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It’s a privilege to join you today and I’m going to suggest we begin by reading parts of Matthew 13:10-17 and then 34 and 35.
10 The disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?”
11 He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.
12 Whoever has will be given more, and they will have abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.
13 This is why I speak to them in parables: “Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand.
14 In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: “ ‘you will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.
15 For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’
16 But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. 17For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
34 Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable.35So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet: “I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.”
This is the word of the Lord.
So there have been many reductionistic answers given to that question. Some argue that Jesus used stories primarily as illustrations. He was a good harmolitician, he make a point and illustrate it that is why he tell stories. And I’m sure because he was an able to communicator that the desire to make things come to a focal point in a narrative lay there in his motives somewhere but it is hard to make that the ultimate reasons for his telling parables in the light verse 11. Why Jesus does tell parables? It is because the knowledge by the kingdom of heaven was given to you but not to them. It is pretty hard to reconcile that by merely desiring to use parables and then illustrative passion.
Others say that Jesus told stories because he favored the enigmatic, the thought provoking. The open ended rather than truths and propositions. So there are many people today not least out of the emerging crowd but here are some others as well who are suspicious of propositions and hard edges and stories by contrast or more open ended. They can be termed or examined by different angles. As a result you see different things depending on the experience of the reader. And after all verse 34 is regularly sided in this respect. Jesus spoke all this things to the crowd in parable. He did not say anything to them without using a parable.
The trouble nevertheless with that answer is that Jesus transparently does preach in other genres. It is easy to find lots of wisdom examples for instance and wisdom examples regularly they have a dichotomy. In wisdom literature you either have Dame Wisdom or Lady Folly you are following one of the two and you can’t follow both at the same time. So at the end at the sermon on the mountain you have a typical wisdom preacher, you either build you house upon the rock or you build your house upon the sand. It’s one of the two. No point saying I don’t like either I heading for hard pan hand clay. It is not wisdom in wisdom literature you build on one or the other. You’re either producing fruit from a good tree or fruit from a bad three. You’re either going the narrow gate or going the broad gate. There is no in between gate. He is a wisdom preacher very often but he was also an apocalyptic preacher, read Matthew 24. He drops a lot of proverbs, he can engage in extended discourse. Sometimes there are laments. There are expositions of Old Testament text. There are none narrow type of extended metaphors likes his utterances in John 10 for example on the ship and the shepherded or in John 15 on the vine and Vedic culture. There is dialogue, there is a provocative question. Jesus is astonishingly flexible preacher in terms of literary genre.
So to argue that he preferred parables because they were enigmatic and open ended simple means that somebody is not paying attention to the text it’s just too desperately reductionistic. And in the light of all of the biblical evidence, verse 34, can’t possibly mean that he never spoke anything but parables. It means rather that in he’s preaching parables were essential parts of it for reasons that he make clear. He did not preach without using parables, this is an essential component as where propositions, as were proverbs, as were many other forms, essential parts of his preaching patterns.
Other says that he told parables simply to hide things from the none elect. And of course he can make a case for that too. Hence Verse 11 and 12,
“Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and they will have abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.”
Then once again there is something to be said for this perspective. But to make it everything is certainly going to lead us astray as well. In fact in verses 34 and 35, “I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.” That is I’m reviling things previously hidden. If he simply wanting to hide things from the none elect just not talk to them. It is a little more complex than saying he use parables in order to hide them there are simpler ways to hide things. Don’t talk to them at all just talk to the elect and be done with it.
So most of these answers to the question why did Jesus tell these stories are at best reductionistic. What I’m going to focus on are just two reasons. These are not the only reasons why Jesus tells stories but they’re two of the most penetrating theological reasons. Let me tell you what they are and then we’ll work to the text to see that they are justified.
Number one, Jesus tells parables because in line with scripture his message blinds, deafens, and hardens. And second, Jesus tells parables because in line with scripture his message reveals things hidden in scripture. Now let me unpack both of those. Neither is simple both nevertheless have a great deal of light on Jesus is doing with his preaching.
