MATTHEW 16:1-12
THERE IS AN OLD AND WISE SAYING about prayer: God always answers prayer. Sometimes God says “yes,” sometimes he says “no,” and sometimes he says “wait.” We have all had God say “no” (for our own good). We have all had God say “wait” (you might be waiting right now). We have also (I would imagine if you’ve been a Christadelphian for any length of time) had God say “yes.” You have asked for something in faith and according to his will, and God gave it to you.
In a talk on 1 Kings 17 at our church. Dr. Nick Perrin shared a story of how God provided for him. When he was working for InterVarsity and was short on financial support, he laid out (literally on the floor) all his needs (the bills/the costs) before the Lord, crying out to him for help. Almost immediately after that prayer, the phone rang. It was nearly midnight. It was an old friend who wanted to support the ministry. God said, “Yes.” Now all of us have heard stories like that—wonderful stories of God’s provision in times of great need. And many of us, I hope, have experienced God’s provision, answers to prayer, in ways that only the word miraculous is properly attached to them.
Have you ever had God say “yes” to a specific prayer? Yes, you have. (At least I hope you have.) But have you ever had God say “yes” one day and then the next day or week or month you are confronted with a new crisis and you doubt God’s care and competence? Or, even more common with me, a need arises, I have not yet prayed for what I need, and God provides miraculously anyway. He knows what I need before I ask, and he gives what I need before I ask. And then (here’s the sad part of the story) the next time a crisis comes, I open my mouth to God in prayer (if it can be called that) only to grumble, complain, doubt. “God, how am I possibly to deal with this?”
As we begin Matthew 16, we are warned about dual dangers. One is false teaching, what Jesus calls “the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees”; the other is spiritual amnesia or forgetfulness. We will start with forgetfulness.
The First Danger: Forgetfulness
The first danger is forgetfulness, forgetting what God has done in the past, or here specifically in our text, forgetting Jesus’ mighty works. The middle of our text records,
When the disciples reached the other side, they had forgotten to bring any bread. Jesus said to them, “Watch and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” And they began discussing it among themselves, saying, “We brought no bread.” (vv. 5-7)
I envision the scene like this. It’s like a husband and wife driving, taking a needed getaway, and the husband crosses onto a drawbridge, and suddenly he feels and he sees that the bridge is rising. So he turns to his wife and shouts, “We have to do something; we’re going to plunge into the river!” And she replies, “You know what, I forgot to pack my swimsuit and the suntan lotion.” His warning went in one ear and out the other. There is real danger ahead, but she’s heard only enough of his warning to think of some temporal need.
I will give another illustration, to prove I’m not chauvinistic. This same couple is in that same car again on that same vacation, and the man is driving (I still think the man should drive) and they whiz by a sign that reads, “Warning: Bridge Out!” The wife immediately turns to him and exclaims, “Honey, stop! The bridge is out!” But he, too oblivious to look at the obvious, checks his GPS and says, “Oh, don’t worry, this says that the road goes right through.” Whoosh. Down they go.
Have you ever been oblivious when it comes to God like these disciples were? One moment you touch and taste and see the Lord is good, and the next moment you’re wondering about Wonder Bread. “Hey, Jesus, we forgot the bread. Are you listening? We forgot the bread!”
What does Jesus say to this lack-of-manna mantra? “I know you forgot the bread, you knuckleheads.” That’s my paraphrase of verse 8. “I don’t care if you forgot the bread. You forgot me! You forgot what I just did twice in the past two months.” The real version reads like this:
But Jesus, aware of this, said, “O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember [ah, forgetfulness!] the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many baskets you gathered?” (vv. 8-10)
Faithless Forgetfulness. Spiritual Amnesia.
I’m not a very mathematical man. But I’m proud to say that even I can do the math here. Even I can do the messianic math of verses 9, 10!
One day Jesus took five loaves and fed 5,000. Then, what seemed like the next day, he took seven loaves and fed 4,000. Now, I can count to five and to seven, with eight toes left. I can add them together (the answer is twelve). I can even add 4,000 and 5,000 (that’s 9,000). I can do the math. But isn’t this strange math, unmathematical math, when it comes to the multiplication? Why five for 5,000 and seven for 4,000? Shouldn’t it be the other way around? The more the disciples had, the more Jesus could do? No. That’s just Jesus’ point. The less the disciples have to work with, the more Jesus can do!
