54 Why Jesus Made Ministry Harder for His Disciples (Matthew 10:8-23)

Krisan Marotta: Welcome to the Wednesday in the Word Podcast. I'm Krisan Marotta, and this is my podcast about what the Bible means and how we know. Today we'll be studying Matthew chapter 10, verses 8 through 23. This is the 54th talk in my series on the Gospel of Matthew. Lecture notes for today's talk are on the link below this podcast, and you can find them at wednesdayintheword.com slash Matthew 5.4. Thanks for joining me today. Five times in his gospel, Matthew records a major teaching of Jesus, and we are looking at the second of those teachings, the second discourse, where Jesus gives instructions to the twelve as he sends them out. Jesus has called together the twelve and he is sending them out to minister on his behalf. We know from Luke that many other disciples followed Jesus, but these twelve are the ones he chooses and will eventually commission to be the apostles who carry on his ministry. Later he will send out seventy, but on this occasion he's sending only the twelve. Matthew told us that Jesus has been preaching that the kingdom of heaven is at hand and that he has been healing every disease and affliction, and the disciples are now going out to do exactly that same thing. He sends them only into Jewish territory. He's not sending them to the Gentiles or the Samaritans. He sends them to the lost sheep of Israel, and he has given them the authority to do exactly the same kinds of things he's been doing. Jesus is taking a very important first step in passing his ministry over to the twelve. They don't know it yet, but ultimately Jesus is going to leave and he's going to send them out to the world as his representatives. So they will be his apostles, messengers who are sent out to speak and act for him. This sending is a kind of dress rehearsal. He's sending them out while he's still around, but ultimately he knows that he's going back to his father and they are going to have to carry on the torch. And if you stop and think about it, you and I know about Jesus today because of the work of the apostles. Jesus himself never wrote anything down. We know about him through his representatives and the people that they taught. And this story in chapter 10 is about the first time they take on that task. This discourse is different in nature from the first one we looked at, the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount deals with a central question for all of humanity, which is who will be saved, who will find a place in the kingdom of God. It's very easy to make the connection between that sermon and believers today. Most everything Jesus said there was directly applicable to us. This sermon is not so straightforward. This discourse is between Jesus, his disciples, and the Jewish people. Jesus is sending his disciples out to preach and heal the lost sheep of Israel. But even though it's not directly relevant to us, it is still part of our story, and I think it is relevant for us today, as we'll see, especially as we get deeper into the sermon, it's going to get more generic and more directly applicable to us today as we get farther into it. So let's start with Matthew ten, eight through fifteen. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without pain, give without pay. Acquire no gold or silver or copper for your belts, no bag for your journey, or two tunics or sandals or staff, for the laborer deserves his food. And whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it and stay there until you depart. As you enter the house, greet it, and if the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it, but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town. Truly I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town. The first point that Jesus makes is that they are not to charge for their ministry. Jesus didn't charge them to be his disciples, they do not pay him to be their teacher, and likewise they should not charge the Israelites they are going out to minister to. That does not mean that they should not receive support from the people they minister to. As we'll see, that's the whole point of what follows. Jesus is telling them not to make payment a precondition. They are to teach and heal, whether others support them in return or not. Since Jesus tells them not to charge for their ministry, they might expect him to tell them, okay, pack a lot of provisions for your journey. He's sending them off on this long walking tour from town to town. If they can't charge people, well then it only makes sense that they'd better be prepared to take with them everything they need. Their expectation would be to provide for themselves. They'd have a money belt, they'd have a bag filled with as much as they could carry of whatever they might need. They would take an extra pair of sandals because they know they will be walking a lot and the sandals they have might break or wear out. They would pack an extra tunic in case the one they have becomes soiled or unusable, or if the weather changes and they need something extra for warmth. But Jesus tells them the opposite. They are not to stock up on provisions before they leave. They're told to leave with what they have. No extra money, no extra bag, no extra clothing, no extra shoes, just go. Jesus is deliberately putting them in a situation where they are