MATTHEW 9:35—11:1
VICTOR KULIGIN, one of my church’s missionaries, wrote a book provocatively entitled Ten Things / Wish Jesus Never Said. In his preface Kuligin writes:
With the rise of the health-and-wealth gospel and prosperity preaching, we have become accustomed to a comfortable, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” Messiah. It is a picture of Jesus I call "Jesus-lite." Great taste, less demanding. Jesus is just interested in my happiness and nothing more. He wants me to be financially comfortable, physically fit, mentally and emotionally stable. He never demands of me anything that would cause these basic goals to be missed... Difficulties, trials, and hardships in my life are only there because of a lack of faith on my part to believe that Jesus truly wants me to be happy.
Later he writes: “The teaching of Jesus was often harsh. He was not a preacher of convenience, but hardship; not a preacher of comfort, but suffering.”
In 9:35-11:1 it is hard to miss this theme of suffering or, more precisely, the theme of persecution, “suffering that derives from the world’s no to Jesus.” In 10:14 Jesus speaks of the possibility of an unfavorable reception and in verse 23 of the reality of persecution: “when they persecute you in one town." In verse 16 Jesus speaks of being sent out “as sheep in the midst of wolves” and in verses 17-19 of being brought before the wolves—before the Jewish synagogue court—to be flogged and then dragged before the Gentile rulers to be sentenced to jail or death. In this section our Lord speaks of even one’s family becoming one’s enemy, to the point where a brother is turned against his brother, a father his child, a child his parents, delivering the Christian over to the authorities (vv. 21,22, 35, 36). Jesus also speaks of being maligned (v. 25), of being “hated by all” (v. 22), and of martyrdom (vv. 21,28, 38,39).
In his commentary, Frederick Dale Bruner writes of our text, “I was sorely tempted to entitle this chapter ‘Jesus’ Sermon on Suffering Mission' because of Jesus’ main emphasis in it.” Well, I have succumbed to that temptation, and thus I have no problem with borrowing the title of my tract from Bruner’s rough draft. The main emphasis here is suffering—Jesus’ call for his disciples to pick up their crosses (more literally than we might imagine) and follow him.
In the last tract, as we looked at 9:35-38, I addressed our motive for mission (compassion) and the means (prayer and people). In this tract I’ll address the actual mission. What is the Ecclesia called to do? However, before we take this text and apply it to ourselves, I first want us to walk a mile in the shoes (or lack of shoes) of the apostles, for if we don’t understand first what he was saying to them then, we will miss what God is saying to us now.
He's Not Talking to You, Stupid!
Perhaps my favorite preacher, certainly one of the two most influential preachers in my life, is Dick Lucas, now retired rector of St. Helen’s Church Bishopsgate in London. Dick has a number of basic lessons on how to read and teach the Bible properly, which have come to be known as “Lucas Lessons.” One of those lessons he labels “He’s Not Talking to You, Stupid.” I’ll change “stupid” to “silly” because “stupid” is not a word Emily and I allow to be spoken in our home, though as a family we certainly recognize the world is filled with very many “stupid” ideas and people.
The “He’s Not Talking to You, Silly” lesson is a corrective against our tendency to read the Bible existentially (what is God saying to me?) rather than historically (what did God say to them?). It is a corrective against, in the extreme, just flipping through our Bibles looking for a word from the Lord: “Lord, what do you have to say to me today?” Flip and read: “Go, sell what you possess and give to the poor” (19:21). Hmm, perhaps there is a different word from the Lord today. Flip and read: “Destroy the survivors of [the] cities” (Numbers 24:19). No, Lord, I’m looking for something less militaristic. Flip and read: “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth! For your love is better than wine” (Song of Solomon 1:2). No, no, no, Lord, something less erotic and alcohol-free. Flip and read: “For I know the plans I have for you... plans for welfare... to give you a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:11). Ah, there it is. I like that. God has spoken to me through his Word.
