Seeds for 12/12/2023 - Matthew 21:14-17
Scripture: The blind and the lame came to Him at the temple, and He healed them. But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things He did and the children shouting in the temple courts, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant.
“Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked Him.
“Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read,
“‘From the lips of children and infants
you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?”
And He left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where He spent the night.
Observation: You can’t juxtapose the descriptions much more sharply than setting “wonderful things He did” against the chief priests and teachers of the law being “indignant.” Those who are responsible for helping the people know God and understand how to live before Him are indignant about Jesus healing the blind and lame in the temple. This seems so odd from our vantage point. What does not seem odd is their offense at and opposition to the children praising Him as the Messianic heir to King David.
This is where the rubber meets the road for Christianity’s core truth claims. Whose interpretation of Jesus’ life, teachings, and works is truthful and reliable?
If we step back, we can see the chief priests’ and teachers’ problem with the situation. Children are praising Jesus as the true Messiah and either they are right or they are wrong to do so. He affirms the children’s interpretation of Him by reference to Psalm 8, a wonderful song of praise to God.
The religious leaders are suspicious about this claim, and understandably so. They are wrong, of course. Einstein famously said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Theirs is a failure of imagination. They have knowledge of their scriptures but they simply cannot put together the connections between Jesus’ actions and teachings—and the response of the people—to the truth of who Jesus is. The bad news is that, like any of us, once we’ve made up our minds, we tend to dig in our heels. Unfortunately, this will only get worse as this final week in the life of Jesus plays out.
An important theme of the whole Bible plays out. The lowly and least likely persons are the very ones who see God for who He is and respond in faith. In this case, they perceive Jesus’ true significance rightly. Those with more status, training, and experience have the greatest problems getting to faith. Not long ago, Jesus welcomed the children and an exhorted His hearers to become like little children in order to enter His kingdom. Here we see that instruction play out in real life because if the chief priests and teachers had done so, they would have been able to imagine the new thing God was doing in Jesus of Nazareth.
[There’s something interesting about Matthew mentioning the city of Bethany so I’m going to say a little about that below as it is more of a Bible nerd note than a reflection related to discipleship.]
Application:
When have you observed (in someone else or yourself) difficulty imagining connections that were “hiding in plain sight” so to speak?
What else might the Holy Spirit be speaking with you about in the text today?
Prayer: Lord, help me see your wonderful works and, like the children, burst forth in worship and praise. Amen.
**Bible nerd extra notes**
Once this scene is complete, Matthew narrates the setting thus: “And He left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where He spent the night.” It bears mentioning that Bethany is a place of significance in the Gospels for this reason: Jesus’ friends Mary, Martha, and Lazarus lived there. Matthew never mentions them. They are referenced in Luke 10, when Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet while Martha is cleaning up and frustrated about it. Then they are featured prominently in John 11, when Lazarus has died and Jesus meets the sisters on His way to raise Lazarus. They are presented as good friends of Jesus. For such significant friends, it seems strange that they are not even named by Matthew, especially since he notes that Jesus retired to Bethany in order to spend the night.
One possible explanation of this odd combination—that Matthew tells us about Jesus going back to Bethany to stay for the night while never once referencing a family who is presented in two other Gospels as close friends with Jesus—is that Matthew does not know about Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. That would make sense of the data. It’s hard to conceive of Matthew knowing about them and making zero reference to their relationship with Him, unless he’s ignorant of their family.
An upshot of this explanation, if true, is that lends ever more credence to the historical rootedness of the Gospel accounts. Assuming this theory is true, then we have in Matthew an historical account of that week attesting to Jesus going to Bethany to stay overnight without knowledge of where or with whom He staying. And we have two other historical accounts with independent knowledge of Jesus’ close connections to a family in the city of Bethany. Given their portrayals in Luke and John, it seems likely that this is where Jesus was staying, even though Matthew doesn’t seem to know that detail. Multiple sources attesting to Jesus’ whereabouts and relational connections that are unaware of one another bolsters the historical credibility and reliability of the Gospel accounts as a whole.
“But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:23)
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Thanks for the notes.....interesting.