045: The Life of Christ:
Crushed by the Crowd
We will be jumping between Matthew 12 and Mark 3 this morning.
These passages deal with the time immediately after Jesus healed
the man with the withered hand and the Pharisee plotted with the Herodians how they
might destroy him.
In Matthew 12:15-16 we find a brief statement about the actions of
Jesus. In Mark 3:7-12 we find the same
narrative expended to give greater perspective.
Matthew 12:15 is parallel to Mark 3:7 which opens the narrative and
Matthew 12:16 it parallel to Mark 3:12 which closes Mark’s presentation. What follows in Matthew 12:17-21 is an
explanation of why Jesus did what he did.
I want to start reading in Mark 3:7-12 as part one of the narrative and
then go immediately to Matthew 12:17-21 as part two of the story. Merged together they show us something more
of the wonder of the Lord Jesus Christ, some of his evangelistic methods and
his continued compassion for the ordinary people who flocked to be near
him.
1. The Initial Action of Jesus
Mark 3:7a ¶ But Jesus withdrew with His
disciples to the sea.
2. The Response of the People
7B And a great multitude from Galilee followed Him, and from Judea
8 and Jerusalem and Idumea and beyond the Jordan; and those from Tyre
and Sidon, a great multitude, when they heard how many things He was doing,
came to Him.
3. Jesus thinks ahead
Mark 3:9 So He told His disciples that
a small boat should be kept ready for Him because of the multitude, lest they
should crush Him.
4. A summary of what Jesus Did
for the People
Mark 3:10 For He healed many, so that
as many as had afflictions pressed about Him to touch Him.
5. The Reaction of the Unclean
Spirits
11 And the unclean spirits,
whenever they saw Him, fell down before Him and cried out, saying, “You are the Son of God.”
6. The Stern Warning of Jesus
Mark 3:12 But He sternly warned them
that they should not make Him known.
And part two:
7. The review of the scene
from Matthew
Matt. 12:15 ¶ But when Jesus knew it
[that the Pharisees and Herodians sought to destroy him], He withdrew from
there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.
Matt. 12:16 Yet He warned them not to
make Him known,
8. The Reason behind these things
Matt. 12:17 that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
18 “Behold! My Servant
whom I have chosen, My Beloved in whom My soul is well pleased! I will put My
Spirit upon Him, And He will declare justice to the Gentiles. 19 He will not quarrel nor cry out,
Nor will anyone hear His voice in the streets.
20 A bruised reed He will not break, And smoking flax He will not
quench, Till He sends forth justice to victory;
21 And in His name Gentiles will trust.”
Let’s look at the texts a bit more closely with some exposition:
1. The Initial Action of Jesus
Mark 3:7a ¶ But Jesus withdrew with His
disciples to the sea. Matthew adds that
this was because Jesus knew what the Pharisees and Herodians were up to--no
good. Jesus took his five disciples and
went to the Sea of Galilee.
He withdrew, that is, he
moved away from that location, implying a considerable distance. Literally it
means ‘to withdraw, to retire, to go off, to go away.’
In Matt 2:2 it is used of the withdrawing or departure of the
wisemen. Matt. 2:12 Then, being
divinely warned in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed
for their own country another way. They
left Palestine to return to their own land.
They withdrew to travel a considerable distance. It is used in verse 13
of the departure once again, then in verse 14 of the departure of Mary, Joseph
and Jesus to Egypt and in Chapter two, verse 22, of their return.
Jesus and his disciples moved a distance away from the trouble
that was brewing, first in Jerusalem with the leaders of the Jews, and now in
Galilee with the Pharisaical and Herodian conspirators at work. He didn’t just move to the next town, he
withdrew some distance to the Sea.
Not every difficulty has to be met with a confrontation and
holding our ground and asserting our rights.
Sometimes the principled protection of body and soul is a legitimate
activity. When Jesus knew these strange
bedfellows were after him, he withdrew to safety as he did before on at least
one occasion.
Sometimes a martyr complex can be nothing but foolishness. Life should be preserved, unless there is a
greater good to be gained, by its death.
File that away for future use.
