Full Transcript

Welcome to Share the Word, a Great Commission project. We’ve been moving through the New Testament chapter by chapter, and we’ve reached episode 230, which covers the Gospel of Matthew chapter 17. So listen closely, open your Bibles, and take notes. And remember, we encourage participation from all who listen. Let’s get started. Matthew chapter 17.

Before the creation of the world? It’s actually Thanksgiving Day as I sat down to write this. I’m getting ready to have dinner with family in a bit. When I clicked on one of my regular sports sites I follow this morning, the first article I saw said, Five big reasons Steeler fans should be thankful today. Then, when I clicked over to Facebook, the first reel to cross my feed was two talking dogs explaining ten reasons pet owners should be thankful for their pets today. And I am, on both counts.

But truthfully, things like that don’t even make my top ten list of things I’m most thankful for today. The older I get, the more I value the spiritual gifts and the lasting things, the truly lasting things. I’m thankful first and foremost for God’s love and for Christ’s sacrifice for us. I’m also very thankful for His Word, which has been, you know, the light on my pathway throughout my life. I’m thankful for parents who not only believed that and taught me that was true, but lived as though they believed it was really true. I’m also thankful for my own family and the love we share, and for very good friends who accept me and encourage me and have been loyal to me.

Those are the kind of things on my mind today, and I hope your list is somewhat similar. The reason I said I’m thankful first and foremost for God’s love and for Christ’s sacrifice. It’s because I’ve been thinking a lot lately. I’m going to hit a milestone in a couple of months, three score and ten, 70th birthday. Man, where has the time gone? I’m glad this is not my only lifetime, the only one I’ll get to experience.

So why would I say that? Because God’s promise is that for those of us who’ve believed into Christ and become His followers, we’ve already begun to live eternal life. As Jesus put it, everyone who believes into Me never really dies. True, there will be that unpleasant speed bump in the road ahead where we finish this phase of life and graduate to the next. But Jesus promises that believers never really die. We just put off the mortal and put on the immortal, in the Apostle Paul’s words.

And it’s only because of God’s love and Christ’s sacrifice that that’s possible for me and for you too. This episode, I want to point out something about that which comes up in Matthew’s Gospel more clearly and more often than anywhere else in the Bible. In chapter 16, for the first time, remember a couple episodes ago we were talking about Simon Peter and his famous confession at Caesarea Philippi. Jesus had asked His disciples who they thought He really was, and Peter piped up confidently declaring, You are the Christ, meaning the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And Jesus told him, You’re right, Peter, but added later, It’s not time to openly talk about that yet. It was just on the heels of that that Jesus dropped a bomb.

This is Matthew 16:21 and following. From that time, Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed. And be raised up on the third day. Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, God forbid it, Lord, that will never happen to you. But Jesus turned and said, Peter, get behind me, Satan. You’re a stumbling block to me, for you’re not setting your mind on God’s interests, but man’s.

From that time. That means that this was a turning point. Jesus told his disciples clearly here, for the first time, that what was really ahead for him was suffering and death. True, things did seem to have been going downhill since the euphoric early days of the Galilean ministry, but you can probably imagine that the disciples were shocked to hear that. Peter, fresh off making his great confession about Jesus’ real identity, hearing Jesus say such a thing, took him aside and in his most serious voice said, Heaven forbid that should ever happen to you, Lord. What in the world are you saying?

And Jesus, just as seriously, shot back at him, Get behind me, Satan. Don’t be an obstacle to me, Peter. Your interests are not in tune with God’s. Then Jesus turned to the rest of them and said, Listen, if you really want to be my disciples, you must be willing to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me. Wow, what a fascinating exchange, which I’m sure struck those disciples hard. On into chapter 17.

There’s a lot of interesting things happening in this chapter, most of which we’ve discussed previously on our way through the Gospels of Luke and Mark. But again, right in the middle of 17, at verse 22, Matthew writes, While they were gathering together in Galilee, Jesus said to them, The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day. Matthew remembers, we were deeply grieved at that, whereas another translation puts it greatly distressed hearing Jesus say that. These are not vague predictions like, I just got a bad feeling about going up to Jerusalem, like something bad is going to happen there. No. Jesus sounds like he knew what was going to happen there, doesn’t he?

And he got only more specific about it as the time drew closer. By chapter 20, the public ministry was coming to an end. You can’t get any more specific than this. When he knew the time was close, as John would put it, his hour was at hand, he headed for Jerusalem with his disciples in tow. And again, on the way there, this is chapter 20 starting in verse 17, it says he took the twelve disciples aside by themselves and said to them, Behold, we’re going up to Jerusalem now, and the Son of Man will be betrayed into the hands of the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and will deliver him over to the Gentiles to mock and flog and crucify him. And on the third day he will be raised up.

