Study of Matthew |
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Matthew Chapter 12
Jesus represented the spirit of the law rather than the letter. He teaches first of all that He is greater than the temple. He is founder of the temple. The law is all about Jesus for He came to fulfill the legal requirements of the law which condemned the sinner to eternal death. What is better, that the poor starve to death and famish from hunger or that he pick a few ears of corn and eat. If the law is studied carefully it does make provision for someone that is hungry; especially if they are poor. It's one thing to have no respect for God's law, have no respect for the Sabbath day nor regard for worshipping God, but it's quite another to nit pick at seeing a blind man healed on the Sabbath day or the hungry fed. Jesus came to save people from the condemnation of the law; not condemn them. He wanted to set the captives free and help people. Yet Jesus would speak out against things that were wrong. We must accept the kindness of Jesus but also His warnings. Setting free those that were bound seemed more important to Him than strict observance of observing days, yet there are places where He tells people that are recipients of his healing, to go and sin no more. That is where study is needed to find out what sin really is that Jesus refers to.
Sometimes our religious sacrifices can be done as routine, as a show or just a sense of duty rather than from the depths of our heart. Remember the story of Cain and Abel. Both brought an offering to God but one was rejected. Mercy is something we can't make a religion out of. It is not a ritual, a show or entertainment. Mercy forgives sin, seeks to deliver one out of sin, out of sickness, out of poverty and bring them into a right relationship with God. Religion alone will widen the separation between God and man. The mercy of God brings them together. This is what God wants. Religion says you are not good enough, you need to keep seeking God in order to earn His favor. Mercy says God loves you and wants to accept all who believe. Yet we must not forget, part of obtaining mercy from God is repenting of sin. Sometimes we tend to leave that out so that our message of Jesus is more user friendly but "Repent the kingdom of God is at hand" is still part of the gospel. Mercy is not just forgiving sin but bringing the sinner out of sin so that he is back to a one on one relationship with God that was lost in the garden of Eden. Remember Adam use to walk with God in the evenings. That was lost when sin came into the human race.
Here we see another example given of mercy rather than sacrifice. This is another example where we see the spirit or intent of the law. Religion says to make the man wait another day until the Sabbath is over. Mercy says to make him well as soon as possible having compassion because of his inability to use his hand. God teach us mercy and to remember the poor. If a person refused to lift his sheep out of the pit on the Sabbath day, the sheep just might die or suffer bad injuries. The spirit of the law says help, save and deliver. There are always emergencies where we have to stop our regular activities and help someone.
Jesus chose not to please the religious crowd but to have compassion on the suffering. We must do the same. We must not try to please the crowds but stay true to the living word.
Never mind that He healed the sick, relieved the suffering, raised the dead and fed the hungry, this man broke their religious rules so they wanted to destroy Him.
Three reasons for this come to my mind: His time had not yet come for Him to be taken by wicked hands and crucified so He needed to avoid being taken ahead of time. Another reason is that He may not have wanted His followers to fight against those against him and forcibly make Him king of Israel. That comes at His second coming. At the first coming He was to die for sins. Those that received healing would be
sure to be attacked by unbelievers and Jesus may have thought that
at that present time, they wouldn't have been strong enough to stand
against them.
What an example for us to follow. He did not come to draw attention to His own greatness as far as Jesus the man is concerned. He did not come at least the first time to become king although He earned that right. He did not come to put on a show according to the flesh sort of like a magician or entertainer would do. His coming was holy. It was to bring fallen mankind back to God. He came to take away the sin that was destroying all of us and sending us to a destiny of no return that we call hell. He did come to make the way of salvation available to any who would believe. Even though people followed Him, He knew this was not the time to get a large crowd and start a big organization of followers. He knew that He had to leave them and they would have to depend upon the Holy Spirit to guide them. The reason we need to learn by His example is this. Our goal should be to seek first our own salvation and reconciliation to God but then to bring others to this way of salvation. We never should seek to draw followers after ourselves or build big organizations with ourselves as the head. Christ is to be the head of the church. The church or congregation is built by bringing souls to Jesus Christ. That is our mission and our goal. We are to bring souls to Jesus and then disciple them and teach them the words of Jesus. We disciple them to obey the call God may place on them that they might go and make more disciples (followers of Christ.) They are not to follow us exactly but to follow Christ. I do not believe the church was ever meant to be a big organized religion with one head and a hierarchy above the laity. There should be no such thing as a laity. We have to have godly leaders of course. People do need to be taught until they too become teachers if that is their calling but we are not to be lords over the flock and have a big separation between a clergy and a laity. Until Jesus returns the second time, we are to minister, to serve and to lead souls to the Lord. The church was never meant to run governments, force a religion we call Christianity on anyone or dominate any group of people. The church or called out believers were to spread the gospel of the kingdom which simply means to good news of being born again by the spirit when we repent of sin and believe upon the name of Jesus. Here are the words of Jesus about this:
Peter said this:
This is the way we are to conduct ourselves. Walking in love in godly submission and in truth.