going to be dependent upon the hospitality of the people in the towns they visit. He's creating a situation where their well-being is going to depend on whether or not the people in the towns receive them. If they're not well received, they're going to be in trouble because they don't have any resources of their own. The reason Jesus gives in 1010 is the worker is worthy of his support. And at first reading that sounds strange because he's just told them not to charge people. So it sounds like he's saying, I want you to do this for free because the worker is worthy of his support. How does that work together? I think Jesus is telling them something like this You're doing the work of God. You are helping me, Jesus, spread the message of the kingdom. You're miraculously healing as a mercy from God and a sign that God is with your message. People ought to recognize that. They ought to welcome you and they ought to want to provide for your needs. The people should know that the worker is worthy of his support. If they appreciate your work and your message, then they are going to be glad to have you around and they will be hospitable and take care of you. I, Jesus, am making your well-being a kind of test for the people of Israel. I want you to be dependent upon their goodwill. Those who recognize the importance and the truth of your message will welcome you. Those who do not like your message or fail to recognize the truth of it are going to turn you away. So Jesus deliberately puts them in this situation. He wants them to travel from town to town, and in each town they should ask around, find someone who seems to be worthy, who would be appropriate to approach for hospitality. Now, Jesus doesn't spell out how to determine who's worthy. Presumably, it's not the town drunk. Hospitality was an important virtue. It was an honor and a duty in their culture. Presumably, that person would have some means to provide hospitality and will ask them to stay at his house. They're to enter the house with a greeting of peace be to this house. But as they stay there, it may turn out that the house is not worthy, that those in the household are hostile to their teaching and mission. The head of the household is not willing to be at peace with them or this Jesus they represent. Instead, it turns out he might oppose them and their message. In that case, they are to take back their expression of peace. And if everyone in the village turns out to be hostile to them and their message, they're to leave. And as they leave, they're to shake the dust of the city off their feet. Now shaking the dust off their feet is the sort of thing a Jew might do after going through a Gentile town. In his gospel, Luke makes it clear that this is a public ceremonial act. In Luke 9, 4 and 5, and whatever house you enter, stay there and from there depart. And wherever they do not receive you, when you leave that town, shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them. In the sending of the seventy, Luke also says this, this is Luke 10, 10 and 11. But whenever you enter a town and they do not receive you, go into its streets and say, Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet we wipe off against you. Nevertheless know this that the kingdom of God has come near. So Luke makes it clear that this action is a testimony, and he even gives them instructions for a verbal confirmation of that when they leave. So if they reject you, Jesus says, leave with a very public and symbolic act of shaking the dust off your feet. He wants them to communicate, we are telling you truth from God. The kingdom of God has come near, but you wouldn't listen, so we're leaving, and we don't even want the dust from your city clinging to us. Now that probably seems like a very harsh response, and I think it is, and I think that's the point. Rejecting the messengers of God is an act of profound rebellion. The issue is not, oh, are the disciples being rude or were the hosts being inhospitable in the town? They're rejecting messengers from the Messiah. And notice the shocking language Jesus said. He takes this very seriously in 1015. Truly I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town. Well, in case you're not familiar with the story, the biblical account of Sodom and Gomorrah is found in Genesis chapters 18 and 19. Briefly, the Lord and two angels come to speak to Abraham, and the Lord tells Abraham that the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin is so grievous that he plans to destroy them. Abraham pleads with the Lord to have mercy on the cities because his nephew Lot and Lot's family live in Sodom. Then the two angels, disguised as human men, visit Sodom and Gomorrah, and Lot meets them in the city square, and he urges them to stay at his house, and the men agree. But before the men could go to bed, all the people of every part of the city, both young and old, were told surround the house, and they demand that Lot hand over the visitors so that they can abuse them. The angels strike the men surrounding Lot's house with blindness and urge Lot and his family to flee the city to escape the wrath of God that was about to come upon it. So Lot and his family flee the city, and then as we read in Genesis 19, 24 and 25, then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulphur and fire from the Lord out of heaven, and he overthrew