Here are the notes and questions from LightHouse last night:
1. As you read the passage what things surprise you, what questions do you have?
2. How would you define faith? (Faith is responding in active trust, active reliance and active obedience to God’s faithful and gracious work of salvation in Christ.)
Matthew is building up an overwhelmingly convincing argument that Jesus is the Messiah; each healing and miracle along with his authoritative teaching provides another piece of evidence in reaching the conclusion that Jesus is the Christ.
His birth fulfils Old Testament prophecy, his teaching is unlike any other which the people have ever heard, he proclaims the good news that the kingdom is here, he claims to be the Christ, and his miraculous work provides yet more evidence of who he is. Jesus healed the leper, then healed the Centurions servant from a distant, then calmed out of control creation with just his voice, he has overcome demonic forces, proven he can forgive sin, transforms and calls sinners whether religious or irreligious and ultimately comes to bring about the new kingdom as he fulfils the old. Matthew is laying out his evidence and it makes a strong case, and now he adds more evidence that Jesus is the Christ.
1. Miracles that point to one conclusion: Jesus is the Christ
It is as if Matthew is piling up the evidence as quickly as possible, providing rapid fire proof with brief pictures of Jesus at work which reveal that he is who he says he is and then moving on the next and seeking to an utterly overwhelming weight of proof that Jesus is the Messiah. It’s worth noticing that Matthew is much briefer in what he reveals about these incidents than Luke or Mark. Matthew doesn’t tell us the synagogue ruler’s name, or all the details of this incident, instead he condenses events to provide a snapshot of it focusing on what it tells us about Jesus rather than filling out all the details.
Jesus is on his way to respond to the leaders request when what happened(20)? This woman touches him and Jesus stops. Both these incidents have something in common; to touch or be touched by either this woman who is bleeding or a dead body was defiling and made you unclean for seven days. For that reason people generally avoided such contact. But not with Jesus, both situations end with an impossible reversal. This woman has been bleeding for how long? 12 years, it seemed unending, nothing will stop it, until she just touches Jesus believing he can heal her. And Jairus’ daughter, well what is going on when Jesus gets to the house (23-24)? They are mourning her death, the funeral has started. Yet Jesus overturns even death itself as he takes her by the hand and brings her back to life. Jesus does the impossible, so impossible that the crowd mock him and laugh at him, you may be a great healer but no one can conquer death. But Jesus can and does.
Jesus makes the unclean clean, he heals, he forgives, he conquers even death itself.
This is a momentous thing, Jesus has just raised a dead girl to life but Matthew doesn’t stop to consider the ramifications of this even or hammer home its significance, in fact he scarcely takes a breath before he carries on his account “As Jesus went out from there, two blind men followed him, calling out, ‘Have mercy on us, Son of David!’”
Can you remember how Matthew starts? It starts with the genealogy of Jesus and David is prominent in it, Joseph his earthly Father is described as a Son of David by the Angel (1:20), and Bethlehem where Jesus is born is the town of David. To call someone Son of David was a clear Messianic exclamation. The irony is that it is two blind men who can see what all the evidence points to! They come to Jesus the messiah and ask him to do what the Old Testament promised the Messiah would do. Isaiah 35:3-6
“Strengthen the feeble hands,
steady the knees that give way;
say to those with fearful hearts,
“Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
he will come to save you.”
Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
Then will the lame leap like a deer,
and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
and streams in the desert.”
It is no accident that this recognition of Jesus as the Messiah is followed by their healing and then a mute tongue being unstopped as Jesus casts out another demon. In ch11:3 Jesus will point back to these miracles as proof that he is the Messiah to John the Baptist and evidence that he should not stumble in his faith.
Every incident, every miracle is another exhibit in the bulging evidence folder proving that Jesus is the Messiah, that he is the Christ, and that his words must be listened to and he must be believed in. (35)And such healings and teaching continue as Jesus goes on teaching, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and illness. Jesus keeps on providing more and more evidence that he is the Messiah the king inaugurating his kingdom.
