Sermon Transcript:

Before the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, the people of Pompeii, Italy, lived average, ordinary lives. They worked, farmed, ate, and slept, and they did all these things while living directly beneath a volcano.

Archaeologists, to this day, are still discovering remnants of that buried city. They have found preserved buildings and roads, various household items, and even the remains of the people who once lived there.

Now, the purpose of this historical reflection is to raise our awareness to just how destructive unbelief can be. You see, the people of Pompeii knew what volcanoes were. They understood what volcanoes could do, but they did not believe that it could or would happen to them. They had lived at the foot of that volcano for a very long time, and nothing had ever happened, so they presumed that nothing would continue to happen.

Unbelief doesn't always present itself in blatant, outright rejection of facts. Unbelief isn't always loud or obvious. Sometimes unbelief presents itself in very subtle ways. You see, normal life can become so normal that we lower our guard and presume that approaching judgment is impossible.

Normal life beneath that volcano caused the people of Pompeii to ignore glaring truths, and because those truths were disregarded, imminent danger was treated as an afterthought—or even as a myth. For years, there were no eruptions, no noise, nothing! Every day seemed exactly the same.

You see, humans prefer normalcy. We crave predictability, and we don't naturally want to deal with anything that might disrupt or change our stability.

We are very comfortable thinking that because yesterday was normal, and because today was pretty normal, we should expect tomorrow to be much the same. This is one way unbelief can take deep root in the heart. It's not blatant, it's not direct; it's subtle, disguising itself as comfort.

And when we look at Scripture, we see this pattern of unbelief throughout human history. Take, for example, the people who were alive in the days of Noah as he built the ark. Jesus Himself says: 

Matthew 24:38-39

“They were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage… And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away.”

There was a man out in the middle of the desert building an enormous boat. This man preached the truth, pairs of animals eventually began lining up to board that boat, and yet the people of that day were so given to their routines and so comfortable with the normalcy of their lives that they were caught completely off guard when the flood came.

There is a blindness that develops in comfort and ease. There is an aversion to change that grows when everything feels stable. I say all of this so that our eyes might be opened to the many different ways unbelief can take a foothold in a person's life.

Unbelief shows up in many different ways and our text this morning is going to show us a few different examples of how unbelief can display itself in the hearts of unbelievers, and as we work through this text, I want you to seriously contemplate, what separates you from the people in Nazareth? What makes you different from the unbelieving people in our text for today? Because as we will see, the main point of today's passage is:

Main point

Unbelief blinds us to the glory of Christ, but grace opens our eyes to see Him.

As we work through our text, we will see that it isn't evidence, intellect, or even familiarity that bridges the gap of unbelief. The truth revealed in our text is that if you believe, you do so by God’s grace alone!

And this tragic text should result in every believer in this building rejoicing and praising God for His unbelief-conquering grace and mercy. Our hearts should be moved to gratitude that God delivered us from the desperate pit of unbelief in which we could have easily remained.

Praise be to God for texts like ours today, because they remind believers of where we once were and where God rescued us from remaining. And at the same time, this text shines a bright light into the darkness of unbelief, revealing where the unbeliever remains today.

Context and Exposition

Now, up to this point in Matthew 13, we have heard Jesus teach eight different parables about the Kingdom of God. Each parable is unique and reveals a particular truth about God’s Kingdom.

Jesus taught in parables because of the rampant unbelief among the Jewish people. He tells us in verse 13 that He taught this way because, even though the people had eyes, they could not see, and even though they had ears, they could not hear. Unbelief had made them blind and deaf to the truth.

Just as the mountain stood before the people of Pompeii, Jesus Christ stood, in an even greater way, before the Jewish people. Mount Vesuvius had lain dormant for many years, which makes it somewhat understandable why the people of Pompeii continued living as they did. But there was nothing dormant about Christ!

The Jewish people witnessed the power of God at work in Jesus. They saw signs and wonders that testified directly to who He was, and yet, even with all of that evidence standing before them, they still did not believe.

Last week, as we continued preaching through Jesus’s parables, we heard Pastor Kevin preach through the final teaching portion in this series. We explored how Kingdom scribes bring out of the treasury of God’s Word things both old and new. Kevin taught us that the old things were never done away with, but instead were made much clearer in light of the new.

Up to this point in His ministry, Jesus had primarily been teaching in the Capernaum area. But where we pick up today, Jesus departs from Capernaum and heads to Nazareth, His hometown.

Look with me at verse 53.

Matthew 13:53

And when Jesus had finished these parables, he went away from there,

Now, Capernaum had served as a sort of home base for Jesus’s ministry in Galilee. He had spent a great deal of time there preaching, teaching, healing, and performing miracles. And yet, despite all of that exposure to Christ, many of the people still did not believe.

