Alright, let's begin with a word of prayer and then we'll get into our study.
Our gracious Father in heaven, we come before your throne grateful for the day, grateful for the energy and the abilities that you've given to us, mindful of your word and your
commandments, how you would have us to live.
We pray that we might strive diligently to walk in the light as you were in the light.
May we follow the example of Christ.
your son and live as he showed us how to live, both in his desire to reach those who are lost, but also his desire to be obedient to your commands, to speak your word, to do your
will.
Lord, we pray that as we strive to do so when we sin and fall short of your glory, we pray that you will forgive us of those things.
We pray that we will have a tender heart willing to repent.
All this we ask and pray in Jesus' name, amen.
After Jesus, as the text often describes, cleanses the temple, uh or at least the summary text, the paragraph headers, describes, uh Jesus cleanses the temple as He has come in
that second day to Jerusalem.
And in the morning, verse 20, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots.
And Peter remembering said to him, Rabbi, look, the fig tree which you cursed has withered away.
So Jesus answered and said to them, have faith in God.
Before we move on from this, it's significant and worth noting and worth even reemphasizing.
The primary attribution for what was done was
God.
Jesus tells them, based upon them having witnessed what has occurred, to trust God, to have confidence in the power, in the ability, in the grandeur and glory of God.
There are so many events in the Old Testament where you have
example after example of people trusting in God.
And God, as a result, acting on behalf of those individuals.
When you look at Noah, and frankly, if you just look at Hebrews chapter 11, and that list, that hall of faith as it's often called, I mean, here you have people who every
description begins with,
by faith.
That is a testament, yes, to their obedience, but ultimately to their trust that God would do what God said.
And that's exactly the point that Jesus is trying to get across to these disciples is that they need to trust that God will do what he has said.
They're going to have to trust that God is going to institute the kingdom.
It's not going to look like it, is it?
In just a few days, Jesus is going to be hanging on a cross.
Is it going to look like God's going to deliver His kingdom?
No, it's not going to look like it.
In just a few days, Jesus is going to be laying in a grave, in a tomb, and it's going to look like it's all over, that it was all for nothing.
And yet Jesus is reiterating to them, is reminding them, have faith in God.
For us today,
We understand that we live in a different time, we live in a different scenario in regards to the miraculous gifts, the powers that Jesus had instilled in the lives and the
abilities of the apostles, the promises that were made to them in regards to those things, but we don't have any lesser promises in regards to His church, in regards to His kingdom.
in regards to what he is doing and how he is active on behalf of his people.
It is a temptation for us to go, well, because the miraculous isn't happening, because we don't see the events of the text happening in the lives of those around us, therefore,
well, maybe we should just adopt the philosophy of some like
uh Some in the 1700s have just decided, well, maybe it's more like deism.
Maybe God's just kind of checked out and he's not really interested in humanity anymore.
He's not actively involved anymore.
He just kind of set everything in motion and then walked away.
And that's just completely in opposition to what the text actually says, to what God has said
he does, and I believe it one of the pictures if we can draw over from the book of Revelation is in the time of the book of Revelation you're going to read about all of
these things happening, you're going to read about these judgments, you're going to read about these things coming to pass, and yet as the visionary language describes God doing
these things to bring about judgment on Rome,
you have to actually step back and realize that the majority of these things are going to be enacted without a single miraculous event by the hands of someone who's in the church.
These things aren't gonna be enacted because of great spiritual gifts that the Christians have.
These things are going to be enacted because God has said that He rules in the kingdoms of men.
And God is going to bring out
the demise of a nation, the judgment of a nation through their own actions.
And so over the course of 200 years of persecution as Rome persecutes the early church, God says, don't worry, I'm storing it up and I'm going to deliver it on their heads.
And so you have this promise of very vivid, dramatic destruction.
And yet when we go back and look in history, don't see the city being lifted up out of the ground and tossed into the sea, do we?
We don't actually open the books of history and go, look at the day that the sky rained down hail and all the ten plagues on Rome.
Yet that's the picture in the book of Revelation.
But at the same time, what do we see?
We see history as a clear testament.
Rome fell from where?
from within.
God brought full and complete judgment and deliverance on a nation on the earth, not with some great set of miracles as He did in the days of Egypt, but much more like He did in
the days of Babylon.
How did Babylon fall?
Alright, Medes and Persians conquered it.
Now they slowly came through the nation, but the city of Babylon, the capital, fell in how many days?
One.
Overnight.