So you see, in this Lucas Lesson, Dick simply teaches that we need to understand first and foremost that there are passages in the Bible that we will misunderstand and misapply if we don’t first understand who the original author and audience were. So when Paul writes to Titus and tells him to “appoint elders in every town” around Crete (Titus 1:5), we are not to read that as God saying directly to us that we are to do precisely the same—i.e., appoint elders in various Greek cities. And as we come to our text, once we realize who is doing the talking (Jesus) and to whom (the apostles), then we can try to determine if what is descriptive is prescriptive—in other words, if what Jesus said to the Twelve applies indirectly to us today.
First, note to whom Jesus is talking: “his disciples” (9:37). That term appears six times in our text—at the beginning (9:37; 10:1), middle (10:24, 25), and end (10:42; 11:1). In 10:1 those “disciples” are defined further as being "his twelve disciples,” and in verse 2 as the “apostles.” The word “apostles” is used here for the first and only time in Matthew (compare that to twenty-nine times in Acts), and then those said apostles are named in verses 2—4.
Those names are given to us—listed here, as they are three other places in the New Testament (Mark 3:16-19; Luke 6:12-16; Acts 1:13)—not merely to help us name our children and churches and hospitals, but so we might know whom Jesus is addressing and their significance. That is, Jesus is (a) replacing Israel’s present, ungodly leaders with “[the] twelve” (10:1; 11:1)—the number “twelve” corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel; and he is (b) beginning to build his Ecclesia, as Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:20, “on the foundation of the apostles.”
Two Major Differences
So, do you see to whom Jesus is talking? In our text he’s not talking to you, silly! He’s talking to the Twelve. But what (if anything) did he say to the Twelve that is not said to us? Or what is different about their mission and ours? I think there are two major differences.
The first is what I’ll call apostolic authority. In 10:1 Jesus calls “his twelve disciples” and gives them “authority.” Later this authority—and remember in my reading of Matthew “all authority” is the key note of the melodic line—will enable them to bind and loose sins (16:19) and in Acts to preach the gospel boldly through the power of the Spirit. But here the emphasis is on healing powers—authority over diseases.
It is especially interesting to note that the Great Commission doesn’t mention healing at all, and yet here in their commission we find, “Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons” (10:8). We can safely say that Christians, other than the apostles, have done all tour actions mentioned here. But it is not normative like it was for the apostles. Have you read the Acts of the Apostles and noticed all the miracles? And have you ever noticed who is doing all those miracles? All the miracles are performed by an apostle. Acts of the Apostles is an apt title, for it is about the acts—-the works and words—of the apostles as acted out through the power of the Holy Spirit given to them by Jesus.
There is a difference between the apostolic age of Christianity and our age, a difference between the apostles’ powers and ours, a difference between “the signs of a true apostle”—mighty works of healing, signs, and wonders (2 Corinthians 12:12)—and the permanent qualifications for Christian leadership (those listed in the Pastoral Epistles for elders and deacons).
So the first difference between them and us is that they had unique apostolic authority—power to preach and heal. The second difference is perhaps more obvious: the scope and severity of their mission. Here in 10:5, 6 they were commissioned to take the gospel only to "the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” not to Gentiles or Samaritans. In obedience to the Great Commission, we are to take the gospel to “all nations” (28:19)—both Jews and Gentiles. Even the apostles will do this (their mission expands after Pentecost). But here their scope is specific: Israel must hear the good news first. The apostles must go “through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes” (10:23).
So the scope and the severity of their mission are different. I’m not saying there have never been Christians who took Jesus’ call of “no gold money... no bag... no clothes... no sandals... no staff’ (see 10:9, 10) literally (read the life of St. Francis and the rule of St. Francis, or take George Mueller as a more modern example). Nor am I saying that other Christians haven’t been persecuted, tortured, and killed for their faith. But you'll have to admit that there is a greater intensity here. Jesus warns these twelve (as he will in his High-Priestly Prayer in John 17) that slander, suffering, and death await them, and according to Christian history all but Judas (who would hang himself) died a martyr’s death: Bartholomew and James, the son of Zebedee, and Matthias (Judas’s replacement) were beheaded; Thomas and Matthew were speared to death; Peter, Andrew, Philip, Jude, Simon the Zealot, and James, the son of Alphaeus, were crucified. John boiled in a pot of oil.
