and open them to Matthew chapter
17. Matthew chapter 17. Let me read verses 22 and 23 first. And while they abode in Galilee,
Jesus said unto them, The son of man shall be betrayed into
the hands of men, and they shall kill him, and the third day he
shall be raised again, and they were exceeding sorry. We've often read and said that
repetition is the best teacher. Repetition is the best teacher. This is the second time of three
times that the Lord Jesus Christ told his disciples of what was
going to happen. If you look back into chapter
16, Matthew chapter 16 and verse 21, he said, from that
time forth began Jesus to show unto his disciples how that he
must go unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and
chief priests and scribes and be killed and be raised again
the third day. And then in our text this morning
here in Matthew chapter 17, the second time He said, the son of man shall
be betrayed into the hands of men and they shall kill him.
And the third day he shall be raised again. And they were exceeding
sorrow. And then if you will, over a
few pages in chapter 20 of Matthew, verses 18 and 19, beginning with
verse 17, and Jesus going up to Jerusalem, took the 12 disciples
apart in the way. and said unto them, behold, we
go up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man shall be betrayed unto
the chief priests and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn
him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock and
to scourge and to crucify, and the third day he shall rise again. Three times the Lord Jesus Christ
told these 12 disciples of what was going to take place, that
they would go to Jerusalem, that he would be crucified and slain,
and that he would rise again the third day. And yet you and
I know that these 12 disciples, they didn't understand, even
though repetition is the best teacher. After our Lord telling
them this three times over, they still did not understand. They
had been convinced, they had been taught probably from childhood,
that the Messiah, who they recognized the Lord Jesus Christ to be,
that the Messiah certainly would not die. He certainly would not
be killed. He would be recognized as a savior
of Israel and deliver the nation of Israel from captivity and
make the nation great once again among the nations of the world
like it was when David was king. They'd been taught this and so
when the Lord told them time after time after time of what
was going to take place, We know that until Pentecost, until God
the Holy Spirit was poured out upon these disciples at Pentecost,
they didn't understand. They didn't understand about
his death. They looked evidently for a Messiah
who would, yes, make things better in this world, make things better
especially for the nation of Israel. But they didn't consider
that the Messiah would come to save sinners, that that was his
purpose in coming into this world, that the Son of Man would come
to seek and to save that which is lost. So yes, repetition is
the best teacher, and that's the reason we repeat the message
over and over and over again, because we need to hear it over
and over again. the gospel of Jesus Christ. Turn
back with me now to Matthew chapter 17. I want us to look today at
the rest of the verses in this chapter beginning with verse
22 or verse 24 rather. And when they were come to Capernaum,
they that received tribute money came to Peter and said, doth
not your master pay tribute? He saith, yes. And when he was
come into the house, Jesus prevented him, saying, what thinkest thou,
Simon? Of whom do the kings of the earth
take custom or tribute? Of their own children or of strangers? Peter saith unto him, of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, then are
the children free, notwithstanding. Notwithstanding, lest we should
offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast and hook, and take up
the fish that first cometh up. And when thou hast opened his
mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money that that take, and
given to them for me and thee. I want us to look at this passage
this morning. First of all, Capernaum. Capernaum, what do we know about
Capernaum? Capernaum was a city in Galilee
on the Lake of Galilee. It was a great city, no doubt. And here are two things we learn
about it in the Gospels. It was here where the Lord Jesus
Christ did many of his miracles, his mighty works. He made his
home here for the most part in Capernaum. Remember he was born
in Bethlehem, he's crucified in Jerusalem where the temple
was, but he spent most of his time, his ministry, at least
in Galilee. And Capernaum was a city in Galilee
where he made his home. And he said this about Capernaum,
that Capernaum was exalted unto heaven. This city, because of his presence,
and because of his mighty works which he wrought in Capernaum,
he said, this city is exalted unto heaven, but it shall be
brought down to hell. You see, where much is given,
much is required. His presence, his mighty miracles,
his teaching, they were responsible. But they had not heard, they
had not repented at his ministry there in Capernaum. And so Capernaum
itself, our Lord said, would be brought down to hell. Although it was exalted unto
heaven by him being there. And I mention that to us here
this morning because surely where the gospel is preached, Where
the gospel is proclaimed, men and women, boys and girls are
more responsible than where the gospel isn't preached. In a country,
maybe in a land where the gospel isn't declared, then those people,
yes, they're guilty. Yes, they will suffer the judgment
of God, but not anything like those who have lived in a country
like ours, in this country, where there's a Bible in almost every
house. And if you don't have one, you
can get one for just a few dollars. And there's a church on almost
every corner in some towns. Yes, to whom much is given, much
is required. And those who have known the
master's will and did it not shall be beaten with many stripes,
the scripture says. Those who did not know his will,
of course, with less. And one other thing I'd say about
Capernaum. Peter was a fisherman, and so
where do fishermen live? They live close to the water,
don't they? He had a house there in Capernaum,
and we know that The Lord Jesus Christ, immediately after his
baptism, he came to Capernaum and went into Peter's house,
and there was Peter's mother-in-law, his mother-in-law, she was sick.