And this is significant because if the people could hear Christ preach and witness His mighty works while He stood among them, and still rejected Him, then we can see that greater familiarity was not going to solve their problem. Another thing that would not solve their problem was going to be the absence of Christ. Even though Christ departed here only for a short while, history shows us that the old romance saying that: Absence makes the heart grow fonder, does not apply to the issue of unbelief.

These people may have loved the miracles and the healings, and they may have even enjoyed the spectacle, but the heartbreaking reality is that they still rejected Jesus for who He truly was. The unbelievers were glad to receive Christ as healer, but they had no interest in receiving Him as Messiah.

The departure of Christ in this moment is significant because it teaches us a tragic truth about unbelief and the progress of God’s Kingdom. There are many people today who live as though tomorrow is guaranteed. They believe that Christ will always be an option, and so they continue in unbelief, living for themselves while telling themselves that they can worry about Jesus later.

But as Christ departs from Capernaum, we are reminded that opportunities to sit beneath the light of Christ should never be presumed upon. These people had been surrounded by light. They had heard His teaching and witnessed His mighty works, and yet many continued to reject Him. And while they rejected Christ, the Kingdom of God continued moving forward, because God’s Kingdom and God’s purposes wait for no man.

Those may be hard words for some to hear, but if you are sitting in this church telling yourself, “I'll worry about that Jesus stuff later,” I want you to take a good, long look at the text before us. Maybe you've determined that you're going to live your best life now and worry about eternal things when they feel important enough. But these people demonstrate just how dangerous that thinking can be. They were perfectly capable of rejecting Christ again and again, even while He stood among them.

Their rejection of the light revealed their desire for a Christless existence. And if you're here today, hearing these words and thinking that you just have to get through this preacher's long-winded speech so that you can get back to your life, then, my friend, this passage of Scripture was preserved just for you.

Archaeologists have unearthed an ancient synagogue in Capernaum, built upon the foundations of an earlier synagogue. And do you know what they found engraved within it? They found images of animals, mythological creatures, and even symbols associated with false gods.

Now, for anyone wondering whether distance from Christ eventually resulted in Capernaum turning things around, history certainly doesn't give us that picture. The city that had experienced so much light did not become known for embracing the Christ who had walked its streets. Their synagogues show us that they actually went the opposite direction.

And this is yet another heartbreaking reminder of the tragedy of unbelief. Rejecting the light doesn't eventually produce greater light. Distance from Christ doesn't cure unbelief. A heart comfortable with distance is a heart in great danger. 

Matthew 13:54-58

and coming to his hometown he taught them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works?  Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household.” And he did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief. 

Now, here we see that when Jesus departed from Capernaum, He headed to his hometown of Nazareth. Nazareth being the place that Jesus was raised. Now, our passage in Matthew 13, may be a record of the second time that Jesus returned to Nazareth during his ministry. Scholars debate over whether the account found in the gospel of Luke chapter 4 is a record of a first visit, or it may be another recording of the same moment that we see here in Matthew 13, but either way, we have a lot of detail from these two records about what the Nazarene people had revealed to them. According to Luke's Gospel, we know that Jesus went to the synagogue, just as he normally would, and he taught. Luke tells us that Jesus was handed the Isaiah scroll and he:

Luke 4:17-19

“found the place where it was written, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 

Afterwards Jesus rolled up the scroll, sat down and proclaimed: Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your presence! In saying this, Jesus pronounced that the Messianic passage that He had just read, was now fulfilled in their presence. Jesus clearly taught his hometown people that He was the Messiah that Isaiah had foretold about. 

Now looking back at our passage in Matthew we can see the response by the Nazarene people to the teachings of Jesus.

Matthew 13:54

and coming to his hometown he taught them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? 

Now, immediately we see unbelief at work. These people hear Jesus teaching in the synagogue and instead of receiving what was being given as a gift from God, their unbelief begins to blur things that are obvious. Instead of seeing the word of God handled rightly, instead of rejoicing at the understanding being given to them, they instead get hung up on the question of how. How did this man get this wisdom and how is it possible that this man is able to perform the things that He is doing? How? Tell me how!