Here I think Jesus is not merely saying, “Remember the leftovers— twelve baskets, then seven baskets full of scraps.” I think he is also saying, “Remember what I had to work with.” With seven loaves, he fed 4,000. With five loaves, he fed 5,000. Imagine what he could do with zero! “We brought no bread.” No bread, no problem. “Don’t forget what I’ve done. Don’t forget who I am. Don't forget how I work.” That’s what Jesus is saying here.
How easy it is for us to forget what God has done in our lives and in salvation history! Our generation so little values two essential components of faith—history and eschatology. That is, instead of looking backwards at what God has done in history and looking forward to what God will do in due time (that’s eschatology, having a longing for the last things, the culmination of God’s kingdom), we live instead in the ahistorical/existential now.
There is nothing wrong with a now faith (I hope you trust in Christ right now). But it limits the growth of our faith if we don't also, in the now, look back to then and look forward to that.
In my book God’s Lyrics, I talk about how the songs we find in both the Old and New Testaments recall God's mighty acts in history. In the Old Testament songs, God’s people sang of the creation of the world, Israel’s election, the exodus, the giving of the Law, the establishment of David’s kingdom, exilic judgment, restoration, and so on. In the New Testament God’s people sing of Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and return. In both Testaments they sing (as we should sing) of God’s works in history.
In the song of Habakkuk, the last song I study in that book. I write about Habakkuk’s faith, which is the model for faith in the New Testament—“the righteous shall live by his faith” (Habakkuk 2:4). Here’s how Habakkuk lived by faith. It’s all spelled out in chapter 3 of his little book. He first remembers God’s redemptive history, notably what God did in the exodus and the conquest (those two important events meld together into one memory in his mind). Then, based on God's righteous judgments in the past, Habakkuk, in the present, trusts that God will judge and save again in the future. He had this historical/eschatological faith, the faith we all need if we want to grow, a faith that looks to the future—trusting God will work again—because it looks back into history, remembering (not forgetting) what God has already done.
The Second Danger: False Teaching
The first danger is forgetfulness, forgetting what God has done in the past or here specifically in our text forgetting Jesus’ mighty works—who he is, what he has done, how he works, what he likes to work with. The second danger is false teaching, a specific false teaching (v. 12), what Jesus labels “the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees” (vv. 6, 11, 12).
A few years ago I read through the New Testament quickly—five to fifteen chapters a day. I did it that way because I wanted to get a feel for the flow of the whole. I also wanted to see what themes were most often repeated (the ones I might miss from reading just a chapter or two a day). By doing this I noticed three themes I previously relegated to “insignificant.” First, I noticed the call to persevere in the faith. Second, I noticed Jew/Gentile relations—the newness of that relationship in the gospel, the necessity of it, the theological and cultural tensions with it, and the way forward in unity. Third, I noticed how much attention is given to false teachers and false teaching. Have you ever noticed those themes?
Sometimes we have this existential faith (a now and now only faith), and sometimes we read the Bible existentially (what topics, themes, verses can I relate to, understand, apply to me right now?). But false teaching is in there. Don't miss it.
The apostles hit on that theme and Jesus hits on that theme so often because false teachers and their false teaching (even more so than the teachers themselves) are so dangerous. This is one of the great flaws in today’s everybody-is-entitled-to-one’s-own-opinion opinion. That idea is one of the most thoughtless thoughts in the history of the world, in my opinion. Listen, ideas have consequences. My opinion is not necessarily equal to yours, and vice versa.
We can see, in retrospect, that ideas have consequences with, for example, someone like Adolf Hitler. In 1925-1926 Hitler wrote a book called Mein Kampf ('My Struggle” in English), and he writes about his struggle. His struggle with what? The Jews, of course. He details how and why he became growingly anti-Semitic, concluding that one cannot be both a German and a Jew. What a political ideology! He was nuts, right? What impact would this two-volume work have on the world? Ideas have consequences. Those two volumes led to World War II. Evil ideas are the most dangerous powers in the world—now, then, always.