What was the only, by all indication of Scripture, only miraculous event tied to the fall of Babylon?
the handwriting on the wall that was seen on the very night that Babylon fell where God declared, you've been weighed in the balances and you've been found wanting and this very
night this nation will fall.
no great miracle that wipes the nation out, no great destruction brought on them, and yet their destruction have been prophesied.
all the way back at the beginning of the time that the Israelites would go into captivity, even prior to that point by Habakkuk, even previous to that point by Isaiah, because he's
going to name the Medo-Persian leader that's going to let the Israelites go.
by Jeremiah who says the captivity is going be for 70 years.
And that would not have been true had the Babylonian Empire continued.
So all of these prophetic statements leading to a view that says God is going to enact complete judgment on a nation and you would think, okay, I'm expecting to see in the text
miracle after miracle after miracle and they're not there.
How does God judge the nation of Babylon with another nation?
with the foolishness of their own leaders.
with the debauchery of their own heads of state.
as they gather together for a drunken feast while there is a siege army outside the wall, believing themselves untouchable.
And so we are to be reminded that if God could do that, and the only way we know that God was the one doing all of it is He told us He was.
If you were standing on the outside, somebody who was not an Israelite had no access to the prophets of Israel, you grew up in Babylon, you knew nothing about Israel or Israel's
God, you had heard nothing about these prophecies, you would have looked at it and it would have seemed like a completely natural event.
And yet...
God pictures it as the sky falling from heaven in prophetic visionary language, the sky falling from heaven, the sun being blotted out and turning to blood.
like mountains crumbling and new mountains being created.
This visionary language that says, I'm going to rip the world open and start over again.
And yet, if you're standing on the outside, what do you see?
A nation crumble and fall and a new nation take over.
say all of that to point out, we should not diminish the statement, have faith in God.
Rather, we should be reminded, verse 25, and whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him.
That your Father in heaven may also forgive you your trespasses.
But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses.
Ask yourself this question.
Much like what Jesus asked when the man was lowered through the roof.
and was told, your sins be forgiven you.
And the Pharisees and those who were there doubted and murmured amongst themselves internally, who is this that can forgive sins?
And Jesus asked, which is easier?
To tell a man to rise, take up your bed and walk, or to say, your sins be forgiven you.
But so that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins,
arise, take up your bed, and walk.
What does Jesus mean by which one is easier and so that you may know?
What's he trying to teach them about the difficulty of one forgiving sins versus another causing a person to walk?
Okay, you could go through a whole list of prophets in the Old Testament that could have told someone, arise, take up your bed and walk.
You could have found a number of prophets in the Old Testament who you could say, wow, look at that, they raised somebody from the dead.
Name one prophet in the Old Testament that could say, your sins be forgiven you.
Zero.
So which one's harder?
in human terms, a rise take of your bed and walk which many could have said throughout history or your sins be forgiven you which zero could have said throughout history.
Your sins be forgiven you.
Okay?
Now you take that same analogy.
how many prophets of the Old Testament could say to a nation, you're going to fall.
In history, many of them, compared to your sins be forgiven you.
Zero.
Now think about what Jesus has just said.
Jesus has said, verse 23, for assuredly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be removed and be cast into the sea.
You say, wait a minute, I don't know that anybody can actually, I've never seen that happen.
I don't read in the text where any prophet just told a mountain, get up and go get in the ocean, and it did it.
Yet this is not the only time Jesus uses this analogy.
but consider the point.
says, surely I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be removed and be cast into the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that these things he says will be done,
he will have whatever he says.
Therefore, I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you will receive them and you will have them.
Before he tells them, whenever you stand to pray, if you have anything against another, forgive him, he says,
Ask for this great thing.
God will do it.
But remember, which is the harder thing?
Forgiveness or doing something prophets could do?
His point and the value of what you're getting here is Jesus is saying, trust God because both of them are the same difficulty in His ability.
You pray for someone to be forgiven or you pray for forgiveness, God has the ability to this.
And yet no man does.
No man has the ability to do that.
You pray for a mountain to be moved?
If you're going to trust God that He can forgive sins, you better trust Him that He can move the mountain.
Now, you can certainly apply this spiritually and metaphorically.
Are there going to be many mountains in the way of the kingdom and its initial creation and growth and coming to fruition in the first century?
Yeah, there's going to be nations that are opposed to it.
There are going to be kings that are opposed to it.
There are going to be people hunting them down.
dragging them out of houses, throwing them in prison, threatening their lives.
Those are some serious mountains.
Are there any of them God doesn't deal with?
No, none.
his point.
is they need to trust God.
