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Keep watch and be ready! Perhaps you think we overdid that point in recent articles? But I cannot have overdone it since in Matthew 25 (the next chapter) Jesus continues His teaching on the Mount of Olives by adding three more parables that also warn us to watch and be ready. The first is the parable of the five wise and five foolish virgins. The second is the parable of the talents (money). The third is the story of the separation of the sheep and the goats.

Each parable makes its own points but taken together they intensify and even broaden Jesus’ warnings. Instead of speaking of people who are obviously saved or lost, such as those who perished in the flood or the wicked, careless servant, Jesus seems to speak of people who look like believers and who even think they are but who will not be ready when He comes.

There are three ways in which the stories are the same.

First, in each case the return of the Lord is sudden and unexpected. In the story of the wise and foolish virgins, the cry, “Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!” comes at midnight, when the women are asleep. The cry awakens them, and they rise up suddenly. In the story of the talents, the master returns “after a long time” when he is least expected. In the case of the sheep and the goats, the decisive moment arrives “when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him.”

This is the chief point Jesus has been making from the very beginning of the discourse in chapter 24. The disciples wanted to know when Christ would return, and Jesus replied that they could not know. They would see many signs that would not be true signs of His coming. When He actually does come, His coming will be so sudden and unexpected that no signs of it can be given. Therefore, they must be ready.

Second, in each case the Lord’s return results in an unalterable division between two groups of people. The division is between those who are ready when Jesus returns and those who are not ready. In the case of the women, five go into the wedding banquet and five are shut out. In the case of the servants, two are commended and one is judged. In the case of the sheep and the goats, the sheep inherit the kingdom that has been prepared for them while the goats receive eternal punishment.

Finally, in each case the people who are lost are utterly surprised at their rejection. This is the most striking feature of these stories. The women who are shut out of the banquet can hardly believe that the door has been closed to them. The wicked servant thinks he has done right by burying the talent he was given. He expects to be praised and is astonished that he is rebuked and cast out. The goats do not understand the Lord’s disapproval. “Lord, when did we…not help you?”

When we think about this feature of the stories, we realize that they are not about people who have no use for Christ or His Gospel. They are about people who are part of what we would call the visible Church. Like many in our Churches today, these people think they are saved and that they are on their way to heaven, but their actual destiny is hell. Is it any wonder the Lord states His warning to “keep watch and be ready” so forcefully?

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org

The pictures in Matthew 24 stress the sudden nature and unpredictability of Christ’s return. The picture of the flood reminds us that many persons will be lost. The picture of the two men working in the fields and the two women grinding at the mill points to a radical separation and reminds us that we are not saved by knowing or being close to a believer. The picture of the thief reminds us that our souls are valuable and that it is simple prudence for us to be ready.

The next picture contrasts two servants. This picture provides an explanation of what being ready means. Being ready means loving, trusting, and waiting for Jesus Christ. The faithful servant is faithful because he is expecting his Lord’s return. But it also has to do with faithful service, that is, continuing to carry out what Jesus has left us in this world to do. We find the same idea in two of the three parables in Matthew 25. In one parable faithfulness is demonstrated by the wise use of the talents Christ has given (Mt.25.14-30). In the other it is seen in selfless service to those who are hungry or thirsty or have other pressing needs (vv.31-46).

How are we to evaluate the service of these two men? Not much is said about the good servant, only that he gave the other servants their food at the proper time. Jesus may be thinking of spiritual food and of the service of pastors in teaching the Bible. On the other hand, much is said about the bad servant. His service is marked by three vices.

He neglects his work because, he says, “My master is staying away a long time.” This reminds us of II Pe.3.4: “They will say, ‘Where is this “coming” he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.’ ” It always seems like that to unbelievers. Jesus has not returned yet, so they are careless. What seems delayed to us is not a delay with him. Therefore, says Peter, “Be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position.”

The second vice of the wicked servant is cruelty to his fellow servants, because he began “to beat” them. This is like the Pharisees whom Jesus said would pursue, flog, kill, and crucify his servants, only here it is not merely the apostles and missionaries who are beaten. The underservants are beaten, and the one doing the beating is a person who claims to be a servant of the Lord.

Finally, the Lord denounces the wicked servant for his carousing.  He has begun “to eat and drink with drunkards.” He is behaving like those living in the days of Noah who were “eating and drinking” and “knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away.”

