Matthew 4:12-17
Jesus the Galilean

1. John's Imprisonment
   1. John's Ministry Is at an End
      1. He will die in prison.
      2. With John, the era of the prophets comes to an end. He is the last one.
   2. Who Will Continue It?
      1. The answer should be obvious. Jesus.
      2. And by the end of this passage, we have that answer confirmed.
2. Jesus Dwells in Galilee
   1. The Background of the Quoted Passage
      1. It comes from Isaiah 9, verses 1 and 2.
      2. Assyria has attacked Israel and carried the people off into captivity
         1. Now remember, who does Isaiah write to?
         2. Not Israel, but JUDAH.
         3. The kingdom was divided after the days of Solomon.
         4. Is Israel the more faithful part? NO. Judah was.
         5. So Israel's captivity comes first and is more complete
            1. Israel is captured by Assyria which disperses them so that they can never be regathered.
            2. Judah is captured by Babylon which allows Judah to stay together and retain their culture, and eventually return to their home.
      3. So the people of Zebulun and Naphtali have fallen away from the Lord completely by Isaiah's time.
      4. And they are taken captive by Assyria and dispersed.
      5. Yet in the midst of this event, the prophet Isaiah proclaims that one day the fortunes of Zebulun and Naphtali will be reversed. One day a light will shine on them.
      6. And this passage goes on to the famous prophecy: "For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7Of the increase of His government and peace There will be no end, Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, To order it and establish it with judgment and justice From that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.
      7. So this is clearly a Messianic passage
   2. The Significance of the Passage
      1. By Matthew's day, this area is predominately Gentile.
      2. The prophecy even mentions that this place is known as "Galilee of the Gentiles"
      3. Even the description of the location is a Gentile description
         1. "beyond the Jordan"
         2. Normally that would mean east, away from the Promised Land
         3. But Galilee is on the Israel side of the Jordan
         4. So who would call if "beyond the Jordan"?
         5. Those who live outside the promised land and look toward it from the east.
      4. So the location is filled with Gentiles and is described in a Gentile manner.
      5. Does Jesus go preaching to the Gentiles, then?
      6. No, he preaches to the Jews. He comes first to call the household of Israel to repentance.
      7. Why then begin his ministry in a heavily Gentile area?
         1. So that you will understand his intention from the outset is to include the Gentiles in his plan of salvation.
            1. By the end of the book, Jesus will be sending his disciples out into all the world, not just to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
            2. You are not an afterthought.
            3. You were part of Jesus' plan of salvation from the beginning.
         2. As a rebuke to the Jews
            1. Remember Herod and the chief priests and scribes in Jerusalem
            2. They knew that the King of the Jews would be born in Bethlehem, but they didn't travel there.
            3. Who did? Three Gentile kings.
            4. And we saw in this the firstfruits of all nations coming and bowing down to Christ.
         3. So we begin to see how Paul will later say that their loss is riches for the world
      8. "The people that SAT in darkness"
         1. The original prophesy said "The people that WALKED in darkness"
         2. Now they SIT. (explain)
         3. Surrounded by Gentiles in a Gentile area, this is no place where the worship of the God of Abraham is maintained.
         4. There may be Jews here, but they are submerged in a pagan culture.
         5. They sit in darkness.
         6. God rejected this area, Naphtali and Zebulun, more than 500 years before.
         7. There they sit, without hope.
         8. There they sit, filthy with sin, having nothing to commend them to God.
         9. There they sit, blind, with no one to light there way.
      9. Suddenly, they see a great light
         1. Jesus, the sun of righteousness has risen upon them.
         2. They dwell in the land of the shadow of death
         3. And light has dawned.
      10. This is what happens when Jesus comes.
   3. Matthew's Sanctified Geography
      1. Matthew here concludes his quoting of OT passages about geography
      2. It began with the chief priests and scribes quoting Micah as saying that the Messiah would come out of Bethlehem.
         1. And so Jesus was born in Bethlehem
         2. This passage was fairly straightforward.
         3. The geographical location of Bethlehem referenced by Micah became the geographical location of the Messiah's birth.
         4. Then things got complicated.
      3. Matthew quotes Hosea as saying, "Out of Egypt I called My Son"
         1. But what "Egypt" is Matthew referring to?
         2. At first glance, we said, geographical Egypt
            1. After all, Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt
            2. So of course they have to come out of it some day, and that's when the prophecy is fulfilled.
         3. Then we looked closer
            1. There is a king who seeks to destroy Jesus, just as in Egypt there was a king who sought to destroy the children of Israel in general and Moses in particular.
            2. This king orders the slaughter of innocent children, just as Pharaoh, king of Egypt, ordered the slaughter of the Hebrew infants.
            3. Do you see how the parallels are going?
            4. The "Egypt" Matthew is talking about is right in the middle of Israel.
               • It is in Israel that a king like Pharaoh exists, seeking to destroy the children of God
               • It is out of Israel that Jesus is called to flee.
               • Israel is Egypt in this story. Do you see it?
         4. The prophesy "Out of Egypt I called My Son" is fulfilled when Jesus leaves Israel, fleeing the persecution of a wicked king.
         5. It is Israel that has become the place of unbelief and wickedness
         6. And it is out of this spiritual Egypt that God calls his Son.
      4. The third geographical reference speaks of the location of Ramah
         1. Matthew makes another one of his daring applications of prophecy, this time from Jeremiah 31:15
         2. A voice was heard in Ramah, Lamentation, weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, Refusing to be comforted, Because they are no more.
