Father, we thank you for your
Word. Thank you for your Son you so freely have given that
you might save your people and magnify your mercy in saving
sinners. Lord, we pray that from your
Word today you would speak, that you would speak to us the Gospel
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Teach us in our heart that we
might believe Him in our heart and call upon Him and declare
Him to be our only Lord and boast in Him as all of our glory. In
Jesus' name we pray, Amen. Now we are in Matthew chapter
21 today if you want to turn there. And I want to go back
just a little bit in the account here in Matthew 21 from where
we were last time. If you look back up at verse
12 in Matthew 21 it says, went into the temple of God, and cast
out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew
the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold
doves, and said to them, It is written,
My house shall be called the house of prayer, but you have
made it a den of thieves." So that's the first thing we see
in Matthew. Matthew's account is slightly
different in the order than it is in Mark chapter 11. In Mark
chapter 11, Jesus first saw the fig tree, cursed it, and then
went in and cast out the thieves in the temple. I think Mark gives
a chronological account, and here Matthew is giving a subject
matter to keep it all together. But just keep that in mind, the
first thing that actually happened seems to have been the cursing
of the fig tree, which we read about in a minute. It says, and
when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that
he did, the wonderful things that he did, what were they?
Well, he cleansed the temple, he healed the lame and the blind,
And then the children were crying out. They saw the wonderful things
he did, and they heard the children crying in the temple, saying,
Hosanna to the Son of David. And they were sore displeased.
These chief priests and scribes and the elders of the people
were extremely angry because of what was going on here. Jesus
seemed to have... there was nothing that they could
do to quiet the multitude. Even little children in the temple
were freely expressing not only supplication to Him, but praise.
In verse 16 it says, "...and they said to Him," they said
to Jesus, these men who hated to hear the children praising
Him, and hated to see all the good that He was doing, they
said, "'Hearest thou not what these say?' And Jesus said to
them, "'Yea, have you never read out of the mouths of babes and
sucklings that has perfected praise?' And he left them, and
went out of the city into Bethany, and he lodged there. Now, in
the morning, as he returned into the city, he hungered. And when
he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing
thereon, but leaves only, and said to it, Let no fruit grow
on thee henceforward forever. And presently the fig tree withered
away, and when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying,
How soon is the fig tree withered away? Jesus answered and said
to them, Verily I say unto you, if you have faith and doubt not,
you shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but
also if you shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and
be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done. And all things
whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive.
Verse 23. I want to focus mostly on this
part, but we will go through the parts we just read briefly. Verse 23. And when he was coming
to the temple, the chief priest and the elders of the temple
came to him as he was teaching and said, By what authority doest
thou these things? And who gave thee this authority?
And Jesus answered and said to them, I also will ask you one
thing, which if you tell me, I likewise will tell you by what
authority I do these things. And here's Jesus' question to
them. He says, the baptism of John, whence was it, from heaven
or of men? And they reasoned within themselves,
saying, if we shall say from heaven, he will say to us, why
did you not believe him? Why did you not then believe
him? But if we shall say of men, we fear the people, for all hold
John as a prophet. And they answered Jesus and said,
we cannot tell. Actually, the words in the original
mean, we don't know. And he said to them, neither
tell I you by what authority I do these things. But what think
ye? A certain man had two sons. And he came to the first and
said, son, go work today in my vineyard. He answered and said,
I will not. But afterward, he repented and
went. And he came to the second son
and said, likewise. And he answered and said, I go,
sir. And went not. And Jesus asked
them, whether of them, of these two sons, did the will of his
father? They say to him, the first. Jesus
said to them, verily I say unto you that the publicans and harlots
go into the kingdom of God before you. And that's where we're going
to stop today. This is the title of the message
is, which son are you? Or I could ask it personally,
which son am I? Because that's the way the Bible
is written. It's written to each one of us. Now, it's frequently
the case in Scripture that God compares all people to two different
sons. That happened with Isaac and
Ishmael, you remember, in the book of Romans, and in Romans
chapter 9 especially, and then in Galatians chapter 4. And in
the Old Testament, Ishmael was first born to Hagar and Abraham. Isaac was second born, but he
was the one that God recognized as the only son of Abraham, and
he received the promise. And then again, Jacob and Esau,
two sons in the same womb, same mother, same father, born at
the same time. They're in the same birth. Esau
was actually born first. But these two boys also were
representative of the entire human race. One was chosen. One
was not. One was loved. One was hated.
And that's in Romans chapter 9, 11, which I hope to go over
next week, incidentally. And then, of course, there was
the prodigal son and his older brother. Remember the younger
son, the prodigal, left home. He took all that his father gave
to him. He wasted it on riotous living and harlots. And when
he was out of, he had nothing left and he had nothing to eat
except what someone offered him to feed the swine. He remembered
his father's house and the servants in his father's house, that they
had more than they could even, that they had plenty. And so
he returned to his father's house and he said to his father, I
have sinned against heaven. and before you, and I'm not worthy
to be called your son, just make me one of your servants." And
so those two sons also were representative of mankind. The prodigal son
was brought back by the grace of God to recognize that there
was no sustenance, there was no food, nothing he could live
on in the husks of the swine, and he returned to his father's
house to the merriment of his entire household, to his father
especially. But now here, in this particular
account, we see two sons. And the parable goes like this.
The father said to the first son, go work in my vineyard.