The passage says of the good servant only that it will be good for him when his master returns. But of the bad servant it says, “The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware… He will assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

There is an old fable in which three apprentice devils were talking to Satan. The first one said, “I will tell people there is no God.” Satan replied, “That will not fool many, because they know there is a God.” The second devil said, “I will tell them there is no hell.” Satan said, “You will never fool many that way, because they know there is a hell.” The third said, “I will tell people there is no hurry.” Satan said, “Go, and you will ruin millions.”

So I ask, even as Jesus asks over and over again: Are you ready for His return? Are you watching? To be ready when Jesus returns means salvation; not to be ready is to perish.

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org

Jesus said, “… stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.  But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part  of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect” (Mt.24.41-44).

The parable teaches the sudden and unpredictable coming of the Lord and is used this way in four other New Testament passages. Paul wrote, “The day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, ‘Peace and security,’ then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape” (I Th.5.2-3). Peter said, “The day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed” (II Pe.3.10). Jesus told the Church in Sardis, “If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you” (Re.3.3). He says the same thing later in Revelation: “Behold, I am coming like a thief” (Re.16.15). Each of these verses emphasizes the suddenness of Christ’s return.

But the image of a thief adds two additional factors. First, it adds the matter of value, since the thief comes to steal what is worthwhile. Almost everyone values his or her possessions. No one is careless with money, cars, or jewelry. That is why we protect these things. If we take such great care about these items, things that will all be lost to us or decay over time, should we not at least take that much care about things that are eternal? Should we not be at least equally anxious for the salvation of our souls?

Jesus said on an earlier occasion, “What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul?” (Mt.16.26). Obviously, it will be no good at all. Such a person will have lost the only thing that really matters, and in the end he will lose the world as well.

The picture of the thief also emphasizes the necessity of being watchful. “Since no one knows at what time, or during what ‘watch,’ the thief might strike, constant vigilance is required,” says D. A. Carson. The need to watch is explicitly stated both in the verse that precedes the words about the thief and in the one that follows. “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come” and, “So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

Are you keeping watch? Are you ready?

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org

In Matthew 24, the disciples ask Jesus, “…when will these things be, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

The first part of Jesus’ answer has to do with bad things that will happen, but which are not in themselves signs of the end. The signs that are not signs are: false messiahs, wars and rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes, persecutions, apostasy, and false prophets. It is easy to give many examples of these from the early years of Church history. But that is not the point. The point is that false teachers, natural disasters, persecutions, forsaking of the faith by many, and false teachers will characterize history. We will always have these things. They are painful, and Jesus likens them to “the beginning of birth pains,” but they are not signs that the end of the world is near. These things existed in the disciples’ days, and they have existed in every age of Church history up to and including our own. Indeed, some of them have taken a great deal of time to develop – nation rising against nation and the Gospel being preached throughout the whole world, for instance. But the followers of Christ are not to be deceived by false teaching on this subject: “The end is still to come.”

The destruction of Jerusalem is a particularly terrible example of the birth pains Jesus is predicting, and He discusses it in detail, for its own sake – it would be a time of unprecedented suffering – and because of the special significance of Jerusalem in biblical history.

There was to be a warning sign of this calamity: when “you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes desolation,’ spoken of through the prophet Daniel.” Those words occur four times in Daniel, where they seem to refer to the desecration of the temple by Antiochus Epiphanes in 168 B.C. Antiochus erected an altar to Zeus over the altar of burnt offering and sacrificed a pig on it, which was the worst possible affront to Judaism, a true “abomination.” But Jesus was not referring to this past event in Matthew 24. He was referring to something like it that would happen before the fall of Jerusalem and would be a warning to His followers to flee the city.

The destruction of Jerusalem would be terrible, but this would still not be the end. Jesus Christ is God. Jesus is the Lord of history. He is the God of detailed circumstance. Nothing has ever happened that has not flowed in the channel that God has dug for it. There have never been any events that have flamed up in spite of God to leave him astonished or confused. The sin of man has reduced the world to an arena of passion and fury. Men tear at each other’s throats. Yet in the midst of the history of which Jesus Christ is Lord, each individual who has believed in Him as the Savior will know the power of His resurrection and will learn that events, however terrible, cannot separate us from the love of God.

This is our God, and this is the word of our God. Wars have come, and they will come again. People will suffer. Men will die. But instead of dismay, we are to serve Jesus faithfully even in the midst of these bad things – until He comes again.

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org

“Jesus called the crowd to Him and said, ‘Hear and understand: it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person’” (Mt.15.11).

