Life Project Blog

Matthew 21:23-27

It is day 2 in Jerusalem. Jesus arrives at the Temple in the morning, and the Jewish leaders are waiting for Him; they are ready to challenge Him. What they probably didn’t understand, was that they were playing the wrong parts, for as the religious leaders of the chosen people of God, they should be rolling out the red carpet for their Messiah, but instead of doing that, they are playing to role of Satan’s stooges, Satan’s shills, giving a voice to his challenge of the Son of God. Maybe it’s just me, but I find that what Matthew has revealed about their thinking here, is fascinating; it speaks volumes…

The Jewish leadership had adopted a political strategy!

Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. “By what authority are you doing these things?” they asked. “And who gave you this authority?” (21:23)

When a politician has a ticklish problem, he will respond to it directly… by changing the subject. This strategy actually has a name: “controlling the narrative”. Thus, instead of speaking to the messianic identity that Jesus so clearly assumed the day before, they ask Him who authorized His actions. If Jesus answers their question, then they will have the upper hand in what follows; an allegation of wrongdoing.

But Jesus doesn’t take the bait:

Jesus replied, “I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?” (21:24-25a)

This is Jesus’ counter move, and with it, He threw their maneuver right back in their faces. Their sidebar is nothing less than fascinating:

They discussed it among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask, ‘Then why didn’t you believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin’—we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet.” (21:25b-26)

If you doubted me in my application of politics in this discussion, you really need to change your mind at this point, for any novice can see the politics in this thinking. The leaders have found themselves in a lose – lose position, so they do the honorable thing they lie.

So they answered Jesus, “We don’t know.” (21:27a)

Jesus has just won their first round:

Then he said, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things. (21:27b)

Even so, Jesus isn’t finished talking on this subject, and seizing the initiative, He will tell them three parables (21:28-22:14) in which He will assert His authority indirectly. We will be looking at the three parables one at a time, but as we do so, I hope you will remember the setting and context of what has just happened, for it is only by doing so that you will see the full picture of what is happening in this incredible scene, see you then!

Matthew 21:18-22

As I mentioned a couple posts back, Jesus would make three moves that declare His Messianic identity upon His arrival at Jerusalem; the first two were public, His triumphal entry, and His clearing of the Temple. Now we come to the third, His private demonstration to the disciples who, it would seem, missed the point just as much as the Jewish leaders did.

Early in the morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered. (21:18-19)

Make no mistake, Jesus wasn’t having a temper tantrum because there was no fruit on the tree; His actions were quite illustrative of the situation they were in. He, the son of David, the Messiah had entered the Holy City of Jerusalem on the previous afternoon, headed directly to the Temple, the very dwelling place of God and the symbol of God in the midst of His people, and He had found only corruption and vice. Israel, as represented by its capitol looked healthy and productive from the outside, but the inside was rotten to the core.

The fig tree looked good, and it should have had fruit, but upon closer inspection, it was barren; Jesus pronounced judgment on that tree for its lack of fruit, and it withered and died. This action is prophetic, for like His actions in the Temple on the previous day, it was an illustration of what was in Jerusalem’s future: God’s judgment.

It would seem from their reaction in verse 20 that the disciples didn’t see the prophetic aspect of this, at least not at first, and as we probably would have been in their place, they were amazed at how Jesus said the words, and the tree had withered right before their eyes. I must admit that would be something to see. Jesus responds to their amazement by speaking to them of faith, a commodity they would need quite a bit of in the very near future:

Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.” (21:21-22)

If you’ve been following along in our journey through Matthew, you will recall that this is not the first time Jesus has spoken to them in this way about their faith. In the days ahead, the disciples will need to have faith, for they will find themselves in a position where they will need to depend mightily on God; thus He reminds them that in doing so, nothing will be withheld from them. The obvious contrast is the Jewish religious leaders, who rely entirely upon their own abilities and self righteousness, even to point of having their long-awaited Messiah nailed to a cross, thus sealing their doom.

In the next scene, the indignation of the Jewish leaders finds its voice; see you then!

Matthew 21:12-17

For the Jews, the Temple in Jerusalem was the center of everything Jewish, the very center of the Jewish people and Nation. It was the embodiment (if I can use that term for a building) of their very identities as a people; it was their pride, it was their joy, and it was their hope for a better day. Yet the real significance of the Temple ran far deeper than all of that, for its true significance was entirely apocalyptic in nature.

The Temple in Jerusalem was the symbol of God dwelling in the midst of His people, the symbol of their exalted status as God’s chosen; God’s elect. There, in the Most Holy Place, dwelt the Spirit of God Himself on the earth; in the heart of Israel’s capitol city. It was a place of gathering in community, a place of teaching and instruction, a place of worship and prayer, and it was also a place of atonement; it was by any definition a sacred place.

