Deo Gloria
December 11, 2022
Advent Sermon
Pastor Martin Bentz
Text: Matthew 11:2-11
Theme: Jesus Dispels Our Doubts!
- By pointing to the fulfillment of Scripture
- By confirming the identity of John the Baptist
There comes a point in your life when you have to know. Maybe it’s when you’re standing at the graveside of a loved one. Maybe it’s when you’re facing a serious health crisis. Maybe it’s when you’re struggling with addiction or find yourself in prison. Is Jesus really the Son of God and promised Savior, or isn’t he? John the Baptist was at such a point in his life. Because of his circumstances he needed to know. This morning we see Jesus reassuring John that he was indeed the promised Savior. Jesus dispelled John’s doubts, and he does the same for us.
“When John heard in prison what Christ was doing, he sent his disciples to ask him, ‘Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?’”(vv. 2+3) Did you catch what Matthew said, that little comment in the second verse? John was “in prison.” He had been imprisoned by Herod Antipas, the Roman ruler of Galilee and Perea. Herod Antipas was angry at John because John had spoken out publicly against him for taking his brother’s wife. So Herod had John arrested and locked away in a remote fortress located on a solitary peak on the eastern side of the Dead Sea, a fortress called Machaerus. It was like being sent to Alcatraz, only worse. Even Clint Eastwood would not have escaped from Machaerus alive. Being in such a solitary area made it very difficult for anyone to come and see John. It was a lonely place, a dark and dirty and depressing place.
Now try to put yourself in John’s shoes for a minute. You are a servant of God, a prophet of God, the one who was sent to prepare the way for the coming Savior. And yet, here you are, locked up in chains in a dungeon in a federal penitentiary out in the middle of nowhere. Your prospects of getting out are slim to none. After all, you can’t take back what you said. It was the truth. Your only way out is by an act of God or by death. You haven’t had a decent meal or a good night’s sleep in weeks. Your most frequent visitors are rats, which you couldn’t chase away even if you wanted to. So, how do you feel? Excited? Enthused? Glad to be alive?
I think you can see why it might be easy for a person in a situation like that to begin having some doubts, some doubts about all kinds of things, especially about what he was doing prior to being incarcerated. “Was I really doing the right thing?” John might have thought. “Was I really the forerunner of the Savior? Is Jesus really the Savior who was to come?”
Besides his depressing circumstances, what also may have contributed to John’s uncertainty is that up until this point Jesus’ ministry had not exactly coincided with what he himself had expected or predicted. Moved by the Spirit, John had portrayed the coming Savior more like a judge than a gentle teacher and healer:
Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near…The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire…His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering the wheat into his barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire. (Mt 3:2,10,12)
But the Jesus John saw before he was locked up in prison didn’t fit that description, nor did the reports he had heard about Jesus since.
The reports John had heard were about a meek and mild man, a person who sat on the hillside and taught large crowds of people, a person who healed the sick and crippled, someone who opened the ears of the deaf and the eyes of the blind, which were all very wonderful things. But where was the judge? Where was the man in the orchard with an ax in his hand, ready to chop down all the unproductive trees? Where was the farmer with his winnowing fork, ready to clear his threshing floor and throw the chaff into unquenchable fire?
Being in the desperate situation he was, John had to know. One way or the other, he had to know. So he sent two of his disciples to Jesus to ask him: “Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?”
Listen again to Jesus’ answer:
Go back and report to John what you hear and see: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me. (vv. 4-6)
In answering John’s question, Jesus pointed to some of the miracles he had been performing, miracles that not only demonstrated his power as the Son of God but also fulfilled the Old Testament Scriptures. In fact, Jesus was actually quoting from several Old Testament Bible passages, passages that spoke about the promised Messiah and what he would do. One comes from the book of Isaiah:
…say to those with fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you.” Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then will the lame leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb shout for joy.(35:4-6)
Another is that familiar passage from Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor”(v. 1).
This is often the way Jesus worked as he tried to lead people to see that he was the promised Savior. It’s what he did in his hometown of Nazareth. First he quoted those words from Isaiah ch. 61. Then he said, “Today those words are fulfilled in your hearing.” Sadly, the people of Nazareth rejected Jesus and ran him out of town. Jesus hoped the same would not be true of John. “Blessed,” he said—“Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me.” Jesus removed John’s doubts by pointing to the fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures.