So, yes, we are called to share in the sufferings of Christ—“Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:12) - but not always to suffer unto death. We must pick up our crosses, but such crosses don’t always lead to Roman execution.
He’s Talking to Us... Seriously
Those are the two major differences between them and us. What then is the same, if anything? No if. There is application for us. Matthew has not written his Gospel simply as a history book. The call and commission of the Twelve provides the Ecclesia with some timeless truths, what I’ll call Six Principles for Gospel Mission Today.
One: The first principle is a summary of what we learned in the last chapter in our study of 9:35-38: Our motive for mission is compassion, and the basic means of harvesting are prayer and people. We are to be compassionate. We are to pray. We are to work.
Two: We don’t have to be great to reach the least. The apostles’ mission is to "the lost sheep” of Israel (10:6), a term used in Jeremiah 50:6 to refer to the people who were under the leadership of ungodly “shepherds.” Here we might say that “the crowds” (9:36) were similarly under the scribes and Pharisees. Or, put differently and more precisely, the apostles’ mission was to those to whom Jesus has thus far been ministering—the crowds but also and especially (reread Matthew 4—9) the social and religious outcasts.
The mission is to the least, and by the world’s standards the missionaries aren’t exactly the greatest. Look at the twelve names of these ordinary men in 10:2-4. And look at the slight additions, those extra long nametags on a few of them. Judas, the last listed (quite intentionally), gets that diabolical addition, "who betrayed him.” A few other tags are added to those who share the same first name, so as to distinguish this James from that James or this Simon—the Zealot—from the other Simon—Peter—who is intentionally listed first (v. 1). But only one man gets his occupation added. It’s not Andrew the fishermen, Thomas the dental hygienist, or Philip the used car salesman. It’s “Matthew the tax collector” (v. 3).
I don’t want to make too much of this addition other than the point I’m making. God chose outcasts to reach outcasts. Here we find not Peter the Great, or Dr. John von Thunder of the Tubingen Institute of Theology, or St. Thaddeus of the Holiest Order of Most Holy Hermits. Rather we find common and uncouth men. And it is this ignoble group of twelve who take the noble message of the gospel to the ignoble of the world (see 1 Corinthians 1:25—29).
You don’t need money; you don’t need an elite education; you don’t need worldly power and prestige; you don’t need an acclaimed reputation (we know about the lives of only a few of these men); you don’t need all that to be an effective minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Ecclesia was built upon the faithful testimony of a bunch of rustics, as Jerome called them God delighted in and still delights in building his Ecclesia with such seemingly, insufficient and slightly contorted building materials.
Three: Gospel goers depend on gospel givers. Put more fully, gospel goers depend on God’s providential provision through Christian giving and hospitality. Notice here the two groups involved in the mission. There are the goers (here the apostles, who are to bring nothing with them, vv. 8 10) and the givers (whom Jesus describes as “worthy” in v. 11), those who welcome the goers into their homes, providing food and lodging and perhaps travel expenses.
Some of you are in full-time gospel ministry or will be in full-time gospel ministry, but the majority of you are givers, not goers. And the beautiful thing here is that Jesus essentially says to the givers, “Keep your head up; without you the mission fails.” In verse 40 Jesus equates receiving the goers as receiving him and the Father. Then he speaks of the givers getting a reward (v. 41), even for the seemingly insignificant act of hospitality, giving “a cup of cold water” (v. 42). How lovely. Simple sustenance for working in and getting back to the harvest field gets rewarded!