And that son said, I will not. He refused to go, but later he
went and he did work. And Jesus said, the second son
said, I will go, sir, but later he did not go. And so Jesus asked
these Pharisees and elders and chief priests of the people,
these people who were supposed to be the leaders of God's people,
to lead them in the worship of God. They correctly identified
the first son as the one who was obedient, who did the will
of his father. And so that's why I've entitled
this message, Which Son Are You? Now, in the first place, here
we see that Jesus rides into Jerusalem, and he rides in to
the supplication. Supplication means when we ask
God for what we need, what we really truly need. They were
asking the Lord Jesus Christ And they were praising him. They
were crying out to him, Hosanna to the son of David. Hosanna
in the highest. And they also said, blessed is
he that comes in the name of the Lord. So he was the son of
David. That means he was born through the line of David after
the flesh. And he was Hosanna in the highest. He was the Lord of glory. And
he was the one who was blessed as he who comes in the name of
the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ. Now this is actually taken from
Psalm 118. And the word Hosanna from that
chapter is spoken this way, save now We beseech Thee, that's the
supplication. Save now, we beseech Thee, O
Lord. Now it's extremely important
to recognize this cry is the fulfillment of Psalm 118. When
Jesus rides into Jerusalem on the foal of an ass, the colt
of an ass, He's riding in meek and lowly and it says in Zechariah
9, chapter 9, verse 9, that He rides in bringing salvation or
having salvation. The people cry out, Save now,
we beseech thee. Why did he come into Jerusalem?
In order that he might die, and in his dying, gain the triumph
over sin. And all of God's people's enemies,
these spiritual enemies, sin, Satan, death, the curse and bondage
of God's law, our flesh, the world, everything that is the
enemy of God's people, now is the time when he came to save
them from those things. And they didn't recognize that.
They thought that he was coming to save them from the imperial
government of Rome. or something like that but this
was not it was not essential for the fulfillment of the prophecy
for them to understand all the reasons why Jesus came but we
understand it from the gospel he came to save his people from
their sins he delivered us from the curse of the law being made
a curse for us Galatians 3.13 and in so many other places we
know that Jesus came in the name of the Lord to do his father's
will and save his people. And so he rides into Jerusalem
as the king who was going to deliver his people from their
enemies, and those enemies are the ones we need to be delivered
from. So the multitudes cry to him
to save them, to save them at this time, save them now. That
was the supplication. And they praise him because he's
the one who comes in the name of the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ,
the anointed of God, coming to save His people, just as God
had long ago prophesied. And Jesus rode into Jerusalem
as the King and as the Lord. He's the Son of God, and He's
the Son of David. But He came, as I said, on this
unridden, never ridden before, colt. the son of its mother,
and he rides in with salvation, according to Zechariah 9.9. He rides in that he might triumph
over his enemies in his own death. Bruising the head of Satan by
his own death, and putting death to death. That was the reason
he came in. And then we saw in verse 12 and 13, which we just
read, that when He came in, the first thing He did was that He
overthrows and cast out of the temple those that bought and
sold. Now these men who bought and
sold in the temple were idolaters. That means they served idols
and yet they came to the temple and they were greedy men, covetous
men. They sought gain for themselves. They sought to increase their
own wealth by selling the sacrifices that men were required and wanted
to offer God in worship. The only way they could be accepted
was to bring these sacrifices. To sell the sacrifices in this
way for profit is the highest form of robbery. Why? Well, because it robs from men
and from God by taking from men what they offered to God. Taking
part. They make the poor, these men
were making the poor pay them, pay these covetous men, to come
to God and to be accepted by Him. And nothing is worse than
when a man inserts himself between a sinner and the Lord in order
to gain from that process. That's especially bad, isn't
it? Remember what Peter says. I point
this out all the time. He says, when the Gentiles were
being saved in Acts 15, he says, but we believe that through the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, not through something we do and
not something we can sell, we shall be saved even as they.
This happens all the time throughout history. We know it in our day,
we see it all the time on TV. Preachers pleading for money
from poor people, especially those who are gullible. And other
people send them money and they take advantage of that. They
put themselves as a necessary step in the process of others
coming to God. And that's not enough. But they
also rob men when they fail, when men fail to freely give
the gospel of Christ to needy sinners. They fail to make Christ
and His finished work the only way in which sinners can be saved
and must come to God. They're actually robbing from
them. They're taking away from them the only way by which they
can be saved. He speaks of this as making merchandise
of you in scripture. The covetous men making merchandise
of God's people. And so, anytime we make anything
other than Christ and His finished work on the cross, anything besides
Christ and His finished work on the cross necessary for our
worship, then we are like these men. We're making a merchandise
of them, we're taking from them, and we're trying to enrich ourselves
in the process. Remember Simon the sorcerer?
He asked Peter, What can I give you that I might have this gift
to bestow the Spirit of God on people?" And Peter said, your
money perish with you. Because you thought that the
gift of God might be purchased with money. That's what these
men were doing. They were making the worship of God and the sacrifices
in that worship something men had to come to them for in order
to get. In order that they might be justified
and accepted and blessed by God. And these are things that God
gives freely. Remember what he says in Matthew 10, 8. He says
to his disciples, freely you have given. I mean, freely you
have received, freely give. That's the principle. And remember
in 2 Corinthians 4, Paul says, we preach not ourselves, but
ourselves, your servants, for Jesus' sake. We preach Christ
Jesus the Lord and ourselves, your servants, for Christ's sake.
