The Two Sons (Matthew 21:23-32)
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Which apparently was on all morning and then i just turned it off before i walked up here so if y'all thought matt sound especially good today because i was singing with him we are picking back up in Matthew and we have been um it's been uh over a month since we were studying the book of Matthew together we've been working our way through the Gospel of Matthew and we're gonna spend the good the better part of spring into easter in the Gospel of Matthew and we're gonna kind of finish out the book.
If you'll remember where we left off Jesus has been performing ministry and miracles and teaching mostly in the the areas away from Jerusalem so he's been in galilee he's been in judea he's come to Jerusalem a couple of times but he's always kind of gone back well now he is in Jerusalem he's headed to kind of the epicenter of religious thought judaism of the day and he's had some run-ins with pharisees they didn't get along well now he's gone to their uh home turf he's taken it kind of to their camp and he's we're gonna.
See over the next several weeks him uh butting heads with them them not getting along and you'll see as it goes on it's kind of aggressive and you start seeing go okay i see why they wanted to kill him this is this has been harsh and so we're going to see him interacting with them and we're picking up there so he's just written in Jerusalem now the way the Gospel of Matthew works is it starts off tells us a little bit about his birth we uh it spends a decent amount of time looking at kind of three years of ministry.
Now we're in the last week of Jesus's life and we're going to spend a lot of time here where it spends the majority of its focus here so um verse 23 of chapter 21 and when he entered the temple the chief priests and the elders of the people came up to him as he was teaching and said by what authority are you doing these things and who gave you this authority so Jesus is in the temple it's a huge area but he's in the temple and at some place he's teaching and people have gathered around him.
Jesus at this point had some notoriety had some fame so we don't know how large the crowd was but it's fair to assume it was fairly large he's teaching in the temple and the chief priests and the elders of the people come to him so it's not just pharisees it's not just people who disagree with him but these are actually the leaders the chief priest and the elders of the people come to Jesus in the middle of him teaching and interrupt him and say by whose authority are you doing these things.
And when they say these things they they mean he rode into Jerusalem and people laid out their coats and sang to him and said hosanna son of David coming in the name of the king hosanna in the highest and then Jesus went to the temple and he cleansed the temple which is a nice Bible way of saying started some mess he went in there and flipped over tables spread their money around and then stood and preached it wasn't like he washed it he he came in and was aggressive in his attack on what they were doing in the temple.
And then he left the next day he shows back up and he's teaching and so they're like hey who told you you could do this what makes you think you you're allowed to whose banner are you flying so if you'll picture this he's teaching the chief priests the elders get together and they're like we're gonna go confront him they walk up in the middle of all of it and they say hey but whose authority are you doing this and so now there's an audience there's.
Jesus the the chief priests and the people he's been teaching to and so Jesus answered them this is verse 24. i also will ask you one question and if you tell me the answer then i also will tell you by what authority i do these things now this is a fairly normal response you ask me a question i'm going to ask you a question they didn't do the uh i asked you first stuff it was the this is a normal in judaism and a rabbinical tradition is.
If you want to if you want to come ask me a question then you're saying we can ask each other's questions i'll answer a question if you'll answer mine first otherwise i don't feel like i have to answer your question if you can't answer mine so that's what he does and he says so if you tell me the answer then i also will tell you by what authority i do these things the baptism of john that's john the baptist from where did it come from heaven or from man.
So he asked him answer that question and then i'll tell you about what authority i do these things and john had come he's the precursor to Jesus he prepared the way for Jesus he had baptized Jesus so there's some connection between john's ministry and Jesus's ministry so Jesus asked them this question says and they discussed it among themselves saying if we say from heaven he will say to us why then did you not believe him but if we say from man we are afraid of the crowd.
For they hold that john was a prophet okay so this is kind of funny to me Jesus is teaching the chief priests come and interrupt him you're like we have a question for you declare whose authority you did this by and he goes i got a question for you he flips it around on them and then they huddle up they're like good question they get over here okay they start whispering now what they're whispering about is not what do we actually think that didn't even come up all they came up with what should we say and how will people respond to that learn from this.