You see, these people recognized Jesus, they knew him as a boy, as a young man, so their hearts determined that because they were familiar with him and knew his background, that He clearly was a man that shouldn't be where he is. This is one way that unbelief robs us of the truth. We see this over and over again in scripture, Jesus heals a guy and instead of rejoicing at the lame man walking or the blind man having sight, the people instead get stuck on asking how, or asking why Jesus did it on a certain day. Unbelief will set its anchor upon a question and because you do not have an answer that immediately satisfies you, you will  disregard the obvious things that are right in front of you. I have sat in so many counseling situations with men who are so stuck on a question that they miss all the glorious truths of the gospel. I have been asked: Carlos what are the Nephilim? I must know this! Are they giants or are they men? I have been asked: Carlos Why was the tree of knowledge put in the garden in the first place? Why did God allow the snake to be in the garden? And the answer that it was God’s divine plan and purpose for those things to be, doesn't satisfy them, they don't like that and so some will carry on convinced that their disregard to everything else is justified because their heart is dissatisfied with the truth. Unbelief will make you miss the entire forest because you are stuck staring at an individual tree.

The people in our text knew that Jesus had not studied under any Rabbi, Jesus had not attended any formal training and they knew that Jesus had no lengthy educational background. Jesus was a carpenter’s son, who should know carpenter things, and so the people marveled at how Jesus was doing the things that He was doing. Instead of seeing the apparent truth that Jesus could only be doing what he was doing by the power of God, their hearts rejected that answer and found more comfort in asking the question how. Their hearts were more at peace resting upon an unanswered question rather than resting upon the obvious answer. Their hearts were more at peace with an unanswered question because so long as that question remained unanswered, in their mind, nothing in their lives would have to change. You see If Jesus was who He was claiming to be, and if his teaching and miracles were proof that He was the Messiah, then immediately that would mean that these people would have to submit to Him as their Lord, but men naturally love to be their own Lord and humans prefer it to remain that way. This is the first way that unbelief shows itself in the Nazarene people. If we are honest with ourselves, we will see that unbelief still shows itself this same exact way today.

Matthew 13:55-56

Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” 

Now, I have to tell you guys, as I was preparing for this sermon, every time I got to this portion of the text, I found myself laughing. Because as we hit this series of questions, all I could think was: What does any of this have to do with anything?

A man is teaching and expounding God’s Word in marvelous and brilliant ways, unlike anything you have ever heard. This same man is known for healing people and even raising the dead, and in response these people look at each other and ask, “But wait, isn't His momma's name Mary? Doesn't this guy have four brothers and a few sisters?”

This is amazing to me! What does any of that have to do with what is happening in the synagogue? If Kevin gets up here in a few weeks and preaches a sermon that reveals truth to you that you had never known before, with all due respect, what does his mother's name have to do with the sermon? Nothing!

This passage made me think of the old story of a young boy waking up early to go fishing with his dad. He comes downstairs and sees his little sister getting ready to go with them. The boy turns to his dad and says, “But Dad, she can't go—she's a girl!”

Again, what does that have to do with anything? How does being a girl affect someone's ability to cast a line and catch a fish? It doesn't! It's an irrelevant statement designed to mask what was really in his heart. The truth is, the boy didn't want his sister to go. He wanted that time with his dad for himself. But instead of admitting his selfish motive, he pointed to something irrelevant as an excuse to get the outcome he wanted.

Church, we must see that unbelief will often show itself by building up the irrelevant. Instead of accepting the obvious truth standing before them, the unbelieving hearts of the people of Nazareth searched for anything they could set up as a barrier between themselves and the truth.

They had a picture in their minds of what they wanted their Messiah to look like, and a man from humble beginnings—the son of a carpenter, lowly, common, taking the form of a servant—wasn't the guy they were looking for. And because they knew so many personal details about Jesus, their familiarity actually supplied them with excuses to reject Him.

They knew His mother. They knew His brothers and sisters. They knew where He came from. But all of that familiarity prevented them from seeing the most important truth of all: who He really was.

Unbelief had established their hearts upon the irrelevant.

These people rested upon thoughts that were inconsequential. Excuses were given the throne in their hearts, while truth was banished from their thoughts. Unbelief made significant the insignificant.

Church, these things did not die in Nazareth. These same tactics are alive and well today. People say they avoid the Church or reject Christianity because the Church is full of hypocrites. And that may be true; there may be hypocrites in the Church. But whether there are or not has nothing to do with the ultimate question: Is Jesus Christ who He claimed to be?

Yes, His mother's name was Mary, but that had no bearing upon Christ's question: “Who do you say that I am?”

And some of you may wrestle with these very things today. Maybe you have an idea of God that Jesus simply doesn't seem to meet. Maybe you've prayed and become bitter because God didn't answer the way your heart desired. Maybe you prefer the idea of a loving and tolerant god who accepts everything about you—a god who stands ready for your prayers, waiting to serve you and give you what you want.