The king is here is what Matthew wants his readers and us to realise, Jesus is who he claims to be the evidence is overwhelming. Jesus is the Christ and you can entrust yourself to him.
2. What is a right reaction to Jesus?
Matthew is leading us to an inescapable conclusion about who Jesus is, he is the Christ, the Messiah as Matthew claims ch1v1. The evidence all point to that conclusion so logically (v33) should read ‘so all Israel praised God and put their faith in Jesus and followed him’, but it doesn’t.
How do the crowd react? They are amazed and said ‘Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel’. But notice that is as far as it goes. They recognise the newness of what is happening, that it is unique, that there has never been anything like it before but they don’t conclude what Matthew concludes that Jesus is the Messiah. In fact you will have noticed here that Jesus seems to want to perform miracles in secret, (25)he puts the crowd outside before he raises the little girl back to life and (28, 30)Jesus deliberately waits until they are inside the house with fewer watching eyes before he heals the blind men and then charges them not to tell anyone. Jesus doesn’t want the crowd just coming for miracles, or to misunderstand the nature of his kingship. He is the king that is what the miracles show but the crowd will not recognise that, they are just amazed at the miracles he can do and come to Jesus for that.
But that response is not an adequate one. Jesus is not just a miracle worker, he is not just someone to be in awe of.
There is a second response in (34) what is it? The Pharisees accuse him of being prince of demons. Notice what they do not do, they don’t deny he can miracles, they argue incredibly that they point to the opposite of where the scriptures would lead them. Jesus is not like the Messiah they had in mind so they will not have him as Messiah. And here they question his power attributing it to demonic rule and because they reject his power they can reject his claims.
Jesus brings division, as John the Baptist said Jesus is winnowing Israel dividing the chaff and the wheat. Jesus is setting the pattern of the kingdom, he does not ask his followers to go through what he does not experience “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.”
Some will stop at being amazed at Jesus as a miracle worker, others will always react angrily to Jesus claims and be hostile towards those who follow Jesus. We ought to expect no less among our friends, family, work colleagues, and society; some will simple think Jesus is a good teacher or miracle worker, others will react angrily rejecting him.
But there has also been another thread running through these chapters, it is faith in Jesus. But we need to notice something those faiths have been very different. The leper has a robust faith that acts and believe even risking being in a crowd to come to Jesus knowing he can heal, the Centurion has an exemplary faith greater than any in Israel, the disciples in the boat have a little faith which is not yet fully formed or fully aware of who Jesus is, the friends of the paralysed man have active stop at nothing faith, Matthew has faith that follows even when it costs. To that picture this sections adds Jairus’ faith that Jesus can even raise from the dead, the woman’s seemingly slightly superstitious faith, and the blind men have a clearer faith in Jesus as Son of David and in his power to give sight as the Messiah. What you notice is that each of their faiths is different. There is no one uniform faith.
But what is it that all of their faith has in common? The one it is placed in. It is not faith that transforms, forgives, heals, cleanses, liberates, conquers and saves. It is the object of faith who does that. Jesus transforms, forgives, heals, cleanses, liberates, conquers, and saves. Each person’s faith is in Jesus and it is not the strength of faith that matters but the person and power of Jesus.
Sometimes people talk of having faith trouble, or struggling with their faith, or wishing they had faith like so and so as if faith itself and the amount I can conjure up or feel in and of myself is the issue. As if we can work at having more faith if we just whip ourselves up a bit more. The object of your faith is what matters, Jesus is the one who saves, it is seeing more clearly who Jesus is that strengthens our faith, it is realising how he loves and what he has done for us that strengthens our faith. And saving faith is faith in Jesus, it is the onject of faith that matters.
Matthew wants us to look at Jesus see he is the Messiah and put our faith in him. It may be weak faith, it may be hesitant faith, but it is Jesus who matters, the object of faith because he saves. It is not about our ability to exercise faith but his utter power to save.
1. A friend says to you that they believe Jesus was just a miracle worker what would you say to them and why?
2. What is saving faith?
3. A friend comes to you saying they are struggling with their faith, how would you go about helping them?
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