Everything Jesus said seems radical to us because Jesus is God and God’s thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are His ways our ways. Yet it is probably the case that nothing Jesus ever said was as radical in terms of the religion of His day and all human thoughts about religion and true worship as what He told the Pharisees, crowds, and disciples in the first half of Matthew 15.

Jesus had been searching for rest, first on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee and then on the western side in the area of Gennesaret. But He was interrupted by the multitudes of people who were following Him wherever He went and who had now circled the lake again and were pressing Him with renewed demands for healings. While this was going on, some Pharisees and teachers of the law came from Jerusalem to ask about His disciples’ failure to wash their hands before eating. This had nothing to do with whether their hands were free of dirt. It was a matter of the Pharisees’ traditions, their ceremonies. That they came “from Jerusalem” probably indicates they were an official delegation.

Washing one’s hands before meals was not required by the Old Testament, but it had become an important part of the Pharisees’ teaching and was of paramount concern to them since their religion was based primarily on such matters.

What we learn in this story is how radically wrong Jesus insisted their position was. Jesus did not reply by some mild attempt to excuse His disciples: “They didn’t have a chance to wash; we’ve been out hiking; I’m sure they’ll do better next time.” Or by mere discussion: “Let’s talk about such washings; why do you think they’re so important?” Instead, He forcefully attacked the Pharisees for fussing about paltry matters while breaking God’s law in essential matters by their traditions. He said that their entire understanding of religion was wrong, that their hearts were “far from” God, and that their worship of God was “vain.”

Even stronger, when His disciples warned Him that the Pharisees were offended by what He said, Jesus called them “blind guides” leading blind men and plants that God had not planted that would eventually be “pulled up by the roots.” This can only mean that the Pharisees were plantings of Satan and would be destroyed by fire at the last judgment.

By these words Jesus was not only condemning their system, He was condemning the best of human religion, saying that all human efforts to please God are external and vain, and that the only thing that really matters is a radical change of heart, since it is what comes out of the heart that makes a man “unclean” (v.18).

The point of Matthew 15 as a whole is that the kingdom of God is for Gentiles as well as Jews because Christianity rests on an entirely different foundation than did Judaism.

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org

Everything Jesus said seems radical to us because Jesus is God and God’s thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are his ways our ways (Is.55.8). Yet it is probably the case that nothing Jesus ever said was as radical in terms of the religion of His day and all human thoughts about religion and true worship as what He told the Pharisees, crowds, and disciples in the first half of Matthew 15.

Quoting from Isaiah, Jesus said, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.” This was Jesus’ second response to a question the religious leaders asked – it was even stronger than the first. He is accusing them of hypocritical and therefore utterly false worship. He said that Isaiah had been prophesying about them when he wrote, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.”

That is a damning accusation for people who were regarded as the best people of their day, but it was a just condemnation – for a love of tradition more than a genuine love of God always leads to false religion. In fact, it leads to self-righteousness, which was the chief characteristic of these men. Self-righteousness does not bring a person into heaven. Rather, it leads to judgment and death since the only possible basis for our justification before God is Christ’s righteousness, not our own.

Jesus called the crowds to Him and strongly applied what He had said, “What goes into a man’s mouth does not make him ‘unclean,’ but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him ‘unclean.’ ” This was a direct contradiction of the Pharisees, for He was saying that what matters before God is not clean hands or kosher food, which is what they were concerned about, but a purified heart.

“Clean hands” refers to one who is holy in outward actions as well as inwardly, because he has been changed within. It is the exact opposite of Pilate, who although he washed his hands publicly, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood,” nevertheless was guilty in his condemnation of the Lord.

Psalm 15.1 asks, “Lord, who may dwell in your sanctuary? Who may live on your holy hill?”

Psalm 15.2-5 answers:

He whose walk is blameless

and who does what is righteous,

who speaks the truth from his heart

and has no slander on his tongue,

who does his neighbor no wrong

and casts no slur on his fellow man,

who despises a vile man

but honors those who fear the Lord,

who keeps his oath

even when it hurts,

who lends his money without usury

and does not accept a bribe against the innocent.

This is the character of those who please God, but the only people who will ever have such a character are those who have had their nature changed by God. Or to put it in the language Jesus used when He spoke to Nicodemus, “You must be born again” (John 3.7).

Maranatha!

(mar-uh-nath-uh – “Our Lord Comes”)

Pastor Steve can be reached at PastorSteve@MaranathaBibleChurch.org