The principle is always the same. The servant of God, the preacher,
he doesn't come to gain by his preaching. Not in this world.
He comes in order that he might have the highest blessing possible,
which is to join with God's people that he saves by his grace through
the preaching of the gospel. To join them at the throne of
Christ and cast his crown at his feet and worship him forever
and ever with them. Nothing Delighted the Apostle
Paul more than to think that he would stand with those to
whom he ministered, with them arm in arm, before the throne
of Christ to see his face and to know him that way. And so
Christ cast out these greedy men. They were idolaters and
they brought, they were seeking this for themselves. But in their
place, when Jesus cast them out, immediately the blind and the
lame are brought in. Jesus casts out those that try
to make a profit on the gospel, and He brings in the blind and
the lame. These two things are set side
by side throughout this particular scripture. In Matthew 21, 22,
23, and 24 you see it. And not only that, but even before
this. The Lord Jesus is constantly
setting side-by-side these men who claim to have a knowledge
of God, and claim to have righteousness, and claim to be guides to those
who are seeking to come to God. And they were themselves nothing
but dead men's bones in their heart. And so He sets them side-by-side. He casts them out. He brings
in the blind and the lame, and He heals the blind and the lame
out of all nations. All nations. Remember He says,
My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations. And that's what He's saying here.
The temple on earth The temple that Jesus cleansed here was
meant to teach us that the household of God, the temple in which God
dwells, is made up of all those for whom Christ made peace to
God with His blood. They are the ones God gives His
Spirit to dwell in. He comes to dwell in them, and
they therefore, believingly, look to the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is what the temple of God is. He giving them faith in Christ,
worshiping God in Christ, and He dwelling in them and producing
in them that faith and that life that they need in order to come
to God. Now here, children, little babes
and sucklings, are not only praising the Lord Jesus Christ, they're
saying what they heard their parents say. They're asking Him,
come now, save us, Lord. And they're saying, blessed is
he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. So what they're doing here is
unrestrained. The children, as if they have
no fear of these men who threatened the Lord Jesus Christ, threatened
His disciples, would later kill Christ and His disciples. These
children have no restraint, and they speak in highest praise
to the Lord Jesus Christ, because they ask Him to save them now. which is what He came to do,
which was His Father's will, ask Him to do what God sent Him
to do and to save them in doing so. Now, this is the way God
gets praise. He chooses the weak things of
this world to confound the mighty things. He chooses the foolish
things to confound the wise things. He chooses the things that are
in the world's eyes nothing in order that He might silence them.
not only silence them, but also quiet to put to silence His enemies
and the avengers. The scribes and the Pharisees,
the elders, the chief priests, these were the avengers. These
were the enemies of Christ. But when the children are praising
Him, and they're doing so in a way where they have no fear,
They're happy. You know how children are in
chorus. These children are crying out in chorus, Hosanna, Hosanna. You can hear the temple ringing
from the voices of these little children. And the Pharisees,
these scribes and these elders and the chief priests, they're
accusing Christ of being so low that He would actually accept
the praise of these ignorant children. These weak and insignificant
ones. You really are having to scrape
the bottom of the barrel to accept the praise and not quiet them.
Jesus says, no, no. This is praise perfected. This is God's strength perfected
out of weakness. You see, this is another example
of how God, not only did He cast out the robbers, not only did
He bring in the blind and lame and heal them, but now these
children are giving perfect praise to Christ when the Pharisees
and those who had the knowledge of the law are ignorant. willfully
ignorant and blind, and these children are giving him that
praise." So, in all these cases, we see these two in contrast
throughout the Scripture. And so, God Himself gets perfect
praise. He establishes His strength through
these little children, just like Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12,
9, God's strength is perfected in our weakness. Every believer's
strength is perfected in their own weakness. Because in our
weakness, that's when, when we are weak in ourselves, that is
when we look to Christ alone. Isn't it? Have you ever found
that? Don't you find that day by day? That when in yourselves
you don't know what to do. You think that you can't think
of why God would save you. You look at your sin and you
think it's going to take control of you throughout your life.
And you think, I'm going to come to the end of my life without
faith. What do you do then? you look to Christ, don't you?
Doesn't God at that point in your life cause you to consider
the fact that all of your salvation is in what Christ has done and
what God thinks about Him? That's the work of God's Spirit
in us to humble us because of our own weakness, our own ignorance,
to not rely on our own reasoning skills, but to rely on God's
scripture alone and Christ alone to save. God saves sinners and
sinners are humbled before God. They know that God forgives their
great debt entirely for what Christ has done. Entirely for
what He has paid by His wisdom they're saved. And so in their
own weak minds they glorify God that He would look to His Son
and find everything in Him that He requires from them. That is
what That is what this strength made perfect in weakness is all
about. These children were crying it
out, Lord, save now, we beseech Thee. And this is in resonant
response to the Spirit of God prophesying that that's exactly
what Christ would do. So believers are strong because
by God-given faith, they see that Christ has defeated their
enemies. Look at a couple of verses around
this. Look at Exodus chapter 15. Remember Exodus chapter 15? God had led Pharaoh Through ten incidents where Pharaoh's
heart grew harder and harder and his pride grew, his stubbornness
against God's command to let his people go grew stronger and
stronger and more resolute. Finally, God, at the peak of
Pharaoh's pride and strength, He brings him to the Red Sea.
