Knowledge & Judgment

Summary of sermon on Matthew 12:38-45 from Pastor Ky Martin:

One of the main reasons Jesus had such a large following during His ministry on Earth was because of all the signs, wonders, and miracles He performed.

He turned water into wine, He healed the sick, He cast out demons… there was a buzz around Jesus that authenticated who He said He was.

Although Jesus had already been performing so many miraculous signs, the Pharisees (in our text this week) asked for another.

What’s interesting about this is how strongly Jesus rebukes them. He says, “it’s a wicked and evil generation that asks for a sign.”

The reason Jesus responds so strongly is because He knows the Pharisees’ hearts. He is talking to a group of people who have already made up their minds on what they think about Jesus. They don’t like Him; He has stolen their thunder. They think that if they ask Him to do something and he can’t, that will give them yet another reason to denounce Him.

The Pharisees were men who devoted their lives to studying God’s Word, yet they could not see what was right in front of them.

Jesus compares the amount of revelation they have to the amount of revelation of people in the past. 

First, the story of Jonah. It’s easy to get caught up in how wild Jonah’s story is (living in the belly of a fish for three days!) -- but it’s even more wild when you consider the Ninevites. They had never heard of God, yet when Jonah arrived and preached God’s love to them, the entire city repented and turned toward God! They had so little reason to trust what Jonah was saying, and yet they did.

Jesus’ second example -- the Queen of the South -- she had very little wisdom when she encountered Solomon, yet the information he gave her was enough for her to turn toward the God of Israel.

Jesus gives these examples to show how little revelation these people had, yet they repented. The Pharisees, on the other hand, had a deep knowledge of the Law and the Messiah stood right in front of them; yet, they rejected Him.

This goes to show that God will judge us in accordance with our knowledge. 

In the end, we all are accountable to God (see Romans 1:12-20; Acts 17:30-31a). The more knowledge we have about God, the more accountable we are for our response (see Matt. 11:23-24; Hebrews 2:2-4). (<-- this ought to get our attention in the Bible Belt Bubble we live in. We have more knowledge than the Pharisees, this side of the resurrection.)

God has provided one path to righteousness.

In verses 43-45, Jesus tells the story of how a demon-possessed man went from one form of hopelessness to another, worse form of hopelessness.

This relates to the Pharisees in that they were known for purging all sorts of evil from their lives: they were poster children for tithing, knowing God’s word, and avoiding shameful behavior. Yet, they were not believing in Christ, so they were not “allowing Him in”. They emptied their houses of evil things, but all of that purging was useless because they kept the Messiah from coming in and backfilling all of it with hope. All their efforts put in them a worse spot than if they had had no knowledge of the law.

Because they had knowledge, they were condemned to a greater judgement. With the knowledge they had, they should have been the FIRST to recognize Jesus as Messiah. They  knew all of the Old Testament prophecies well and, what’s more, they saw Jesus turning water into wine, healing the sick, casting out demons, and doing all things in accordance with God’s word. No one was ever able to stump Jesus or find fault in His teaching.

We never see Pharisees possessed in scripture, but we do see them plunge into deeper darkness as they go from not believing Jesus, to confronting Him, to accusing Him, to crucifying Him.

What was missing in the Pharisees was God’s Holy Spirit indwelling the person. To remove evil from one’s life, while simultaneously rejecting the Messiah, simply leaves one open and vulnerable to new kinds of sin and evil. 

Surely knowing God’s Law didn’t make it harder for the Pharisees to believe. But as esteemed leaders who were admired, their hearts became prideful.

How can we avoid making the same mistake as the Pharisees did? Because of their pride and religious accomplishments, they had a false confidence in their ability to attain righteousness.  They did not want to abandon the idea that they could, by their history, accomplishments, and law keeping, attain a right standing with God by their own efforts.

Whether a Pharisee or a tax collector, all of us need forgiveness. The ground is level. We have all sinned and need mercy.

We must actively abandon our own attainment of righteousness.

In our Bible Belt culture, being a member of a church is often synonymous with being a good citizen. We can get trapped in the mentality that simply coming to worship and trying to do the right thing puts us in right standing with God.

We must not simply avoid this kind of thinking, we must ABANDON it. The only way to do this is by remembering our need for forgiveness.

Second, we must learn in order to love.

We don’t spend time learning about Jesus to check off a box, we spend time learning about Jesus because we love Jesus and want to be near to Him!

Knowledge of God’s word is not enough. To go to church on Sundays is not enough.

We must put our hope and trust in Jesus, our Messiah, the only One with the power to forgive us our sins and declare us righteous.

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