06 October
Bible In 365 Days
Matthew 11-12 
Matthew 11
This picture of John is very full of pathos — from the high triumph of inspired preaching to the solitude and loneliness of a prison. John made as direct application to Jesus as his circumstances permitted. Surely the wisest course possible. Jesus answered him not by verbal assurance, but by the deeds of the Kingdom. The credentials of Christ are ever to be found in His actual works.
The fickleness and worthlessness of public opinion has striking exemplification here. In the ordinary manner of life, Jesus and John were contrasts. The one was a stem ascetic, living in the simplest fashion; the Other was a Man of the people, living in the ordinary way. The first they said had a devil; the Master they charged with gluttony and drunkenness. There is but one thing for any who are called to public service, that is, to go straight on, undeviating in loyalty to God, and deaf to the voices around, knowing that at last "Wisdom is justified by her works."
Christ upbraiding the cities! It seems so contrary to His spirit of love and gentleness, but it is not so. Why does He thus reproach them? "Because they repented not." They persisted in rebellion, and that in spite of the manifestations of His power. There is, then, a condition more deeply degraded, more hopeless, than that of Sodom. The sin against light is far more terrible in itself, and more awful in its results, than sins committed in darkness. Capernaum's rejection of the Son of God is infinitely worse than Sodom's bestiality.
From reproach of cities, the Master turned to prayer. The use of the word "answered" is suggestive, revealing the perpetual fact of communion existing between Christ and God. The note of praise was the response of Christ's heart to the secret of Jehovah.
From prayer He turned back to the crowd with words full of sweetest pity and divinest power. He claims knowledge of the Father, which can be gained only by those to whom He willeth to reveal the Father. And while we pause and wonder who the favored ones will be, there breaks on our listening ears the sweetest of all music. He calls all who labor and are heavy laden, and promises to give them rest by so revealing the Father that to do His will will be the delight of life, the light burden, the easy yoke.
Matthew 12
This chapter chronicles direct attacks on Christ. The first was petty and foolish. It is on the question of the Sabbath. The Master gives to His people the true conception of the sanctity of the Sabbath. It is established, and remains, for "the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath." "How much is a man better than a sheep? Why, then, rescue a sheep and neglect a man?"
The second attack was characterized by malicious hatred; it was an absolute denial of the sovereignty of God. Satan is cast out by Satan. The absolute folly of the position is revealed in the Lord's reply. Only two forces are at work in the world, the gathering and the scattering. Whoever does the one contradicts and hinders the other. Beelzebub and the demons of whom he is prince are breaking up, destroying, scattering! Christ's work is the opposite, healing, saving, gathering.
The third attack was a manifestation of contemptuous unbelief. "Master, we would see a sign from Thee." Christ revealed the true reason for their unbelief, "an evil and adulterous generation."
The last attack would be to Him the bitterest of them all. Mark gives us an insight into it that we miss in Matthew (Mark 3:21-35). Jesus' friends, even His mother, are so far out of sympathy with Him as to believe Him mad, and to desire to put Him under restraint. Of this He makes occasion to declare the blessedness of the relation that the subjects of the Kingdom bear to Him. It has been wrongly imagined by some that the Lord's language here shows disrespect for His mother, as though she had grieved Him. This is surely to miss the deepest truth in His statement. The relationship with Him into which those come who do the will of His Father is as dear as that of brother and sister and mother.