His entire army in the Red Sea, and God covers the army and Pharaoh
in the Red Sea. And here in Exodus 15, this is
what happens next. Then, in verse 1, "...sang Moses
and the children of Israel this song unto the Lord, and spake,
saying, I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously,
the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea." The
Lord is my strength and song. He has become my salvation. He is my God and I will prepare
Him a habitation. My Father is God and I will exalt
Him. You see that? These people are
rejoicing over the fact that Pharaoh and his armies were cast
into the sea and destroyed, turn to Revelation 15 now if you would,
they were destroyed in the sea in the eyes of these helpless
Israelites who looked at them and didn't have to lift a finger
and God utterly destroyed their enemies after their enemies thought
they were going to destroy them. This is exactly what God does
to Satan and his kingdom. Because Pharaoh is a picture
of Satan and his kingdom. All the armies of Pharaoh are
a picture of the kingdom of Satan. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
the one who's going to cast Satan and his kingdom into the lake
of fire. Just like God threw Pharaoh and
his kingdom into the Red Sea and buried them. He says in Revelation
15 verse 1, And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvelous,
7 angels, having seven last plagues, for in them is filled up the
wrath of God. And I saw, as it were, a sea of glass mingled
with fire, and them that had gotten victory over the beast,
and over his image, and over his mark. and over the number
of his name. And he saw them stand on the
sea of glass, having the harps of God. And they sing the song
of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying,
Great and marvelous are thy works, Lord God Almighty. Just and true
are thy ways, thou King of saints. Who shall not fear thee, O Lord,
and glorify thy name? For thou only art holy, for all
nations shall come and worship before thee, for thy judgments
are made manifest. This is talking about the victory
of Christ over our enemies. And so we see this throughout
Scripture. The children praise Christ. The Pharisees are silenced
by their praise and by the fact that, like believers do this,
Satan and his kingdom are much greater than us in numbers, and
much greater than us in wisdom and strength. But what do we
do? We look to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we fearlessly pray
and praise the Lord Jesus Christ for what He's done to save us
from our sins. Micah 6.8 says, "...what does
the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy,
and to walk humbly with thy God?" As children, we walk humbly,
knowing that Christ is all of our salvation, and that's the
way we do what's right before God, is we look to Him only.
And we love His mercy, and we praise God for it. 1 Peter 5
says the same thing. He says in verse 5 of 1 Peter
5, God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. Humble
yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God that he may
exalt you in due time. And on and on we could go through
Scripture. This is the pattern of Scripture. But now look back
in Matthew chapter 21 in verse 17 through 20. Jesus comes to
the fig tree. Now the fig tree is like the
people. The fig tree is like men who
boast in their outward righteousness. What is the fig tree doing? Well
it's just sitting there. But it's not just barren. It's
full of leaves. It's pretentious. It's acting
as if it has something which it doesn't really have. And so
Jesus comes to the fig tree. It looks like it's going to have
fruit on it, because it's full of leaves. And he finds no fruit
on it. But when he found no fruit on
it, that, by all appearances, it should have had fruit. It
says that Jesus cursed the fig tree, and He says, it's quoted
in Mark 11, 14, "...no man eat fruit of thee hereafter forever."
And immediately, the fig tree withered from the roots. Now,
as I mentioned a week or so ago, The fig tree here represents
apostate, unbelieving rulers and Jews in the nation of Israel
and all who follow them. Now we know this is true because
at any time in history The fig tree, well in this particular
case, the fruitless fig tree that had leaves is used by God
to represent the fact that these people had all outward blessings
that men could think that a nation chosen by God should have. They
had, their fathers were the ones given eternal promises. given
the revelation of God. They had God's promises given
to those fathers of eternal inheritance. So the nation had the gospel
given to them. Hebrews 4-2, the gospel was preached
to them. And Galatians 3-8, God preached
the gospel to Abraham, saying, In thee and thy seed shall all
the nations, the Gentiles, be blessed. and be justified. So the Gospel was given to Israel.
The Law was given to them. The service of God. The Temple
was given to them. The priests, the prophets, were
their people. The prophets weren't from some
foreign country. They came out of Israel. The
kings that God gave were from their own people. God delivered
them numerous times, in spite of their wickedness. And over
and over again, God showed Himself favorable to this nation. They
had all these things. And yet, for all the leaves of
their knowledge of Scripture, for all of the things that should
have been an indication that they had a righteousness before
God, Yet when Jesus comes to this fig tree and he comes to
that nation, they had no true fruit. And so he curses them. Now, we know it's the fig tree
not only because of these things revealed in scripture, but also
because in Jeremiah, as I pointed this out a couple weeks ago,
in Jeremiah 8.13, God speaks about the fact that He would
consume this idolatrous nation of unbelieving Jews, and at that
time He compared them to a fruitless and fading fig tree without any
fruit. That's in Jeremiah 8.13. So the
scribes and the Pharisees were the teachers of false gospels,
Because they promoted themselves. They promoted the works of the
flesh. They were idolaters. And these are the ones that Jesus
exposes as liars. And that's what we're going to
see here in this next account. Because Jesus is going to encounter
them head-on. And He's going to show a wisdom
that we would never have expected. Except from one who is God Himself.
The Spirit of God. with the wisdom of God speaking
to these men. So the fig tree had all appearances
of being a fruitful tree. It had leaves that gave the expectation
of fruit, but it was totally fruitless. And in the same way
the Jews boasted in their knowledge, they should have judged the poor
by showing the poor their utter sinfulness, and showing them
their only Savior in the Lord Jesus Christ, their Redeemer.