Verse 27, then they came again to Jerusalem and as he was talking or walking in the temple the chief priests, the scribes and the elders came to him and they said to him, what
authority are you doing these things and who gave you this authority to do these things?
You've just run a whole bunch of people who were operating under our authority out of the temple.
You've just done all of these things and who gave you this authority?
Who said you were allowed to do this?
Jesus answered and said, I also will ask you one question.
Then answer me and I will tell you by what authority I do these things.
The baptism of John, was it from heaven or from men?
Answer me.
Someone comes to you and says,
You shouldn't be doing this.
But the thing you're doing is completely in accordance with the will and the commands of God.
Should you be doing it?
Absolutely.
But also remember that you don't have to give an answer to everybody who wants an answer.
Peter reminds us to be ready always to give an answer to him that asks a reason of the hope that is in us, but he doesn't say answer everybody's questions.
He says you be equipped and prepared to answer.
He doesn't say answer all the questions.
Jesus says I'll answer you if you answer me my question first.
Baptism of John.
Was it from heaven or from men?
They reason among themselves saying if we say from heaven he will say why then did you not believe him?
But if we say from men, they feared the people, for all counted John to have been a prophet indeed.
So they answered and said to Jesus, we do not know.
And Jesus answered and said to them, neither will I tell you by what authority I did these things.
Did John operate under the authority of the scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the chief priests?
No.
When John came preaching, where did he preach?
In the temple?
In the wilderness.
But unlike those who came to the temple, all Israel came out to hear John.
So Jesus just asked a simple question.
John commanded baptism.
John commanded, repent and be baptized for the kingdom of heaven is in hand.
And all Jesus wants to know is,
from whose authority was the command for baptism?
And they know they only have two options.
God or not God!
Those are the options.
God or not God!
Have you ever considered the interesting point
that when it comes to a religious command, there are all of the commands we must obey that originate with God, and then there's everything else?
When someone argues that we should do something because of religious tradition.
When someone argues that we should do something because that's how we've always done it.
When someone argues that we should do something because some great scholar or theologian or preacher said this is how it's to be done.
when someone argues that some teacher in a theological school or even a school of preaching says this is how it should be done therefore we should do it that way.
we should take our minds back to this question of Jesus.
baptism of John.
Where did it originate?
From heaven or from men?
because the moment they answer from heaven, what do they know about admitting the source of the authority?
They're now a meanable little command.
Yet when the scribes, the Pharisees, and others came out to John where John was preaching, you remember how John greeted them?
You brood of vipers who commanded you to be saved from the judgment to come?
Sean said, I'm not preaching to save you.
because you won't actually obey God.
They would do it for a show.
They would do it to be seen of men.
They would do it to have the perception of being righteous, but they weren't about to do it because they actually obeyed and believed the commandment of God.
So they didn't do it at all, because John wasn't about to allow them to do it.
So they reason, wait a minute, if we say the authority and the source of the authority was God, nobody's gonna ask.
If you knew where the authority came from, why didn't you believe him?
If you knew where the command originated, why didn't you obey it?
So let's turn the question on us.
if in a matter of religion, in a matter of doctrine, in a matter of worship, we can open up the text and go, all right, well that's what God said.
then the question is, are we going to be like the chief priests and go, but I'm not going to obey it because I don't like it.
I don't agree with it.
I don't think it's necessary.
I don't think that's the only way to do it.
I don't think we need to be that legalistic.
Jesus is pretty legalistic with this question, isn't he?
He gives you two options.
Is it from heaven or from men?
Because if it's from men, and the chief priests know it.
there's no authority there.
As a matter of fact, if it's commanded exclusively by men and not from God, it makes John a false prophet.
And now they're afraid for their lives.
because the people consider John to be a true prophet.
So what do they do?
They do what most doctrinally backbone-less people do.
They go, oh, we can't tell.
It's a really hard question.
Really?
You've only got, you've got a 50-50 chance.
Take a shot at it.
except the problem is when you build a foundation of power on lies
It only takes one truth to disassemble all that power.
And so people fight and wiggle their way out of situations to avoid telling one simple truth because the simplest truth destroys a mountain of lies.
There's a reason why the religious world fights so voraciously against baptism as being necessary for the remission of sins.
And it's because if you give in to that one authoritative source and command, you wipe out a thousand years of false doctrine.
and authorities in religious structures in denominations across the globe.
And when you threaten power, people will lie to defend their power.
It's important to realize.
that that wasn't new a thousand years after the church was created.
That was going on even before the church was established with the baptism of John.
A simple command, be baptized for the mission of sins.
was fought against by the chief priests, by the elders for a reason.
It denied their authority.
