Sometimes an obvious question is not as much about seeking the answer, as about hearing the answer said out loud, again and again. A wife asks her husband, do you love me? It is possible she has occasion to wonder, but just as likely she simply enjoys hearing him say it out loud, again and again. Sometimes we know the answer, but conditions or circumstances give us pause, they cause to seek affirmation, to chase our doubt away. A wife asks her husband, did you do it? When faced with the accusation of a crime, when compounded with evidence even if only circumstantial, her faith in her husband begins to tremble. What she looks for now is re-assurance of that faith she already holds. She looks for his affirmation to chase away her emerging doubt. But when conditions are overwhelming, when doubt has not only entered the building, it has taken over the building, we throw our question to the wind, desperately hoping for an answer strong enough to quell doubt, strong enough to overcome common sense, strong enough to be centered in a still small voice through which only God talks.
Imagine yourself, a minister of Christ, devout in your duties, and with great success. You preach every day. The power of the Holy Spirit is evident in both your words, and the response of hearts that melt in those who hear them. With your success, the “organized” church begins to take notice, and resentment begins to build. These are powerful men, with powerful friends. You are a nobody; just a humble minister of Jesus. As your ministry grows, the church in whom you should belong, begins to take steps to curtail your ministry, by having you thrown into prison on false charges. And it works. Now consider, you have gone from humble minister with great success, with a great number of people who listen and respond, to complete isolation in a cell with limited visitors on limited occasions. You own nothing. You have no family left living. You have only a few friends left who have not yet deserted you. Could you have been wrong? Could your own words have been what “you” thought, perhaps not what God wanted you to speak? Could you have been so wrong, God allowed you to come to this end, in order to stop what you were saying?
If you can imagine yourself here, you may begin to imagine the mind of John the Baptist in prison at the time of Christ. He spent his life preaching the coming of the Messiah. Then he announced Jesus as he came to him. But not long after, he is cast into prison, with a grateful priesthood, and conniving powerful women bent on his quick murder. In a religious philosophy where God rewards the faithful and punishes the wicked, which side of that equation would you imagine yourself to be on. Your circumstances would clearly outline, you are the punished of God, not the rewarded. It is this underlying misguided philosophy that even today forms the basis of “wealthy gospels” and “eternal hells”. It blames God for all the evil that occurs to one of His servants. We get cancer, it must be God’s fault, for allowing it. We lose our homes to disaster in hurricanes, earthquakes, fires and floods; again God’s fault, we even term these events “acts of God”. We are robbed, raped and killed; or worse our children suffer this fate. We blame God again for allowing it to occur. Atheists determine a loving God must not exist, because evil does. Doubt begins to creep into our own thinking, when our circumstances do not reflect the rewards God offers, but only the punishments we hold Him responsible for.
Matthew begins to recount the question of John, and the thoughts of Christ about the ministry, message, and person of John. Perhaps in this story, is undone the misguided philosophy we continue to cling to even in our own day. Matthew picks up in chapter eleven beginning in verse 1 saying … “And it came to pass, when Jesus had made an end of commanding his twelve disciples, he departed thence to teach and to preach in their cities. [verse 2] Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples,” The gospel commission has just completed in chapter ten. Jesus has sent His own disciples into the region of Judea to preach the gospel of the Messiah. To perform miracles in His name. They were to spread the gospel of salvation to the house of Israel, that the Messiah is come, to bear witness that it is Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Messiah, God incarnate. And while His disciples do this, Jesus Himself remains active in the ministry. And with predictable success. Not many can resist the pure love of our God.
By contrast, John sits in a cell largely in isolation. He has periodic visits from Herod, perhaps the last listener of his gospel the world will ever offer him. John is smart enough to know that the message he speaks of repentance will not take root in the ears of Herod’s adulterous wife and daughter before they work out a way to kill him. The priesthood will not come to the aid of John, they are not happy with him either. And while John sits here. The disciples of Jesus wander the countryside, performing miracles, teaching and preaching largely unimpeded, empowered by Jesus through the Holy Spirit. Jesus Himself wanders the nation, with no agent of the Sanhedrin bold enough to kill Him in public. Even the Romans keep their distance from Jesus, excepting the ones who seek His help, which He grants. While the largely Nazarite John, of meek clothing and diet, sits in jail; Jesus has taken up a tax collector for Rome into His company. A man of at least formerly lavish lifestyle, built upon the backs of his own people. Hardly seems fair. Hardly fits the model of a just God, one who punishes and rewards based on those who deserve it.