Because it's easy for us to get into that mode and then someone asks a question and you go what do they want to hear what do other people think how should i rather than saying what do i think is true how can i be honest and have some integrity nope just let's talk tactics but i have to imagine it was fun for the people watching because the chief priests and them strutted in interrupted the class Jesus asked them a question they huddle up and they're going they're looking you know and talking to people like oh i actually want to hear how this turns out i want to.
See so they say if we say from heaven he's going to immediately say why didn't you believe him because they didn't oh you thought he came from heaven and you rejected heaven what a terrible decision but if we say man well the crowd believed him so can't say that verse 27 so they answered Jesus we don't know they huddled up they came back and definitively declared we're not sure and he said to them neither will i tell you by what authority i do these things he looked at him and said oh.
Well then y'all aren't a judge of this type of thing y'all have if y'all don't know that then why does it matter if i tell you this like y'all aren't capable of judging these sort of things but Jesus being Jesus doesn't leave it there he follows up i don't know if you've found this to be the case but if you've ever come to Jesus with a question i found that often he changes the subject on me or he has follow-up questions of his own sometimes i come to him really praying about something i'm studying the word and he keeps being like i want to talk about this thing and i'm like that's not why i.
Called this meeting but he does what he does and he says verse 28 he's going to turn it around on him and he's going to kind of follow up and begin to press this and this is where we'll spend the most of our time this morning we're going to see that Jesus is going to press in on their response to john the baptist and he's going to begin to show us that there are two basic responses to john's message and to his message that there's a way.
For us to reject this message and so we're going to spend a little time looking at this and trying to respond as we ought to to the message of john and the message of Jesus so let's pray and then we'll start breeding back in 28 or we ask for wisdom as we study your word we ask for help we ask for the work of the spirit we pray that we would see you clearly see our sin clearly that we would respond.
Well to your message we love you and we praise you in Jesus name amen so verse 28 he says what do you think a man had two sons and he went to the first and said son go and work in the vineyard today and he answered i will not so that that's not great but afterward he changed his mind and went and he went to the other son and said the same and he answered i go sir but did not go which of the two did the will of his.
Father and they said the first i have two sons i agree with them if i tell both of my kids go clean your room one of them yells no runs off and cleans his room and one of them yes yes sir and then goes and does something else so he says which one did the will of the father which one actually did what was asked and they say the first it's a simple parable two sons one says no but then follows through and actually does what the.
Father asks one says yes but does nothing Jesus said to them truly i say to you the tax collectors and prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you what okay he's talking to the chief priests not the regular priests the chief priests and the elders of the people he says i want you to help me with a little story here which son does the will of the father they answer the question they answer it correctly and he goes exactly tax collectors and prostitutes are going into heaven and you are the conclusion i just imagined them just staring at him like what on earth are you talking about everybody not just the chief priests.
But the crowds also going what what on earth tax collectors and prostitutes were the most looked down on people in their culture they were a byword they were they were scum tax collectors had joined the romans to take advantage of their own people to help the romans occupy Israel and to get rich doing it to use the romans as their backing and to take more taxes so that they could be wealthy and to help keep the romans who had occupied their land in their land in the promised land.
If you were going to pick someone who had rejected God in the things of God and the will of God you'd pick tax collectors or you'd pick prostitutes same thing have rejected God's design had rejected the will of God we're not willing to listen to God and were doing what they wanted and he says they are making it into the kingdom before you but he's going to tell why verse 32 for john came to you in the way of righteousness so he tells him the answer to his question earlier his message was from heaven his baptism was from heaven he came in righteousness john came to you in the way of righteousness and you did.
Not believe him but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him and even when you saw it you did not afterward change your minds and believe him so he says the tax collectors and the prostitutes make it into the kingdom they're going into the kingdom they've displaced you because they believed john what he was saying was true he came in righteousness and they believed him and you didn't and even when you saw them believing and repenting and going to john and you still didn't change your mind.
So in the story the first son started poorly but changes his mind and then does the will of the father the second son sounds great but then does not do the will of the father and he says the will of the father has been presented to you in john the baptist preaching he came to you in righteousness they believed you didn't and even after you saw them believing you didn't change your mind and belief now what was john's message and why did they reject what was john's message and why did they reject it and why did tax collectors and prostitutes accept it.
