Week 25 ———  John the Baptist has Doubts about Jesus
Matthew 11:2-30 — Luke 7:18-35

(A note from David: I am still catching up after three weeks of being away (our annual camp meeting and then ten days in Alaska). So here is today’s blog entry, but #43 from August 2 will be posted Sunday.)

Matt. 11:1   When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in their cities.  Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” 

Jesus has had a busy week.  He healed the man with the withered hand in the synagogue on the Sabbath (#43).  The following day, great crowds gathered to be healed.  Then Jesus spent the whole night in prayer on a mountain (Luke 6:12).  The following day, he chose 12 of his disciples to become apostles (ones who are sent out).  (Remember that some of these twelve had been following Jesus for over four months.)  Then Jesus preaches another sermon to a group of people, heals a centurion’s servant, and then raises a widow’s son in Nain.  So Jesus is moving among the towns of Galilee, not just teaching and announcing the Kingdom of God, but also bringing it into reality by what he does, the healings, signs, and wonders.  He is gaining more and more public attention, and word gets back to John the Baptist, who is in prison.

John has been imprisoned for several months in Herod Antipas’ fortress of Macherus, located east of the Dead Sea in what is now Jordan.  I have been there. I have sat in the place John sat while waiting to be beheaded.  And regarding our passage today, I have been where John is…I can identify with John in this passage. There have been times Jesus didn’t do what I expected him to do. Perhaps you have been there also.

Jesus mother, Mary, and John’s mother, Elizabeth, were related, but the Bible does not specify how.  We know that Mary visited Elizabeth during their pregnancies.  However, John and Jesus did not grow up together.  Jesus grew up in Nazareth, while Luke tells us that John “grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel” (Luke 1:80).  John saw the Spirit of God descend on Jesus at his baptism and pronounces him as the ‘Lamb of God.’ 

John publicly rebuked Herod because he married his brother’s wife, Herodias.  So Herod had him imprisoned.  Mark tells us that “Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death. But she could not, for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly” (Mark 6:19-20).  

Prisoners in the first century were not fed or provided with clothing. If you had family or friends, they would bring you food (and anything else you needed), or you would starve. Presumably, John’s disciples visited him regularly and filled him in on the news about Jesus, so John sent his disciples to Jesus to ask him a question.  However, the question is not likely the one you would have expected John to ask.

Now, if you were John and had the opportunity to ask Jesus a question— the one you baptized, saw God’s spirit descend on, and called the “Lamb of God,” what would you ask? “Wow, all this healing and preaching sounds wonderful; how can I pray for you?”  “Can you use a few extra disciples?”  “Do you need to borrow some camel hair clothes?”  But here is the question John asks Jesus:

“Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”  (Matthew 11:3).

John is asking him, “Are you the Messiah?“ 

If you look at how Matthew has structured his gospel, you see that chapter 11 and the following chapters contain stories of how people react to Jesus (John, Jesus’ family, the Pharisees, etc.).  So John hears what Jesus is doing, and it doesn’t convince him that Jesus is the Messiah.  He begins to think he was wrong.  Remember what John said about the coming Messiah: 

Matthew 3:7-12   “But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming to watch him baptize, he denounced them. “You brood of snakes!” he exclaimed. “Who warned you to flee the coming wrath?   Prove by the way you live that you have repented of your sins and turned to God.   Don’t just say to each other, ‘We’re safe, for we are descendants of Abraham.’ That means nothing, for I tell you, God can create children of Abraham from these very stones.   Even now, the ax of God’s judgment is poised, ready to sever the roots of the trees. Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit will be chopped down and thrown into the fire.”

“I baptize with water those who repent of their sins and turn to God. But someone is coming soon who is greater than I am—so much greater that I’m not worthy even to be his slave and carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.  He is ready to separate the chaff from the wheat with his winnowing fork. Then he will clean up the threshing area, gathering the wheat into his barn but burning the chaff with never-ending fire.”

So, John’s message is much like the Old Testament prophets. God is sending a Messiah, and there will be a time of judgment—harsh stuff. Then John baptizes Jesus, and the heavens open, and the spirit descends, and the voice from heaven says, “This is my son….”

Everything is going just as John expected. But then Jesus started his ministry, and John began having second thoughts.  His disciples tell him that Jesus is healing everyone, teaching, and having banquets with sinners and tax collectors.  And John thinks, “Hey, wait a minute!  Where is the ax?  Where is the fire?  Where is the winnowing fork and the never-ending fire? If he can do miracles, then why am I still in prison?  This is not what I expected from a Messiah.”

Matthew 11:4-6   And Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.  And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” 

Jesus summarizes his activity.  And since Jesus knows that John has Isaiah memorized, each of those six things is from passages in Isaiah.  Jesus uses a teaching moment to open the scriptures and show how they reveal the Messiah.  Since there may be a few of you that don’t have Isaiah memorized, here are the references from Isaiah that speak of what will happen when the Messiah comes:

In that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see. (Isaiah 29:18)

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy.  For waters break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert;  (Isaiah 35:5-6)

Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise.  You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy!  For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead. (Isaiah 26:19)

So Jesus tells them to report back to John, “You were right. I am the Messiah, and I have come to inaugurate the kingdom. And it doesn’t look like what you thought it would. But it is just like Isaiah described it if you remember the verses.  And then Jesus adds, “And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” Or, as some versions say, “Blessed is anyone who doesn’t stumble because of me.”  The Greek word translated as ‘offended’ or ‘stumble’ is ‘skandilizo’, from which we get our words ‘scandal’ and ‘scandalous.’  As an adjective, scandalous is defined as “causing general public outrage by a perceived offense. “  We have seen how Jesus is causing a good bit of outrage among the religious leaders of the day because they perceive him as offensive.  To them, Jesus is scandalous.  But Jesus says that it is the ones who don’t see him as scandalous but who see him as the true Messiah who are blessed.