Perhaps you have had your doubts about Jesus too. After all, isn’t it a little naïve on our part to believe that story about a virgin giving birth to a child? I know I could come up with a much more logical explanation. And then there’s that part about the shepherds and the angels—really? And do you really expect me to believe that when the Son of God came into the world, he was born in a stable? Or do you really expect me to believe that God, the King of all creation—that he could or even would come into this world as a little baby, that he would live as a peasant, that he would die as a criminal? That’s a little bit hard to swallow, don’t you think?
Or maybe your doubts stem from another source, the source of disease or depression. You prayed and prayed that the results would come back negative; but they didn’t. You have cancer. Next you prayed and prayed that the surgery would be successful and the doctors would be able to remove the tumor. It was and they did; but they also found signs of cancer elsewhere in your body. So you prayed and prayed some more, this time that the chemo would do the job. It did, somewhat, but the cancer is still there. Now they’re running out of treatments, and you’re running out of time. “Why?” you ask. “Why is Jesus letting this happen? Can’t he hear me? Why doesn’t he answer my prayers? Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he isn’t the Son of God and Savior, like I thought.”
Jesus handles our doubts the same way he handled John’s. He doesn’t remove them the way we might like him to, by performing some miracle for us. I’m sure John would have liked that. I’m sure John would have been thrilled if Jesus had performed a miracle for him and rescued him from prison. But Jesus didn’t do that, did he? Instead he pointed John back to the Scriptures. And that’s where Jesus points us. “Look,” he says. “Look at God’s Word. Compare my words and actions with what was said about the Savior in the Old Testament Scriptures. If the two don’t mesh, then don’t believe in me. But if they do, if what I do does match up with Scripture, then I am the promised Savior. And trust me, I know what I’m doing.”
Or maybe it’s sin that has created doubt in your mind. I mean, you did it again. You promised last time—you promised yourself, you promised your Lord that you would never give in to that sin again. And in a moment of weakness, you did. How can you ask for forgiveness? And even if you did ask, would Jesus forgive you again? Or maybe it’s the seriousness of your sin. Can God really forgive something like murder or abortion? Can God really forgive adultery, for cheating on my spouse, for sleeping with my boyfriend? Can God really forgive me for hurting my child in a moment of anger? What does the Bible say? “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool”(Isaiah 1:18). Put your doubts aside. Jesus is your Savior, the one who came to rescue you from all your sins, as Scripture so clearly teaches.
Jesus also removes our doubts in another way, by confirming John’s identity.
As John’s disciples were leaving, Jesus began to speak to the crowd about John: “What did you go out into the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind? If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear fine clothes are in kings’ palaces. Then what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written: ‘I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you’”(vv. 7-11).
For many John the Baptist was a spectacle, an oddity, sort of like a freak show at the circus. They went to see him simply out of curiosity. They simply had to see this guy wearing camel skin clothes. Maybe they could catch a glimpse of him munching on locusts and wild honey. Eeeww! Or maybe there would be some Pharisees in the crowd and they might get to hear John lay into them with another “Brood of Vipers” sermon. “Yeah, John, let ‘em have it.” Many did not understand who John was or why he had come.
Here Jesus removed all doubt. Was John a reed swayed by the wind, a preacher who changed his message from week to week in order to conform with popular opinion? No, the people knew better than that. Was he a wealthy individual, then, someone who could speak firsthand about the lifestyles of the rich and famous? No. So who was he?
Many had come to the conclusion that John was a prophet. “You’re right about that,” Jesus said. “And then some.” John was a prophet, but not just any prophet. John was the prophet who had been sent to prepare the way for the promised Messiah. Jesus points that out in v. 10, as he quotes yet another Old Testament passage, this time from the book of Malachi: “This is the one about whom it is written: ‘I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.’”
And then Jesus concluded by saying, “I tell you the truth: Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist”(v. 11). Many people today, including many religious leaders who call themselves Christians, would have us believe that Jesus is nothing more than a prophet, a good teacher, an inspiring leader. Others would like us to think of Jesus as a “freedom fighter” like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. or Nelson Mandela, an advocate for racial equality and social justice long before his time.
You cannot come to that conclusion, however, if you take Jesus’ words seriously. If, as Jesus said, John the Baptist really was the forerunner of the promised Savior, then he (Jesus) is that Savior. There is no other way to take these words. That baby born in a stable in Bethlehem was and is the Savior of the world. He is John’s Savior and he is ours—no doubt about it! Amen.