Matthew continues in verse 3 saying … “And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?” The question John asks two of the last disciples he will ever have, to ask our Savior is, are you the one? Is this doubt or affirmation? Is the answer obvious to John, or has his own circumstances particularly when contrast with other disciples of Christ grown so far apart, doubt has begun to creep in? John is on death row, and he knows it. Jesus is doing nothing to break him out. Wouldn’t the leader of the Jewish nation, with the full support of the people, have the power to simply demand his release, or overrun the jail if needs be? What kind of leader, leaves a righteous man in prison to die, while sending far from righteous men into the field to proclaim His name? How is any of this fair? The leadership of the organized church hate Jesus already, do they have a point? Jesus is undoing the concept of rewards for those who deserve it. Jesus is undoing the concept of punishing those who deserve it, instead He offers forgiveness and redemption. This goes against long held beliefs about the nature of God, both then and now.
Jesus answers John’s disciples beginning in verse 4 saying … “Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: [verse 5] The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. [verse 6] And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me.” Note how Jesus responds, those in need are getting the miracles they need. And the gospel is being preached. But finally a blessing is offered for those who are not “offended” by who Jesus is, and what Jesus does. To have a sinner come to repentance is a thing to be praised, not to be criticized because of how it occurred, or that I was not present when it did. The goal is the redemption of mankind, not the pre-perfection of the messengers of that calling. Increasing the membership of the Kingdom of Heaven, did not come with a prequalification test, it came with a simple answer, do you want this, or not.
John could have easily taken offense at what Jesus did for him, or rather, did not do for him. John could have demanded that by his lifestyle he had earned special treatment by Jesus, and a special place at His side. But Jesus points out, the ministry is its own reward. What is special, is that lives are converted, souls are saved, and relationships are established with Him. When the Holy Spirit blesses that effort, none need doubt about the results, and none need criticize the messenger who aided in it. John had the benefit of having his doubt removed by the miracles which alone were probably up to the task. You and I should have a similar lens in examining our own lives, where we are today, and where we were so many years ago. There should be measurable progress there we do not understand. There should be testimony there of victories we had no hand in, but benefited from. Our testimony is about our own salvation, wrought by the hand of Jesus Christ Himself, our only Savior. It is not boast, because our progress has nothing to do with us, and everything to do with Him. That evidence should be the miracle we need, to overcome our own doubt. None else can take it away.
John understood much of this. Though he remained on death row, and he died a cruel death alone with an executioner. Jesus never came to save him from jail or the axe. Jesus never broke him out of prison, or demanded his release. Jesus allowed the earthly life of John to end, the first martyr for the gospel, faithful to the end. Later followers of Christ would look back to the example set by John, and echo his response. When faced with roaring lions, and seeing their children killed; these future martyrs would continue to take up the cross of Christ instead of the swords of resistance. They laid down their lives, and the lives of the spouses and children for the cause of Christ at the hands of wicked men. This was not the punishment of God. It was the ultimate destination of sin. What seems innocuous in sin, ends in the coliseums of ancient Rome, and the axe of the executioner of John. All roads of sin lead here. The innocent are punished by sin itself. This is not a condition God allows in apathy, it is a condition God permits in order to have time to save the precious life of the perpetrator. That is not fair. That is not justice. It is mercy. The same mercy that saves you and I. The goal is the redemption of mankind, not to punish it for what it has coming. Punishment will be finally an eternal separation from the love of God, for those who chose no other course.
The questions and life of John, disprove a misguided philosophy about the character of God, in his own day, and in ours. But what Jesus would then say about the life of John is an even more interesting consideration …
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