◑1. Jesus tells parables because in line with scripture his message blinds, deafens, and hardens.
Now if we return to verses 10 and following what we discover is that in 10-12 a contrast is set up. In 10, the disciples ask a question, “Why do you speak to people in parables? And the answer, what Jesus says initially is that there is a division going on. “The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you but not to them.” A division, verse 12, “Whoever has will be given more, and they will have abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” There is a division set up in verses 11 and 12. Then verses 13 to 15 treat the negative side of that division that is how the parables function with respect to the negative side of the contrast in verses 11 and 12. Then in verses 16 and 17, how the parables function with respect to the positive side of the division. That is the logical outline of these verses 10-17.
So begin then with the negative side. It’s casting of variety of ways but in particular, it is cast in terms of Isaiah 6. So to that passage we must now turn for few moments. Please turn to Isaiah 6 and I will remind you of some things which I’m sure you are aware.
Isaiah 6 appears in this prophecy, after Isaiah has indulge in several chapters of prophetic denunciation. So the woes are pronounced for example the condemnation a little earlier of chapters 2 and 3 of those who are rich and greedy and stingy oppressing the poor. In 5 you have this ballad of the vineyard that is designed to strip away the excuses of Israel, God’s vineyard. In 5:8 and following “Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the land”. I kind of driving capitalism that is so uncontrolled that destroys all the little people or again verse 11, “Woe to those who rise early in the morning to run after their drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine.” Not just alcohol but drunkenness as its goal, drunkenness and drinking merely to say that you’re having a party. Verse 18, “Woe to those who draw sin along with cords of deceit, and wickedness as with cart ropes, verse 19 to those who say, “Let God hurry; let him hasten his work so we may see it. The plan of the Holy one of Israel— let it approach, let it come into view, so we may know it.”, snarling, sneering, condescending God disclosure, verse 20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.”, that is more revivalist: 21, “Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight”, the arrogant, the insufferably arrogant, the condescending arrogant: 22 “Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and champions at mixing drinks, and on and on and on. Prophetic denunciation, some of the strongest you’ll find anywhere in the Old Testament.
And then in chapter 6, Good King Uzziah dies. Chronicles says that he dies in a certain shame too. After being a moderately good king he actually comes loose and dies in shame. And that was really the only strong point of Israel at that time. And stripped of this hope, Isaiah were told, “Saw the Lord high and exulted seated on the thrown and the train of his robe filled the temple”. And in this vision then he sees the seraphim he hears the voices of the seraphim crying out as in Chapter 6:3, “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God. The whole world is full of his glory.” And now Isaiah says, “Woe to me”. Up to now it’s been woe to all of the people for all of their sins carefully cataloged and listed but now it’s, ‘woe to me, I’m ruined for a man of unclean lips and live among the people of unclean lips and my eyes have seen the King’, The Lord almighty.
One of the things that unbearably happen when we approach God more closely and understand his ways and his character more deeply is that we change from prophetic proclamation that always condemns others, to prophetic proclamations that begins with self-condemnation. We become numbered with the sinners. See likewise Daniel. And here Isaiah “I’m ruined for a man of unclean lips and live among the people of unclean lips”.
Now a live coal is taken to the altar and put upon his mouth to take away his sin. And only at that time does the Lord speak, for the first time speaks. And as almost as if Isaiah is permitted to hear the voice of the Lord, to overhear the voice of the Lord asking a kind of rhetorical question in the courts of heaven, “Whom shall I send and who will go for us?” it is not even directed to Isaiah but he is permitted to overhear it. And Isaiah answered, “hear am I, send me”. We must understand this; this is not some courageous thing. ‘The world else forsake you Lord, not I. I will go I’m your man’. Rather in the light in the flow of the narrative clearly Isaiah is saying more something like this, “Please Excuse me Will I do? Please, please do you think you can use me? I… I… I know I’m disgusting with my mouth nut you know the live coal from the altar has touch me. Please could you use me somehow?" And God says go and this is what I want you to tell the people, “Be ever seeing but never perceiving, make the heart of these people calloused, make their ears dull and close their eyes otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their heart and turn, be healed. I want you to like that, preach to your council.