those cities and all the valley and all the inhabitants of the cities and what grew on the ground. The destruction of these cities are frequently alluded to in scripture. The wickedness of the twin cities became proverbial. Sodom and Gomorrah became the poster children for willful, sinful rejection of God. To compare a Jewish town to Sodom and Gomorrah is amazingly harsh, but this is how serious it is to reject the Messiah of God and his apostles. In sending out the twelve, I think Jesus is deliberately crafting an experience that is going to be profoundly important for both the apostles and the children of Israel. Jesus creates a meeting between his representatives and the cities of Israel and deliberately sets up that meeting so that his representatives are dependent upon the hospitality of the people. The apostles will then have firsthand experience of the ways in which Israel is going to respond to them as representatives of Jesus, and it's not going to be pretty. They have no money and no resources. Their daily well-being is dependent on how people respond to them and their message. And that response is going to be really obvious and personal. They will immediately know who accepts them and who rejects them. They're not going to be like a televangelist who discovers months after the fact that, oops, the ratings are down. Or they're not going to be like an author whose book sales drop. The response of low ratings or the low sales is very far removed from the author or the televangelist. But the apostles will immediately experience the response firsthand. They could be in a situation where they have nothing to eat that day because no one in the town wants to listen to them. On the other side, the people of Israel are also experiencing a kind of test, the same kind of test that Jesus himself represented. His miracles and his teaching should provoke a response of faith and gratitude, but many are going to reject him instead. And the same thing is going to be true about how they respond to his representatives, the apostles. The ministry of the apostles becomes both a mercy and grace from God for those who listen and believe, but also a kind of judgment for those who listen and reject them. This is as significant an outreach to Israel as the ministry of the Old Testament prophets. Jesus, the Messiah, has come. He's taking his message to the people of Israel, and his representatives are extending that message throughout Galilee. That's very analogous to God sending his prophets to the people to call them to repent. Jesus is sending the twelve to call them to repent. Well, how are the people going to respond? The apostles are about to experience that response firsthand. Now when Jesus sends them out without money or resources, I don't think he means this as a model for all ministers, all evangelists, all workers in all cultures in all times. I don't think he's suggesting that those who preach the gospel should make no preparations at all. For one thing, that's not how we see it work out in the rest of the New Testament. For example, in 1 Corinthians 9, Paul tells us that as an apostle he has the right to receive financial support from those he ministers to, but he sometimes declines to take that support out of love for them. He provides for himself with a day-to-day job of tent making in order not to confuse them into thinking that he's preaching the gospel for financial gain. This mission of the twelve is a particular phase in the training of the apostles and in their relationship with Israel. I think Jesus is setting up a unique situation for their sake and for Israel's sake. Later those circumstances are going to change, and we see that clearly in the story. Luke records that on the night Jesus was arrested, he says to his apostles, this is Luke 22, 35 and 36. And he said to them, When I sent you out with no money bag or knapsack or sandals, did you lack anything? So he's referring back to this event, and he says, When I sent you out and I said, Don't make provisions, how did it go? Did you lack anything? They said nothing. He said to them, But now let the one who has a money bag take it, and likewise a knapsack, and let the one who has no sword sell his cloak and buy one. So when he sent them out earlier, Jesus meant for them to experience the full range of acceptance or rejection that they would find among the people of Israel. They were assessing the spiritual temperature of the people by making themselves dependent upon the people's goodwill. Now the situation is different. That lesson has been learned. Now he says, when you go out, take the provisions you need. The temperature is decidedly chilly out there. Not only should you take the provisions you need, pack a sword, because you're going to find hostility and rejection. So I think this mission of the 12 is a unique and distinct event in the history of Israel. It was a learning experience for everyone concerned, and it is not meant to be a model for how everyone should conduct their future missions, trips, or ministry work. Now think about what the apostles probably expected. If the kingdom of heaven is truly at hand, then the Messiah is here. If the Messiah is here, then he must be about to take his place on David's throne. And if the Messiah is about to take his place on David's throne, then we're about to win big. This is the triumph of God