First Jesus warns us about forgetfulness, but second, he warns about evil ideas or false teaching. So “beware”—that’s the word he uses. And notice he doesn’t say, “Beware of the huge red dragon with six heads that looks and sounds dangerous and breathes out fiery false teachings.” Rather he says, “Look out for leaven!” Not even, “Watch out for burnt crust on the bread” or “mold around the edges.” No, he warns of leaven, a substance you can’t see well, a substance that is hard to perceive is there. But something unseen has subtle but sure effects, like drops of an odorless, colorless poison in a glass of champagne—one sip doesn’t kill, but drinking the glass dry will. Not immediately but eventually you’re dead. This is why the word “understand” (or “understood” or “perceive”) is used several times in our text. Watch out for the leaven. See what is hard to see, but you need to see.
So, what then does deadly “leaven” look like? What are we to watch out for? Let’s look back at our text and see what we can see. In verse 1 we read, “And the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and to test him they asked him to show them a sign from heaven.”
Notice several facts here. First, this is the first time the Sadducees are mentioned in reference to Jesus’ ministry. (They are referenced in 3:7 in relation to John the Baptist.) We’ve gotten to know the scribes and Pharisees, but who are the Sadducees? What you need to know about them is what Scripture says about them. This is how Matthew describes them: “Sadducees... say that there is no resurrection” (22:23; cp. Acts 23:6-8). This was a different position from Jesus, but also from the Pharisees.
So first notice the Sadducees have entered the drama. Second, notice they approach Jesus with the Pharisees. This is a very “unlikely alliance.” It would be like the Israeli national soccer team getting together with the Iranian team to eat pig’s feet while they cheer for the U.S. in the World Cup. What are these two doing together—the overly ritualistic with the overly rationalistic, the super-serious with the super-sophisticated, the legalist with the modernist? They are together because Jesus threatens them—their religious power—individually, and so they come together corporately to deal with him. It’s a diabolical, not a theological alliance.
Third, notice that they came to “test him.” The word “test” here is the same word used in 4:1 of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. They come to tempt him. How? The same way the serpant tempted Adam and Eve—“be like God"—and the same way the adversary tempted Jesus in the wilderness—“act like God." They say, “Give us a heavenly sign. Yes, we’ve seen the earthly signs. You turned bread into more bread, but we want to see you turn the moon into blood. Enough with healing the sick, feeding the poor, and dealing with those of a lesser spiritual caste; show us something spectacular in the sky! You’ve made some God-sized claims for yourself [see 7:21-23; 9:2; 11:4-6, 27; 12:28], so we want a God-sized sign. We'll take the sun standing still, a starless night sky, lightning that strikes a few trees that then fall and spell out M for Messiah. Hey, we’ll even take a voice from Heaven. Just give us a voice, somebody up there saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, listen to him.’”
Ah, but what they ask for in verse 1 flies in the face of Jesus' person and mission. He has not come to show off his superpowers, but to demonstrate the power and justice and love of God through his weakness, even his death on a cross. And while he lives he will never perform just to prove himself. Do you want to see from God and hear from God? Here’s how it works, according to chapters 8-15: you must come in faith first. And then let the fireworks begin. No faith, no fireworks (cp. 13:56)! No faith, no heavenly voice. No faith, no manna in the wilderness. No faith, no sky-filled wonders for you from this Messiah. He answered them, “You want to talk about signs; let’s talk about signs.”
When it is evening, you say, “It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.” And in the morning, “It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.” You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times [what you see down here on earth, before your very eyes]. An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a [heavenly] sign, but no sign will be given to it except the [earthly] sign of Jonah.” (vv. 2-4)
He felt the coldness of these men’s hearts. He saw the charcoal impurities of these purity freaks. Oh, they could tell the weather—isn’t that still the world’s preoccupation?—but they couldn’t tell time. They knew if it was going to storm or not, but they couldn’t tell that the fullness of time was upon them, that the King of the kingdom of the heavens was here. And in this way they are so like some of our friends, coworkers, and neighbors. They worry about whether or not it’s going to rain tomorrow, but they don’t give a single serious thought about Jesus and his death and resurrection.