It denied their teachings and doctrines.
And it still does.
They answered and said to Jesus, we do not know.
Were they telling the truth?
Yeah, they weren't telling the truth.
They were just simply unwilling to answer the question.
But he only gave them two options.
So they said, well, can't accept A and I can't accept B.
I'll take C.
I'm ignorant.
I'm more willing to look stupid, but I'm not willing to lose power.
Or my life.
Jesus, go ahead.
Was it ignorant or was it just the I'm not going to give you an answer?
Well, they would appear ignorant from the people because the people knew.
No, they're willing to appear ignorant because ignorance doesn't harm them.
They're willing to lie and say, don't know.
Because by saying we don't know, they don't have to pick one choice or the other.
They don't have to claim amenability to the command, and they simultaneously don't have to inflame the people against them for denying that John was a prophet.
So, you know, sometimes generals get their army out to battle and things are not going well.
And they realize, well, I can go this way and I'll kill off my army.
Or I'll go this way or kill off my army.
Or we can retreat and we can try another day.
And that's essentially what they're doing.
They're like, let's back up.
Let's try this again.
because they're not done arguing with Jesus' authority.
But they're not going in this one.
as we mentioned before about not answering every question.
It is important to realize that sometimes the greatest power you have to answer the question is by not answering the question.
Because the question is framed to cause you to look as though you have no answer.
If Jesus had said the authority is from God concerning his driving the people out of the temple, they could have argued, show us the proof, do another miracle, give us another
sign, show us that you are who you claim you are.
He didn't do that.
He defeats their position by forcing them to defend their position.
by asking them a very basic simple question.
Whose authority is this?
If you can tell me, I'll tell you.
They said, We do not know.
Jesus answered and said to them, Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.
If you are not capable of determining the authority of John, who all the people could determine the authority of John, that's why they were afraid of him.
That's why they were afraid of the people, to say he wasn't a prophet.
All the people had it figured out, but they couldn't figure this out.
This is fine.
If you can't figure this one out, then I'm not going to tell you whose authority I have.
Then he began to speak to them in parables.
A man planted a vineyard, set a hedge around it, dug a place for the wine vat, and built a tower.
And he leased it to vine dressers and went into a far country.
Now at vintage time he sent a servant to the vine dressers that he might receive some of the fruit of the vineyard from the vine dressers.
And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty handed.
Again he sent them another servant, and at him they threw stones, wounded him in the head, and sent him away shamefully treated.
And again he sent another, and him they killed, and many others, beating some and killing some.
Therefore, still having one son his beloved, he also sent him to them last, saying, They will respect my son.
But those vine dressers said among themselves, This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.
So they took him and killed him and cast him out of the vineyard.
Therefore, what will the owner of the vineyard do?
He will come and destroy the vine dressers and give the vineyard to others.
Have you not even read this scripture?
The stone which the builders rejected.
has become the chief cornerstone.
This was the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes.
Jesus begins teaching the people.
During the last week of Jesus' life, Jesus will go out of Jerusalem at night, Jesus will come in, He will begin teaching in the temple.
Jesus presents a parable, the parable of the vineyard owner who plants the vineyard, then leaves for a long journey, and sends back his servant to do what?
What's this servant supposed to do?
What?
All right.
Collect the benefit from the vineyard.
Who's vineyard was it?
and your donors.
who was being paid to take care of it.
All right, the servants.
But what did the servants come to think about the vineyard?
that it was theirs.
Now, don't separate, I know we had a chapter break, ignore that.
Don't separate this parable from that fig tree.
What was the problem with the fig tree?
looked like it ought to have fruit, but it was bear.
Here's the vineyard owner.
Has the vineyard produced fruit?
But is any of the fruit getting back to the owner?
No.
Why?
It's all being hoarded by the people who are the servants, supposedly, of the vineyard owner.
The caretakers, the stewards of the vineyard owner and of the vineyard.
are stealing what belongs to the owner.
Now.
Jesus presents the scenario and says, here's the person who has the vineyard, here's what he does, here's all the work he puts into it, here's all the preparations that he gives
for it, he puts it in the hand of somebody, all they have to do is not mess it up.
and it's going to produce fruit.
And yet, instead of it producing fruit for the owner, every time the owner tries to get any value out of it, the stewards come in, intercept it, and do more damage.
to the owner by beating the servants and progressively working up to killing the servants that are sent to get the owner's portion.
question.
In the scenario, does the owner insist that the stewards should never have received any benefit from the vineyard?
No.
Does the owner seek to get all the proceeds from the vineyard?
No.