over all of evil. They probably expect that their mission is going to be a kind of triumphant gathering of the people of Israel. The Messiah's here, the Messiah, the King of Israel, is coming to rescue us. Let's gather together and overthrow Rome. They probably expect that they're going to be gathering a mighty following as they travel from town to town, and that they will be gathering a grassroots groundswell of excitement for the Messiah and his kingdom. Yet that's not what's going to happen. Jesus tells them that many are going to reject them. The experience they have on this first trip introduces them to the harsh reality that many people refuse to follow God and his Messiah. Therefore, this job of proclaiming the message of the Messiah is going to be very hard. And Jesus makes it even harder by saying, Don't take any provisions. This is a lesson they are not going to be able to avoid learning. And they are about to learn that the children of Israel are not very interested in the fact that the Messiah has come. That's a very big deal and probably not what the apostles were expecting. As Jesus continues, most of what he says is about rejection, being arrested, being persecuted, and being hated. He emphasizes the difficulty. Let's look at Matthew ten, sixteen through twenty three. Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to the courts and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles. When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. For it is not you who speak, but the spirit of your father speaking through you. Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise up against parents and have them put to death, and you will be hated by all for my name's sake, but the one who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes. Except for the first sentence, ten sixteen, this entire section is also found in Mark and Luke. The verse about the sheep among the wolves is the only one that's found only in Matthew. But Mark and Luke both include this section in what is called the Olivet Discourse. At the very end of his ministry, Jesus talks to his disciples about what's going to happen in the future. They're sitting on the Mount of Olives looking across to Jerusalem, and so this talk is usually referred to as the Olivet Discourse, and it is the fifth of the five discourses in Matthew. There, Jesus tells them what they can expect to happen after he leaves, and this description that he gives is very close to what the book of Acts reports happened to the apostles after Jesus leaves. They will be persecuted, they will be beaten, they will be delivered to courts, they will stand before Gentile kings and governors. And in these circumstances, the Spirit of God will give them amazing wisdom so that they can powerfully preach the gospel and accurately remember everything Jesus taught them. While these words very accurately describe what the apostles will experience after Jesus leaves, they do not seem to describe what happens to the disciples in this first mission to the Jews. We have no record of this kind of thing happening during this first journey. They didn't stand before Gentile kings because Jesus told them to stay in Jewish territory. But all of those things are exactly what they did after Jesus left when they picked up their ministry in earnest. And I think that's what Jesus is talking about later in the Olivet Discourse. But in Matthew, this discourse is much earlier in Jesus' ministry. Matthew has put this block of teaching here. What do we make of that? Well, here's what makes sense to me. As I look at all the gospels, it seems to me that Jesus spoke to his disciples on many occasions about what was coming in the future and what they could expect as his representatives. Some of that language pertains to their immediate circumstances, and some of it looks ahead to future things to come. What I think Matthew has done here is give us a very true picture of the kind of instructions Jesus told them on these occasions. He doesn't tell us which particular statements Jesus has made on which particular occasions, rather, he collected together the kinds of instructions Jesus taught about this particular subject. Everything in chapter 10 comes from various teachings and instructions Jesus gave his disciples about what they're going to face as his representatives. They may not stand in front of kings and governors on this particular trip, but one day they will. So their understanding is to be informed by good judgment about what is true. It's not to be informed by defensiveness or vengeance or desire to win or manipulate or something like that. In trying to think this through, I think the Apostle Paul is a good example of this kind of shrewd integrity that was needed to be an apostle. In one particular story in Acts 21, Paul got involved in a riot in Jerusalem. He was falsely accused of bringing a Gentile into the temple, and a mob forms and starts beating him. The Romans intervene, and as the soldiers are taking Paul away, Paul says, I'm a Jew from Tarsus, let me speak to the crowd. Well, Tarsus was a very important city. The soldiers agree, and Paul has an opportunity to preach to the Jews of Jerusalem. The mob listens to Paul for a while, and then they become angry when Paul mentions taking the gospel to the Gentiles. The soldiers have to take Paul away. They take him back to