Wednesday Bible Study: What Jesus asked, Part 4

 

The next two questions are in Matthew 8-9, and cover three separate stories:  The storm on the lake (8:23-7), the demon possessed men (8:28-34), and the paralytic healed while the scribes scoffed (9:1-7).  Two questions, linked by a one word response: Go.

It should be the most chilling thing you can hear from God: Go.  Not 'go out and make disciples', but, 'go, and don't come back.'  And those who received this, they did not get a question.  But they are a link between those that did.

 

 

So in the first story, Jesus has gotten His disciples into a boat to cross the lake.  But while He sleeps, a storm comes up...

Mat 8:24  And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep.
Mat 8:25  And they went and woke him, saying, "Save us, Lord; we are perishing."
Mat 8:26  And he said to them, "Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?" Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. 

The phrase, "of little faith', I was surprised to see translated thus even in the literal translations, as Strongs translates it as "incredulous"; however, a further breaking it down makes it "puny credence".  So these were men introduced to who Jesus was and who He claimed to be- they had a little knowledge.  Enough to cry out to Him in their hour of need.  But faith?  That was weak; they rode with Incarnate God, and still feared.  Knowledge of Jesus should draw us closer to Him, and increase our trust in what He could do.  If we know Him, there is no need to be afraid.  

I read a chapter of Proverbs every day.  One of my favorite sections is:

Pro 4:7  Wisdom is the main thing; get wisdom, and with all your getting, get understanding. 

To trust Him, you have to get to KNOW Him.  

Then they encounter the demon possessed men.  There is something here to notice about pure evil:

Mat 8:28  And when he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men met him, coming out of the tombs, so fierce that no one could pass that way.
Mat 8:29  And behold, they cried out, "What have you to do with us, O Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?"

The demons KNEW Him.  They had nothing like faith; what they had was total fear in His presence.  They recognized His power, but had no repentance.  This has nothing to do with the men possessed; freed of the demons, they witnessed of Jesus to the unbelieving multitudes.  But note:  Jesus had but one thing to say to the demons;

Mat 8:32  And he said to them, "Go." So they came out and went into the pigs, and behold, the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the waters. 

And the unbelievers?  They said the same thing to Him:

Mat 8:34  And behold, all the city came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw him, they begged him to leave their region. 

 

I've mentioned this before: this is the demon Legion we learn in the other Gospels; and I don't see how that THAT many demons get into a man (or two men) without a lot of help from a demon-worshipping village.

 

 

But now, we go back across the lake, and we meet a group of people that are basically, the opposite of the Disciples.  They have next to no knowledge of who Jesus is; but they have great faith in what He can DO.  They've heard of His miracles, and come to seek them in their lives.  But Jesus doesn't give miracles alone- He wants us to see that faith MUST be combined with knowledge.  Thus, instead of what they thought He would say- and apparently, what the crowd thought He would say- He told them:

Mat 9:2  And behold, some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven." 

Because His true purpose was to heal the soul, not the body.  Perhaps we can infer that, from what comes after, they looked around at each other and said, "Sins are forgiven?  What sins? and what about his legs?"  We don't know.  Because we get interrupted by the final group, and the final question:

Mat 9:3  And behold, some of the scribes said to themselves, "This man is blaspheming."
Mat 9:4  But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, "Why do you think evil in your hearts?
Mat 9:5  For which is easier, to say, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Rise and walk'?
Mat 9:6  But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins"--he then said to the paralytic--"Rise, pick up your bed and go home."
Mat 9:7  And he rose and went home.

The scribes- the so-called religious experts- should have, by this time, realized who Jesus was.  They had the knowledge available to them.  But they had their pride, their place in society, in the way; and thus, they reacted a lot like the demons.  They rejected what Jesus was to men.  But unlike demons, Jesus had something He was willing to teach them: That man's problem is sin, and no solution can be had that doesn't start with the REMOVAL of sin.

This, too, reminds me of Proverbs, and it should have reminded them.  Because of their unbelief, what was 'good advice' in Proverbs became a prophecy for them:

Pro 1:24  Because I have called and you refused to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded,
Pro 1:25  because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof,
Pro 1:26  I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you,
Pro 1:27  when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you. 

 

 

The closer of the story shows us the difference between the crowd that is willing to seek God, and the crowd that is not.  Remember the demon-town rejected Jesus out of fear and disbelief?  But THIS crowd...

Mat 9:8  When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men. 

So let's line up our takeaways here:

-Faith and knowledge go hand in hand; faith opens the door, and knowledge closes it against fear.

-Demons have no choice in their destruction- YOU DO.  Don't be among those who hear Jesus say, "Go."

-Jesus came to heal the part that matters; the flesh may benefit, but eternity is ALWAYS His top concern.

-The scribes basically said, "I'm not willing to give up my ____ for this," and thus missed what was right before their eyes.  And the wisdom they'd worked with all their lives, for a thousand years, became a dust-covered Bible they never opened.

For me, I'd rather be questioned about fear than about evil.  Fear is an ignorance that can be remedied through learning.  Evil is a choice that can't easily be unmade.  How about you?