When Jesus entered the city on that donkey colt as the son of David, He went directly to the Temple, and He did so in a manner that asserted His authority as king and Messiah, as one who is greater than the Temple itself (12:6). His actions there demonstrated prophetically what the Temple had become, and in doing so, Jesus went to very heart of the corruption of Israel, for they had perverted the very blessing that set them apart from everyone else, and that blessing was their relationship with God. In His actions on that fateful afternoon, Jesus told an active parable about what would be the fate of the Temple, for it would be utterly destroyed. Later in chapter 24, Jesus would speak to His disciples prophetically about this destruction. But on this day, Jesus, by His actions, would deliver a stinging indictment of the entire ideology that had developed within the teachings of the Jewish religious leaders concerning the Temple.

As a result, they question His identity (21:10), and His authority (21:23); they were indignant (21:15). Later in the drama, Jesus’ predictions concerning the Temple’s destruction are levied against Him at His trial (26:61) and hurled at His in the form of taunts at His crucifixion (27:40). Yes sir, the Messiah was on the scene, and He has brought to them a message that says serious house cleaning is needed, and in so doing, He has “let loose the dogs of (spiritual) war”!

Game on.

Matthew 21:1-11

Jesus makes the first move in the rising conflict, actually He makes three moves, two of which are in public, and one in private. All three moves have something in common; He is answering the question “Who do you say that I am?” His identity as the son of David comes to the fore first here and in the next section, as though He were saying to Jerusalem, “Here I am, the son of David, Messiah!”

The people seem to be delighted, at least those who were present, yet there is an undertone, a very dark undertone. What we have in this entire section is the outward and physical manifestation of the ultimate spiritual conflict, for the thing we need to recognize is this: Jesus’ actions here are the first shots in a war, a showdown with eternity itself as the prize for the victor.

In this passage, Jesus gives instructions to the disciples to obtain the donkey on which He would enter the city, and as was his custom, Matthew ties that into Israel’s prophetic history (21:4-5). As I have mentioned in other posts here, in the ancient near east, a king arriving in peace rode a donkey, a king arriving to conquer rode a war horse. Jesus, the Prince of Peace, comes to town on a donkey, for the battle He was fighting was not a clash of arms between battalions of mortal men, but a spiritual battle between good and evil in the hearts of men; make no mistake, Jesus knew exactly who the real Enemy was.

Along His path, He was greeted by the crowds as a king would be greeted as He arrived in the city in peace. In the eyes of the crowds, He was the new Davidic King come to claim His throne and overturn the Roman occupation with the power of God, restoring Israel to its rightful place among the Nations of the earth. In the eyes of the Jewish religious authorities, He was trouble. Yet in the eyes of Satan, this was what he had been waiting for, in both dread and anticipation. Dread because Jesus could utterly destroy him, anticipation because if he could manipulate the Jewish authorities, already in a state of rebellion against God and hardness of heart, he could destroy Jesus by an assault upon His body, killing Him before He could destroy the Devil, and thus our drama, the greatest drama of all time begins.

In the next post, we will see Jesus make His second move, in which He takes His Davidic identity a step further− see you then!

Matthew 21-25

With the end of chapter 20, we have concluded the section that spans from 16:21-20:34 in which Jesus tries to reveal His true messianic mission to the disciples. With the end of the section, we have come to realize that they had not yet understood adequately what He was teaching, although the time would soon come when they would understand it. Now, in this new section, we will see the rising conflict between Jesus and Jewish officialdom that will ultimately result in all of Jesus’ predictions concerning His fate to come to pass.

As He arrives in the city, Jesus begins a series of provocative actions (cf. 21:12, 14-15, 23; 24:1) in the area of the Temple which result in the “chief priests and teachers of the law” becoming “indignant” (21:15). There has been conflict before, but with the conflict over His “authority” (21:24-27) followed by three parables that expose their rebellion and hardness of heart, they resolve to silence Him for good (21:45).

The initial strategy of the leaders was a purely political one; they would try to bring public condemnation upon Jesus by forcing Him to take unpopular stands on controversial issues of the day, just as politicians try to do with their opponents in our time (cf. 21:46; 22:15-48). As all of them would discover, you simply cannot “trap” Jesus, and by the time He has finished with their attacks, they are reduced to plotting in secret.

From the very beginning of this narrative, the battle will rage over the leaders’ response to the demonstration of Jesus’ messianic credentials (21:1-17), and His authoritative teaching and affirmations concerning His identity that follow (21:23-22:46). The refusal of the Jewish leaders to recognize His identity results in Jesus seizing the initiative and denouncing the hypocrisy of the Pharisees (23:1-39), and pronouncing apocalyptic doom on the city (24:1-34) and finally, giving exhortation to the people of the New Kingdom (24:36-25:46).

We will jump into the fray with Jesus when we get together next time; you won’t want to miss this!