Man, could he say it any more plainly? But moving forward to the final week, now for a fourth time on Wednesday of Passion Week, after a day of public teaching at the temple, Matthew writes at the beginning of chapter 26, Jesus said to them, almost like a reminder now, You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and that’s when the Son of Man is to be delivered over for crucifixion. Like, you know what I’ve been telling you. The time is about here now, friends. Some people who have not read the New Testament documents carefully and just know the story of Jesus generally are under the impression that he came as a special messenger from God, and he lived an exemplary life, and he did a lot of healings and miracles proving his divine nature, and he taught lofty principles about unconditional love and forgiveness and humility and service to other people.

And then an evil and jealous group of people had him killed, because Jesus threatened them, and ultimately because darkness hates the light. And that’s all true. But if that’s where you leave Jesus’ story, you have missed the most important point by far. Jesus came out of heaven to die. At Caesarea Philippi, he told his disciples that explicitly. He used the word must.

From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things and be killed. That was a divine imperative. Think about this. He told them who would be behind his death: Israel’s elders, the chief priests and scribes, that is the nation’s religious elites. He told them that it would be triggered by a betrayal. He told them who would do the actual killing: Gentiles will mock and flog and then crucify me, pointing to the Romans who alone had the authority to carry out capital punishment in Israel.

And he even told them exactly when it all would happen: on Passover, a Jewish holy day commemorating Israel’s release from Egyptian bondage. Passover fell in early April of that year. That was the when. And when that dread day grew close, he reminded them, Friends, what I’ve been telling you all about, it’s happening in two days. When we reach Matthew’s account of the Passion, a few chapters ahead of us now, I want you to understand that no part of what happened then to Jesus was unexpected by him. At no point was he surprised by any of it.

In fact, on the evening the final events were set in motion, when Jesus was in the upper room eating the Passover meal with his disciples, he turned to Judas, who was sitting next to him at a certain point, and whispered, What you’re going to do, do it quickly. Judas had to have been more than a little taken aback, realizing Jesus knew he’d betrayed him. He must have thought, He knows what I’m going to do, and he’s urging me to get on with it. Jesus absolutely knew. The time had finally come to complete the mission he had come into the world to complete. He was not anxious to do it, but he was anxious to get it over with.

And so he sent Judas out that night to alert the high priest, to get their arresting party together so he could take them to where Jesus would be. At the time, the idea of Jesus dying and being taken away from them had to have been hard to imagine for disciples like Matthew and the handful of others who had now been with him for three years. I mean, after all they had seen and heard, the incredible miracles, the authority he demonstrated over demons, over the forces of nature, over every kind of sickness, even over death itself, they knew by now who he really was. And although Jesus had been quite reluctant to say it out loud, in response to Peter’s declaration, he owned it out loud. He confirmed that he indeed was the Messiah, and the Messiah does not die. That’s not how the narrative goes that they had heard all of their lives.

It’s hard for us to understand how much their emotions and hopes were all wrapped up in Jesus by this point, and how hard it is for people to accept what they desperately do not want to accept. So although Jesus had told them several times over the months leading up to that Passover, not only that he would die, but specific details of how it would come about, they could not wrap their minds around that. It seemed impossible to them. Now, here’s something fascinating to me. Matthew does not admit this, but in the Gospel of Mark, which is Peter’s recollection of all this, we learn that during that last period in Galilee, when Jesus was withdrawing from the crowds and focusing more and more of his time and attention on teaching his closest disciples, that’s when he told them that second time exactly what was ahead.

That was after Peter’s great declaration, and so after Jesus had affirmed that he was, in fact, the Messiah. Only Mark adds anything like an explanation. At Mark 9:32, he writes, Although they did not understand what he meant, they were afraid to ask him about it. Afraid to ask him about it. This talk of betrayal and death and all this stuff was not computing for the twelve, but none of them dared ask Jesus anything more about it. Peter, who was the most bold among them, had tried and already been rebuked by Jesus, who called him an obstacle, a stumbling block.

Stop talking to me like that, Simon Peter. Satan is talking through you, Peter. The tempter was no doubt in Jesus’ ear enough, trying to deter him, trying to make him doubt God’s plan. He didn’t need Peter helping out. So if Peter was not going to press for an explanation from Jesus, then no one else certainly would, that’s for sure. This appears to be why all that happened was so unclear, it seems, to the twelve at the point it was happening.

It was just an emotionally unapproachable subject. I used to have more trouble understanding that than I do now. I used to wonder, how could the disciples seem so clueless about what was happening with Jesus when he had told them repeatedly what was going to happen? Then we underwent a seriously emotional trauma in my own family. Something happened with one of our loved ones that no one wanted to accept was possible or real. Our hearts and minds just couldn’t fathom it or accept it for a long time.

So you just do not allow your mind to go there. You live as though it’s not real. That’s how the disciples, it seems, proceeded toward Jesus last weeks with them. But for him, for Jesus, it was plenty clear. He had not been carried along by events like a weak swimmer caught in a strong current. Hardly.