Thus, as much as this passage commands that the goers can’t be greedy and must sacrifice much, it also commands sacrifice for the givers. I know a Christian man, a retired millionaire, who chose to live in a trailer park so he could pay for the college educations of all his relatives and give generously and sacrificially to Christian missions. If you’re not going to go, you must give, and if you’re not going to give generously, then you’re going to go where the Sodomites went. With the closed-doored and close-fisted, God will shake off the dust from his feet (v. 14). The world is at war with Christ. This is no time for cowards and half-hearted hospitality. Either we go or we give to the goers... or else.
Four: Our character commends Christ. Verses 8b-10 teach that the goers must not be greedy for gain. We better not preach the gospel for money. Disciples are not to be beggars or mendicants, but we better not be well-to-do or economically ostentatious, since “going green” in that way is a contradiction of the message of the gospel. In fact it is an offense and affront to it. Further, we must be dependent on God’s provision of givers. Moreover, our simplicity, urgency, and even austerity should embody the gospel since the gospel is not about worldly wealth, power, or security. We well commend Christ when we have “nothing to commend other than Jesus himself.”
In verse 16 we find further character commands—what we might call the crest of character. School crests or family coat-of-arms often have pictures of animals, perhaps a lion, bear, eagle, or some other powerful creature. Sticking with the animal theme, here the Christian coat-of-arms has a sheep (surrounded by wolves) and then a snake and a dove. “Behold,” Jesus says, “I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (10:16). A sheep, snake, and dove. Seemingly not very impressive, I'll admit.
In terms of character, we are not to be like tigers—preying on the weak, strutting our bold and beautiful colors, showing our teeth, if needed, to coerce people to believe or else. We are to be as sheep—peaceful, nonviolent, vulnerable, fully dependent on the shepherd to lead, provide, care for, and protect. But we are not to be as sheep in their sheepishness or in their foolishness. That is why Jesus adds the bit about the snake and the dove. We are to be shrewd but innocent, a rare combination of characteristics that we usually put backwards. It is easy to be as “guilty as serpents and as stupid as doves.” Instead we are to be godly but not gullible—snake smart, but not snake sneaky. For our character commends Christ; our godliness proclaims the gospel.
Five: Like the apostles, we are to give the same gospel announcement: “The kingdom of heaven is at hand” (10:7). I say gospel announcement intentionally, because both here and in Acts the Christian message is not so much a suggestion or even an offer—“God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life, if you’ll welcome him into your heart.” Rather it’s an announcement of the good news of the kingdom!
The good news is that God, in the person of Christ, has sent his own Son as King. God has demonstrated Jesus to be the King through his life, teachings, miracles, sufferings, death, and resurrection—all in fulfillment of Scripture and all witnessed in history. Therefore, the time of ignorance is over, and the time for repentance (cp. Mark 6:12) and faith is here, for God has “fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:31). Either you submit to Christ and receive eternal life, or you do not submit and thus incur his just judgment.
It is often preached in churches today that God can change your life— God can help you find yourself—God can help you love yourself—God can bring you peace of mind—God can save your marriage or get you a new job or help you be a success in this world. Such messages will not cause persecution, will they? The world loves those messages. They’ll buy your book and watch your TV show. But if you preach what Jesus said and what the apostles preached—that Jesus is the only way to God (v. 40) and therefore we must have allegiance to him above even our closest family members (v. 37) and that judgment is a reality, since God “can destroy both soul and body in hell” (v. 28)—you can expect persecution. You can expect persecution for heeding Jesus’ commands on how to think, live, and witness to the world. Preach the gospel of the kingdom and what happens? Exactly what Jesus said would happen—persecution!
Six: Our mission is dangerous and divisive, but it’s worth giving our lives. The mission is dangerous—there is nothing as obvious in our text as that. Are you looking to be maligned, hated, and possibly put to death? If so. sign up today for Christian Missions 101.
