Matthew
8:18-27: “Jesus Gives Requirements To
Those Who Would Desire To Follow Him / Jesus Calms The Sea When The Boat He And
His Disciples Is In Enters A Storm”
by
1.
INTRO:
1.1.
In this next
section of the gospel of Matthew we see what Jesus required of those who came
seeking to be one of His followers
1.1.1. We see in these verses that Jesus required would be followers
to first count the cost of being His disciple before He allowed them to follow
Him
1.1.2. We see also that a person wanting to follower had to
make a decision to completely forsake his old way of life and submit his life
completely to Him
1.1.3. Jesus teaches here also that His disciple must not let
anything in his life take precedence over following Him
1.1.4. The principles taught in this section apply to all
people of all eras who would consider being a follower of Christ
2.
VS 8:18-20 - “18 Now when Jesus saw a crowd around Him, He gave
orders to depart to the other side. 19 And a certain scribe came and said to
Him, “Teacher, I will follow You wherever You go.” 20 And Jesus *said to him,
“The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man
has nowhere to lay His head. 21 Another disciple said to him, “Lord, first let
me go and bury my father.” 22 But Jesus told him, “1Follow me, and let the dead
bury their own dead””” - Jesus
meets men who wish to follow Him but who have not counted the cost in doing so
2.1.
Jesus knew that
though there was a crowd congregating around Him and that this group was not
able at this time to hear the words which He might speak to them concerning
salvation and faith in Him, so He chose to leave the crowd and cross over to
the other side of the
2.1.1. Jesus often taught the multitudes in parable stories
which they couldn’t understand since they were not ready in heart to hear from
Him, and He could then explain the meaning of the parables to His disciples who
were ready in heart to hear
2.2.
Here in chapter
8, we meet two wanna-be disciples who tell Jesus that they want to follow Him,
however their lives are not characterized by the good soil in the parable of
the sower, but one of the bad types
2.2.1. The scribe
2.2.1.1.This man was a teacher of
2.2.1.2.This man rightly understood that being a follower of
Christ involved the surrender of one’s life, for he vows to follow Jesus
wherever He went, however he really hadn’t counted the cost of where following
Jesus might lead him
2.2.1.3.This man surely thought as did all Israel, and even
the apostles themselves at this point, that Jesus had come to be a political
Messiah and that His throne would immediately be setup and the world subjugated
to Him, and thus to follow Jesus meant that he would be taking the high road of
luxury and ease, not the low road of suffering, sacrifice, and crucifixion
2.2.1.3.1.This man may have thought merely of the profit that
would come to him for following the Messiah
2.2.1.4.What Jesus says to this man proves His discernment of
the man’s heart was correct, for the man quits following Jesus as soon as He
gives him a hint at what the lifestyle of following Him might involve, ““The
foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has
nowhere to lay His head”
2.2.1.5.In Luke 14:25-33 (it is found below) Jesus preaches
the wisdom and necessity of first counting the cost of discipleship before
following Him, for a rash commitment to follow Him will rarely be followed
through
2.2.2. The man who wanted to put off following Jesus
2.2.2.1.This man asks a request that we might think would be
harmless, for he wanted to follow Jesus but he wanted to do so after he buried
his father
2.2.2.2.We don’t know if the man’s father is dead at this
point, or whether he is just old or ailing
2.2.2.3.John MacArthur brings out in his commentary that this
phrase is a middle-eastern phrase that people sometimes use even to the present
day and that what it means is that the man wanted to wait around until the day
when his father finally passed away, then after he received his father’s inheritance
he would be willing to follow Jesus
2.2.2.3.1.This view is strengthened by the fact that in Jesus’
day people were buried the same day that they died
2.2.2.4.The point Jesus is making here is that no disciple can
let anything take precedence in his life over following Jesus, even family, and
that a disciple must always be willing to go wherever the Lord shall desire to
take him no matter what his circumstances
2.2.2.4.1.In Luke 14:25-33, Jesus on another occasion teaches
the lesson that it is wise to count the cost of discipleship before believing
upon Him, and also that nothing can be placed above God in the disciple’s life,
“25 Now great multitudes were going along with Him; and He turned and said
to them, 26 “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother
and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he
cannot be My disciple. 27 “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after
Me cannot be My disciple. 28 “For which one of you, when he wants to build a
tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost, to see if he has enough
to complete it? 29 “Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation, and is not able
to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, ‘This man began
to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 “Or what king, when he sets out to
meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and take counsel whether
he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against
him with twenty thousand? 32 “Or else, while the other is still far away, he
sends a delegation and asks terms of peace. 33 “So therefore, no one of you can
be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions””
2.2.2.4.2.It is very important as a follower of Christ to never
look back to the old life and the things of the world and your previous life,
things which could so easily entangle and stumble you in your faith
2.2.2.4.2.1.In Luke 9:61-62, Luke records a very similar incident
to the one here in Matthew, and there Jesus makes the point that His disciple
must never look back on his old life (look back while plowing) after beginning
to follow and serve Him, “61 And another also said, “I will follow You,
Lord; but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home.” 62 But Jesus said
to him, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit
for the
2.2.2.5.Before coming to Christ each of us is spiritually
dead, dead in our transgressions and sins, and thus Jesus here tells this man
that he should let those who are spiritually dead bury their own dead
2.2.2.5.1.Have any of you ever seen the old movie, “The Night of
the Living Dead?” Well, the Bible
teaches us that in this world there are dead people walking around all over the
place
2.2.2.5.1.1.Paul wrote about this in Eph. 2:1-3, “2:1 And you
were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked according
to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air,
of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. 3 Among them we
too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the
flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest”
3.
VS 8:23-27 - “23 And when He got into the boat, His disciples
followed Him. 24 And behold, there arose a great storm in the sea, so that the
boat was covered with the waves; but He Himself was asleep. 25 And they came to
Him, and awoke Him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing!” 26 And He *said
to them, “Why are you timid, you men of little faith?” Then He arose, and
rebuked the winds and the sea; and it became perfectly calm. 27 And the men
marveled, saying, “What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea
obey Him?”” - Jesus
calms the sea and saves His disciples in the boat
3.1.
We see in these
verses first of all that Jesus’ humanity is beautifully portrayed
3.1.1. He was exhausted from His labors, and thus He goes
down into their boat as they are rowing or sailing across the sea and goes into
a very deep sleep
3.1.2. In His humanity He trusted so completely in God and in
the fact of His divinity, that He was able to have perfect peace and sleep
soundly even in the midst of a horrible storm
3.2.
The disciples
reveal their humanity here
3.2.1. They trust in Jesus, and thus when the storm arises
they come to Him for help having an apprehension that there was no trouble that
He could not protect them from
3.2.2. They show the littleness of their faith and that they
had doubts in that they appear to be more than a little put out at Jesus that
He is sleeping rather than watching out for them and protecting them
3.2.3. As one translation reveals here, in their reaction to
Jesus they questioned whether or not He really cared about them since He was
sleeping in the midst of their tremendous and fiery trial
3.3.
Jesus exhorts His
disciples by asking them why it was that they were ‘timid’, and then by calling
them ‘men of little faith’
3.3.1. Later in time the disciples realized that this whole
incident was nothing more than a “divine setup” to teach them faith
3.3.1.1.God place ‘divine setups’ in our life from time to
time in order to test us in order for us to learn whether or not we have
learned the lessons He has been trying to teach us
3.4.
Notice how when
Jesus rebukes these winds and waves, the waves don’t just gradually begin to
calm down as always happens when a storm passes overhead, rather they
immediately are made to be perfectly calm
3.5.
The disciples
marvel at Jesus now because even the very elements of this world obey Him and
heeding His very words.
3.6.
Jesus is
progressively revealing to His disciples that He is qualified to be the Savior
of the world
3.6.1. In order to be a savior who can save us from our sins,
and redeem our bodies for heaven, He must have victory over all of the forces
in heaven and upon earth, and in Matthew’s gospel He presents Christ as meeting
all of the criteria necessary to validate His being the eternal Son of God from
all eternity
3.7.
I love the saying
my wife saw written on a plaque one time, “Sometimes God calms the storm
around His child, and other times He calms the storm within His child”, and
it teaches us the truth that sometimes God allows us to go through fiery trials
and storms, yet in the midst of those times if we will look to Him and trust in
Him we can have the peace that passes all comprehension
3.8.
If the disciples
had just thought about the fact that Jesus had told them that they would go to
the other side of the lake, they would not have been fearful of perishing in
the storm, for the Lord doesn’t tell us that He is taking us across a lake only
to have us perish