Remember Isaiah 53? Isaiah 53, it says, "...who has
believed our report, to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed."
And he goes on and he says that the Lord Jesus Christ, he doesn't
use the Lord Jesus Christ, but he shows it's God's servant,
the Christ of God, would come and bear the sins of his people. And God would cause him to prosper
in doing so, to save them. All these things in scripture
are meant to point sinners to Christ, but these men didn't
see that. They didn't know it. Jesus tells
them in John 5 39, search the scriptures. In them you think
you have eternal life, but they testify of me, and you will not
come to me that you might have life. So they had no fruit whatsoever,
and yet they stubbornly held to their own righteousness, which
was but filthy rags. They were idolaters, like the
men of Sodom and of Egypt. And their idols could do nothing,
just like they could do nothing by their works. So they had the
gospel for some 2,000 years, and yet they did not believe
Christ. And they had no fruit. What is fruit to God? What is
this fruit? It's faith, isn't it? Faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. When God gives us life, the fruit
of that life is faith. And what does faith do? Faith
works by love. These are all the fruits of the
Spirit. They didn't point sinners to Christ. They didn't have faith
in Christ. They didn't love God. In fact,
they hated Him and they killed His prophets. And that's what's
going on here in Matthew 21 through 24. So, I want to look now with
you at verses 21 and 22 here. It says
here that the disciples, when they saw the fig tree withered,
they were amazed that it withered so quickly. Whenever we think of faith, I
know that this is a distortion. In verse 21 and 22, men see this
and they think, well, I can just do anything. I can command a
mountain to be cast into the sea. That means I can move cars. I can build buildings. I can
overthrow armies. I can do all these things. That's
not what the Lord is talking about here. Because faith, excuse
me, faith, How does faith come? It comes by hearing, what? The Word of God. Therefore, faith,
if it's God-given faith, believes what God says, doesn't it? It doesn't believe just anything.
It believes what God says. Remember David? I've quoted this
before, 2 Samuel 7.25. Lord, do what you have said. That's what faith does, Ezekiel
36-37. For this I will be inquired of
by the house of Israel, to do it for them. After God said and
promised in the new covenant what He would do, He says, and
I'm going to be asked by them to do it. We saw it here, the
children saying, Hosanna! Save now, Lord, we pray Thee,
we beseech Thee. So faith, first and foremost,
believes what God says. Abraham believed God, who calls
those things which be not as though they were. So that's what
faith is. True faith believes God will
do His will. not just anything, He'll do His
will, and true faith prays according to God's will, revealed in Scripture. Now, Jesus cursed this fig tree,
but God had prophesied that the nation of Israel would be stripped
of the gospel as a nation, and Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and Isaiah,
all the prophets, even in Deuteronomy. Throughout Scripture, it was
prophesied that this nation would reject their own Messiah. And
as a consequence, God would utterly reject them. And you can read
about that in Romans 9-11, which we will try to go through next
week. But here, the Lord Jesus curses
the fig tree. And the fig tree was cursed.
It withered up. And in the same way, Jesus says
here, not only if you say to this fig tree, He curses it. But if you say to this mountain,
be you cast into the sea, then it will be done. How are we to
understand this? Well, remember, look at one scripture
in the book of Acts. I want you to think back now
as we're turning to this. What was God's will that He revealed
would be done? Didn't Jesus say to his disciples
in Matthew 16, I will build, what? My church and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it. And remember when David and
his King David, in his life, he destroyed so many of Israel's
enemies. He himself and his armies went
out and destroyed these enemies of Israel. So much so that at
the end of David's life, he had amassed Huge quantities of gold
and silver and all these precious things. And he had subdued all
of his enemies. But then he died. And it was
his son Solomon who actually built the temple. Remember? In the same way, the Lord Jesus
Christ, as the son of David, comes in his life to this point
and he's going to destroy all of God's enemies by his death.
But in his death, he is preparing for the building of that temple.
And so in Acts chapter 4, we see this. Acts chapter 2. In
fact, look at Acts chapter 2 verse 36. Peter is preaching to the
very people who put Christ to death on the cross. And he preaches
this sermon explaining to them, the Lord Jesus Christ is the
son of David who would die by your hands, wicked hands, and
God purposed that it would be that way and he would raise him
from the dead. And then in verse 36 of Acts 2 he says, Both Lord and Christ. Now you
can imagine what they're thinking here. If they believe Him, if
they believe what Peter is saying by the Spirit of God, they're
given faith to believe, what are they thinking about themselves?
Oh man, we killed the Lord of Glory, who sits on Heaven's throne. He's going to destroy us. And
so when they heard this, verse 37, they were pricked in their
heart. And they said to Peter and to the rest of the apostles,
men and brethren, what shall we do? There must be a reason
why you're telling us all of this. Verse 38, Peter said to
them, Repent, and be baptized, every one of you, in the name
of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive
the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you,
and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as
many as the Lord our God shall call. As many as God calls. Remember Jesus said, my sheep
hear my voice, I know them and they follow me. He calls them. And when He calls them, through
the preaching of the gospel, what did it do? It humbled them.