And if you're talking about starting a religion if you're talking about starting a group of people that are going to be together and display what God is like you don't start with tax collectors and prostitutes i don't maybe you don't Jesus does john the baptist did and let's see why let's see what this message was and so we're going to see the distinct difference between the message of come be righteous come be good versus come be forgiven so this is john the baptist this is in uh chapter three of Matthew verse one um this is actually the very.
First week we started in uh the Gospel of Matthew we started here and uh last week spencer said we're gonna be starting back up in Matthew this week and somebody texted me from my group and said wait we're starting Matthew over it's like no no we're starting back we've made it to chapter 21. we're not starting it all the way over but that would be fun we didn't like how we taught it so we're going to start back over so just.
For him we're starting back up in Matthew this is where we started so in those days john the baptist came preaching in the wilderness of judea repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand and that's uh Jesus's original message as well repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand so the message was a message of repentance now repentance carries with it a few things it carries with it that there is judgment coming this the kingdom of heaven is at hand there's judgment coming next step that's not going to go.
Well for you there's judgment coming and you're a sinner and i think sometimes that's all we think we hear when we hear repentance you're a sinner oh but a message of repentance is a message of hope there's judgment coming you're a sinner and there's forgiveness offered you can come right now and repent you can come right now and be forgiven you can come right now and be washed clean come on in boys the water's fine to quote delmer from oh brother that's what john the baptist was saying is that you can come right.
Now all right so i have a little i want to talk to y'all this morning about student loan forgiveness people have student loan debt and there's a possibility the government will offer student loan forgiveness now some people just thought you've got to be kidding me this is ridiculous how much is that going to cost well i don't know if you've paid much attention to our debt or our spending but we're in imaginary numbers at this point are you kidding me we're going to forgive student loan debt and some of you thought preach that's the best thing you've said this morning tell me more about this student loan forgiveness.
If i'd have known you were going to talk about it i brought my tambourine i was going to do a praise lap the people who want who would be most inclined towards student loan forgiveness who would be most excited about it are the people who have student loans they're the people who even the people who are going i really don't think the government should do this but i mean as long as they're going to do it what website am i supposed to fill out.
For this i mean i'm not going to say no i got principles but i'm not an idiot the people who want student loan forgiveness who would accept student loan forgiveness people have student loan debt if they came out and announced right now we're just going to pay everybody's mortgage who's excited about that people with mortgages do you know who's really annoyed about that the person who just paid off their mortgage the person who's most excited is the person who just bought a house that was way outside of their means the person who's house poor they got a nice house they can't hardly pay.
For it the person who's who did not do good math and didn't realize taxes were coming or whatever the person who's they're like yes i just bought a huge house this is amazing and the person who's worked really hard to do exactly what they were supposed to and pay extra payments and while their friends were going out and having fun they weren't having fun but they were thinking you'll pay one day when i've got my house paid off and they finally paid it off and they were dancing their way to the bank.
And then all of a sudden they're paying off mortgages for free you've got to be kidding me tax collectors and prostitutes heard there's repentance and forgiveness are you serious and those who were well behaved and had done all the things they thought they were supposed to do to get God to owe them heard there was forgiveness and they said are you serious you've got to be kidding me you see those who want forgiveness those who line up for forgiveness are those who think they need forgiveness those who know they have sin.
So when there's a message of repentance that's good news to sinners when there's a message of religion and i'm using religion in a with a negative connotation i don't mean religion as in the worship of a God i mean religion is in the behaviors you do to earn God's favor the work you put in to make God owe you the message of a religion which is do these things and God will love you the message of repentance doesn't make any sense sounds crazy sounds backwards.
So these are the two approaches to God let's assume for a second that this right here indicates the line in which you interact with God and so we're all over here on our way to a confrontation with God well a message of repentance and a message of religion of behaviorism of good works both say that God's a judge they agree and the message of repentance says when you meet him he will judge you and the message of religion says he will judge you.
But religion behaviorism this moral ethics this come be good says that what you're supposed to do in route to meeting him is find out what he wants and do the things pray give fast celebrate the right holidays don't celebrate the wrong ones do these things don't do those things that you would come to God and you would say God i my whole life i've worshipped you i've given to the poor i gave 10 to the Church i gave 2 to oliver Gospel mission i was in race or gas i was in awanas or cubbies i read my Bible i went through confirmation i was baptized.