the barracks and prepare to flog him to get the truth out of him. And as that's happening, Paul says, Is it lawful for you to flog an uncondemned Roman citizen? So when he needed to speak to the Jews, he mentioned, I'm a Jew from Tarsus. Now he's about to be beaten by Roman soldiers. He says, By the way, I'm a Roman citizen. When the commander finds out that Paul's a Roman citizen, he fears for how much trouble he's gotten himself into and he stops the beating. But then the commander decides he'd really like to know what's going on with this Paul guy, so he calls the Sanhedrin together, the Jewish ruling council, and he brings Paul before them to sort this thing out. Again, Paul has no power in this situation, but he's very strategic. The Sanhedrin is made up of both Pharisees and Sadducees. The Sadducees hold the power. They are the party of the high priest and the ruling elite, but they aren't particularly religious and they don't believe in a bodily resurrection. On the other hand, the Pharisees are very religious and they do believe in a resurrection. So while he's standing before the Sanhedrin, Paul calls out, I'm a Pharisee, and I'm on trial for the hope and the resurrection of the dead. Which is also true. Well, that gets the Sadducees and the Pharisees fighting among themselves, and the dispute gets so loud and violent that the soldiers have to take Paul away. So in each of these situations, we see Paul being very truthful, but also very strategic. He was a Jew from Tarsus and he brought that up when that was helpful. He was a Roman citizen and he mentioned that when it was helpful. And he was a Pharisee. All those things came into play when he needed to get his voice heard or to save his life. So we see Paul walking this tightrope in a very volatile and dangerous situation. But as he walks it, he understood the political undercurrents, he understood the people he was dealing with, and I think this is a good example of an apostle pursuing his ministry as a sheep among wolves. Paul had no power against the mob, against Rome, or against the Sanhedrin. Any one of them could have beaten or executed him at any moment, but he was wise about who he was dealing with, and he acted with truth and integrity to proclaim his message. I think that's the picture of what it means to be as wise as a serpent and as innocent as a dove. From here on we get this material that Mark and Luke later include in the Olivet Discourse. As Matthew tells it, Jesus is now pointing to the larger mission that they're going to have after he leaves. We'll go back to ten seventeen through twenty. Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to the courts and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake to bear witness before them and the Gentiles. When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour, for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Well, if you read through Acts, this is exactly the kind of things that happens to the apostles after Jesus leaves. And I want to comment briefly on this idea that God will give you the words to say. Way back when I was in college, I heard a Christian use this verse to justify not studying for an exam. Based on this verse, I've seen people put new believers up in front of large groups to teach with the advice don't worry about what you're going to say, it will all become clear. And when I first started teaching, I had someone quote this verse to me and tell me I was not supposed to prepare because that would be a lack of faith. The faithful act, they told me, was to stand up in front with a blank piece of paper, open my Bible, pray and see what comes out, letting God speak through me. Well, I can tell you, after 40 years as a Bible teacher, the less I prepare, the worse I am, without exception. The blank page method is a surefire way to be a disaster. If you look at the context here, I think it's fairly obvious that Jesus is not telling all Christian teachers everywhere to make no preparations about what they're going to teach. He's talking to his apostles. He is promising them that when they are in the extraordinary situation of being arrested and brought before kings, that they will be given the words to say. These are the twelve apostles. They have a unique authority and commission as representatives of Jesus. They have been given the authority to speak for and about Jesus that the rest of us do not have. Just as the prophets of the Old Testament could stand up and say, Thus says the Lord, so the apostles are representatives of Jesus Christ. They are sent out authoritatively to speak for Jesus. And in these situations that they're going to find themselves in, because they're apostles, God promises that he will make sure that he gets his message out by giving them the words to say. It's not their own thinking, it's not their own philosophy, they don't have to make up a worldview, they are not being sent out to proclaim anything of their own making before kings and nations. They are to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, and God is going to make sure that as his spokesman, they get it right. They will proclaim the Word of God because God is going to miraculously and extraordinarily give them clear, precise, and accurate understanding such that when they speak, they speak what He wants them to speak. You and I have no such promise. We are