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Reading Matthew 12:22-29 where Jesus heals a man possessed by a demon causing the man to be blind and mute, and the Pharisees accuse Him of being of Satan. Visit wwutt.com for all our videos!
Jesus casts out demons, and the Pharisees accuse Him of being a demon Himself. But Jesus says, a house divided against itself cannot stand. The Kingdom of God will stand forever. When we understand the text.
This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study in the Word of Christ. For He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com.
Once again, it's Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. In our study of the Gospel of Matthew, we've been in chapter 12. Today I'm going to read a little bit longer section. We'll go from verses 22 to 37, which I'm reading from the Legacy Standard Bible.
Hear the word of the Lord. Then a demon-possessed man, who was blind and mute, was brought to Jesus. And he healed him, so that the mute man spoke and saw. And all the crowds were astounded and were saying, Can this man really be the son of David?
But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, This man does not cast out demons, except by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. And knowing their thoughts, he said to them, Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and any city or house divided against itself will not stand.
And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand? And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? For this reason they will be your judges.
But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can anyone enter the strongman's house and carry off his property, unless he first binds the strongman, and then he will plunder his house?
He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters. Therefore I say to you, Any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven.
And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come. Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad.
For the tree is known by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak what is good? For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart. The good man brings out of his good treasure what is good, and the evil man brings out of his evil treasure what is evil.
But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.".
So this is one long answer that Jesus gives, beginning in verse 25. And so that answer goes from 25 all the way through verse 37, which was why I chose to read that full section, but it divides up into this way.
You have the response that Jesus gives about a kingdom divided against itself. That's in verses 25 to 29. And then you have the warning about the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. That's in verses 30 to 32.
And then a heart is justified or condemned by a person's words. That's going to be in verses 33 to 37, where Jesus even calls back to something that he had mentioned in Matthew 7, in the Sermon on the Mount, something that he had preached there.
And all of this is demonstrating the person who is really for the Lord and the person who is against him. From the inside out, a person is against Christ from the inside. And then that will be manifested even on the outside.
So that's what we come to recognize from this lesson. So let's, between today and tomorrow, we should get through this full section. Let's look at the setup. In verse 22, then a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute was brought to Jesus, and Jesus healed him so that the mute man spoke and saw.
Now this is on a different day in a different setting. In the last three sections, we've considered some things regarding the Sabbath. That was at the end of chapter 11, beginning of chapter 12, the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.
And then yesterday, we considered the end of that Sabbath teaching with Jesus healing on the Sabbath. And then saying even that a man is more valuable than a sheep. So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.
The laws were not given to oppress people. Although it does say in Romans chapter 5, the law came in that the trespass would increase, but so that God's grace would increase all the more. And so that's what we see even with the way Jesus preaches about the Sabbath.
And later on in Matthew 22, he will say, this is the sum of all the law and the prophets, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.
So as you should do good on the Sabbath, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath, then you are fulfilling the law, to love your neighbor as yourself. So that was the conclusion of Sabbath teaching and seeing that it was in fulfillment of those words that were spoken in Isaiah.
That was the section we concluded with yesterday, verses 18 to 21. So remember that Jesus had gone away to heal people and the people that were brought to them, he had compassion on them. He warned them not to make him known so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah would be fulfilled.
Though he was reviled, he did not revile in return. So that ends that section, really. The chapter divisions are kind of misleading in that sense, because what we're in in verse 22 here is a whole different section.
Jesus is in a different place and it's a different teaching. It's not even on the Sabbath anymore. We finished the Sabbath teaching, here we are with a demon-possessed man being brought to Jesus. He was blind and he was mute.
So the effects of this possession caused the man to be blind, caused the man not to be able to speak. Now, we don't know if that was physically the case. Was he physically incapable of doing this or was it because of this spiritual oppression that he could not physically see or physically speak?
We don't know. The scripture doesn't tell us. But we do know that things that happen to us spiritually do affect us physically. David had prayed in Psalm 32, How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered!
How blessed is the man whose iniquity Yahweh will not take into account, and in whose spirit there is no deceit! When I kept silent about my sin, my bones wasted away, through my groaning all day long.
For day and night your hand was heavy upon me. My vitality was drained away as with the heat of summer. Selah. And I just read that just to demonstrate that there are things that affect us spiritually that will also have a physical effect on us.
Maybe that's what was happening with this young man. We don't know for sure. But this demon-possessed man, blind and mute, brought to Jesus and Jesus healed him so that the demon is cast out and there was physical healing as a result.
So that the mute man spoke and saw. Now this is picking up right where we left off with the prophecy concerning Isaiah. Behold my servant, in whom I have chosen, my beloved, in whom my soul is well pleased, I will put my spirit upon him, and he shall proclaim justice to the Gentiles.