When all my friends were going out and doing bad things i wasn't i looked down on them i did the things i'm supposed to do and that you would come and present these things to God and he would evaluate he would judge whether or not you had lived up whether or not the things that you had done were presentable and he would judge you worthy or unworthy a message of repentance says you go to him and all you bring to him is your mess that's why it says that they were baptized by john confessing their sins that they went to all they had was mess and they asked.
For mercy they knew they were supposed to meet the lord but they knew they had nothing to offer they knew they came they said all i've got is mess and i know that i don't deserve anything from you but i just need mercy i've sinned i've fallen short i'm broken that's the message of repentance and then on this side in the message of repentance john the baptist tells them go and bear fruit in keeping with repentance look like you've repented look like you've met a merciful.
God who forgives sinners on this side of forgiveness and on this side of religion the behaviors often look very similar reading your Bible reading your Bible memorizing verses giving money to the poor giving money to the Church being kind being gracious trying to to follow after the things but the heart is so fundamentally different on this side of mercy and grace and forgiveness from the lord and on this side working your way towards him in a way that would present to him what you have to accomplish to hand him your resume honestly both of them think they're handing the.
Lord their resume but one's writing down all the terrible things they want washed off and one of them's writing down all the good things they want remembered it's like walking in to hand your new boss your resume and go here's all the ways i got fired here's all the times i should have gotten fired but nobody caught me because you know you're just here to get forgiveness you're here to get it clean if they said if you wrote down everything you can write on this paper that's bad will get forgotten every crime you've ever committed will be expunged you just got to put it on the paper i'm i'm learning how to write small i'm.
Going front and back on this thing see motive matters in these two approaches one of the best stories i've ever heard that illustrates this is there's a there's a king and he's a good king he has a good land and on his land there's a farmer grows root vegetables small farmer just has one acre of land and he grows a carrot and boy what a carrot he pulls it out it's the biggest most beautiful carrot he's ever grown he's staring at this thing it's magnificent as far as carrots go and he decides i'm going to take it and give it to the king.
So he goes he gets an audience with the king he goes to present it to the king he gives the king he says king i grow vegetables i i live in your kingdom i love living in your kingdom i have a small one-acre plot and this is the best carrot i think i've ever grown and i just wanted to give it to you the king looks at him sees his heart and he says i actually know where your land is and i own the land behind it and i'm going to double your property i'm giving you another acre one of the king's advisors is sitting there and he's like an acre.
For a carrot this is a screaming deal so the next day he shows up he gets an audience with the king and he brings in a magnificent horse strong young sleek healthy and he says king i breed horses and i think this is the best one i've ever bred and i love you king and i wanted to give this horse to you in honor of you and in my appreciation to you the king looks at him he knows his heart and he says thank you they'll put the horse with my other horses that guy stands there dumbfounded he's just struck he doesn't know really how to react and the king says oh are you thinking.
About the farmer he was giving me the carrot you're giving yourself the horse and there's a way in which we follow and we submit and we obey in response to who God is there's a way in which we bear fruit in keeping with repentance meaning we've been changed and now we bear the fruit of that change which is grace and humility and love and generosity because we know what he's like and we've been forgiven and we know that what the debt that we had that he took away and there's a way in which we do really good things.
But ultimately we're just giving ourselves the horse we're doing all these things because eventually he'll owe us and that's where we come to the fact that in a situation where you have come be good versus come be forgiven there's a distinct difference in who gets the glory because if i do all the good things i'm supposed to do and i meet God he evaluates me and he says well done and i transfer to this side well now i get to move the tassel from one side of the cap to the other you guys i'm one of the good ones i've earned it i'm worthy.
But if you come to the lord in repentance and your understanding is that what you get from him is mercy you guys he's so good that he would forgive a sinner like me self-righteousness or gift righteousness see when there was a message of repentance to those who did not see their sin and those who had been behaving really well they didn't want to hear it but to those who knew they were in their sin it was sweet beautiful news and this makes sense.
If you've been in the Church for a long time if you've been around for a while and you your understanding is that primarily what God wants from you is behavior i'm going to show you how this really breaks down when you get to thinking about how glory works how praise works i want to talk to you about the theology i've recently learned from a sitcom called the good place it's terrible theology but i want to talk to you about it in the show the good place i don't want to ruin it.