But this is hard for John because he taught the Messiah was coming to kick butt with a chainsaw and a flame thrower. Instead, Jesus comes healing and teaching and having parties with tax collectors while he is rotting in prison.

And I am sure John was thinking about a different verse in Isaiah that Jesus preached from in Nazareth:  

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor;1 he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound”  (Isaiah 61:1).

John is missing something important, but put yourself in John’s sandals.  Think back to the last time you were in a first-century prison waiting to die, and you told everyone who Jesus was and talked about what Jesus was going to do —- and now he is not doing that, and you’re still in prison.  John had a picture of how things would go and what exactly Jesus would do—and it was not going at all the way he expected. We may not be able to identify with John in prison, but we can all identify with this: We have all suffered disappointment when our expectations didn’t come to reality.

Perhaps you’ve had a crisis of faith — maybe when your expectations weren’t met — a friend or child died, people let you down, a good friend burned you in business, or prayers that weren’t answered how you wished.  When this happens, and you question your faith, you need to ask yourself what your faith is in.  Is your faith in Jesus, or is your faith in a picture of what you expect Jesus to be?  This is why Jesus was a scandal to the Pharisees.  They had a picture of what the Messiah would be: a warrior who would conquer Rome and restore the kingdom to Israel.  When he failed to meet their expectations, they were outraged and conspired to do away with him.  

The same is true of our understanding of Jesus. Many people follow Jesus, expecting him to solve all their problems and make their wildest dreams come true—and then when their dreams don’t come true, or the opposite happens, they are scandalized by Jesus and what he is doing.  How about you when your friend or family member passes away, your business fails, a significant illness strikes, or your home is destroyed?  Ask Job about it.  If your faith is in the god of your imagination and not the God of the Bible, it will fail.

Then John’s disciples leave, and Jesus speaks to the crowd:

As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John: 

Matthew 11:7-11   “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?   What, then, did you go out to see?  A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in kings’ houses.   What, then, did you go out to see?  A prophet?  Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.   This is he of whom it is written,
“‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.’
Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.   

Jesus has nothing negative to say about John and affirms him as the messenger that would come before the Messiah.  But John will die in prison before Jesus completes his mission.  Those in the Kingdom are greater because they will be privileged to see Jesus bring the kingdom to its great beginning.

Matthew 11:12-14   From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force. 

John and Jesus are bringing the kingdom on in unexpected ways, and they have met a lot of opposition from the Bible scholars and teachers, the Pharisees, the temple Sadducees, and the government.  Herod has imprisoned and will kill John. And the religious leaders and the government will condemn Jesus.  But just because there is a lot of opposition, Jesus says, don’t think for a moment that God’s plan is being thwarted.

Matthew 11:13-15   For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John, and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear. 

The kingdom is here, but it doesn’t look like what John or anyone thought it would look like. He is the Elijah figure predicted (Malachi 4:5) to come before the Messiah. You have to be willing to accept it as it is, even though it is not at all like you expected.

Matthew 11:16-17  “But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their playmates,
  “‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’

So Jesus uses a village parable of kids in the marketplace.  They play a flute for people to celebrate and dance, but no one dances.  They sing a funeral song, but the mourners (usually paid professionals) would not mourn.  Like the villagers who do not respond as expected, Jesus and John don’t act as expected.

Matthew 11:18-19   For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ 

Jesus says, “You wouldn’t like it no matter what we did because we don’t fit into your mold.”

Matthew 11:19 “Yet wisdom is justified by her deeds.”

Here, Jesus is borrowing from proverbs, personifying wisdom.   You will see that this is right when you see it happen.  Jesus realizes he will never convince them with words.  Or, to say it another way, words do not prove wisdom — it’s not what you say will happen that matters; it’s what actually happens.

We know what is going to happen very soon.  John is going to be beheaded, and Jesus is going to face even more opposition, be put up on false charges, and put up on a Roman cross where he suffers and dies.   They both die.  And Jesus’ opponents will see that as a sign of their failure.  Many people in the 200 years before Jesus claimed to be the Messiah.  And the Jewish leaders would mostly just sit back and watch them until they died, and then they would say, “Well, you see, they are dead, so they weren’t the Messiah.”

But Jesus was different.  Because he didn’t play the expected role of the Messiah, he “did it all wrong.”  So they said from the beginning he wasn’t the Messiah.  And when he died (which they hurried up to get rid of the troublemaker), then they could say beyond doubt, “See, we were right; he wasn’t the Messiah.”

But Jesus was different because he didn’t stay dead.  Their expectation of the Messiah was to defeat the great enemy— the one that had been a thorn in their side and persecuted them for years –  and that great enemy was the Roman Government and soldiers and any sympathizers.

But Jesus was different.  He saw the great enemy — the one that had been a thorn in their side and persecuted them for years –  and that great enemy was evil —sin and the penalty of sin —death.

Jesus did not come to meet everyone’s expectations or solve everybody’s problems, but to be God’s gift of love to us, to be the solution to the problem of the barrier between God and man.  So don’t choose to follow Jesus if you expect him to solve all of your problems and cure all of your diseases.  It didn’t work that way for John the Baptist, and it didn’t work that way for Jesus.  Choose to follow Jesus because he loved you enough to suffer and die for you.  Choose to follow Jesus because following Him is the only way to defeat evil, sin, and death and be reunited with your creator.