Well you might respond the way Isaiah did, “Well Ok Lord if you say so. How long will it last? Three years and then we’ll have revival? 10 years? I mean I’m happy to go 40 Lord God as long as I know there is revival at the end of it. “How long will this go on? That what I said, “How long Lord?” God does back neither trap nor wimp, God answered, How long Isaiah? Until thy city is laid ruined without inhabitant, until the house are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravished, until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken and get this Isaiah though a tent remains in the land it will again be laid waste. You preach on guaranteed of the negative responds, you preach in such a way that you condemn people to unbelief and harness of life and the end will be the destruction of the nation. That is how you preach, that is how your ordination calls.
Then the first and only glimpse of hope in the entire chapter is in the last couple of lines. “But as the terebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.” That notion of a stump is then picked up in Isaiah 11, one of the great messianic passages in the Old Testament. “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jessie. From his roots and branch will bear fruit." And as the chapter moves on, you’ll eventually have a picture of spectacular, wonderful transformation.
“The wolf will living with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them."
“They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain,”
But of course Isaiah is in the 8 century B.C it is a little over 700 years before Christ. So the hope held out in Isaiah 6 is not hope that is going to be fulfilled in Isaiah’s day. Tradition has it. It’s probably good tradition, it is not quite certain, but is probably good tradition that Isaiah died a martyr fleeing from the soldiers of wicked King Manasseh hiding as an old man in a hollow tree. They found him in a hallowed tree tied ropes around the whole in the tree into which he has crawled and then tied cut down the tree. Which almost stand the words in Hebrews 11, “Somewhere saw the asunder”. How would you like that for your ordination call? Yeah preach on 7 hundred years from now there will be revival.
The hope in other words is not individualistic hope for a glorious ministry in his day rather the hope is eschatological hope, it is salvation historical hope bound up of the promise of the coming seed from the stump of Jessie. Now that is the passage that Jesus quotes in verses 14 and 15. The people who do not understand his message, he says, are fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah. That is Isaiah foresees under the revelation from God that there is a hardening of the heart to the preaching of truth and that is fulfilled precisely even in Jesus day.
“You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.”
“For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.”
Perhaps the closes analogy to this sort of thing in the New Testament is John 8:45. There Jesus said to people in his own day, “Because I tell you the truth, you do not believe me”. Have you reflected on that? That is a causal, “because I tell you the truth”. It is not a concessive. It is not bad enough if Jesus had said, “although I tell you the truth you do not believe me”. But he puts it causally, “because I tell you the truth you do not believe me”. It is precisely the truth that guarantees you do not believe. So what are your options as a preacher? Tell none truths? If you tell the truth people will not going to believe, that is what Jesus says, that is what Isaiah says. It is precisely the truth that is going to harden their heats and guarantee their unbelief.
And indeed there are voiced today that say again and again and again our culture can no longer accept this or that and therefore they want the message to be trimed because if we say that this is what the gospel is or this is the entailment of the gospel then people are going to turn away from it. So what is the options for trimed gospel? “Because if I tell you the truth you will not believe”.
In other words in certain periods in history and in certain sectors in every period of history it is the faithful preaching of the gospel truth itself that guarantees unbelief. If you don’t see that stay out of the ministry, you are dangerous. At certain periods in history, in certain sectors in every period in history it is the faithful preaching of the truth itself that guarantees unbelief. In fact therefore Isaiah is commanded to harden the people simply by preach the truth to blind them to deafen them. All he have to do is preach the truth and Jesus fulfilled this text, this pattern in chapter 13:14 of Matthew. This is the trajectory and it is easy to trace the trajectory in the Old Testament.