Many knew from the word of the prophets that a descendent of David was to be the Messiah who would set up an everlasting kingdom and rule the world. That is why many thought Jesus was here for that purpose not realizing that the sin problem had to be dealt with first. Unless Jesus provided the final sacrifice for sins there would be no one worthy to enter into the kingdom He is coming to set up. At that moment in time the only Kingdom to be concerned with was the kingdom of God that came within those that repent of sin and believe in Jesus as savior.
If Satan cast out himself, he would not profit anything. Imagine Jesus doing good works upon people and those same people were not only saved from sin but healed of diseases, set free from Satan and on their way to eternal life. Yet people accused Him of being "of the devil." The accuser of the brethren is still at work today. We have to be careful. I hear of people that pray for the sick today that are accused of being "of the devil." I read of non Pentecostals making that accusation against those that speak in tongues. Let's be very careful. I know Jesus warns of those that do miracles in his name and still He doesn't know them. We need to take heed. The bible says that we shall know them by their fruits. Their lives need to reflect the word they preach. We do not have to follow everyone that comes along and does miracles but we must be careful not to falsely accuse them. If they preach a false doctrine, then attack the doctrine but making sure first that we are not the one that is wrong.
I've heard many explanations for the blasphemy of the Holy Ghost. However, Jesus mentions this passage just after He is accused of doing miracles by the power of Satan. So it would seem to me that blasphemy of the Spirit has to do with knowingly attributing the works of the Holy Spirit as being Satanic or of the devil. Think for a minute. The Holy Spirit is given to common man (women as well). In the Old Testament we see that the Holy Spirit was only given to a few. Usually it was a prophet or someone especially called of God. Through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, a way was made for all who would believe in Him to be saved from sin and receive the baptism with the Holy Spirit. A big price was paid to allow God's spirit to come and dwell within each and every believer on a personal one on one level. It is an individual gift and is for any who would believe. Remember that to believe in Jesus is to believe in and partake of His word and all He represents. We can't have a one time experience where we publically repeated some words and say we accept Jesus in our hearts, then go about our own business forgetting about what just occurred. He is Holy, He is God and He is the only way of salvation. To partake of Jesus is to keep His word and have His word abiding within us. It's an everyday continual life for the Lord. To help us live and walk in the word, God sent us the Holy Spirit to abide within us. Evidence of this is the fruits of the spirit; love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness faith, meekness and temperance. One will probably immediately or soon afterward speak in an unknown tongue. It is a definite sign that the Holy Spirit has come to dwell within a believer. Some may prophesy which is a define utterance by the Holy Spirit like tongues is but it is in a language that is spoken by the speaker and can be understood by those that hear. All these beautiful gifts are freely given to those that obey the Lord and believe in the word. A big price was paid by our savior to provide all those holy gifts from God. They were given though so that we might spread the gospel and live a life that reflects a true belief in Christ. The Holy Spirit was never given to exalt ourselves above someone else. We have nothing that we did not receive and we have nothing that is not available to anyone else who believes. To downplay, criticize, mock, belittle and speak evil of any gift of the Spirit of God is very dangerous. It is the gift of God. Tongues is the one that is attacked the most. Even people who believe in speaking in tongues are capable of taking that gift lightly and calling it a lesser gift. To me it is just the opposite than less. It is the one gift that any believer can receive whether or not He is in the ministry of teaching or preaching. It is for all. It is more not less. Having said that though, there are many great wonderful believers in Christ who have never spoken in tongues and we must not ever make them feel they are less than they should be. Since Paul did say, not all speak with tongues, some believe they may already have the Holy Spirit but just have never spoken with tongues. There will be other evidences, like love, joy, peace and other fruits of the Spirit. Others believe tongues are the visible sign that one has received the Holy Spirit. If one is not sure one way or another just have a purpose to keep seeking God at all times and be willing to receive all He has for us holding nothing back. Be willing to serve God in any capacity He leads us into. I use to assume that if one never spoke in tongues, they never were baptized with the Holy Spirit, but I sometimes wonder if we are right about that and how that must make them feel if we guilt people about that. There is no way we can make them receive tongues and we wouldn't want to. Yet I like the idea of God giving us reassurance and a sign that the Holy Spirit has come and tongues being present does give us that reassurance. Why some do not receive that particular gift we don't know. We are to seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit and then leave the signs up to God and just encourage one another to keep seeking God in prayer and the study of the word. Notice I said encourage not beat up and guilt people. Let us be careful of accusations against something God gives to us. The Holy Spirit is given to abide within us. There is also a place in Acts where it says that the Holy Spirit is given to all who obey Him. Let us not take this lightly. If we do not understand this, then at least keep it to ourselves and speak to God about it. Be careful to always have love and yield to the Holy Spirit. Genuine love that comes from God is one of the main things to seek along with the gifts of the Spirit.
We must be careful then how we speak. Idle words are words said without thinking, without considering the effect they will have on the listener. Foolish talking and jesting are idle words. Lying, backbiting and false accusations are idle words. God will forgive us because we all have been guilty of this at one time or another, but we need to stop and speak things that edify and build up each other in the faith. These men that spoke to Jesus were using idle words to falsely accuse Him.