students of the Bible. And yes, it is true that any understanding or wisdom we gain from studying the Bible is a gift of the Holy Spirit. We see it, we learn it because He has opened our eyes to see it and learn it. But He does so through the ordinary means of Bible study, thought, prayer, and meditation. In my series on the Holy Spirit, we talked about two different works of the Spirit that are relevant here. One work is the particular understanding that the Spirit gives the apostles and prophets. This is revelation. The second work is understanding the message that the Spirit gives to all students of Scripture and believers. This is understanding. In Revelation, the Spirit makes known the thoughts of God to God's chosen messengers, who then speak out of that inspired understanding to tell the rest of us. So the Spirit reveals the thoughts of God to God's chosen messengers such that they understand it and can teach it to us, and the Spirit authenticates and testifies to the authority of God's chosen messengers through the miracles they perform. That's all revelation. In understanding, the Spirit is opening the ears of their listeners so that they receive the truth with humility and understanding. Understanding is something that the Spirit gives to all believers. Revelation is something that is only given to the apostles and prophets. So yes, I think God is teaching me as I study and do these podcasts, but he's not teaching me as an authoritative apostle with a promise that he's going to give me the words to say. We are Bible students telling each other what we've learned. I'm telling you, this is what I think the scriptures mean, and you're free to say, nope, I think you missed the point. The inspiration is in the scriptures. The inspiration was given to those who wrote the Bible. You and I are just trying to figure out what they said. The apostles had a promise we don't have. Jesus told them, I'm going to put you in extraordinarily difficult situations, and I'm going to make sure that you know what to say. And in part that's why we listen to them and why we study the scriptures, because God told his prophets and apostles the truth and promised that he would inspire their understanding such that they would get it right. We study the Bible because its authors were divinely inspired. Their message is divinely inspired. We teachers today are not divinely inspired. So I think it's crucial to understand the difference between revelation and understanding. Somehow Christians today have gotten this idea that we live by personal revelation. We tend to see the Holy Spirit as a kind of force, like from Star Wars, that we need to channel to get direction and guidance. And we think that the Holy Spirit has this direct one-to-one calm link into our mind, and we just have to figure out how to isolate the right frequency, and then we can listen to him. This is where we have to grasp the difference between revelation and understanding. God gives his prophets and apostles revelation. He revealed his words and his thoughts to particular individuals and charged them with telling the rest of us. To the rest of us, he gives understanding. Revelation is something no one understood up until the time God chose to reveal it to his messenger. Understanding is the receptivity needed to receive God's message as wisdom. God revealed his wisdom to his messengers, his apostles and prophets, and that's where we learn it. Our job is to listen to the word of God as revealed in his word, learn from it, gain wisdom from it, and apply it to our lives. God gives us both understanding, but in a different way. God's apostles and prophets learned it directly from God or from Jesus, or through a direct revelation of the Holy Spirit. The rest of us typically learn through the understanding that God has given his messengers. The Spirit still works on us, but in a different way. If you want to know what God thinks, you look at what he communicated to his apostles and prophets because they wrote it down. It will only be in your own head to the extent that you have read and studied and understood Scripture. So God gives his prophets and apostles revelation. Revelation is something no one has understood up until the time of God chose to reveal it to his messenger. Understanding is the receptivity to receive God's message as wisdom. And this verse in Matthew is a promise that God will ensure that his apostles get it right. It's not a promise to believers today that we can skip Bible study and skip seeking God. Jesus now begins a very sobering discussion about how everyone is going to hate them. And this topic is going to go on for a while. We'll be talking more about this theme in future podcasts, but we'll get into it now. He says in 10 21 and 22, brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death. But you will be hated by all for my name's sake, but the one who endures to the end will be saved. This division is a common theme in the teaching of Jesus. Family ties can be broken by the split between those who love Jesus and those who hate him. And this is deeply unsettling, especially in their culture, because families tended to be more cohesive. They stayed together, both geographically and emotionally, and family ties were often the most important support and commitment a person had. And here he says faith in Jesus can tear those families