Matthew and Mark are driving a wedge between the common folk who
attended to Jesus’s every work and word and the leaders of the Jews. The Pharisees and Herodians want to kill him,
the crowds, the masses adore the Lord Jesus.
It really is quite a contrast.
Jesus deals sharply and angrily with the scribes and Pharisees; he
deals compassionately with the multitudes. And, Mark gives us .....
2. The Response of the People
7B And a great multitude from Galilee followed Him, and from Judea
8 and Jerusalem and Idumea and beyond the Jordan; and those from Tyre
and Sidon, a great multitude, when they heard how many things He was doing,
came to Him.
They came from great distances when they heard all that Jesus was
doing for the people.
The Lord Jesus was in the North, in Galilee, by the Sea of
Galilee. We would expect many to be
there. But Mark continues to show us the
demographic makeup of the masses who came to him--without any special
sociological growth techniques and methods, by the way....
There were some from Judea, the enclave of Jewish power and
aristocracy in the South. There were
some from the Capital city of Jerusalem.
There were some from Idumea, or Idumaea. This is the Greek form of Edom, the
southernmost part of Israel’s land down by Arabia.
Some came from beyond the Jordan, also known as Decapolis. It was an area comprised of ten cities =deka,
meaning ten, and polis, meaning city. It was a district on the east and
south-east of the Sea of Galilee containing “ten cities,” which were chiefly
inhabited primarily by Greeks. This audience was not exclusively Jewish, would
have been the realization of the ancient reader.
Mark continues, he mentions the ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon
up on the Syrian Coast. These cities
were inhabited by more Gentiles, especially Syrians and descendants of the
ancient Philistines--no friends of the Jews.
But, they heard about Jesus and wanted to experience him firsthand.
a great multitude, when they heard how many
things He was doing, came to Him.
Their motivation was simple: they had travelled a great distance
with the sole purpose of meeting Jesus.
They came from all directions representing the entire ethnic diversity
to be found in Palestine. This was not
just a Jewish thing. It was for the
nations of the world--Jesus was doing his works of mercy for all who would come
to him.
Many people came from each of these areas. Do you get a sense of the vastness of what
was going on? They were pressing in upon
him and following him as he wandered in the wilderness with his followers. But, Jesus had some legitimate concerns.....
3. Jesus thinks ahead
Mark 3:9 So He told His disciples that
a small boat should be kept ready for Him because of the multitude, lest they
should crush Him.
We don’t yet learn why Jesus wanted the boat. Only that he told his disciples to make this
provision and to keep it ready for him because of the army pressing in upon
him.
Have you ever been in a crowd where everyone wanted the same
thing? I was once at a used book sale
where there were about 200 men in a parking lot getting ready to squeeze
through one door in the back of a bookstore.
As the time for the book sale drew near, more and more people tried to
get closer to the door. Those who had
been there for hours, often lost their place because of the crowd. You could stand and be moved without moving
intentionally. The crowd just carried
you along. The place you didn’t want to
be was behind where the door opened.
Even though you were one of the closest to the door, the force of the
men going by precluded you from coming around to enter. Crowds can take on a personality of their
own. We talk about a mob or herd
mentality. This is what surrounded Jesus that day. It pressed in upon him, pushing him ever
closer to the Sea. He made legitimate
provision for the protection of his person and his disciples. These words add to the wonder of all Jesus
did in his ministry, what he had to endure, what he gladly did that God’s work
might be done according to his Word. For this he endured the crush of the crowd
upon him. Mark gives us .....
4. A summary of what Jesus Did
for the People
Mark 3:10 For He healed many, so that
as many as had afflictions pressed about Him to touch Him.
Jesus was the God-man dispensing undeserved compassion to
many. All those with afflictions and
troubles, do you see the word that is used? “PRESSED” about to touch him. The more grace Jesus dispensed, the more they
desired. And, this is not necessarily
saving grace, but healing grace out of the compassion of Jesus for the masses
who were in the language already introduced in Matt. 9:36 But when He
saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were
weary and scattered, like sheep
having no shepherd.