The thought creeps in: “God has the power to heal me, so why hasn't He? Why hasn't God done what I've asked Him to do?”

But those self-centered expectations will never be fulfilled in Scripture. Every time you read of God's redemptive plan, His disposition toward sin, and everything He has done to save sinners, you are reminded that the God of Scripture looks nothing like your personal butler.

We do not serve a weak God who conforms to us; we serve a mighty God who conforms us to Him.

To believe in God is to believe in who He has revealed Himself to be, not who we expect or desire Him to be. And Scripture gives us great warning concerning this very thing:

Romans 1:21-25

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves. Because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen 

Now, quickly look back with me to our passage in Matthew 13, because this text isn't finished yet. There is more revealed in our text about the tragedy of unbelief.

Matthew 13:57-58

And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household. And he did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief. 

This passage says that the people of Nazareth took offense at him. He preached, the power of God accompanied him, He carried light into their darkness, and then they asked: “where did this man get all these things? How is he teaching like this? How is he doing the work that he is doing? Isn't his Mother Mary? Don't we know his brothers? Isn't Jesus the son of a local carpenter? All of these questions lead these people to look upon Jesus and instead of worshipping, they saw something offensive. Their hearts were not glorifying or rejoicing, their minds were not hungering or thirsting for the truth, they instead settled their darkened hearts upon the idea that Jesus was an object of offense, something worthy of scoffing at and discarding. The work of unbelief had met its final form, these people were blind. Unbelief had blurred the obvious, it had built up the irrelevant, and now, it turned their hearts, not only away from Christ, but also against him. These people were no longer merely dismissive, they were now enraged, offended at Christ's presence. Unbelief may initially display itself in subtle dismissive ways but given time it shows its truest form in outright rebellion.

so that seeing they would not see and hearing they would not hear. The unbelieving heart is an unwilling heart. It isn't a problem of comprehension, it isn't a problem of intellect, there isn't enough proof that could undo the unbelief. The unbeliever doesn't believe because truly they don't want to believe. They reject because they love the darkness rather than the light and the light becomes an object of offense. The horrifying tragedy about Hell is that Hell is a place in which the gates are locked from the inside. Hell is the ultimate fulfillment of what you desired here on earth. You want a Christless reality? You want to set your own righteousness on the altar? You want to reject God and live outside of his grace? That is exactly what you will receive

This passage says that after the people took offense at Jesus that He did not do many more works in that town. To be clear, I believe this was another display of mercy by Christ. Jesus had previously told the people of Capernaum, in Matthew 11, that they would face harsher punishment, because if the mighty works that had been done in them were done in Sodom, that Sodom would have remained to this day. The people of Sodom would have repented and turned but because the people of Capernaum did see the great works of Christ and heard the truth most clearly proclaimed yet did not believe, they would now face a harder judgement than Sodom. Jesus walked away from Nazareth jere, discontinued his miraculous works, not because he was constrained in any way by unbelief, but instead He did so to show another measure of kindness to people that should have known him best.

Beloved, I want you to see how pervasive unbelief can be and how blinding it is. Unbelief will search desperately for an excuse, or for a reason for you to reject God as He reveals himself to be. We must understand, for the sake of the unbelieving world, that it isn't familiarity that destroys unbelief, it isn't a well articulated argument that destroys unbelief and it isn't signs and wonders that will destroy unbelief. Unbelief is only overcome by the Grace and mercy of God. 

If you are a believer today, you have much to rejoice in because it is exclusively by God’s grace and mercy that your eyes can see and that your ears can hear, because clearly in our text we see just how tragic unbelief can be, even to those who should have known Jesus the best. What sort of love is this, that any of us should ever be called the children of God, What sort of love did God display in removing the stubborn God hating, God rejecting, stony heart of this man, and giving me a new heart that desires and has affections for Him. The truth is, for us all, we would have died content in our sin, and we would have been justly condemned for our rejection of Christ. But God in his mercy met us in our need, He sent his only son to a world that never asked for Him, and never would have asked for Him.  That son then lived a sinless life, suffered every physical, emotional, and every human experience, and He did so without sinning. That same son set his face toward the cross, a punishment that He did not deserve, a punishment that we were due, and He willingly laid his life down, suffering under the just wrath of God, taking upon himself what you and I deserve, and He did so, not out of obligation, but out of love. To the ancient Jewish people who were awaiting a triumphant King, and to the world of unbelief,  the cross of Christ looks like an utter failure, but to those who have been given eyes to see and ears to hears, and to those who have their stony hearts removed, the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is the most beautiful and triumphant display of who God is and what His love looks like. If you believe, my beloved, we have so much for which to rejoice.