The Way Jesus Treats People (Matthew 16:1-4)

Introduction.

Years ago, I knew a guy who used to ask people, “how’s Jesus treating you these days”. Now I know he was just trying to begin a conversation but at the same time I thought you know that that’s kind of an odd question, also not a particularly useful question to those who are believers already. However, I think if I took a survey of everyday people in the street and asked them how they thought God was treating them, most would say well, I don’t pay much attention to him so why should he pay attention to me.  I think there are a few who might say, he’s very attentive to me, I have contact with him all the time he pays a lot of attention to me. So, although that question in and of itself is a little strange it does provoke me to ask the question what does determine how God treats people, and can we learn anything about this by looking at how Jesus treats people.

I assume some people feel they get treated well, so to speak, and others feel ignored, then how does he/God make that determination, because I’d like to know. Because I’d like to be in the group that God pays attention too. I’d like to be in that group that gets attended to and cared for by God. What makes God attentive to some and maybe even seem to ignore others? What’s the difference, well turn with me to Matthew chapter 16 and I will show you because there is a story that helps answer that question because it illustrates how Jesus treats people.

The Pharisees and Sadducees Seek a Sign

1 Then the Pharisees and Sadducees came and testing Him asked that He would show them a sign from heaven. 2 He answered and said to them, “When it is evening you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red’; 3 and in the morning, ‘It will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Hypocrites! You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times. 4 A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” And He left them and departed.  (Matthew 16: 1-4)

This passage consists of two different parts in the first part the Pharisees and the Sadducees come to him and have a short conversation with Jesus and then he leaves.

Then the second half of the passage deals with his discussion with the disciples. It seems to me that this passage illustrates Jesus treating two different groups of people in two radically different ways and as we move through this what we need to ask is what determines how he treated each of these groups.

In order to find that out let’s begin at the beginning and just move through the passage verse by verse again and it starts in verse one where we’re told the Pharisees and the Sadducees come testing Jesus. Now let’s pause just for a minute and get into clear focus who are the Pharisees and the Sadducees because it’s highly relevant to understanding the story.

Moses recorded that the word of God was a written revelation. Over the years the Jews added to that written revelation and oral tradition was added. We have talked already as we have worked together through the Gospel of Matthew about how this oral tradition added too, and some would say complicated, the original commandments of God given in the Torah. For example, the original commandment said you should not work on the Sabbath day, and you should keep the Sabbath day holy (set apart) from the other six days of the week. Well, some of the rabbis came along over centuries and added other little laws to those main laws and they determined things like you shouldn’t walk more than a certain distance on the on the Sabbath day. Or carry a weight.

As a matter of fact, that thinking still exists today not only in Israel but anywhere an Orthodox community exists. A friend of mine who has been to Israel saw what he described as a Sabbath elevator. This elevator allowed those of an extremely conservative nature to use it even on the Sabbath. You see some Rabbi’s said you can’t push the button on an elevator on the Sabbath because that was work, so they’ve set up what they called a Sabbath elevator. It just ran on the Sabbath, and it worked automatically and stops on every floor so you can stand there and not push the button and just wait until you got to your floor. But the elevator is compliant with the Sabbath rules.

That’s the oral law, and the Pharisees of Christ day were tenacious proponents of this oral law. They clung to it, that was the nature of the Pharisee.  However, there was also a religious group called the Sadducees who were the opposite so to speak. In the first place they rejected all the oral law, and they only wanted to keep the written law. 

They were also known for denying the resurrection of the dead. Their position was they couldn’t find a verse in the Old Testament, as we call it today, that supported the resurrection. So, they said, we don’t believe in it. But in my estimation, they didn’t look hard enough, and interpreted everything literally. But that was their problem, they didn’t see it but their point was we just go by the written revelation in the Torah, and if we can’t find the verse on the resurrection there, we won’t believe it, so they didn’t believe in the resurrection.

The Sadducees were a very political group, and they were also mainly the wealthy aristocrats in the society. They held many of the influential positions in the Jewish society of that time. They have a lot of money and a lot of influence only in that day it was even more insidious because they were a political group and had a heavy influence on all the political interactions within Israel at that time.

The Pharisees and the Sadducees hated each other they would normally have nothing to do with each other. What is happening here is a bit like the labour party and the Conservative party in the UK, or the Republics and the Democrats in getting together to gang up against somebody else. That will hopefully give you some idea of what’s going on in this passage of scripture. But it was unusual alliance because one group was mainly a religious outfit, and the other was more politically inclined. Though they had different theological positions what they did in this passage is they got together to test Jesus doctrinally. Look again at verse one.

An Unholy Alliance.

“The Pharisees and the Sadducees came to him asking that he would show them a sign from heaven”.

The idea that these two groups would get together is just unbelievable, but they had a common enemy in Jesus, so they formed an unholy alliance to try and undermine him. The fact that these two would get together is improbable because of their vast differences between them. But, in a sense, Jesus drove them together. So, they ask for a sign. Up until this point Jesus had already given them signs but apparently the didn’t recognise the miraculously healing of people. This wasn’t seen as a sign, or how about casting out a demon, was that not a sign either. Remember what they said about these things when they saw them back in chapter 12. That said he did those things by the power of hell itself.