She had a fever. And they told the Lord Jesus
that she was there in the house and sick, and so what did he
do? He healed her. And you see, when the Lord heals
someone, it's instantaneous. It's immediate. When he healed
her by his touch, she immediately arose and served there in the
house. The scriptures tell us that.
Peter, the so-called first pope, can you believe this? He had
a wife. He had a mother-in-law. He really
did. He really did. Now, let's look
at the passage. First, I have two parts to the
message. I pray the Lord will bless it. What do we know about
this tribute? Notice in verse 24, it says,
And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money,
actually a tax, came to Peter and said, Doth not your master
pay tribute? What do we know about these people
who were gathering this tribute or this tax. Well, first thing
we know, they were not publicans. These people were not publicans.
You remember last week, we studied about Zacchaeus, a publican.
And the publicans, they collected taxes or tributes for Rome. And that's one reason they were
so hated, because Rome, of course, ruled over the nation of Israel
at this time. And so these were traitors in
a sense, Jewish men who would work for Rome and take taxes. And most of them were thieves
and anyway, but these here, this tribute here wasn't going to
Rome. Not at all. These men were Jews. Remember one time in our Lord's
life, The Pharisees, the religious leaders, they came to him and
they tried to entrap him. They were always looking. Wherever
the Lord was, they would come around and they'd be listening,
just trying to catch him in some word. Some word that he shouldn't
have said or some word he should say or something he should do
or not do. How would you like to live your
life like that? How would you like to live? Our
Lord did. He lived his life under a spotlight
of men who hated him and watched him, every move, every word,
just trying to find something for which they could accuse him.
Remember they came one time and they said, is it lawful to pay
tribute to Caesar or not? Now they thought. They thought
they had him entrapped by that, because if he says it's lawful,
then they would charge him to the religious leaders of Israel,
the priest, for giving a command to pay tribute to a Roman, a
Gentile. But if he said no, then they
could charge him to the civil rulers. While he's promoting
rebellion, not paying taxes to Rome. They didn't know who they
were dealing with, did they? Here is wisdom personified. The Lord Jesus said, well, show
me a piece of your money. Of course, they brought him a
piece of money. And he said, whose image is that
on that coin there? Well, that's Caesar's. Well,
render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the
things that are God's. But they just had many different
ways they tried to ensnare the Lord Jesus Christ, but they couldn't
do it. They failed completely. But these
men here were not publicans that Peter dealt with. They were Jews,
and they were collecting money, not for Rome, but they were collecting
money for the expenses of the temple in Jerusalem, a tax to
support the temple in Jerusalem, God's temple. What do we know
about this tribute money? Well, evidently, it was based
on tradition. And there are three different
historical Facts in the Old Testament that people say, well, they started
doing this because of this, or because of that, or because of
the other. But it was all a tradition. The
first one is based on, is when God gave command to Moses concerning
the tabernacle in the wilderness. He had Moses to take a census
of all the men who were 20 years and older. And each one had to
pay a tribute, a shekel, a half a shekel. It was called a ransom,
a ransom for the soul. And that shekel, it had to be
a temple shekel. It was made of silver and it
was used to support the ministry of the tabernacle. Some believe
that, well, it went back to that, but God didn't give a command
for that to be continued. He didn't command it, that was
a one-time command to support the tabernacle. Others say, no,
it came from during the reign of King Josiah when the temple