For you but in the first two seconds you find out the main character's dead and she's gone to the good place the point of the show is that she actually shouldn't be there but they explained to her how the good place works and the good place works like this everything you did on earth no matter how small or big was recorded and evaluated and you got good points or bad points and the really really good not the 51 good the really really good get to come to the good place.
So this person who's not supposed to be there she goes around she meets a lot of people and they're all really really good they talk about their generosity they talk about the the way they've served the hungry and the homeless they talk about hunger strikes and how they fought for this injustice and that and how they gave away money they're all really really good so i'm watching this show and the reality is the good place declares the glory of the people in it it proclaims the glory of their worth and their good work it sings praises to their value there's even a scene where.
Because she's there she's messing the whole place up so a lot of people are sad in the good place even though they're not supposed to be and there's a scene where he's talking to one of the guy who's over it's talking to one of the ladies in it and he says you have nothing to prove you've already proven you're a good person you've already proven you're worthy by being here see the reality is if we're supposed to do the right things.
And then God gives us a check mark when we reach heaven heaven sings our praises it declares the glory of our work of our effort and our name if we're gonna sing names in heaven we could all stand and sing our own or we could sing the names of everybody else there that's not how heaven works there is a name that is praised in heaven there is one who receives glory in heaven and by his grace he shares it with us.
But we praise the name of Jesus because he's righteous and we aren't he's good and we aren't he forgives and we needed mercy that's why sinners respond to a message of repentance and why the religious didn't and the real danger for them and for us is that they didn't see their sin and the danger for us is that we might not see ours the danger for you this morning is that you might be sitting here knowing you're not a pharisee even looking down on them that's one of the things that Christians are really good at is being super judgmental to super judgmental pharisees.
But not realizing that we are in the category of terrorists and prostitutes that if you're going to come to the lord that you understand that all you've brought to the table is your wickedness your sin that needed a savior there's a temptation for us to begin to as we practice faithfulness to begin to think that our job is to be good and to do good and to be right and to do right and to be upset when messy people come in here and mess up our good people club as.
If somehow by messy sinful broken people being a part of this they've somehow sullied our good name but the reality is they have proclaimed the good name of our lord that in our brokenness and in our sin we declare his glory because he's the one who forgives sinners and if we're here to be righteous and good on our own merit and to declare our glory let's shut this place down but if we're here to declare our sinfulness and our need for our savior and his glory.
Then praise Jesus and so the question for you is are you living as if you are here to present your good work to God for his evaluation that you're supposed to develop some form of self-righteousness that he can sign off on that your good works are somehow adding into his good response to you or are you understanding that even in your good works done with a sinful prideful heart need to be repented of that's what Jesus looks at them he says as you saw the sinners repenting you didn't change your mind and belief.
And so i'm asking you this morning to change your mind and believe if you know you have debt and you feel like sin clings to you threatening to suffocate you threatening to drown you through it it sticks to you and stench rises from you i've got good news for you you can come be forgiven right now and if you're sitting here and you're thinking i'm good change your mind and believe your goodness will not amount to anything before a God who can.
See clearly to your heart to the core of our wickedness that needs a savior that if Jesus Christ came so that you might learn how to be good he would have never gone to a cross but he came to pay for sinners and prostitutes and tax collectors and addicts and abusers and adulterers and those who practice homosexuality and swindlers and idolaters will stand in the kingdom praising the name of our lord Jesus because they've repented and they've seen that he forgives and may we stand shoulder to shoulder in a place that would have been.
So overrun with wickedness were it not for the blood of Christ may we stand and praise his name and his glory and not think for one second that our name will be lifted up because of our good work but may we respond in good work to a good savior who redeems sinners if you're in your sin you don't have to be you can be forgiven right now if you place your faith in Jesus and if you're sitting here in your own righteousness i would warn you that it will not be sufficient change your mind and believe in the only one who can pay.
For your sins and your pride and your self-righteousness with his blood on the cross let's pray oh lord we thank you that you save sinners and may we see our debt so that we rejoice may we see our debt so that we line up to be forgiven and may we live in the confidence and the humility and the joy that the forgiveness of sinners provides may we walk out in obedience in grateful joy elevating your name the whole way and for those who have lived their lives behaving.
So that you will owe them lord may they see their sin and as you see their heart will you help them to see their heart so they might change their mind and belief we ask this in Jesus mighty name amen.