Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Evening Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/ev/ev19960721.htm

MATTHEW: JESUS AS ISRAEL'S MESSIAH AND HIS MESSIANIC KINGDOM
Part IX: Christ's Messianic Kingdom Certified
F. Messiah's Predicted Withdrawal From Conflict Fulfilled In Jesus
3. Christ's Warning Of The Spiritual Fate Of His Religious Opponents In Israel
(Matthew 12:38-45)
  1. Introduction
    1. Apart from Christ, the Messiah, people are vulnerable to horrendous spiritual defeat in Satan's domain. It thus behooves God's people to stick close to the Messiah and to His teachers for blessing.
    2. This lesson is clarified in Matthew 12:38-45 where Jesus, in withdrawing from Israel's apostates who had rejected Him, detailed their spiritual vulnerabilities to defeat in the angelic conflict.
  2. Christ's Warning Of The Spiritual Fate Of His Religious Opponents In Israel, Matthew 12:38-45.
    1. After hearing Jesus' rebuke for saying Jesus exorcised demons by Satan's power (Mtt. 12:24-37), the Pharisees asked Jesus for one impressive sign from Him so they could know if He was of God, Mtt. 12:38.
    2. Jesus responded that only a spiritually destitute party would still ask for such a sign when He had already fulfilled Scripture in giving so many authenticating, Messianic signs, Mtt. 12:39a.
    3. The only sign that they would get would be the sign of His death, burial and resurrection, a sign that when viewed, would come after their opportunity to have the Messianic Kingdom was postponed, 12:39b-40.
    4. Because of their hardness of heart, Jesus shared that Gentiles who had believed in Israel's God with much less expression of divine signs would condemn these religious detractors of Jesus, Mtt. 12:41-42:
      1. First, the men of Nineveh who repented at Jonah's preaching would one day condemn Christ's generation in Israel as they repented with less signs than they saw, Mtt. 12:41. They had seen and believed the sign of Jonah living through be ing swallowed by a fish for three days and nights and restored to land where Jesus' generation of Jews would reject Him even after His resurrection!
      2. Second, the Queen of Sheba believed in Israel's God upon seeing the divine wisdom granted to Solomon, and this was less that what Jesus had shown to Israel in His wisdom; thus, she would condemn Jesus' generation in the judgment, Mtt. 12:42.
    5. In view of this hardness of heart on the part of the religious detractors of Jesus, Jesus predicted severe spiritual trauma for them in Matthew 12:43-45:
      1. The teaching given in verses 43-45 is a picture of what the condition of Jesus' religious detractors would be if they continued in their unbelief, Bib. Know. Com., N.T., p. 47.
      2. This condition is pictured in a simile as follows:
        1. Jesus likened these men to a man who had been delivered from a demon by a Jewish exorcist, 12:43.
        2. After deliverance by a religious but spiritually destitute exorcist, the "religious" convert, being without God's spiritual power, was vulnerable to a worse demonic possession since he depended on a futile religiosity, Mtt. 12:44-45a,b .
        3. Accordingly, Jesus' generation would be worse off in the angelic conflict after rejecting Christ than if they had never seen Him come: upon rejecting His spiritual power as being Satanic, their only hope for victory over Satan, their impotent religiosity was so futile as exposed to Satan's power that they were vulnerable for terrible later demonic persecution, Mtt. 12:45c! (Ibid., p. 47-48)
Lesson: There are two supernatural entities at war for the hearts and minds of men -- God and Satan. This being the case, man-made religiosity stands no chance of helping man, but actually works to make him vulnerable to horrible defeat under Sata n. We do well to believe in the power of God in Christ as revealed in the Word and reject what is of Satan or face certain horrendous defeat.

Application: We have to be very careful about making judgments on spiritual ministries, as to whether or not they are of God. If we make a mistake either way, by calling what is of Satan good or what is of God evil, we open ourselves up for TERRIB LE consequences. As John commands us in 1 John 4:1-3, "test the spirits . . . because many false prophets are gone out into the world."