The vineyard owner is providing for the livelihood of the caretakers.
And in return, they're stealing everything that belongs to him.
So Jesus presents this and says, so the vineyard owner says, I have a son.
Surely they will respect my son.
The thing we have to be careful about with parables is they illustrate a single particular point.
But that does not mean that we are to take a lesson or create a point-to-point equivalent with every detail of a parable.
It doesn't mean there's not significance there.
It means that you should not assume that because the vineyard owner, obviously who is a parallel to who, God, who sent prophet after prophet after prophet after prophet to a
nation, Israel.
whose leaders, whose teachers, whose priests, and whose false prophets have rejected God's messengers, defied God's messengers, killed God's messengers.
You should not now assume that God, as premillennialists do, that God is now ignorant of what Israel and its leaders are going to do to His Son.
that God was somehow confused and thought Israel would accept his son and that Jesus would come and establish his kingdom on the earth and everything would be great, except that's
never what God said he was going to do and that's certainly not Jesus' point.
Jesus is not emphasizing that God somehow had the wool pulled over His eyes concerning His Son any more than God had the wool pulled over His eyes concerning His prophets.
Go back in your mind to the days of Jeremiah.
In Jeremiah chapter 1, God calls Jeremiah to be a prophet.
Jeremiah is a young man.
God tells Jeremiah, I'm going to send you to my people, you're going to deliver my message, whatever I put in my mouth you're going to say to my people and they're not going
to hear you.
God wasn't confused about Israel's rejection of His Word or His prophets or His messengers?
back to the days of Moses.
Israel comes out of Egypt, they get to Sinai, they've been grumbling along the way, they continue grumbling all the way till they get to the land of Palestine and they're about to
go into the land, and when they finally decide they're going to reject God entirely, who do they decide they're going to kill?
Moses and Aaron, let's kill those guys and let's go back to Egypt.
From generation one until the first century, there was no confusion about Israel's rejection of God.
there would be times Israel would come back, but those were anomalies in a people entirely given over to following leaders who would tell them to reject God, and they'd listen.
So here you have a picture of God saying, I'll send my son.
They will respect my son.
But the vine dressers said among themselves, this is the heir, come let us kill him.
Does that phraseology bring to mind any Old Testament events?
Joseph's Brothers.
We went back as far as Moses for Generation 1 of Israel.
but Jesus' parable really draws to mind the forefathers.
the ones who saw the, at the time, only son of Jacob through Rachel.
and said, come, let us kill him.
And Jesus, through His statement, draws out that their rejection of God and their rejection of His authority has been from the days of their fathers and the fathers of
their tribes all the way till now.
He says, this is the heir, come let us kill him and the inheritance will be ours.
So they took him and killed him and cast him out of the vineyard.
Now how do we know these are not just because the parable is not a true full parallel to reality?
Was Jesus killed in vineyard?
No, Jesus was uh hung on Golgotha.
Jesus was hung on a cross.
They did not then cast him out of the vineyard, right?
They buried him.
Not a point for point parallel with reality, rather an object lesson with significant emphasis.
Yes, Walker.
that it's about consistency.
You could even go a little further from the idea of vine dresser or it being in a vineyard to, well okay what if Jerusalem is the vineyard?
He was still killed outside of Jerusalem.
So verse 9, therefore what will the owner of the vineyard do?
The whole significance of the parable is not all about the events leading up to it, it's about the question Jesus asked.
What will the vineyard owner do?
He will come and destroy the vine dressers and give the vineyard to others.
Jesus is applying in parable form the prophecy of Isaiah about the chief cornerstone.
Jesus is saying that which was spoken is going to come true.
Sorry, the prophecy from Psalms, Psalm 118.
And what God has spoken, He's going to fulfill.
And so as they will enact their own demise.
as they will enact their own destruction.
I want to draw back one point that we made at the beginning.
Jesus is going to prophesy the fall of Jerusalem.
The Old Testament is going to prophesy the destruction of the Israelite nation.
The Old Testament is going to prophesy the destruction of the Jews.
Jesus is going to give them the signs leading up to the event of the fall of Jerusalem.
But with what miracles is God going to bring about the destruction of Jerusalem?
How's going to it?
He's going to Titus's army, Roman general, son of Caesar, and they're going to besiege the city, and then they're going to go into the city, and then they're going to dismantle the
city, and they're going to dismantle the temple.
And when they do, Jesus will have said almost 37 years before that, it's God doing it.
So we're reminded, have faith in God.
For we do not know how He will do what He will do, but we do know this, He will carry out His will.
All right, thank you for your attention.