apart. The apostles are going out in the name of Jesus. That is, they are speaking as his representatives. They bear his name. They're not saying, here's my personal opinion. They're speaking in the name of Jesus, whom God has sent as his Messiah to proclaim the coming kingdom. So just as the Old Testament prophet says, Thus says the Lord, the apostles can say, This is what Jesus said. And many are going to hate them, the apostles, because they hate Jesus. Jesus is warning them that their own personal salvation is dependent on continuing to follow and trust him, even in the face of this hostility and persecution. They themselves need to persevere in the faith. Again, this is probably not the sort of reaction the disciples expected. Jesus is clearly sent by God. It sure looks like he's the long-awaited Messiah. The kingdom of God is all about victory. God establishing his rule over all creation through the Messiah. Kings and rulers are supposed to bow their knees before the Messiah. And Jesus is saying, Oh, wait, they're going to hate you, arrest you, beat you, and drag you before kings. You're going to be vulnerable, and you have to testify to me in that hostile environment. Was that the job they expected? They probably wanted to ride into victory with an army and an entourage and say, Hey, Roman king, here's your ultimatum, take it or leave it because the new king's in town. But that's not the plan. They're going to be beaten, persecuted, and rejected for proclaiming this message, and this would be surprising news. Well that brings us to Matthew 10 23. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes. Well this is a tough little verse. Some scholars have called it the most difficult verse in the New Testament canon, and there is a lot of debate about exactly what's going on. At first glance, this verse doesn't seem so hard to understand. The problem comes when you try to figure out exactly what Jesus means by the coming of the Son of Man and what that has to do with sending out his apostles. The coming of the Son of Man opens doors to all kinds of eschatological debates about the second coming. Is he talking about the second coming of Christ? If so, what does that have to do with the sending of the twelve? If he's not talking about the second coming, then what's he talking about? Well, many forests have died to generate the paper for the books written about this issue. And because there's so much to talk about, I'm going to leave this verse for the next podcast. I plan to do an entire podcast just on this verse, and even at that, I am really only going to be scratching the surface. Let me close this talk with one last comment. This passage is primarily directed at the apostles and their ministry to the Jews. I do think it has some implications for us tangentially, and as we continue in this discourse, we're going to talk more about them in future podcasts, but I want to mention one in particular now. Jesus is deliberately sending the twelve out and making it harder for them. He tells them not to stock up on the provisions they need. Instead, he tells them to rely on the hospitality of those they will meet and he tells them the people are going to hate and reject them. He's crafting an experience that's going to be difficult. He's sending them out like sheep among wolves, and he says so. Jesus makes it harder for them and he does so for their own sake. He wants to teach them something. He wants them to learn what it means to proclaim the name of Jesus, a name which many people will hate because ultimately, as his representatives, they will have a very difficult task in front of them, and he is preparing them for that task. The funny thing is that in doing this, Jesus is acting just like God. Jesus is treating his disciples the way God treats all of his people. We all get taught to swim by being thrown into the deep end of trials and struggles. The story of the Bible shows us that God is quite willing to take his people through hardships and through trials so that we learn to trust him. God teaches us to trust him through suffering primarily. He teaches us wisdom and discernment when we face difficult situations. He teaches us what is important and what is not, all things we desperately need to learn. And he usually does this through trials, struggles, and hardship. Our job is to persevere. Our job is to stand firm in the faith and lean on the hope of the gospel. We don't have to go out and create hardship or invite tribulation. It's gonna come. Our job is to face it, stand firm on our faith, and cling to the promises of the gospel. Thank you for listening to Wednesday in the Word. This is the podcast that explains not only what a passage means, but also shows you how to figure that out. You can hear all the previous episodes in this series on my website, wednesdayintheword.com. There is no charge, no spam, and no ads. If you've been blessed by this podcast, please subscribe to the podcast, leave a positive rating or review wherever you listen, but most importantly, tell a friend what you learned, and if you can, mention where you learned it. Our theme music is graciously provided by my friend and my favorite musician, Reggie Coates. You can listen to all of Reggie's music at heartfeltmusic.org. Thank you for joining me today. I'm Krisan Marotta, and I'll see you next week at Wednesday in the Word.