was in such ruins that they put a chest, they set a chest with
a hole in it in the temple, or on the porch of the temple, rather,
and people put their money in, kind of like we have here, an
offering box. And, you know, the people gave so much they
had to ask them, stop. We've got too much already. And
that was just to refurbish and rebuild the temple. And then
others said, no, it came because when they came back out of 70
years captivity in Babylon, remember Nebuchadnezzar, he burned the
temple, he destroyed the temple. And when they came back, it had
to be rebuilt. And so they started receiving
a tribute to rebuild the temple. The thing that I want to point
out to us, it was based on tradition. It was based on tradition. And
you know, Tradition gets into religion. There's so much tradition
today. I mean, in some churches, so-called
churches, they repeat the Apostles' Creed every Sunday. Well, first
of all, we know it wasn't written by the apostles, that creed. But they say at every service,
every Sunday, they've got to repeat the Apostle's Creed. And
there, if you didn't do that, well, that wouldn't be legitimate
worship. And, you know, in Baptist churches,
some of them at least, you have to sing the doxology every service. If you don't sing the doxology,
well, there's something wrong, something bad wrong. And all
of this is just based on tradition. We conduct our services and we
support the ministry here as we're taught in the word of God. Everything that we believe, everything
that I believe and everything that you believe, you should
be able, I'm talking about in the things of God, you should
be able, I should be able to go to the scripture and say,
this is why I believe this. This is why I believe that Jesus
is the Son of God. This is why I believe that there's
a trinity of persons in the Godhead. This is why I believe that Jesus
paid the ransom price only for His people. We should be able
to support what we believe from the Word of God, line upon line,
precept upon precept, and if it's not found here, I don't
care how old the tradition may be, that's all it is. You know, remember this, in the
wilderness, because of the Israelites, they were murmuring. Now we don't
think of murmuring, complaining as a sin, but God does. God does. They were murmuring
and complaining about the way. Oh boy, this is a rough way. That one country wouldn't let
them pass through the king's highway. They had to go around
and it was a rough way. And they began to complain and
murmur against God. And God sent those serpents,
those fiery serpents. And when a person was bitten
by one of those serpents, it was a death sentence, poisonous. And then God gave a remedy, didn't
he? God told Moses, make a serpent of brass and put it on a pole,
and anyone and everyone who is bitten, look, look to that brass
serpent and you'll be healed. And everyone who looked was healed. Well, what do you suppose they
did? Well, they took that serpent down from the pole when they
moved on, took it with them, Took it into the land of Canaan
after God gave them the land. And for many, many years, they
kept that serpent. And they worshipped it. It turned
into an idol for them. Until finally there was a king
of Judah who said, destroy it. It's a worthless thing. You know,
people, the cross. This cross, people, in many places,
that's a tradition. If you don't have a cross on
your church building, must be something wrong with you folks.
Tradition. As one of our friends said one
time, if you could find the actual cross, and of course, the mother, I forget, Constantine. Constantine's mother, she claimed
she went to Jerusalem, this is in the 300s, and found the literal
cross. And there were so many pieces
supposedly of the real cross across Europe in the 1600s, almost
every church in Europe had a piece of the cross. And people made
pilgrimages. Someone said, and I agree with
this 100%, if you could actually find the real cross upon which
Jesus died, the best thing you could do with it is burn it.
Burn it. You can touch the cross. You
can go on your knees over glass to a cross. That's not going
to help you. It's who died on that cross.
