Mat 11:1-6, When Doubt Can Be a Good Thing.

Class Outline:

Sunday January 19, 2025

 

Main Idea: Self-learners run into perplexity, but their doubt is an impulse to discovery.

 

Intro: Next section of Matthew’s Gospel (11-13).  

 

MAT 11:1 signals us that a change is coming in the narrative of Matthew’s Gospel.

 

Structure of Matthew so far. In 5-7 we were taught how to be disciples and in 10 we were instructed on how to be disciplers. 11-12 contains various responses to the declaration of Jesus as the King, Messiah, Savior. 13 is the third sermon in which Jesus teaches the mystery kingdom as a result of Israel rejecting Him.

 

The first example: John the Baptist.

Historical background. John imprisoned by Herod Antipas (son of Herod the (not so) Great; tetrarch of Galilee and Perea. John had denounced his taking his brother’s wife, Herodias and Herod had him imprisoned and later beheaded. John’s disciples bring him news about what they have seen and heard about Jesus’ ministry.

 

Portrait of Christ: Messiah who comforts His own when they’re perplexed.

 

LUK 7:18-23, a little more detail.

 

MAT 11:1-6.

 

Expectant One? (Coming One): ho erchomenos (verb used over 600 times in the NT). MAT 3:11.  

 

John is in a very unique position. He is the forerunner and the Messiah is to come after him.

 

John doubt / alternative view (John’s disciples are the doubters).

 

 Jesus’ response - not condemnation.

 

Beatitude (MAT 11:6): blessed is he who does not brought to a downfall (skandalizo) over Me.

 

Skandalizo often refers to catastrophic effects of those who are offended at Christ, and particularly at Pharisees who are always seeing but not seeing. These are skeptics.

 

Skeptic who is always seeking proof but never comes to faith.

This will not be John, but it will be others in 11-12.

 

Why might John have doubted?

 

We can only speculate (listen in for some stabs at it).

 

The OT gave a shadow of Him and now the clear reality of the God/Man was right in front of them.

 

What we can glean from John is that, as devoted and faithful a man as he was, he did not see in Jesus everything he expected. And that is true for them all, and, I would bet, for all Christians ever.

 

“a man may be haunted with doubts, and only grow thereby in faith. Doubts are the messengers of the Living One to the honest. They are the first knock at our door of things that are not yet, but have to be, understood…. Doubt must precede every deeper assurance; for uncertainties are what we first see when we look into a region hitherto unknown, unexplored, unannexed.”

― George MacDonald, An Anthology: 365 Readings

 

That’s not a bad thing. It is the reality of fallen, finite creatures, who although regenerated, baptized by the Spirit, in union with Christ,

 

Jesus’ response - not condemnation

 

OT quotes (ISA 35:5-6; ISA 61:1) -

When you share a love of the Word, the Lord will use it to confirm to you.

 

It is one of the benefits of the self-learner.

 

Self-learner: student stimulated to gain knowledge and not just receive it. Go and get it.

 

The self-learner is not satisfied with what others tell them about God. They go to the source.

 

“Christian education today is entirely too passive. And that’s incongruous, because Christianity is the most revolutionary force on the planet. It changes people.” [Howard Hendricks]

 

Hendricks also writes: The learner is primarily an investigator, a discoverer, and a doer.

 

For the good news to the poor we have seen in the SOM that the poor were blessed with the kingdom of heaven - the reality of the miracle of life entering the world through Christ, which life is given to those who have faith, not to the rich, mighty, noble.

 

The doubter simply needs to be reminded and also reminded to dig a bit more into the fields of the Word of God.

 

The Word of God spans across every human need. It was designed for our good.

 

God is the Word, which is another way of saying that He is our need.

 

It is when we forget, do not know, get our eyes away from God’s communication to us that we doubt.

 

COL 3:1-2 seek heaven and not earth. Notice the verbs: set your mind on; seek.

 

“What is honored in a country is cultivated there.”

Plato

 

MAT 13:23

"And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it;

 

The definition of the verb “understands” is to have an intelligent grasp of something that changes one’s thinking and practice.

 

1CO 15:47-48 earthy and heavenly (first and last Adam).

 

Determine to be a self-learner.

 

You are to grow from unconscious incompetence to the point that you are so competent that you don’t have to think about it anymore (unconscious competence).

 

Learning is difficult. Tension will create anxiety and stress, but none will produce apathy. God wants to change you and the old entrenched, preconceptions do not want to leave their comfy home. That’s tension.

 

Make it your goal from today on to become a self-learner who seeks first the kingdom of God.

 

Don’t fear doubt. See it for what it is. The tension that God uses to get you moving.