Sunday, February 26, 2006
Feast or Fire?
Matt. 8:11-12. "And I say to you, that many shall come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven; 12. but the sons of the kingdom shall be cast out into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
We now return to Matthew’s account that presents the centurion as present before Jesus. After Jesus has been taken back by this Gentile’s faith, He makes a pointed statement that opens with, “And I say to you (pl.)” His words are spoken for all to hear and carry the authority that He proclaims for Himself.
Here is a Gentile who has no faith in the Roman system of religion but does have faith in the Jew’s God. Jesus words are presented to comfort him in that he is not the only Gentile in the kingdom of heaven because many more would come from the east and west and recline at the table with the Jewish patriarchs: Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. These words are not what the Jews had been taught by their rabbis or what they wanted to hear.
The emphasis on these verses pertains to one’s faith. Hendriksen draws a good formula: OPPORTUNITY + ABILITY = RESPONSIBILITY. The Jews largely rejected Jesus, as scripture illustrates, but faith knows no racial boundaries. The Jews were the sons of the Abrahamic kingdom in the national sense but refused Him as Messiah their king. Paul explains the universality of faith in his letter to the Romans (4:11-12): [Abraham] received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all who believe without being circumcised, that righteousness might be reckoned to them, and the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also follow in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham which he had while uncircumcised. Without Abraham’s faith, whether Jew or Gentile, one’s fate is horrid. Jesus has set the scene of those Gentile nations, whom the centurion would represent, from east and west reclining at the table with the Jewish patriarchs. The sons of the kingdom, Abraham’s physical offspring (the Jews), shall be cast out from this dinner into the outer darkness if they do not possess like faith.
Jesus begins to teach on the characteristics of hell, in particular what it would be like for those highly privileged rejecters of the King who had special claim on them (Hendriksen). Instead of enjoying their banquet in the light of the glory of the King and their patriarchs, they will wake up in the outer darkness in which they have been judiciously cast; the place where there shall be weeping and gnashing (or grinding) of teeth. The pain is the outpouring of God’s perfect wrath inflicted on those who rejected His Son that was sent to save them from this very place. The weeping comes from a fully informed conscious knowing that their opportunity to repent and believe was personally rejected. There is no appeal because at this point only truth can exist. The sentence never ends and neither does this existence that suffers under perfect justice. Dan 12: 2-3 "And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. 3. "And those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. Jude 6-7 And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day. 7. Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example, in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.
We now return to Matthew’s account that presents the centurion as present before Jesus. After Jesus has been taken back by this Gentile’s faith, He makes a pointed statement that opens with, “And I say to you (pl.)” His words are spoken for all to hear and carry the authority that He proclaims for Himself.
Here is a Gentile who has no faith in the Roman system of religion but does have faith in the Jew’s God. Jesus words are presented to comfort him in that he is not the only Gentile in the kingdom of heaven because many more would come from the east and west and recline at the table with the Jewish patriarchs: Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. These words are not what the Jews had been taught by their rabbis or what they wanted to hear.
The emphasis on these verses pertains to one’s faith. Hendriksen draws a good formula: OPPORTUNITY + ABILITY = RESPONSIBILITY. The Jews largely rejected Jesus, as scripture illustrates, but faith knows no racial boundaries. The Jews were the sons of the Abrahamic kingdom in the national sense but refused Him as Messiah their king. Paul explains the universality of faith in his letter to the Romans (4:11-12): [Abraham] received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all who believe without being circumcised, that righteousness might be reckoned to them, and the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also follow in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham which he had while uncircumcised. Without Abraham’s faith, whether Jew or Gentile, one’s fate is horrid. Jesus has set the scene of those Gentile nations, whom the centurion would represent, from east and west reclining at the table with the Jewish patriarchs. The sons of the kingdom, Abraham’s physical offspring (the Jews), shall be cast out from this dinner into the outer darkness if they do not possess like faith.
Jesus begins to teach on the characteristics of hell, in particular what it would be like for those highly privileged rejecters of the King who had special claim on them (Hendriksen). Instead of enjoying their banquet in the light of the glory of the King and their patriarchs, they will wake up in the outer darkness in which they have been judiciously cast; the place where there shall be weeping and gnashing (or grinding) of teeth. The pain is the outpouring of God’s perfect wrath inflicted on those who rejected His Son that was sent to save them from this very place. The weeping comes from a fully informed conscious knowing that their opportunity to repent and believe was personally rejected. There is no appeal because at this point only truth can exist. The sentence never ends and neither does this existence that suffers under perfect justice. Dan 12: 2-3 "And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. 3. "And those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. Jude 6-7 And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day. 7. Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example, in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.
# posted by Castusfumus : 7:18 PM