23:00~ on the video above
After Isaiah you might turn to Jeremiah, 6 century B.C and he ended did he not face something of the same thing preaching the truth was precisely what guaranteed that people won’t believe they did not have categories for it. They preferred to rely on other preachers. They much prefer preachers who said what the power authority is actually wanted to hear. But it is not so very difficult in both earlier and later preachers, Amos on the one hand, Josiah on the other, even Haggai and Zephaniah.
Jesus has already indicated that there is this kind of trajectory running to salvation history, as early as the sermon on the mounts and at the end of the beatitudes. We read;
“Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matthew 5:10-12)
And now it comes to the fulfillment of the ministry of Jesus himself. And of course it also applies to us. Where Jesus is aware of how some are being blinded by the light, he uses more parabolic teaching, verses 11 and 12. For this is also in line with his value judgments elsewhere going back on the sermon on the mountain again. In chapter 7:6 we are told not to cast our pearls before swine.
It is not that we become deceptive. It is not that we hide truth from certain people just because we know that they are not going to like them. But we come to recognize that if we cast certain truth out there with some people all you are going to get is an almighty Hoh! Hah! and dismissive condemnation. There might be simpler ways of getting at people rather than putting at you pearls on all at once before swine.
And indeed this is true in many parts of the world where you are only a whisker from violent opposition from formal cohesion and persecution. In the Muslim world for example where Christians are bold enough to bear witness in those parts of the Muslim world where there are a lot of open antagonism where they are bold enough to witness. They learn how to side up to things and see if there is openness at all and attempt to bear witness quietly to see if they can now start talking about Isa(Jesus) because they’ve learn not to cast their pearls before swine. They do know that a certain kind of open preaching just blind people in ferocious hatred and so one of the reasons why Jesus talks in parables that are somewhat enigmatic is precisely because of the people who are diametrically hardened to clear teaching of the truth. In mercy he speaks more elliptically it still condemns, it still blinds. But nevertheless what Jesus is saying in these opening verses of this parables is he tells parables because in line with the scripture his massage blinds, deafens and hardens.
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Second, interestingly enough the second point is almost the converse. It is clearly complementary but it is almost the converse point.
◑2. Jesus tells parables because in line with scripture his message reveals things hidden in scripture.
Now it comes to verses 35 and 35. Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables. He did not use anything to them without using parable. So was what was fulfilled was spoken to the prophets, “I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world”.
Once again an Old Testament passage is quoted for Jesus to make his point and in this case the passage is drawn from the Psalms, Psalms 38, which I invite you to turn. Psalms 78 is one of the so called historical psalms.
In this historical psalms the writer in this case Asaph apprently, the writer surveys something of Israel’s history and draws some moral spiritual lessons from that history. This as you know was a pretty common way of preaching, you find Steven using this device. For example in his lengthy sermon reported in Acts 7. What Steven does in Acts 7 is tell the history of Israel in such a way that he highlights how often, how regularly people rejected the prophets that were sent to them. So it is not all that surprising that they reject Jesus when he was sent to them to which makes them flaming angry because that is not how they think of their history.
I’m a Canadian by birth eventually I became an American and probably in part because I want to make up in my lack of knowledge I read a fair bit of American history. I think I can tell you quite a lot of American history. I could tell the story in quite a lot of different ways. For example I could begin with a great heroism of the Pilgrim Fathers. Escaping from a land of tyranny in order to have freedom of religion bringing with them their bibles and their deep commitment to confessional theology and they carve a sanctuary out of the wilderness and despite losses in the first two years of about a third of their small number. Nevertheless they go on and eventually these land is formed into thirteen colonies in the eastern sea board with the enormous Christian heritage built in to many of the communities. And in due course the tyranny of Great Britain taxation without representation led to the American Revolution and with it such amazing documens says as the constitution itself or the declaration of independence, ‘one nation under God’.