It drove them to despair in themselves. They said, what do we do? And
He says, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe Him. And be baptized to teach us that
our life before God, our acceptance before God is in His life, death,
burial and resurrection. And only in that life, death,
burial and resurrection do we have any possibility of coming
to God. And so He speaks to them, and
many of them. Look at Acts chapter 4. And verse 24, Peter and John
had been put into prison, or Peter was in prison, and they
were praying for him. And they let him, actually no,
this is a different account, sorry. But Acts chapter 4 verse
24, we'll pick it up here. When they heard what the chief
priests and elders had said to them, in verse 24 it says, "...when
they heard that, the men that Peter and John were telling about
what they did, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord
and said, Lord, Thou art God, which has made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that in them is." The first thing that these
people pray in their prayer is what? Lord, You're sovereign
over all things. Heaven and earth, the sea, everything.
You made it all. who by the mouth of thy servant
David said, Why do the heathen rage? And the people imagined
vain things. The kings of the earth stood
up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and
against His Christ. For of a truth against thy holy
child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed both Herod and Pontius Pilate
with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel were gathered together,
for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before
to be done. What's Peter saying here? He's
saying these people are praying this prayer and they're all saying
with one accord, Lord you've done what you wanted to do. Even
the death of your son was according to your will. Verse 29, And now
Lord, O sovereign and almighty God, behold their threatenings,
and grant unto thy servants that with all boldness they may speak
the word. What was it Jesus said? If you
say to this mountain, be removed and cast into the sea." So they're
praying this way. Lord, grant to your servants
that with all boldness we may speak the word by stretching
forth thine hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be
done by the name of thy holy child Jesus. And when they had
thus prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together,
and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake
the word of God with boldness. That was the answer to their
prayer. multitude of them that believed were of one heart and
one soul." So what happened because of these things? These Jews,
these Jews who were adamant, so opposed to Christ that they
took Him and killed Him and hung Him on a tree, when they heard
the preaching of the gospel, what did they do? They were converted. God took the unbelief in their
heart like a mighty mountain opposed to God's truth, and He
cast it into the sea of His judgment. He saved those people. That was
a miracle much greater than taking a mountain of any size and casting
it into the sea, wasn't it? And so the Lord Jesus Christ
is prophesying here about how He would give to His apostles
the ability to go forth with the gospel and overcome every
obstacle in the preaching of Christ and Him crucified. And
that's what these things mean. Remember what Paul says in Romans
chapter 1? I'm not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ. It's the power of God unto salvation. Why? Because in it, the gospel, the
righteousness of God is revealed. It's revealed from faith to faith.
That the just live by faith. God reveals it to us that it
might be believed. And in believing it, we see that
all of God's righteousness is in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so, when Paul said that, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, he's
really saying the same thing that every believer says. That
without a doubt, every believer knows in his heart, that without
a doubt, The gospel of Christ crucified, risen, reigning, is
the very power of God unto salvation. Do we doubt that? It's because
of His righteousness that we're saved. That's the power of God,
isn't it? That God would save us from our
sins by the Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Corinthians 5.21. God made Him to be sin for us,
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. This is the Gospel.
And this is the power of God. And every believer believes it
and knows it. And so, it's that unbelief. that mountain of unbelief that
the gospel overthrows when it's preached to us. And that's the
amazing thing of it. Now, In verse 23, finally we're
getting to the heart here of what I was trying to get to.
Verse 23, it says, When he was come to the temple, the chief
priests and the elders came to him as he was teaching, and they
said, By what authority do you do these things, and who gave
you this authority? In verse 24, Jesus answered and
said to them, I also will ask you one thing, which if you tell
me, I likewise will tell you by what authority I do these
things. What's happening here? These guys, these elders, chief
priests and the scribes, they see the multitude crying out.
They hear the children. They see the lame and the blind
being healed in the temple. The temple is completely cleansed.
The filth of these animals and the tables that hold the money
of these money changers and the men themselves are driven out
by one man with a cord. and a lash, and he drives them
all out. The temple is restored now as
it's supposed to be, a place for sinners to come and worship
God through the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so,
These guys were amazed at that. So they know they can't come
directly against him, though they wanted to, and they would
eventually kill him. So what they do is they say,
well, let's ask a question. This is the way Satan works.
We're going to ask him a question. And when he answers it, it'll
cast doubt in the minds of the people that he actually has the
right to do what he's doing. So they said, by what authority
do you do these things? By what authority do you stand
and teach and preach the gospel in the temple? By what authority
do you heal these blind and lame? By what authority do you cast
these people out of the temple? By what authority do you accept
the praise of children and the multitudes? By what authority? And he says, I'll tell you. But
first, I'll only tell you if you tell me one thing. Just answer
this one question honestly, and I'll give you the answer to your
question. He says, And this is where you
see the wisdom of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Such a depth
of wisdom that's incomprehensible. He says to these men, he says,
I'll ask you this question. The baptism of John, was it from
heaven or was it from men? There's no way they can answer
this question without getting themselves into trouble. If they
say, from heaven, Then he will say, why didn't you believe him
then? If they say, from men, they knew
the people would kill them because the people believed that John
was a prophet of God. And if he was a prophet, and
they denied God's messenger and God's message, it made them false
prophets, and false prophets should be stoned. Put to death. Deuteronomy 13 verse 5. And so,
these guys were in a pickle. We can't say from heaven. We'll
pin ourselves to the wall then, and we can't say from men, the
people will kill us. So, we're not even going to say,
we don't want to answer, so they told a lie. I don't know. We don't know. It was a flat
lie. They knew. Look at John chapter
1. The Gospel of John. What did
John say? What was his message? What was
his ministry? Remember, John didn't do miracles.