As Jesus and his disciples were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed him. Two blind men were sitting by the roadside, and when they heard that Jesus was going by, they shouted, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”

The crowd rebuked them and told them to be quiet, but they shouted all the louder, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”

Jesus stopped and called them. “What do you want me to do for you?” he asked.

“Lord,” they answered, “we want our sight.”

Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.

Matthew 20:29-34

The old Roman road, which was almost certainly the route Jesus took from Jericho to Jerusalem, would have been a tough climb for anyone going up to Jerusalem as it winds its way through a steep canyon, climbing several thousand feet in elevation as it goes. I’ve been up that road in a bus, and I can tell you that many on the bus were afraid as we crept along, many looked away from their windows; even our driver who had taken this route many times before was visibly nervous. As for me, being a little crazy as I am, I moved up to the front of the bus and sat on the step next to the driver for a better view; there are points along the way where the road is so narrow, and turns are so sharp that it appeared as though the front of the bus was protruding out over the edge of the cliff (with a direct drop of several hundred feet) as we slowly negotiated hairpin turns. Oh did I have fun on that trip!

As much fun as I had in a bus that day, I wouldn’t really want to hike up that road, even though the scenery is spectacular, for that would be a hard climb for anyone: This is the setting in which our story takes place. Jesus, the disciples and a large crowd are heading up into the mountains from one of the lowest points on earth, interesting to keep this in mind.

Right away, we have a contrast between the crowd, the blind men and Jesus; the crowd treats the blind men like outcasts, and by the standards of the times, they were outcasts since the prevailing thinking of that time would have been that they must have been serious sinners for God to have made them blind. Thus, the crowd rebukes them for trying to approach Jesus, but Jesus takes compassion on them. The contrast here is greater than just the crowd’s attitude as opposed to Jesus’ attitude, for there is also a distinction between the blind men’s attitude toward Jesus, and the way the crowd viewed Him, for the crowd was excited by the sight of the son of David going up to Jerusalem, for like so many others, they were expecting Him to restore old Israel and destroy the Roman occupation, while the blind men saw Jesus and His ability to give them sight so they might see His truth. Thus, we have two entirely different views of Jesus’ Messianic mission in Jerusalem, views that will come into sharp and definite conflict in the next section starting in chapter 21.

Jesus gives sight to these two, and as the scene closes, what is their response to this? They followed Him, and when we receive our sight, what do we do? We follow Him: “He, who has ears, let him hear; he who has sight let him see.”

As we will shortly discover, when Jesus arrives in Jerusalem, He will encounter many who have ears but do not hear, and many who have sight, but do not see.

Matthew 20:20-28

Jesus took the disciples aside on the road to Jerusalem to tell them in very explicit terms what would happen when they arrived in the city, and before we could hear their reaction, the mother of James and John, the sons of Zebedee, comes up to plead for her sons’ position around the glorious throne of Jesus in “your kingdom”.

Can you believe her timing?!

In the last post I mentioned the contrast between the earlier discussion of the disciples’ rewards in the Kingdom, and the real mission of Jesus in Jerusalem; immediately this woman interrupts the conversation for this. It is simply too much, that is unless we remember what is going on in this section, in which the dialogue in every scene is for the instruction of the disciples concerning the real messianic mission of Jesus. No, the messianic purpose of Jesus was not to re-establish the glory days of old Israel as an earthly Nation, nor is it the purpose of God to do so in the future, for the Kingdom of heaven is not of this world.

Jesus makes this clear in His answer, telling the woman that she doesn’t know what she is asking. Then He counters with a question to the disciples, asking if they can “drink the cup I am going to drink.”  Naturally, thinking that their position in the new Israel is on the line, they say they can. I must say that I wonder if they were even listening to what Jesus was telling them before the interruption. Jesus tells them that they will indeed drink from His cup, and that drinking of it won’t determine their position at His table, for His Father would make the seating chart.

Hearing this, they were indignant, for even now they seem to have been clueless about His real mission. It was at this point that the crux of His teaching comes to the fore; it would do us well to pay attention too:

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (20:25-28)

Notice how Jesus taught them, using the Gentiles as the example to show them what they were looking like at this juncture, demanding to have high positions. The Kingdom of heaven is not of this world, and thus, the way to be great in the Kingdom of heaven is not a worldly journey, but a journey of service and putting others first, which is the exact opposite of what is considered great in this world. Jesus’ mission as Messiah was not to be hailed as a conquering hero, as it would be in this world for a great King, for He had come to be humiliated and tortured for the sake of all humanity; such was the degree to which His service would go in the service not only of Mankind, but of His Father. Implicit within these verses is something Jesus would say elsewhere, that the servant is not greater than the Master, and if the Master is Himself a servant, then so shall His disciples be servants. Sadly, not everyone who considers himself as a Christ follower today has learned this lesson, for if we are to follow Christ, we are to be servants, and if we are to be leaders in the congregation of followers of Christ, then we are to be the servants of all.