Moreover, our mission is not only dangerous but also divisive. It is divisive not just in society but in our own homes. Christianity can renew a home. I have seen a wife converted to Christianity and then soon after her husband, and the aroma of that house went from the smell of death (fighting, hatred, disunity, even abuse) to an aroma of life (love, consideration, hospitality, forgiveness). But I have also seen households turn asunder because a husband or wife or child or parent hates the gospel and does everything in his or her power to destroy it and banish it from that home.
In verse 34 Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”
I’m sure you are familiar with the peace symbol. This symbol was originally designed for the British nuclear disarmament movement. But the first time I heard an explanation of its symbolism, which was a historically inaccurate explanation, was at a Christian summer camp, where the director told us counselors that the peace symbol was a broken cross and thus anti-Christian. Even though that explanation is inaccurate, I have often thought there is something to the anti-Christianness of how the world views the notion of peace. To most people, peace means merely a lack of hostility between all people.
Christianity is not opposed to such peace, but for the Christian the means of obtaining it and the timing is different. True peace between God and man— and also between man and man—comes only through “the blood of [the] cross” (Colossians 1:20) and is to be seen in the Ecclesia. Eventually there will be such peace that even lions lie down with lambs, children play with asps, and Calvinists will hug Arminians and enjoy it. But that final eschatological peace will only come with the second coming of Christ.
Now, however, those who do not believe view the cross as a sword. God’s peace sign is not a broken cross but the cross of Christ, and yet, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer rightly said, “The cross is God’s sword on earth.” The cross is a sword because its message is not the message that insurrectionists want to hear. Who wants to hear that he is sinful at the core of his being? And who wants to hear that in Jesus’ death God has opened the gates of freedom and peace for all insurrectionists, if and only if they stop their insurrection? And who then wants to hear that God won’t permit such insurrection to go unchallenged forever - that judgment awaits those who will not accept this peace treat from the Prince of Peace?
Let me be clear here: if you come home after being baptised, and you tell your dear mother how foolish she is for not believing in Jesus and that you see the light and she doesn't... it is not the cross that is offensive, but you. Many Christians today are needlessly offensive, committing great blunders and stirring up much opposition “which might have been avoided by the little prudence and exercise of judgment.” But if your heart has indeed been changed, and your actions follow, and in time you begin to demonstrate Christian humility and witness in words and in deeds to your dear mother, and then, if she rejects the gospel, the cross of peace for her has, as Jesus predicted, become a sword of division between you and her.
So our mission is dangerous and divisive, but it’s worth giving our very lives. Did you notice in our text all the motives Jesus gives for missionary perseverance? Jesus teaches that we must expect persecution, endure persecution, and not fear persecution. But why? Why not fear? There are four reasons: (1) this was the way Jesus went—he suffered; we will suffer, through suffering for the gospel, we identify with Christ. (2) Such persecutions will not impede the advance of the gospel but actually promote it. (3) God knows how many hairs are on your head and knows when a sparrow falls to the ground dead, and with fatherly love God is with you even through your sufferings. (4) Following Jesus, according to Jesus, is worth it: “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (v. 39).
If you are doing everything in your power “to make it”—to get the perfect spouse, the lucrative job, the big house, and all the right connections, guess what? You lose. The biggest gainers are the biggest losers. But if you are willing to come to Jesus as King and give him your life—“Here’s my life, Lord. It’s all yours. I’ll go where you would have me go, do what you would have me do, give what you would have me give, suffer what you would have me suffer”—then (and this is the beautiful irony of the kingdom life) you will find life, true life in this life and true life (and reward) in the life to come.
In summary:
1. Our motive for mission is compassion, and the basic means of harvesting are prayer and people.
2. We don't have to be great to reach the least.
3. Gospel goers must depend on gospel givers (and gospel givers must give).
4. Our character commends Christ.
5. We are to give the same gospel announcement that the apostles did.
6. Our mission is dangerous and divisive, but it’s worth giving our very lives.
(R. Kent Hughes. and Douglas Sean O'Donnell., 2013; edited Carl Hinton., 2020)