We've heard from Isaiah previously about how when the Savior comes, the blind can see, the mute can speak, the deaf can hear. Jesus does this physically and spiritually. He opens our eyes. That we might see our sin and need for a Savior and that Christ is that Savior.
And so even what he's doing here with this demon-possessed man, we're seeing both spiritual and physical healing. That God can heal physically to show that even more in-depth, he heals spiritually. He healed him so that the mute man spoke and saw.
This would be indicative of a person who is healed of their darkness. Who is drawn out and up from the dead. That we might live unto Christ and live in righteousness. And what we speak now, these are words that are honoring of Christ.
These are words that give praise to God who has saved us because our mouth has been opened to declare them. As said in Psalm 8, God has ordained praise even upon infants. So that those things that we speak might be honoring unto the Lord.
The things that we hear, we would understand the truths that have been spoken by God. The things that we see, we see our sin and that Christ is our Savior. Now notice that we have this statement in verse 22.
And I told you this section goes from verses 22 to 37. We open with a man being healed so that he speaks. And we close with Jesus saying, by your words you will be justified. And by your words you will be condemned.
Those are the bookmarks on either end of this section. A demon-possessed man who is mute, healed spiritually and physically so that now he speaks. And then at the conclusion, the spiritual condition of a man is even manifested in what he does physically.
By your words you will be justified. By your words you will be condemned. Those are our bookends on this section, Matthew 12, 22 to 37. So let's continue on. I'm still in verse 22. We're not going to get very far.
Verse 23, and all the crowds were astounded, having witnessed this, having seen this, and they were saying, can this man really be the son of David? Now by that declaration, it doesn't appear as if they're making some sort of spiritual confession, but they are, because we know that the Savior is going to come in the line of David.
So if this man is the one that we are waiting for, perhaps he is our Messiah. He is the son of David. He's the one that's been promised from the line of David. He will assume David's throne. Now the people may have political aspirations when they say this.
In fact, I would say just about the majority did, if not everybody did, for they did not understand what Christ was going to accomplish with his death on the cross and resurrection from the grave. That had not yet happened.
This was still mysterious to them. So by those promises that they had read about in the Law and the Prophets, they expected that the successor to David's throne was going to be a political power that was going to free them from their political enemies.
In this case, that would have been the Romans at this particular time. So the people are anticipating that Jesus is going to kick Herod out. He's going to sit on David's throne, and then he's going to kick the Romans out.
That's what they're anticipating. Now that's not said here, but that's what we understand was kind of the climate or the expectation of the people at that time. Jesus' kingdom is much greater than that.
And even He says in this section, verse 28, if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. So He's declaring a greater kingdom than even whatever earthly political aspirations you might have.
So going on in verse 24, but when the Pharisees heard this, when they heard the people saying, Is this the Son of David? Is this the Messiah we have been waiting for? Look at these things that He does, these miraculous signs He performs, as Isaiah said that He would.
So the Pharisees heard it, and they said, This man does not cast out demons, except by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. So their attempt to try to explain what it is that Jesus is doing, so not to let the crowds be swayed by Him, they're saying, Oh, yeah, sure.
He casts out demons because He is a demon Himself. He is the prince of demons. He is Beelzebul, another word for Satan. Now I'm just reading the text here, and I'm interpreting the text to you. But even saying that, like I felt my skin crawl when I said that, I'm just explaining the text.
But to even put, they're accusing Jesus of being Satan. To even say that in the same sentence, it just makes me tremble. That's scary. That's some scary territory, and that's exactly what the Pharisees were treading upon, and is what leads Jesus to that warning that He gives about blasphemy of the Holy Spirit that will never be forgiven.
So we'll get to that. We'll talk more about that tomorrow even, because I probably won't get that far today. But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, verse 25, He said to them, Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and any city or house divided against itself will not stand.
So there's the statement, and then He explains it. It's a proverb. A kingdom divided against itself is laid waste. Kingdom divided against itself will not be able to stand up against its enemies. So if Satan were to be driving out Satan, then he makes himself vulnerable.
Any city or house divided against itself will not stand. How could Satan be gaining power if he's casting out Satan? And so, verse 26, if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand?
You know, in the very way that Jesus asked that question, He's asking it rhetorically, of course. But in the way that He puts this, it's as if to say, Pharisees, you're dumber than Satan. I mean, even Satan understands that he can't cast out Satan.
This is not a winnable strategy for Satan, to be telling his demons, okay, you possess this person, this person, this person, and then I'm going to come and I'm going to cast you out. What is Satan accomplishing with that, exactly?