Of course there where horrible miscues or misperception but the racism that was part of the culture was confronted nobly and a great sacrifices by the civil war. And then God’s mercy he raise up man like Jonathan Edwards who brought what we know in this country the great awakening, it is called the evangelical awakening in Britain and with more awakening under Dwight and other in the 1800. And in due course God made this land a land of shining commitment to democracy and liberty around the world. How am I doing?
Now let me tell you the same story. God permitted the Pilgrim Fathers to come here but they brought with them small pox and other deceases and of course those deceases ravage the native population that was already here. And while the whites from Europe were coming out their nation in the wilderness they were slaughtering the red Indians right across the nations. And of course there was lot of bloody warfare both ways. And when they did eventually form their nation and their constitution and so on, yes well it was pretty wonderful in the one hand, it was also bit two faced treating the blacks like two thirds of humans. And in due course it caused the bloodiest war that we ever had, the civil war. That didn’t end after all. After that came at the Jim Crow law, all the rest of the things that are so ugly that if really only been confronted good three centuries later. Confronted in the civil rights movements and that is the thing, still many, many sorts of iniquities. And meanwhile are we so righteous or really and really pure in this front and that front and as I go on and on and on. Did you see the same facts folks? Have I told the truth both times?
Believe me I could do the same thing for Canadian history or British history or Chinese history because the fact of the matter is human history is so shaded there are high points there are low points, there are glory, there are shame. And it is understandable why many Israelites wanted to view their history in a certain kind of way we’re the covenant people of God. All the nations of the earth God chose us. God disclose himself powerfully to Moses. He gave us laws that are transcendental, a sacrificial system God is disclosing himself to us in gloriously theophanies. What a great heritage this is. He raise the man after his own heart, King David and so on and so on and so on. You couldn’t understand why people would say that is a pretty glorious heritage. on the other hand, you could take another look.
Yah God got out of people in and the first thing they do is make a golden calf. They doubt God again and again at every juncture. They are ready to curse Moses and go back so they can have garlic. There is no integrity when they approach the Promised Land the spies give a good report and a bad report. That is it is just too big for God despite the fact that the people has seen what God did to get them out at the first place. And then when they get in to the land it’s two steps forward two steps back, two steps forward two steps back, two steps forward so there is tree steps back. And the Philistines commander, the Phoenician’s commander eventually the Philistines comes in, the Babylonia’s comes in the nation is set up the nation is destroyed, just a disgusting scene everywhere. Don’t you understand people are always not listening to the prophets that too are Israel’s history?
And as a rule the historical psalms and the preaching of Steven are closer to this second reading of his treat in than the first. That is to say it begins with the reading of history in such a way to maximize what God has been doing enabling us to see it more clearly and to see how badly we continuously let down aside in our sin, in our unbelief, in our shame, in our wickedness in our rebellion, in our disobedience calling people therefore again and again and again to sue God for mercy, calling people again and again to examine their own hearts. But is the opening lines that say something very interesting in this regard.
The 2011 NIV rather what I’m reading reads in verse two, “I will open my mouth with a parable”. In Hebrew it is bMashal, parable is pretty close to Mashal, wise utterances. In Greek the word parable can refer to not only to narrative parables, like the ones we have been talking about but it can refer to riddles, utterances, proverbs, secrets. It refers to genre of literature just about as broad as the Mashal, wise utterance in Hebrew. “I will open my mouth with a parable, I will teach you lessons from the past. But that is stronger than that in Hebrew. The old NIV, “I will open my mouth with a parable, I will utter hidden things, things that are old that is just about God. And that is what Matthew quotes. So what fulfilled, what was spoken to the prophets?