They said they wanted a sign from heaven, maybe they wanted something like manna coming down out of heaven like Moses got in the wilderness or like when Joshua prayed and the sun stood still, or Elijah prayed, and fire fell from heaven. Maybe that’s what they’re asking they’re asking for. But the truth of the matter is they didn’t really want to sign, they had had those already, what they were really doing was testing him. That’s what they are really doing, they were not looking for a sign from heaven, and the probably wouldn’t believe it even if they got it. 

Discerning the Signs of the Times.

Here’s what Jesus says to them.

. 2 He answered and said to them, “When it is evening you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red’; 3 and in the morning, ‘It will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Hypocrites! You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times.

(Matthew 16:2-3)

Now these couple of verses can seem a little confusing because the sky is red both in the morning and the evening and it is seen to give an indication of two different kinds of weather. Well apparently, that was exactly the case that when the sky was red as it says here.

This phrase has been turned in our time into the phrase, “Red sky at night, shepherds delight, red sky in the morning, shepherds warning”. Then as today they had this little proverb so that they could predict the weather, and everybody knew this. Jesus is saying to them that you say you can look at the sky and discern the weather signs, but you can’t discern the signs of the times.

So, what does he mean by the signs of the times? Well, he saying I’ve come amongst you doing all kinds of miracles and you didn’t figure out what that meant. You look up at the clouds and see what’s going on but you can’t see all these miracles and figure out that they might mean something important. Like the Messiah is here. So, he refuses to give them another sign, and look at what he says in the next verse,

A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” And He left them and departed.

(Matthew 16: 4)

I am not going to give you another sign. Now if you’ve been following to the Gospel of Matthew, you know that he told them about the sign of Jonah back in chapter 12, where he said, the sign of Jonah was when he was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights before he got spat out unto dry land. So he prophecies he is going to die and three days later he's going to come back from the dead. In other words, the big sign is going to be my death and resurrection. I’m not going to give you any other sign other than that.

What is significant is he refuses to have anything to do with their request, no more minor prophetic signs, He won’t do it, flat out he says no, just the main event now, his death and resurrection. But notice what he also says that they are a wicked and an adulterous generation. He isn’t calling them adulteress because of sexual immorality. In the Jewish mind set throughout the Torah and religious writings the term adultery was used as a figure of speech, as a metaphor for being unfaithful to God, and that’s what they are also doing here.

Their problem is they had no faith, which is obvious because in the first verse because they came testing him instead of believing in him. 

So, he says because you don’t have faith, the only sign I’m going to give you now is the sign that I’m going to die for you and be raised from the dead and I’m not giving you any other sign from heaven because that’s all the sign you should need. The finally, it tells us that he left them, he departed from them. In the Greek text these are stronger words than is normally used when someone leaves. As a matter of fact, these words carry the connotation of he is abandoning them. He didn’t just walk away it’s stronger than that, he forsook them, he would have nothing to do with them. So, why did he abandon them? Because they didn’t believe. That’s very important, this religious leader had no faith in him so Jesus rejected them. I know this sounds harsh; these are hard words.

Let me try and illustrate what’s going on here. Imagine a  scenario where a man and his young son take a walk in the woods. His father at the beginning of the walk said to his son, don’t wander off and don’t go climbing any trees. At one point his little son does wander off and climbs up in a tree and he got stuck and slips and the son ends up dangling from a branch holding onto a limb for all his worth. The father says, let go and I’ll catch you, and the little boy didn’t let go and eventually he slipped and fell, and the father tried but he didn’t manage to catch him. Don’t make my illustration go any further than that I just want to illustrate if at that point that if the father wasn’t unable to save him then ultimately whose fault was it. The sons, for disobeying his father and not heeding his warning.

That’s what’s going on here the Pharisees were committed to the oral tradition, externalism, ritual religion, rules regulations and Jesus came along and undermines all those things, and Jesus says you need to let go of all those things and just trust me. These guys had their money and their position, and their political power and Jesus said, look, God doesn’t consider any of that as important.  None of that is a sign of God’s blessing on you, as matter of fact the reverse is true. Jesus is saying in essence, let me free you of all that stuff, let go of it and  I will save you, but if you don’t let go of everything, I won’t be able to save you. Still today if you want to have Jesus attention, you got to trust in him and let go of everything else you are holding on to. To have a relationship with God you have to let go of everything else that you are hoping will make you right with God other than Jesus himself.

You can’t come to God and say well I believe in Jesus but I’m going to hold on too some other things to impress you. Even holding onto things like being baptized, or going to go to church every week, or doing some religious things, that’s all Pharisaic. Even thinking I’ll do good works to make God accept me, even that is Pharisaic. It’s faith alone, in Christ alone. Jesus here, simply rejects people who do not trust him and him alone. It’s a hard statement but the Bible is very clear about this throughout.

So, he walks away from them he turns with his disciples, and they head over to the other side of the lake, where he will issue a warning to his disciples related to what has just gone on here.