Isn't it great how there is scripture to cover all we need to live godly in a fallen world.
One trait I've seen in some believers is the ability to encourage and exhort. I'm not speaking of false flattery just to make someone feel good about themselves when what is said may not even be true. God is not the author of lies and false complements. True exhortation is to encourage other believers to continue in the faith, to keep on believing and to pray along side of them when they are troubled always focusing on God being the source of their comfort and help. Constructive criticism may have a place but in this we must be careful. Criticising about trivial things is not necessary. I heard a good brother in the Lord say something once that stuck with me. He said that if we chip in and help where help is needed but look around and criticize those that did not show up to help, then we actually are robbing ourselves of the blessing of helping. If God lays something on our hearts to do, lets do it with cheerfulness and let Him take care of those that stayed home. Remember the words Jesus spoke to Peter when He was telling Peter to feed His sheep. Peter asked the Lord what the other disciple was supposed to do. Jesus said, "If I will that he tarry until I come, what is that to thee, follow thou me." In other words, we are to do what God calls us to do and let others do what God calls them to do. If God wants us to praise the Lord, let's praise Him and not worry about the person standing beside us who remains silent. Assuming someone else is not doing enough for God is not our concern. That is the kind of judging we are to avoid. There is a place for judging when it comes to open sin but assuming and imagining things are not righteous judging.
So we see the resurrection of Jesus is a definite sign to that generation and the only sign given to them as unbelievers. They didn't believe it of course or they would have been saved.
Repentance is always the key to getting right with God. We must recognize that we have sinned and need a savior. Nineveh at one time repented at the preaching of Jonah. Even though Jonah was a reluctant preacher. He did not want Nineveh to be saved. Still God used that reluctant preacher to save a whole city. Jonah pouted about it later but it shows the mercy of God in spite or our lack of mercy. In defense of Jonah we must remember that the Assyrian Kingdom was very evil. They were fierce enemies of Israel. They used torture and did horrible things to their enemies. It was perfectly understandable and natural for Jonah to feel like he did about the city of Nineveh. God however, would rather see sinners repent and be saved rather than destroy a whole city. That is why He sent Jesus to save us from sin. So if we neglect this last final way of salvation sent to us by a merciful God, then there remains no other way of salvation. Judgment has to come and the wrath of God will be poured out in the end. That is why now is the day of salvation. The door of mercy is still open but it will close one day.
The wisdom of Solomon that she wanted to hear was the part about God. Solomon lost that in the end when he allowed his wives to worship false gods but while he was still right with God the Queen of the south came to hear what he had to say about the wisdom that came from God. That was a preview of what the people who sat at the feet of Jesus must have heard. Awesome.
That is a scary thought. The generation that saw Christ in person and heard His voice in their streets, yet rejected Him, is the same as a person who had unclean spirits cast out yet does not receive God's spirit but remains empty and then allows those evil spirits to return and occupy him again. His last state is worse than the first one. So we can't just come to an altar of prayer and be forgiven of sins, we must receive Jesus Christ into our lives and be born again or changed by the Spirit of God. This also may describe a backslider who returns to the sin that Jesus saved him from. If we does not continue in Christ and walk in obedience to the word, he is in danger of being in a worse condition than he was before he met the Lord. More is required of him because he knows to do good and does it not. Mostly this is a warning against that nation to whom God first brought the gospel; that if they reject the only way of salvation, they will be worse off after that rejection than they were before Jesus came. This too is another explanation for blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. If they reject the only way of salvation when the Holy Spirit continues to call them, and they die without receiving the message of the gospel, there is no other way to be saved and they can never be forgiven if they die in that state.
I never hear this part spoken of too much but if we believe in Jesus and do the will of our Heavenly Father, we become the same to Jesus as His own mother, sister and brothers. This proves a lot. Even though Mary was considered blessed of God to have been chosen to bear the child that was to save the world from sin, she is not exalted above any other believer. She definitely is not to be worshipped. We definitely are not to make an image of her to worship. Mary worship is not scriptural. This scripture also proves that Jesus had natural brothers and maybe sisters that Mary and Joseph had after the birth of Jesus. Remember they were ordinary folks. There is nothing in scripture that says Mary and Joseph did not have a normal married life after the birth of Jesus. Of course they had other children. This scripture proves it. Why they tried to make Mary into an
icon to worship is beyond my understanding. At the time the Roman
church mixed with the pagan worshippers, it could be that they mixed
Mary with some pagan goddess and go into Mary worship just changing
the name of the pagan goddess that was previously worshipped by the
Romans or former Babylonians. There was a Queen of Heaven that was
worshipped in pagan times and that could have been where the worship
of Mary originated. We need to be careful not to add to scripture and make the gospel complicated or make it only obtainable by rituals, ordinances and other commandments of men. The blood of Jesus was shed to pay for our sins. Faith in that atoning blood of Jesus to cleanse us from sin is what makes us children of God, born again by God's spirit and recipients of eternal life. To make it simple, we turn away from sin and turn to Christ by faith. To complicate it with a bunch of manmade rules will hide the gospel from those that need to be saved. DC
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