He was in control. He knew exactly what was ahead for him. He knew he must go up to Jerusalem and suffer, and he was determined to do it. They came into the city of Jerusalem, you remember, that spring Sunday surrounded by a big throng of Passover worshipers calling out messianic slogans and strewing their pathway with palm fronds, even their own cloaks. How bizarre that must have felt to Jesus. He knew his enemies were waiting for him in the city like spiders ready to pounce.

Then when Thursday of that week arrived and they were eating the Passover meal that evening in the upper room, it was Jesus taking the initiative, whispering to Judas to get about doing what he had already made arrangements to do, the betrayal, setting the final wheels in motion. Later that night, Jesus agonized in prayer awaiting his enemies in Gethsemane, and when they arrived, he went out boldly to meet them. When Peter tried to intervene, he stopped him. Jesus allowed himself to be apprehended and led away. Taken to the high priest’s palace, he submitted to their abuse, their interrogations, their false accusations without protest. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth like a lamb being led to slaughter.

Up all that night and into early Friday morning, he allowed himself to be mocked, beaten by the Roman soldiers, then mercilessly flogged with a cat o’ nine tails. He stood passively, wrapped in a blood-soaked purple robe with a crown of thorns driven into his head as the mob howled for him to be crucified at Pilate’s judgment seat. And after the order was given, he carried his own cross toward Calvary, long as he could. And once they reached the execution site, he laid down on that cross, stretched out his arms, and accepted the nails. As the priests and soldiers taunted him, he could have called ten thousand angels to destroy his enemies and set him free, Matthew writes in chapter 26, looking back on that day. But he didn’t.

He allowed himself to be lifted up and hung to die between two criminals. When the unthinkable darkness of God’s judgment came, he took up our pain and bore our suffering. Yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him and afflicted. But he was pierced through for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities. It was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, as the Lord made his life an offering for sin. Ours.

Mine and yours. If you’re unfamiliar, I’m just describing what happened interspersed with what the prophet Isaiah 700 years earlier had said would happen. The early Christians later realized Isaiah’s prophecy had been written all about Jesus. So no, in no sense was Jesus just being carried along by events. In fact, in Peter’s famous sermon only weeks after this all transpired, after Jesus’ resurrection and ascension back to heaven, he proclaimed. Fellow Israelites, listen to this.

Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was then handed over by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge, and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him up from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it is impossible for death to keep its hold on him. He raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of it. Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah. What happened with Jesus, Peter said, was according to God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge.

And now very certain Peter said that. Jesus had not been a victim of circumstances. In fact, once they all got clarity on this, the New Testament writers went on to explain that Jesus’ suffering and death had been God’s plan. Their words: before the creation of the world. Before the creation of the world? Yes.

Peter wrote that exactly in his first epistle. He says in chapter one of his first epistle, God paid a ransom to save us from the empty life we inherited from our ancestors, and it was not paid with gold or silver, but with the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom before the creation of the world. The apostle Paul makes similar assertions in his epistles, as does John in the book of Revelation. That’s kind of mind-blowing, isn’t it? Even before the Godhead decided, Let us make man in our own image, or anything at all was created, they had already arrived at a plan of redemption to address mankind’s eventual fall.

That God the Son would one day come out of heaven, become one of us for a time, and then suffer and die as an atonement for our sins. And God the Son submitted to accomplishing that plan before Adam and Eve committed their first sin in the Garden of Eden. Jesus was the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world, it says in Revelation 13. So what we read happening in real time on the pages of the Gospels is Jesus obediently following a plan conceived of before the world began. What is there to be thankful for more than that? To know that God Himself came for us, knowing full well what would be required of Him to redeem us.

And even in the face of it, when the awful day finally arrived, He would not be deterred until He completed all that was necessary for our redemption, suffering the penalty and death for our sins, spilling His precious blood for our atonement. As one contemporary hymn writer has put it, Thank you, Jesus, for the blood applied. Thank you, Jesus, it has washed me white. Thank you, Jesus, You have saved my life, brought me out of darkness into Your glorious light. Probably won’t be Thanksgiving when you listen to this, but whatever day it is, whatever you’re doing now, I hope your heart is full of thankfulness for God’s love and Christ’s amazing sacrifice. This has been Paul for Share the Word.

Thanks, Paul. And once again, we want to remind you that as a crowdfunded nonprofit organization, we’ve made sure that everything on ShareTheWord.org is free to use, to download, and we encourage you to share it. Our hope is to continue to share the good news with everyone around the world, and this is where you come in. We release two episodes weekly, but you don’t have to wait because you can go on ShareTheWord.org and listen to everything available. We appreciate the emails letting us know where you listen and when. So far, the consensus is in the car, headed to or from your destination.

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