Do you want a sign, Pharisees and Sadducees? Do you want a sign, weather-watchers of our world? Here’s a sign—the sign of Jonah (cp. 12:39). That's the sign to look for! Remember Jonah—his self-sacrifice (“throw me overboard”), his burial in the waters (he’s as good as dead), but then his deliverance from death (the big fish—salvation!), and then remember his proclamation to the Gentiles, the Ninevites (the Gentiles of the Gentiles). “Remember Jonah. Now look at me. What he did, I’m doing and will do. Just watch and see! Watch what I do. Listen to what I teach. See if it fits with Moses and the Prophets. See if it fits with the promises of God. See if it fits with the pattern of the prophet Jonah. For if you won’t watch and listen now, you won’t believe even if I rise from the dead (cp. Luke 16:31). You want a heavenly sign. You’re looking at him—the Son of God ”
So, those are verses 1-4. Question/answer time with Jesus is always invigorating! But now on to the second point I’m making—the second dual danger is the leaven of these leaders. What then is this leaven? What are we looking to avoid? What does this leaven look like?
If you take the whole Gospel of Matthew into account, what J. C. Ryle wrote is most fitting:
Let us remember that we live in a world where Pharisaism and Sadduceeism are continually striving for the mastery in the church of Christ. Some want to add to the Gospel, and some want to take away from it; some would bury it, and some would pare it down to nothing; some would stifle it by heaping on additions, and some would bleed it to death by subtraction from its truths.
Both parties agree only in one respect: both would kill and destroy the life of Christianity if they succeeded in having their own way. Against both errors let us watch and pray, and stand on guard. Let us not add to the Gospel, to please the modem Pharisee; let us not subtract from the Gospel, to please the modern Sadducee. Let our principle be “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth”: nothing added to it, and nothing taken away.
So Bishop Ryle sees the leaven here as adding to or subtracting from the gospel, or more broadly, adding to or subtracting from Scripture. And that is very true when you look, for example, at 15:1-9 and how the Pharisees by their oral traditions (ceremonial hand-washing for all people always) added to the Word of God, and if you look at 22:23-33, for example, where the Sadducees, by their denial of the resurrection, subtracted from Scripture.
Ryle is right. We must watch out for this. We must watch others, watch ourselves. Are we staying on the line of Scripture, or are we straying above it (legalism) or below it (liberalism), above it (perfectionism) or below it (anti-nomianism), above it (traditionalism) or below it (pragmatism)?
So, yes, there is something to the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees being adding to and/or subtracting from Scripture. But in the immediate context—these leaders looking for a heavenly sign, and Jesus telling them, “I'm only giving you one sign”—I think Jesus is warning about “one doctrinal tendency” found in both groups, and found too often in us or desired by us, and that is “wanting more than Jesus” and wanting more from Jesus than what he has offered to give, or in our case more than he has given. It’s the attitude, for example, so prevalent in the world and sadly so prevalent in the Ecclesia that says, “Give me something more lively than the life of Christ. Give me something more powerful than the passion of Christ. Give me something more dynamic than the death of Christ. Give me something more relevant than the resurrection of Christ.”
Do you know what my first word as a child was? It was “more.” Not “mommy” or “daddy,” but “more,” said in the context of wanting more applesauce or something sweet to eat. Well, spiritually immature people always want “more” of the wrong thing. They are not satisfied with the Bread from Heaven. They are “not satisfied with the sufficiency of the suffering and resurrected Jesus.” They consider “simple faith in the crucified and risen Lord himself to be... merely milk; not meat; appetizers, not the meal.” But oh, how wrong they are. The person of Jesus and his work—his death and resurrection especially—that’s the milk, water, bread, wine, filet mignon, and a big slice of apple pie. That’s the full substance of our faith. No more saying “more” when you have that.
So, watch out for the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. This leaven is alive and rising still today, working its way through the Ecclesia. Beware of going above or below the line of Scripture, and beware of wanting more from God than Jesus and his death and resurrection.
These dual dangers are what God’s Word urges us to think about and apply to our lives. The first danger is forgetfulness, forgetting what God has done in the past, especially forgetting Jesus’ mighty works. The second danger is false teaching (yet very much related to the first danger), particularly the false teaching that says, “I won't believe in Jesus until you show me more than Jesus.”
May God protect us from such dangers. May he deliver us from these two evils. Amen.
(R. Kent Hughes. and Douglas Sean O'Donnell., 2013; edited Carl Hinton., 2020)