It's looking to Him, knowing Him, trusting in Him. Tradition. Know what we believe,
and not only what we believe, but what we practice. What do
we practice here in our worship services? We sing hymns. We're told to do that, aren't
we? To make melody in our hearts and sing hymns unto the Lord.
We read the Word of God. We study the Word of God. We're
not here to entertain people. We don't bring in famous people
out of the world to try to attract people. What we do, what we believe,
and what we practice, it must be based upon God's Word. It must be. tradition. And so, one of my dear friends
who's gone to be with the Lord now, pastored, and he told me
years ago, not many years after we began this church, he said,
David, it's a whole lot easier to get something into a church
than it is to get something out of a church. And that's true. I mean, you
can start something one Sunday, do it the next Sunday, do it
two or three Sundays in a row, and before long, if you don't
do it, somebody's mad. Somebody's upset. Some tradition. We are not following tradition. By the grace of God, we want
to follow the Lord. And the way to follow the Lord
is to follow his word. But I want you to notice our
Lord said he was exempt. He was exempt. On two grounds,
he was exempt from paying this tribute. First of all, he was
the son of the king. He was the son of King David.
And he asked Peter, do they collect tribute of their own children
or strangers? of strangers. He was no stranger. He was exempt from paying this
tribute on the grounds of the fact that he was a son of a king. And not only that, but the temple
was his temple. It was his temple that they were
collecting to support. But notice that word notwithstanding. We can preach a message from
that one word, I believe, notwithstanding. We would not offend people needlessly,
and neither did the Lord Jesus Christ. No, we'll pay the tax. We'll pay the tribute, the Lord
said. Now here's the second part of
my message, and I have five things, and I'll be brief on each one
of them, but five things that we may learn about our Savior. from these words. Five things
we can learn about the blessed Lord Jesus Christ. I want to
know Him, don't you? And I want to know more about
Him. I want to know Him, whom to know is life everlasting.
The first thing we see here is His perfect knowledge of all
things. His perfect knowledge of all
things. And this testifies to His deity. Only God knows all things, is
omniscient, and that's our Lord. He is God, manifest in the flesh. You notice in verse 25, when
Peter came into the house, the Lord said, the scripture rather says, Jesus
prevented him. Now that word prevent means at
the time the translation was made, it means to precede. Today,
if you said, well, he prevented him, he kept him from saying,
no, he didn't keep him from saying, he preceded. Before Peter could
open his mouth and tell what had taken place and what he had
said, the Lord Jesus Christ speaks as though he had been right there
with Peter, as though he had been right alongside Peter when
they asked him, Doesn't your master pay tribute? The Lord
knew exactly what Peter had said, what he'd been asked and what
he said. You know, the scripture speaks
of him as the living word, that all things are manifest in his
sight. Bishop J.C. Rowe, he made this
comment, he said, we ought, we ought to attempt to make a practical
use of this truth. Let us measure every difficult
question as to right and wrong by this simple test. How would
I behave if Jesus was standing by my side? That's something, isn't it? How
would I behave? How would I answer? What would
I say if Jesus was standing here by my side? But yet, he knows
all things. He sees all things. No, physically,
he's not here by our side. But the same is true. He knows
everything. He sees everything. So that's the first thing we
see, his perfect knowledge of all things. Second, his absolute
power over all things. He's Lord of all. People sometimes
say, well, you know, I like the God of the New Testament, but
I don't like the God of the Old Testament. That's so foolish. Same God. Same God. There's only one God. And God
Almighty has all power over all things. You think about his absolute
power over creation. The night that Israel marched
out of Egypt, now there was probably 2 million people. Maybe more, maybe a little less.
Have you ever thought about 2 million people walking? The noise, the
noise, and do you know what? shut the mouth of every dog in
Egypt. Not one dog barked. Isn't that amazing? My neighbor has a dog and I can
just go outside sometimes and I hear that dog over there yapping.
