Click here for the Matthew 12:15-21 PODCAST
15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew from there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all. 16 Yet He warned them not to make Him known, 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.” ~ Matthew 12:15-21
Today, we continue our study of Matthew 12 where the Lord Jesus has just healed a man with a withered hand in a synagogue in Galilee. Who knows how much anguish his hand brought to him but once he saw the purpose in it, I'm sure he was grateful for having had it for as long as he did. The purpose was to give the religious leaders of Israel yet another miracle performed by the Lord Jesus. This was another opportunity for those hard-hearted men to see the fulfillment of the many prophecies in the Old Testament coming to fruition before their very eyes in the Lord Jesus Christ. Sadly, their hearts grew harder as they rejected the truth over and over again, even though it was accompanied by many wonders, signs and miracles.
This merely proves miracles do not always improve the trajectory of our hearts toward God. Without some measure of brokenness, we will never come to faith in the Lord Jesus. Since the Fall, brokenness has always been the launching pad for biblical faith to be realized in us. Our brokenness attracts us to the cross of the Lord Jesus where He was utterly broken so that we could enter into a personal relationship with God. It is only the brokenness of the Lord Jesus that makes our brokenness yield meaning and purpose. His brokenness means we can forever know the comfort and security of the Father who is perfect in all of His ways.
In v.15-16 of today's passage we read, "15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew from there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all. 16 Yet He warned them not to make Him known."
The Lord Jesus did not observe the Sabbath as the Jewish religious leaders did. He observed the Sabbath in the way He intended it to be observed. The principle of rest behind it gives us an opportunity to be restored in our bodies, souls and spirits. The Sabbath gives us the opportunity to bring our week to a screeching halt in order to be rearranged by God. God meant the Sabbath to be a time for redirection and restoration. But the religious leaders of Israel ruined this simple command. In fact, they made it the worst day of the week. The religious leaders missed the true identity of the Lord Jesus because they were watching Him with no objectivity. They did this because they, at some point along the way, had begun defining themselves and their world for themselves. This led to a redefinition of God in their hearts which was shaped by themselves. Had they followed God's definitions, they would have arrived upon the Lord Jesus as their Messiah.
This is why the Lord Jesus proclaimed the gospel so that sinners could be forgiven and set free from all our guilt and shame. He illustrated this message as He continued to heal the many who came to Him. Physical healing has always been His encouragement to us to be healed in our spirit and soul. His message yields a meaningful life through a personal relationship with Him and the sure hope of eternal life. Christianity is not about our ability to measure up to the law, it's about our intimacy with God and with one another. Once we get that right, we begin to realize that we can live with our imperfections, flaws, and brokenness because God lives with these in us. We will even find ourselves more patient with others. And, even the unwanted things in our lives will be included in the ingredients of spirituality that God brings into our lives.
With reference to the healings, the Lord Jesus warned the people not to make Him known. He didn’t want His miracles to be the focus of His ministry. And He didn’t want to keep feeding the wrong expectations of the people. He knew that one day He would ride into town, mounted on His great white horse, and take out all the enemies of Israel. This will happen at the end of the seven year Tribulation and just before the Millennium. Whereas during His first coming the Jews expected the King on His throne, they failed to recognize that He had to come first to be the Lamb of God who took away the penalty of our sin. Oh, there will come a day at the end of time as we know it that He will come as the conquering King but for now He has come as the redeeming Lamb.
In v.17-21 of today's passage we read, "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.'"
The Lord Jesus continued His ministry of healing which corresponded to His teaching on everlasting life because from the foundation of the world He agreed before the Father and the Holy Spirit to rescue man from sin and death. The sentence "Behold My Servant whom I have chosen, My Beloved in whom My soul is well pleased" is the basis to His whole ministry. He healed the people in order to fulfill such passages as Isaiah 11, 42 and 61 which Matthew quotes here to remind us that it was the Spirit of the Lord who enabled Him to do these miraculous things as predicted by the Old Testament prophets.
The justice the Lord Jesus declared was through His teaching but most profoundly through His cross. It was at the cross that justice or judgement on the behalf of all willing sinners was rendered. A better translation of the word justice would be judgement and it was on the cross that the judgement that all sinners deserve fell upon the Lord Jesus. God judged our sin in Christ's body as He hung on that tree.
We read, "He will not quarrel nor cry out" which means He would be the lamb who was silent before His shearers. His sacrificial death on the cross made it possible for a bruised reed to avoid being broken. It was at the cross that a smoking flax would not put out. It was at the cross that we would learn that He sent forth justice to victory and that in His name, the Gentiles would trust. This was not expected by the religious leaders of Israel even though Isaiah told them in advance it would be the case. The religious leaders of Israel expected the Messiah to set up His kingdom by force, and make people worship God.
The smoking flax and the bruised reeds picture those stepped on, discarded, and thrown away. These are no longer able to play the required tune. They could also no longer give light. These are the kinds of people, like the man with the withered hand, the religious leaders did not value. But these are the kinds of people the Lord does not break. These are the people who qualify for salvation because they had embraced their brokenness.