Jesus desired for them to have one to look after them, to be their
shepherd. Do you see now that the
imagery is not just a metaphor, they were literally and really like an
unordered flock using him for fodder.
They were in great need, physically and spiritually. Jesus was a man of compassion. He healed those who came and he had a
profound effect upon the world of spirits too.
We find out about their reaction to Jesus in verse 11....
5. The Reaction of the Unclean
Spirits
11 And the unclean spirits,
whenever they saw Him, fell down before Him and cried out, saying, “You are the Son of God.”
The Unclean Spirits had more sense than who? Think about it for a minute? Who is becoming the major opponent to all
Jesus was doing and all he was? It was
the leaders of the Jews in John’s Gospel and in Matthew Mark and Luke it is
usually the Pharisees and their co-conspirators. The unclean spirits, the demons, have the
sense to make themselves low before the King of Kings, the Son of God, in a way
the hardened Pharisees never did.
The word for fell down is not one that shows a mere physical trip
of fall, nor one of intimidation before another of greater stature, it means to
prostrate oneself before someone, implying supplication — ‘to prostrate oneself
before, to fall down before.’7
pi÷ptwc Ú kai« peso/nteß proseku/nhsan aujtw◊^
A strictly literal
translation of prospi÷ptwa or pi÷ptwc,
namely, ‘to fall down before,’ can be entirely misleading in that it may
suggest an accident caused by stumbling or tripping. It may therefore be
necessary in a number of languages to translate ‘to bow down low before’ or ‘to
bow down to the ground before another in reverence.’
We have to give the unclaen spirits credit for doing what was
right. Isn’t it ironic to contrast them
with the leaders of the Jews? It is
powerful irony, indeed.
We now read something that seems strange to our minds on first
glance....
6. The Stern Warning of Jesus
Mark 3:12 But He sternly warned them
that they should not make Him known.
When we looked at the healing of the leper, Mark 1:43 we
read: And He strictly warned [the leper]
and sent him away at once, 44 and said
to him, “See that you say nothing to
anyone; but go your way, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your
cleansing those things which Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”
Jesus didn’t need any more advertising. His words and his works were enough to draw
crowds that were already unmanageable.
He knew it was not his time. To
preserve his own life and person to finish the work that had been given to him,
he gives the command to the masses and to the unclean spirits, that they should
not make him known. Some commentators want to explain the “them” in verse 12 as
referring to the unclean Spirits, however, in the parallel passage in Matthew
we find the same words without any mention of the Unclean Spirits. There is clearly refers to the people, the
multitudes.
And part two:
7. The review of the scene
from Matthew
Matt. 12:15 ¶ But when Jesus knew it
[that the Pharisees and Herodians sought to destroy him], He withdrew from
there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.
Matt. 12:16 Yet He warned them not to
make Him known,
Why did these things happen?
Matthew tells us:
8. The Reason behind these things
Matt. 12:17 that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
One of Matthew’s concerns is to show how Jesus fulfilled the Law
and the Prophets. Here again, he brings
in an Old Testament idea to explain the New Testament reality. This passage in a special way exemplifies
what this passage from Isaiah 42 says and means.
Matthew quoting Isaiah 42:1-4 from the LXX wrote:
18 “Behold! My Servant whom I have chosen, My
Beloved in whom My soul is well pleased! I will put My Spirit upon Him, And He
will declare justice to the Gentiles. 19
He will not quarrel nor cry out, Nor will anyone hear His voice in the
streets. 20 A bruised reed He
will not break, And smoking flax He will not quench, Till He sends forth
justice to victory; 21 And in His
name Gentiles will trust.”
God the Father is speaking of his special servant who was doing
his work or serving the Father. This
servant is to labor as a specially chosen one.
He is the one in whom the Father’s soul takes much delight. He is the one who will have the Spirit of God
upon him, and He will make a public declaration of God’s Justice to the
Gentiles, to the nations.
His character is such that he will not quarrel needlessly with
men. He puts those who oppose him to
silence, or he just walks away. We have
already observed that on a few occasions.
Neither will he cry out in order to draw attention to himself or to what
he says. He will not be a man of
mourning and wailing against others. He
will speak gently in the way he deals with the common folk. Nobody in the streets, the city, will hearken
unto his voice.