John did no miracles. But everything that John said
about this man was true. Remember? Scripture says. So
John, in John chapter 1, It says in verse 15, John bare witness
of Him, of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he cried, saying, This was
He of whom I spake. He that comes after me is preferred
before me, for He was before me. I was born before Him, but
He was before me. And of His fullness have all
we received, and grace for grace." And look at verse 19. And this
is the record of John. When the Jews sent priests and
Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, Who are you? Who art thou? And he confessed and denied not,
but confessed, I am not the Christ. They asked him, What then? Art
thou Elijah? And he said, I am not. Art thou
that prophet? And he said, No. Elijah was the
one that Malachi promised he was going to come. He said Elijah
would come before the great and terrible day of the Lord. And
Moses said that you're going to have to hear the prophet when
he comes. God's going to send his prophet. So he says, No,
I'm not Elijah. I'm not that prophet. Then they
said to him, Who art thou that we may give an answer to them
that sent us? What sayest thou of thyself?
And John said from Isaiah 40 verse 3, I am the voice of one
crying in the wilderness. And this is why he was sent,
to make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Isaiah. John was sent to prepare the
hearts of men for the Lord Jesus Christ coming. He was sent to
speak and preach Christ and Him crucified. Look over at verse
29. The next day John sees Jesus
coming to him and said, this was John's message. Behold the
Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world. This is
he of whom I said, after me comes a man which is preferred before
me, for he was before me. And I knew him not, but that
he should be made manifest to Israel. Therefore am I come baptizing
with water. And John bear record saying,
I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode
upon him. What was his authority? The Spirit
of God came from heaven and landed upon him. And I knew him not,
but he that sent me to baptize with water the same said to me,
Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining
on him, the same is he which baptizes with the Holy Ghost.
Who but God can baptize with his own Spirit? And I saw and
bear record that this is the Son of God. And the next day
after, John stood with two of his disciples, and looking upon
Jesus as he walked, he said, Behold the Lamb of God! And they
heard Him. So, you see what John said? The Lord Jesus Christ is so great,
I'm not even worthy to unloose His sandal. He's the Son of God. He was before me. The Spirit
of God descended upon Him and abode upon Him. He's the Lamb
of God. Did they not know? Didn't these
men know? They heard John's testimony.
If they said from Heaven, then they would have to say that your
authority, the Lord Jesus, is from heaven because that's who
John was speaking about. He's greater than me. And if
John was from heaven and he spoke of Christ being from heaven,
then they knew what authority gave him the right to do these
things. But they couldn't admit that. And of course, if they
said from men, they would be destroyed by the people. So they
said, We don't know. We don't know. They lied. And
so, you can see the wisdom here. Now, Jesus has set them up, hasn't
he? He says these things to them
and then he says, okay, let me tell you a parable in verse 28.
What do you think? A certain man had two sons. He
came to the first, as I said before, and said, son, go to
work in my vineyard. And he said, I will not. But
afterward he repented and went. And then he came to the second
and said the same. And he answered and said, I go, sir. And he went
not. Which of these two boys did the
will of his father? They said to him, the first.
And Jesus said to them, This is the summary of the parable. If you want to know what the
parable is about, what is the teaching? It's this. That the
publicans, the tax collectors, and the prostitutes go into the
kingdom of God before you. Now here we see again the contrast. There's two kinds of people in
this world. There are those who are like
the scribes, the chief priests and the Pharisees, who even though
they have the truth, suppress it, who deny the truth they know,
and therefore God gives them over to their own heart's lust
and blinds them in the hardness of their heart. And then there
are those who, even though they're publicans and sinners in themselves,
who say with uplifted fist, as a son said to his father, I will
not go and work in their vineyard. And then later turned, he says,
these, he says, these were those prostitutes and tax collectors,
the immoral and the covetous and the greedy, openly sinners.
that God brings the gospel to by John. And when they heard
the preaching of John, what did they do? They repented. They
believed what John said. They came to God on the basis
of what John said. Behold, the Lamb of God, which
takes away the sin of the world, my sin, and they trusted Him. And they looked to Him and they
were baptized by John to confess that they were sinners and their
only hope was Christ and His being baptized under the wrath
of God. That was what He's teaching them.
And these men didn't hear it. You're like the second son, He's
telling them. They admitted the first son was
obedient. You're like the second son. You
say, I will do your will, my father. And they didn't do it. They did not do it. They were
hypocrites. They claimed to have the law
and keep it, but they didn't. They didn't understand what the
law was teaching, and they certainly didn't keep the law. They were
the second son. But what is the will? What is
the will of the Father here that they did not do? What is that
will? Well, isn't it what God says
throughout Scripture? Jesus said, I came to do my Father's
will. Didn't he? Let me read to you
a few verses in the book of John. He says in John chapter 6, verse
40, he says, Well, in verse 38, "...I came
down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him
that sent Me. And this is the Father's will, which has sent
Me, that of all which He hath given Me, I should lose nothing,
but should raise it up again at the last day." And verse 40,
"...and this is the will of Him that sent Me." that of every
one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting
life, and I will raise him up at the last day." What is the
will of God that they didn't do? They didn't believe God's
Son. They did not believe Him. Look
at verse 29 of the same chapter. How do people believe this Son? It says in verse 28, They said
to Jesus, What shall we do that we might work the works of God?
And Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God,
that you believe on Him whom He has sent. That's the will
of God. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Remember when the people in Acts 16, the Philippian jailer said,
Sir, he said to Paul and Silas, When it seemed like the prison
was crumbling and all the prisoners were open to go and he knew he
was going to lose his life, he says, Sir, what must I do to
be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. What must I do? Look to the Lord
Jesus Christ. That salvation is in Him alone.
That all righteousness from God is in Him. Isn't that what he
says throughout scripture? 1 John 3.23, this is His commandment,
that you believe on His Son and love one another as He's given
you commandment. Faith in Christ is keeping, is
doing the will of God. Isn't it? Isn't that what it
says throughout scripture? He says in this faith that God
gives us to do the will of God is in Ephesians chapter 2. He
says, when we were dead in sins, but God, who is rich in mercy,
for his great love wherewith he loved us, has quickened us
together with Christ. By grace you are saved. And then
he gave us this faith, this salvation and this faith. It's all of grace
to do God's will. Romans 1.5, Romans 16.26. speak of the obedience of faith.
1 Peter 1.22, Acts 15.9 speak of being purified by faith. Romans
6.17 says that When we were the servants of
sin, God be thanked that you have obeyed from the heart that
form of doctrine. This is what God is speaking
about throughout scripture. Those who believe have everlasting
life. Those who do not believe Christ
face eternal damnation. Therefore, believing Christ is
doing the will of God. These men refused to believe
Christ. They were the second son. So
we must learn these lessons. Now, when we look at this, just
quickly, I want to point these out. Never despise the preaching
of the Gospel. Remember, Jesus told these men,
He says, if you answer this question, I'll answer you your question.
They didn't answer His question. What did He do? I'm not going
to answer you. I'm not going to tell you. God
seals His truth from those who reject His Son. So in Hebrews
2, verse 1, it says, Therefore, let me look at that, Hebrews
2, we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which
we have heard. Remember that, Hebrews 2, verse
1? Therefore, we ought to give them more earnest heed to the
things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them
slip. For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and
every transgression and disobedience received a just recompensive
reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?
"...which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and
was confirmed to us by them that heard." Look at Hebrews 4.1,
"...let us therefore fear, since the Israelites perished in the
wilderness because of their unbelief, let us therefore fear, lest a
promise be left us of entering into his rest, any of you should
seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached
as well as unto them, but the word preached did not profit
them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard." Never despise
the preaching of the gospel. Flee to Christ today and every
day and go to Him. Ask Him to give you this obedience. What is true obedience? True
obedience is heart faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that
what it says in Romans 10, 9? With the heart Man believeth
unto righteousness. It's not what you do outwardly,
it's what you believe in your heart that makes a difference
between keeping the will of God and not keeping it. And when
we believe in our heart, that faith works by love. What causes
us to love God? There's only one thing. Knowing
that He's forgiven us all of our sins for Christ's sake, has
established everlasting righteousness by His obedience, by His death. And to fail to believe Christ
as He reveals Himself in the Gospel is the greatest disobedience. We must be delivered from that.
We must be delivered from that disobedience. Now, isn't it true? Don't you know Psalm 80, he says,
Turn us again, Lord God of hosts, cause thy face to shine, and
we shall be saved. Unless God shines the light in
our hearts to cause us to be persuaded of not only our sin,
but Christ's righteousness, and to trust Him alone and rejoice
in what He has done and come to God because of Him. We'll
just go on callous and hardened and go on deeper and deeper in
our sin unless God rescues us. And then the last lesson I want
to point out here is that God Himself sovereignly turns unbelieving
sinners to faith in Christ. One last scripture. Look at 1
Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 1. Paul is speaking about himself,
his own experience of being an unbeliever. Remember, a persecutor
of the Church of God. He says in verse 13 of 1 Timothy
chapter 1, that he was before a blasphemer and a persecutor. He spoke against God and the
truth, against Christ and his people. And injurious, he actually
did them harm. But he says, I obtained mercy
because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. He needed mercy because
of his unbelief. Romans 11, 32 says, God has concluded
them all in unbelief. that he might have mercy upon
all. All of his people he saves were in unbelief, just like Paul.
And verse 14, And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant. What did he do? How did this
grace come to him? With faith and love, which is
in Christ Jesus. God's love to him in Christ And
his work for him, because of that love, resulted in God giving
him life and faith in Christ, and he himself loving, then,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And verse 15, he reflects on
this as the prostitutes and the tax collectors. He says, "...this
is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ
Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained
mercy, Why did I obtain mercy? That in me first, Jesus Christ
might show forth all long-suffering for a pattern to them which should
hereafter believe on Him, to life everlasting." He was a Pharisee. He was a scribe, just like these
men. But God saved him, because that's the way God saves all
His people. He only saves when He gets all the glory. Let's
pray. Father, we thank you for your
mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you for this parable of
these two sons. Lord, we know that in that parable
both sons were sinners. But you rescued the first son.
You saved these who were outwardly the worst son. But then you saved
them and gave them this inward life and faith in Christ to believe
the message that John the Baptist preached about him, the Lamb
of God. And yet, Lord, in your justice,
you left these others to their own blindness. Lord, help us
to bow before you and know that what you do is right, and see
it in Scripture, and to not neglect the day of your preaching, of
your gospel, but to bow ourselves down and come to the Lord Jesus
Christ as these publicans and harlots did, and find in Christ
Jesus our Lord a salvation that's everlasting and irrespective
of our sin but removes our sin from us and puts it on the Lord
Jesus Christ and takes it away and establishes our righteousness
in His obedience. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.