What would be the success of Satan casting out Satan, a man who is blind and is mute by a demon, and Satan casts out that demon and he heals the man, and suddenly he can see and people are praising God because of it.
That's where they go with it. They don't praise Satan, they praise God. Verse 23, can this man really be the son of David? They're looking for the fulfillment of the prophecy that was made by God through his prophets.
This would not be a winnable strategy for Satan if he's doing things that are casting himself out and then turn people to the Lord. So if Satan casts out Satan, he's divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand?
And if I, by Beelzebul, cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? For this reason, they will be your judges. Ooh, that is a one-two punch there. So the first question, your strategy is dumber than Satan's, is his accusation there.
And then the second question, your sons will be your judges because the Pharisees were acting out of Satan, not out of God. They do not have the mind of God, they have the mind of Satan when they accuse Jesus of being Beelzebul.
So he says in verse 27, if I, by Beelzebul, cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? So who are they casting out demons by? Are you going to condemn your sons? And if that is what you're saying by this question that you ask, for this reason, they will be your judges because you actually have the demon and they're casting out demons, they're going to judge you.
So verse 28, but if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. And this goes back to the first words that Jesus declared when he began to preach in Matthew chapter four.
He said same words that John the Baptist preached, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. If the son of God is here, the son of David is here, fulfilling the prophecies that had been foretold about him, and we've been seeing over and over again throughout Matthew, how Jesus fulfills those prophecies.
If the fulfillment of that prophecy is here, the son of God, son of David, who is casting out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you and you should fear and you should tremble.
Going back to the words that Jesus first proclaimed, repent, turn back, turn to God for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And when that kingdom comes in, it will drive out all who are opposed to that kingdom.
And that's exactly what Jesus is doing by casting out demons. He is driving out the kingdom of Satan, that the kingdom of God may come in. And you have the illustration of the strong man in the next verse, verse 29.
How can anyone enter the strong man's house and carry off his property, unless he first binds the strong man, and then he will plunder his house. And this is what Jesus is saying that he is doing. What the ministry is accomplishing in Jesus' time, as he's casting out demons, as he is driving back the work of Satan, he is binding the strong man and plundering his house so that there are many who would be one out of the world, out of the fallen world, the kingdom of darkness, that realm that is coming to destruction, they would be one out of that into the realm that will last forever, the kingdom of God that is eternal.
Jesus is binding the strong man, that he may win people from the nations to the household of faith. So the strong man of the household of the devil, he's being bound. So that he could plunder, Jesus would plunder the strong man's house and bring them into the household of faith, which is the eternal kingdom, which is the church.
As we are continuing to grow and expand and members are being added to as the gospel is proclaimed and those people are coming into faith in Jesus Christ and adopted sons and daughters of God. This goes back to what we had just read about the prophecy from Isaiah, that in his name the Gentiles will hope.
Jesus is making a further declaration of that here in verse 29, the strong man is being bound so that the deceiver of the nations will not be able to deceive them any longer. And there are people from the nations that will come to faith in Jesus Christ and so be saved.
That's part one of this particular section, verses 22 to 29, with Jesus casting out demons and saying that the kingdom of God has come upon you. The strong man is being bound. People are being won out of his kingdom into the kingdom of light.
So then tomorrow we read about this warning of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and it's kind of bridging two parts, between part one, which we've just read, and then part three, which will be verses 33 to 37.
So we have this middle section, verses 30 to 32, where Jesus gives this warning about blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. I didn't want to get that too quickly today or get through that too quickly because it's a pretty controversial passage and people ask a lot of questions about it.
How do I know if I've committed blasphemy of the Holy Spirit? Well, that's what we will consider tomorrow when we come into the rest of this section, Matthew 12, 22 to 37. But let me highlight again the bookends on this.
Jesus heals a man who is demon-possessed. He is mute and he is blind. And Jesus says at the conclusion of this section, by your words you will be justified and by your words you will be condemned. Your words will demonstrate that the condition of your heart is really for Christ or for Satan.
So be no more after the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that being conformed to Christ, you may know God's good, pleasing, and perfect will. That's Romans 12, 2.
Heavenly Father, as we finish this up, as we have considered the words of Christ, I pray that we would long for that kingdom. We would seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, as Jesus said back in Matthew 6.
We would, as Paul said in Colossians 3, seek the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Help us to put away every sinful deed, those things that entangle, casting off every sin and drawing near to Christ, running with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith.
Continue to purify our hearts, in Jesus' name, Amen.
Pastor Gabe is the author of several books and Bible studies, available in paperback or for your e-reader. For titles and more information, visit our website at www .wutt .com. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in God's Word, when we understand the text.