”I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.” That is, in this historical psalm, these things are in the known and shared history. The writer of Psalm 78 does not introduce you data in the historical record, these things are all there but they are not all perceived in the right configuration as it were, in the right pattern. You read your history and you’re very proud of the tribe of the nation. You read your history again and you see things that are there but hidden in the text as it were, hidden in the plain view but hidden in the text because we are blind to them. We do not see them but because we want to read the history in certain kind of way but this historical psalms forces to read the same history and study in a different kind of way. I will open my mouth and speak in symbol laden ways, in parable, Mashalin(pl.). I will utter things hidden from above all. Hidden in the text, they are right there and then retell the history so people see what wasn’t there.
In large part, that was Jesus was doing. Isn’t that what he says already back in verse 11. “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom, the mysteries of the kingdom”. The word mystery, Mosterin, is used 27 or 28 times in the New Testament. And either always or almost always the word means to refer to something that hasn’t some measure that has been hidden in the past but now disclosed. After all the Jews expected the kingdom to come but they did not expect because the kingdom would come exactly as it did. They expect it to come with a little bit of a bang, ‘David would be restored, the Jews would be triumphant, and the romans will be overthrown’. That is what will happen when the kingdom comes. Instead when the kingdom comes it comes in strange ways but Jesus says the material is already there.
I am now going to unpack to you the secrets, the mysteries of the kingdom. And then the parables go on to talk about how the kingdom is like leven permitting, it is like a treasure that people have to pursue, it is like a seed that is sawn in ground which receive it and reject it in different kind of ways and Jesus is insisting that all of this ways of thinking about the kingdom are already at some level buried in the Old Testament. They are there for all eyes to see but people did not see them precisely because what people wanted to see was a kingdom with a bang! it would come David would be there and power will be restored to the Israelites. But then you stop and think of all the other kinds of things that the Old Testament says that are often overlooked.
All those great psalms of David which shows them in terrible suffering and betrayed by friends like Psalm 69 quoted three times now is being fulfilled ultimately in Christ in his passion. Or the promise of the kingdom, yes but where the suffering servant is fit in to that. This suffering servant who is God’s own servant as David is God’s own servant. And yet this servant was wounded for our transgression, he was bruised for our iniquities. Chastisement for our peace was upon him with his strife we are healed. That was simply not very integrated in to Israelites expectation of what would be by the end. What about the promise given to Abraham that the message of God’s grace would go to all nations of the earth, what about the promise given to Ezekiel that the day would come when God would say to Egypt, “Egypt my third”, and to Assyria “Assyria my third” and to Israel, “Israel my third”. How that was get integrated in, so many hints and lairs and then anticipations pointing forward.
What do you so with this replicated feast with the pass over that goes on and on and on and on and keeps going forward and forward and looking back until it is going forward so much that we wonder do we ultimately need an ultimate pass over. Is there not some sort of anticipation for the future? What about the promise Melchizedek and Alkian priest for goodness sake in psalm 110 at David’s day. What so you need of Melchizedek in priesthood for when you’ve got a Levitical priest already established in the Law of Moses. All of these trajectories built right in to the text and Jesus comes along and says, “I will declare the mysteries of the kingdom, things hidden there in the text, things hidden form of old”.
At this juncture even the disciples did not see them. After all three chapters later in Matthew 16 when Jesus asked his own apostles who do people say that I am. Eventually peter says you are the Christ the son of the living God. Jesus told them that he could not possible know this clearly and truly apart from the revelation from God Himself. Then when Jesus goes on to talk about his impending death his sacrifice his crucifixion and resurrection, peter having scored ones theologically thinks he’ll try again and says, “Never Lord this shall not happen to you”. He still got no category of for a kingdom as Jesus understands kingdom as Jesus understands kingdom out of the Old Testament text. Reading from same text but misunderstanding miscuing. Get behind me Satan you do not understand the things of God.
one of the things that Jesus is doing in his parables as he compares things just as Asaph in Psalm 78 it is comparing things, speaking in utterances that are somewhat enigmatic. Comparing things with things until all of history is viewed a bit differently so Jesus with his parables and his parallel structures recreate history again to help people to see what the kingdom is going to look like. How it will be built and Jesus tells these parables thus at least in part because in line with scripture his message reveals things hidden in scripture.