In verse 20 we have one of the most poignant and profound
descriptions of the character of the Son of man. Listen to the poetic imagery used 700+ years
before the birth of the Lord Jesus to describe him:
20 A bruised reed He will not
break, And smoking flax He will not quench, Till He sends forth justice to
victory;
What the Prophet is describing here are the people to whom Jesus
was ministering. They had little
understanding. Some, the Jews, had been
taught wrongly by their teachers. Others, the Gentiles, were in ignorance. Towards these, Jesus was tender and kind as
he sought to shepherd them through patient instruction based on God’s Word and
works of compassion and mercy done for them as needy sinners. Jesus did not
seek to snap off the bruised reed, he sought to tend it to make it whole. He did not snuff out the little embers of a
smoldering wick, he sought to feed the spark that it might be of use. The
masses were still ignorant of who it was before them. Yet, Jesus dealt tenderly with them. He saw a little faith, weak grace, occasional
repentance, but he continued to teach and work for their understanding of who
he was and the importance of his ministry.
But, he will not bear with their weaknesses, unbelief and lack of
thorough repentance forever. The Word
also says, in 12:20 Till He sends forth
justice to victory... One day there
would be a reckoning based upon all they had seen and heard. For the time being, Jesus was tender and
compassionate towards the multitudes, while angry and grieved with the
Pharisees. But all would one day sit
under the justice that he as the righteous judge would deliver. This is the Word of the Lord, true through
the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This imagery of the bruised reed and smoking flax should give us
hope. Many of us are those bruised reeds
and smoking flaxes. What a blessing it
is to know true the character of the Lord Jesus towards those who follow
him. He will not break us, nor will he
snuff us out. He works for our good. It
is all undeserved and of his grace. It is often the goodness of God that leads
men to repentance. In his public
ministry, it is only when that goodness of God and the Person of Christ is
despised, that God turns men over to judgment and wrath. And, we will see that
Jesus talks a lot about judgment and hell. For those who follow him, even with
weak faith, Jesus is tender and compassionate.
He wants his people to grow and to follow him. He is one who can be trusted, by people from
anyplace, any background or any origin.
He is what they need. But, they
must follow on his terms.
Look at the last phrase of the Prophecy from Isaiah 42:4 as quotes
in Matt 12:21 as it is used to tell us of the Character of the Lord Jesus
Christ in Matthew 12:21, it says
21 And in His name Gentiles will
trust.”
They were there, from Syria, Tyre and Sidon, from beyond the
Jordan, from Edom, Jesus was already ministering to the nations, the ethnoi, of
the world. THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH WAS
NOT SIMPLY SOMETHING THAT WOULD TRANSFORM JUDAISM, it was to transform the
people in the nations of the world who would look with trust to the Lord Jesus
Christ. The Scribes and Pharisees should
have known the character of the Messiah, and the character of the work he had
to do. When we read that verse our ears
should perk up and we who have believed should say, “That’s me!” I am included
in that prophecy. I am a Gentile who has
trusted in the Messiah, the Son of Man, the Lord Jesus Christ.” I am mentioned
in the Bible! You see, the salvation of
any and all would be based solely on this one of a tender character dispensing
mercy and grace to bruised reeds and smoldering flaxes. It is found in his life
of mercy and grace fulfilling the righteous demands of God’s Law and it will be
found in his death to secure the deliverance of sinners held in bondage. What a glorious savior.
Jesus was not some sort of human revolutionary. He was not merely
an inspirational teacher. He was much more. He was God sent to man to live as a
man to die in the place of man that man might be brought back to God. His revolution is a revolution of the
heart. He changes people from the
inside-out. As the heart goes, so go the
people. Upon what is your heart this
morning? Upon what or whom do you place
your affections? Is it this one sent
from God? Is it his servant who worked for the ultimate good of the souls of
men? Is it this one with whom God the
Father was well-pleased? Is it the only
one upon whom God placed his Spirit is special measure. Is it this one who declared God’s justice to
the Gentiles that they might trust in him?
It ought to be, if you profess to be his follower.
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