ways.

He's saying look, you've got to stretch.

You've got to accommodate.

You need to think bigger.

I desire compassion more than sacrifice.

I desire mercy more than sacrifice.

God wants mercy.

God wants people to be forgiven and to live forward.

He wants to find ways to bring them in, not to push.

Them out.

That's Matthews point.

He wants this set of miracles to lead us to this place where we are willing to accept that Jesus because he demonstrated he has authority over the natural and authority over the supernatural and authority to forgive that we can listen when he says we need to find ways to include.

Not to exclude people, we need to find ways to bring folks into the fold, not ways to push them out.

This middle set of three miracles and all the stories that attach to those they are here so that we can recognize Jesus has authority, and it's the authority of God.

Whether you believe Jesus was God or you don't believe Jesus.

God Jesus is acting with the authority of God and Matthew is very careful at this point to say.

Look back up a couple of these verses about Jesus having the authority of God had, which has been given to men, so he's surprised that Jesus would have this authority.

People are surprised that Jesus would have this authority.

Matthew 8 verse 27. What kind of man is this that even the winds in the sea obey?

Him what he's a man.

He's fully human, and yet the winds in the sea obey him.

They don't do that for me.

What kind of man is that?

It's a God, man.

Cast out demons.

What kind of man does that?

Well, only a God man.

What kind of man could heal someone from their paralysis?

And forgive their sins. No one can do that except God, God's authority through Jesus says that this is.

Someone Jesus is someone who has this power and what power is it?

It's the power to start everything over.

You can start everything over from this very moment.

All you need to do is say God.

Jesus, I accept that you have the authority to forgive me.

Can we say that I am forgiven and move on and.

Go from here.

Yes, we can, and that is all that Matthew is trying to say here and that is all Jesus asks of any one of us.

Can we just say God?

I haven't always got it right.

I want to go forward.

Help me.

Yeah, that's it.

In fact that is.

It let's close on a word of prayer, God.

Hey, I haven't always got it right.

Please forgive me and help me to move forward.

Help everyone who's hearing this.

Everyone who can be part of this help us to understand that your authority given through Christ is all that we need to hold onto to claim that.

Forgiveness and to move forward from this.

Lord, I ask that you would please guide us into a better future.

Help us learn to be the people that you created us to be rather than staying stuck in the misery of our past in the paralysis of old ways.

Help us to embrace the new.

And to look for new ways to bring people in and to be.

Inclusive in our spirits, for those who would seek you and seek ways to follow you, just help us please Lord, to stop pushing people away and to find ways to seek peace in our relationships and peace in our families and to grow our families to include.

All of those around us who are willing to say, Lord, let's go forward from here.

Pray all this in the name of your son Jesus.

Amen hey, thanks for joining me in the car here.

Grace and peace to you all this week.

Wherever you go, remember, God is already there.

So you have nothing to fear.

Go with God.