         3. Jeremiah is referring to the event of the Jews being deported to Babylon.
         4. The area of Ramah, the place of Rachel's burial, was the way station where the Babylonian conquerers gathered the conquered Jews together and deported them in bulk to Babylon.
         5. And in Jeremiah's depiction of this, Rachel is depicted as weeping for her children being taken away from their home in the Promised Land.
         6. So Bethlehem becomes Ramah, spiritually speaking, for here the mothers of the land weep for their children.
      5. And lastly we saw Jesus move to the town of Nazareth
         1. And Matthew says this was done, "That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, 'He shall be called a Nazarene.'"
         2. We saw that there is no prophesy with these words anywhere in Scripture.
         3. But we thought a little further and remembered Nathanael when he was about to meet Jesus and found out he was from Nazareth: "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?"
         4. So we said Nathanael was reflecting the feeling of the time
            1. Nazareth was an obscure city
            2. It was a backwater town, a place of no consequence
            3. And people who come from there are obscure and of no consequence.
            4. To have the Messiah come from Nazareth of all places just seems like such a letdown. It's like having him come from Barstow.
            5. Yet that's exactly what happened. The Messiah came from an obscure, backwater town. He was marginalized and deprived of earthly significance and splendor from the beginning.
            6. That's what it means to be a Nazarene.
         5. And that's exactly what all the prophets had said.
            1. The Messiah will not be a mover and a shaker with a lot of clout in the world.
            2. He will be despised and rejected by men
            3. He will have no form or comeliness that we should desire him
            4. He will be weak and foolish in the eyes of the world
      6. Now, in the last such passage, Jesus comes to Galilee
         1. This time the literal geographical region again
         2. To be the light that shines on their darkness.
         3. To Galilee of the Gentiles
      7. What's wrong with this picture?
         1. If you're a Jew in Jesus' time, what do you see as missing from Matthew's geographical references?
         2. Jerusalem!
         3. Sure, there are prophecies about other geographic locations scattered throughout Scripture.
         4. But the one the prophets keep coming back to is Jerusalem.
         5. Ps 68.29 - "Because of your temple at Jerusalem, Kings will bring presents to you."
         6. Psalm 147:2 - The Lord builds up Jerusalem. He gathers together the outcasts of Israel.
         7. Isaiah 24:22 - For the Lord of hosts will reign On Mount Zion and in Jerusalem And before His elders, gloriously.
         8. Isaiah 27:13 - So it shall be in that day: The great trumpet will be blown; They will come, who are about to perish in the land of Assyria, And they who are outcasts in the land of Egypt, And shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem.
         9. Jeremiah 33:15,16 - In those days and at that time I will cause to grow up to David A Branch of righteousness; He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. 16In those days Judah will be saved, And Jerusalem will dwell safely.And this is the name by which she will be called:THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.
         10. You can't get more Messianic than that.
         11. And believe me, this is only a small sample of the prophecies I could cite
      8. The Messiah was supposed to come sit on the throne of David.
      9. The Messiah was supposed to come to his temple
      10. Where could he do these things but Jerusalem?
      11. Matthew does mention Jerusalem in his gospel
          1. It is a place of unbelief - Herod and the chief priests and scribes and pharisees all come from there. Matthew makes sure you know this
          2. It is the place Jesus must go to be betrayed to the chief priests and scribes who will condemn him to death.
          3. It is the place that kills the prophets and stones those sent to her.
      12. Jerusalem has become a spiritual Egypt and worse
      13. So we start to realize that Jesus must bring in a spiritual Jerusalem.
      14. THEN all those prophecies will be fulfilled
      15. THEN the kingdom - which we are starting to realize is a spiritual and heavenly kingdom - will be brought in.
3. Jesus Takes up John's Ministry
   1. His Message Is the Same as John's
      1. Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.
      2. How could it be a different message?
      3. After all, he is the king.
      4. When the king has come, so has the kingdom.
      5. So this Bethelehem born, Nazareth raised, Galilee of the Gentiles ministering man, is the King of the Jews.
      6. And where is the kingdom coming?
         1. Not in Jerusalem, geographically speaking.
         2. But in the heavenly Jerusalem.
         3. Jesus brings the true Jerusalem with him.
         4. Where the king is, there is the kingdom.
      7. The Old Testament pictured the day of the Messiah as a day when all the Gentiles would come streaming in to the city of the great king, Jerusalem.
      8. Now this image is in a sense reversed.
      9. It is JERUSALEM, the city of the great king, that goes out to the Gentiles.
      10. Christ brings the city with him.
      11. So we begin to realize that earthly geography is not important.
      12. You and I are citizens of the new Jerusalem, the one where David's true throne is, the one where Jesus sits as king.
   2. He Did Not Come to Abolish but to Fulfil
      1. How could Jesus have a different message?
      2. He hasn't come to say, well, the Law didn't work and the Prophets didn't work, so I'm going in a new direction.
      3. He came to say that the Law and the Prophets bear witness to ME.
      4. Therefore, if the message of the last prophet is "Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand," then this is the message Jesus brings, for he has come to fulfil that message of J the B.
   3. So Let us Heed his message
      1. Repent
      2. Lay up your treasure in heaven.

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