And it is out of this matrix that eventually the New Testament writers taking their cue from the hermeneutics of Jesus at the end of the day. They begin to see how these trajectories do work from this scripture with the pass over sacrifice pointing forward to the ultimately pass over making Paul writes Christ our pass over have been sacrificed for us, 1 Corinthians 5. And then you look at Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the sacrifice the bull and the goat for the sins of the priest and of the nation pointing forward at the ultimate sacrifice, Hebrews 9 and 10, the ultimate Day of Atonement scarifies. Not before a tent or a temple but in the heavenly sanctuary before God himself. And there is the blood of those various animals spilled by the thousands of gallons at the times of the great festivals and now the blood of Christ outstrips them all. And then there is the temple itself that veils it stops people from going into the most holy place but now Christ flesh is the veil ones torn it opens up the way of access in to God’s very own presence. And then there are the priest and the mediators and now Christ is the ultimate high priest. And the temple itself which was the meeting place of God and human beings. God and sinful human beings and now Jesus himself is the ultimate temple. The ultimate meeting place between God and human beings.
The patterns are all there don’t you see? And who got them together? “Because the knowledge of the mystery of the kingdom has been given to you and not to them.” Jesus use it as a form of communication that unpacks these trajectories that unpack how we read the Old Testament in a way that nevertheless at the same time hides things from people who remain in their sneering condecention.
So why Jesus does tells parables? Theologically he tells parables because in line with scripture his message blinds, deafens, and harms. Theologically he tells parables because in line with scripture his message reveals things hidden in scripture.
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◑Now what shall we learn from these messages, from these passages? There are three things:
1. We should gain wonder in worship because we gain our fresh grasp on how God has put the bible together.
I sometimes play with my students of Trinity of this respect. We’ve all had the experience of reading some passage in the New Testament that quotes the old and we look in the margin to see where the Old Testament comes from and we look it up. Then we read the Old Testament text and its context within good grief what do the New Testament writer called that for it seems terribly whipped out of context. Well I’m sure somebody knows about it somewhere and then we press on with our devotions and don’t give it another thought but deep down there is suspension in the back of our minds, it says you know this may be overly clever and we can hide it under the categories like typology. I don’t want to be critical but God could have sent things a little more clearly. Don’t you think? So I suggest to my students that God could have written Isaiah 53 a little differently like this.
And it shall come to pass. In those days says the Lord verse 7 reveals before Christ that there shall be Roman emperor by the name of Cesar Augustus. (Footnote) I know the Roman Empire doesn’t exist you are still under the miserable Assyrians. After the Assyrians comes to the Babylonians, after the Babylonians comes the Mede-Persians, after the Mede-Persians comes the Greek, and the Greece comes the Romans. I know that at that moment there is no Rome, they are just a bunch of a little villages on the left bank of the Tebere but they are going to be called less and become the city of Rome and they are going to capture all of Italy and eventually going to rule at the Mediterranean world. And at the time that I’m talking of there will be a king in fact who will be called the emperor. His family name will be Caesar and Caesar will become the title roughly like king. That Caesar is Augustus. That is what I’m talking about back to the text. And this emperor called Caesar Augustus will pass a decree that the entire roman world shall be taxed and then consequence there will be a man by the name Joseph engaged to a charming young woman by the name of Mary who will be forced to go back to Bethlehem, his natal place, to enroll for taxation. Then everybody is happy so far.
Then eventually go on with detailed description of everything. You mention Pontius Pilate and you describe how he’s going to have to wash his hands in water when he finds Jesus guilty but don’t want to pronounce him guilty. And then eventually he does pronounce him guilty, and the vision of his wife. All the details are there, there are all there.