And here's a whole, whole nation of people leaving. And God had
so closed their mouths that not one dog barked. God used ravens who usually eat
meat to serve his prophet Elijah, to take him food to eat there
in the desert. God brought quail into the camp
of Israel so that they might have meat. Just mountains of
quail, the Lord. God prepared a fish to swallow
Jonah, his disobedient prophet, to swallow him and then to take
him to where he needed to be, to go to Nineveh. And yes, my
friends, God even enabled a donkey, a donkey to speak. Balaam's donkey talked to him. He said, do you believe that?
Absolutely. Why? Because he has all power over
all things. That's why. Because it's recorded
in the word of God. How many times did our Lord in
the gospels tell his disciples, cast your net on the other side.
They've been casting all night, caught nothing. They cast the
net on the other side and the nets break because there's so
many fish gathered together. God has power. The Lord Jesus
Christ has power. He commanded this fish to bring
a piece of money to Peter. The third thing that I see here
is his condescension in order to save his people. The Lord
Jesus Christ was here in his world, his world. He created it. He owns it. He governs it. And yet, to become
your Savior, my Savior, he who was rich became poor, that we,
through his poverty, might be made rich. Here he is, and this
tax, this tribute, he didn't have. Peter, his disciple, and
the Lord Jesus Christ, they didn't have. The foxes have holes. The
birds have their nest, but the Son of Man hath not where to
lay his head. How the Lord Jesus, how, to think
about how poor he became, you've got to think about how rich he
was. And when you stop and think as
God, as the eternal Son of God, there's no way you could calculate
how wealthy and rich and glory he, He was, but yet he laid all
that aside and came into this world and was born in a stable. He did that for you. He did that
for me. The condescension of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Here he is. There's a tax. It's
a small tax, really. But they didn't have the money.
The fourth thing. Our Lord's ability, his ability
to providentially provide the needs of his people. Peter had
this need. He told these people, yeah, we
pay the tax. Sure we do. He didn't have any
money. The Lord Jesus didn't have any
money. He had a need. He had committed himself. He'd
given his word. Yes, we pay this tax. You know, at one point the Lord
Jesus Christ sent these 12 disciples out and he sent them out without
purse. That is, they didn't have a billfold.
They didn't have a script. They didn't have a carrying bag. They didn't have shoes even.
He sent them out and when they came back later he asked them,
lacked you Anything. Anything. Did you like anything? And they answered, nothing. Nothing. His ability to providentially
supply the needs of his people. He said, Behold the fowls of
the air, for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into
barns, yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are you not much
better than they? His ability to provide for his
people. You know, I was thinking earlier,
next Sunday, next Sunday will mark the 46th anniversary of
our church. 46 years. And we could, have
we lacked anything? Have we? Have we lacked anything? He has
provided week after week, day after day, hasn't he, for all
of these years. And he's still got plenty. Yes,
he's providentially able to supply all of our needs. And the last
thing I would mention, his ability to provide but not encourage
slothfulness. Think about that. His ability
to provide but not encourage slothfulness. The Lord provided,
but He used Peter in doing so. God uses what we call means. There was something that Peter
could not do. He couldn't do it. He couldn't
pay this tax. He didn't have the money. But
there was something he could do. He could bait a hook and
cast his line. And the Lord provides in such
a way that he does not promote slothfulness. He does not promote
slothfulness. Let's go back, and I'll close,
but look back in that Psalm we read earlier, Psalm 104. That's
so beautiful. how that God provides for all
of his creatures and all of creation. But here in Psalm 104 in verse
24, we read, O Lord, how manifold are thy works! In wisdom hast
thou made them all. The earth is full of thy riches.
So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping,
innumerable, both small and great beasts. There go the ships. There
is that Leviathan whom thou hast made to play therein. Now notice
this, these wait all upon thee, that thou mayest give them their
meat in due season. Now watch this, that thou givest
them, they gather. God gives it, but they gather. And the same thing is true. This
is an example of Paul's admonition, work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling. For it is God who worketh in
you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. May the Lord
bless this word.