Now wouldn’t that be a great prophecy. There will be no dealt then especially if you could prove that we have manuscript back from Isaiah’s day. God could have arranged that. I mean if we don’t have all the way back, I mean we have it form the Dead Sea scrolls. We have Isaiah’s scrolls 150 two hundred years before Christ, good enough. I mean considering the detail now given regarding Jesus. Wouldn’t that be convincing prophecy? Why didn’t God make things clear for goodness sake?
Well for a start there would have been an awful lot of babies around by the name of Joseph and Mary. The population of Nazareth could have been overwhelming because everybody would want to be there when the time came to have to head back for Bethlehem. And if Pontius Pilate ever read this manuscript before Jesus came before him he will be in one miserable place, “I will not wash my hands, I will not wash my hands but somebody’s power drags me to wash my hands.” Does he wash his hands or does he not? If he doesn’t wash his hands then of course he has utterly destroyed the prophecies of God and if he does wash his hands when he doesn’t really want to as he had been reduced to a real robot.
You think you’ve got promise with God sovereignty in human responsibility now. We had a few more responsibilities like the way I greet Isaiah 53. You have much bigger problems I assure you. Do you see? But is more than that. God has given us such stellar patterns in institutions, in people, in kingdoms, in rights. Such stellar patterns which blind and harden and deafen those who are offended by the truth but which are seen with clarity for what they are in the fullness of time as we look back and marvel with God’s intricate desire to bring us in such clarity to King Jesus. And you can’t study these things for very long before you bow in worship. God interweaving these various patterns together across the centuries from Genesis right through the old covenant scriptures and then the new covenant and parables are constituent part of that in fullness of time, self-disclosure. So we should gain wonder in worship where there is a fresh grasp in how God has put the bible together, culminating in the gospel of God.
2. We should gain discretion in witness where there is a hostile environment.
Of course that is true in our hostile environment like parts of the Muslim world but our world is increasingly becoming hostile too in certain sectors like media sector, some university sectors and elsewhere. And how do we answer wisely and faithfully in such a way that we don’t cast our pearl in swine but in such a way that we understand when we speak clearly. We will in fact be condemning people to one belief precisely because it is the truth that condemns it is the truth that blinds. It is sometimes the truth that guarantees unbelief. And you face it and you suck it up.
It happened in Isaiah’s day, it happened in Jesus’ day, it happened in Paul’s day and it happens in our day and we learn a certain kind of digression in witness, the challenge in working our faith, valor, courage, wisdom, boldness and digression.
3. We should gain gratitude in humility for the gift of seeing the truth in Jesus and his gospel.
The knowledge of the secret of heaven has been given to you. This is a gracious gift. In fact that is the tenner of the positive part of the verse that we read. Verses 16, blessed are your eyes because you see certainly not because you are much smarter. This is part of the gift, the blessing of God, our ears because they hear. For truly I tell you many prophets and righteous people long to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it. Here there is a longing across the ages of redemptive history down to the period of Jesus’ disciples who are seeing the unpacking. The unfirming of God’s self-disclosure comes to its fruition and its culmination In Jesus and some do see it. And Peter was not intrinsically better because he was born about A.D.5 instead if B.C 40 or 50 or 60 then he wouldn’t have seen any of those things. This was not something that he chose but God placed him in this particular juncture in redemptive history and then further enlightened him subjectively so that he saw when others who were the same truth and merely did not believe because they heard the truth he came eventually to see it God forgive.
For truly I tell you many prophets and righteous people long to see what you see but did not see it. and to hear what you hear but they did not hear it. We should gain gratitude in humility for the gift of seeing the truth in Jesus and his gospel. And such gratitude ones rightly perceived will stand how we declare the truth to others instead of being miserably condescending towards those who are sacrificing their culture and their heritage. We become instead suffused with grace and humility because we are no better than they apart from grace.
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