Latest / Reformed Thinking / Quiet Mercy, Certain Victory: Jesus the Servant-Messiah (Matthew 12:15–21)

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Quiet Mercy, Certain Victory: Jesus the Servant-Messiah (Matthew 12:15–21) · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome back to Reformed Thinking.
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  It is Monday, January 26th, 2026.
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  We are opening up the files again today and I have to say
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  the stack of notes in front of me is it's pretty intimidating.
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  We are looking at the Gospel of Matthew, specifically chapter
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  12, and we have arrived at what the sources are calling a
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  narrative hinge. A hinge.
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  That's a good way to put it. Yeah, it's like if you were
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  reading a novel. This is the page where the
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  antagonist stops, you know, sending mean letters and decides
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  to go buy a gun. That's a grim but, but a very
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  accurate way to put it. We're zeroing in on Matthew 12,
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  verses 15 through 21, but you just can't make sense of those
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  verses without looking at the explosion that happens right
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  before it in verse 14. Right.
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  So the mission for this deep dive is to figure out a specific
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  paradox. We get a murder plot against
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  Jesus, a literal conspiracy, and his response is just, it's so
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  counterintuitive. He doesn't fight back, goes
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  quiet. So we need to understand why.
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  Why does the Messiah choose restraint over, say, a
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  revolution, and how does that connect back to some of these
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  ancient prophecies from Isaiah? It really is a study in 2
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  completely different kinds of authority.
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  You have the loud, crushing, performance based authority of
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  the religious establishment, and then you have the quiet, gentle,
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  restoring authority of the servant and they just collide
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  right here. OK, let's set the scene then.
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  We're in what our outline calls the context of conflict.
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  This isn't just a polite disagreement at a, you know, a
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  theology conference. Not at all.
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  The sources point out that there has been this this wave of
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  conflict just building and building through Matthew
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  chapters 11 and 12. It's been escalating.
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  It has. It's a polarization.
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  You see it in Chapter 11. Jesus offers rest to the weary.
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  Come to me, all who are heavy laden.
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  And some people take that offer, they find peace.
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  But others, and specifically the Pharisees, they just harden.
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  They don't want rest from God, they want control over people.
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  And Jesus is a direct threat to that control.
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  A massive threat. He completely bypasses their
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  entire system of what the sources call man made
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  righteousness. He offers forgiveness directly
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  from God. They see that as cutting them
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  out of the deal entirely. And the flashpoint, the thing
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  that finally just sets them off, is the Sabbath.
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  The Sabbath was, I mean, it was the third rail of Jewish life.
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  You have to understand, and the source material breaks this down
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  really well, the Sabbath was a covenant sign.
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  What does that mean? A covenant.
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  Sign It testified that God is the Creator, He rested on the
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  7th day, and that He is the Redeemer.
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  He brought them out of slavery in Egypt and gave them rest.
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  So it was supposed to be a gift. A huge gift of mercy, a
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  sanctuary in time. A day to stop scribing and
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  remember that God is in control. But the Pharisees had basically
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  built a fence around it. A very high barbed wire fence.
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  Yes, they took this beautiful gift and they twisted it into a
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  tool for accusation. Instead of a day to breathe, it
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  became a day where you were just terrified of breaking a rule you
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  didn't even know existed. And we see this play out
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  perfectly in the grain incident. This is in the first few verses
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  of chapter 12, right? The disciples are walking
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  through a field. They're hungry, so they grab
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  some heads of grain and snack on them.
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  To me, that sounds like, well, a snack.
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  Right, a handful of wheat. To the Pharisees, this is
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  harvesting and reaping and threshing.
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  And harvesting is work, therefore they are breaking the
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  Sabbath. And you have to see the mindset
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  here. Human need Hunger is treated as
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  a crime. And showing mercy is treated as
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  a compromise. Exactly.
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  The Pharisees would rather see a man go hungry than see their
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  interpretation of the rules bent even an inch.
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  Their system was more valuable than a person.
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  Jesus, of course, just pushes back hard on this.
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  He brings up King David eating the consecrated bread from the
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  temple. Which was technically unlawful,
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  but it was a matter of necessity.
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  He was saving his men's lives. Then he brings up the priests
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  who work in the temple on the Sabbath.
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  So he's saying there's a priority of laws.
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  The temple service takes precedence.
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  His point is you guys are straining out a gnat and
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  swallowing a camel. You don't understand your own
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  Bible. And he lands it with that quote
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  from Hosea. I desire mercy and not
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  sacrifice. That's the principle, that's the
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  core of it. If your version of holiness
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  makes you cruel, if it makes you unmerciful, it is not holiness,
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  it is just religious pride. And that leads us right into the
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  trap, the withered hand incident.
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  This part of the narrative is just, it's gross when you really
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  think about the calculation behind.
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  It it is calculated cruelty. They're in the synagogue.
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  They find a man with a withered, paralyzed hand.
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  Now a healing should be A cause for celebration, a miracle.
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  Right, everyone should be amazed.
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  But the Pharisees look at the suffering human being, and they
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  don't see a brother made in God's image, they see a prop.
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  A prop for entrapment. That's the exact phrase from the
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  notes. It's chilling.
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  They asked Jesus, is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?
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  They're not curious. They know His heart.
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  They know it's too big for Him to say no.
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  They are banking on His compassion being His downfall.
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  But Jesus, he flips it right back on them, doesn't he?
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  He does. He asked about the sheep in the
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  pit. If any of you has a sheep and it
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  falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and
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  lift it out? And of course they would.
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  A sheep was a valuable asset. Exactly.
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  The logic is just unassailable. If you are willing to break your
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  own strict rules for Sabbath rest to save a financial asset,
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  livestock, then why on earth would you not save a human being
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  who bears the very image of God? And then he delivers the final
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  blow. How much more is a man worth
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  than a sheep? And there's just silence.
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  He exposes their greed and their utter lack of love in one single
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  sentence. It's masterful.
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  So he heals the man, the hand is restored and this is where we
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  get to verse 14. You would think, you would hope
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  the Pharisees would say, OK, you got us.
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  That was a good point and wow, an amazing miracle.
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  But that's not what happens. Their hearts are too hard, the
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  text says. But the Pharisees went out and
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  conspired against him. How to destroy him?
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  Destroy, not debate him, not marginalized him.
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  Kill him. That's the narrative hinge.
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  That's the turning point. We have moved from public
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  criticism to a settled private conspiracy.
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  The official religious establishment has now decided
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  that Jesus of Nazareth must die. So here's where it gets really
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  interesting for our deep dive If you're a king and you find out
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  there is a plot to kill you, what do you do?
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  Well, human wisdom is pretty clear on that.
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  Right. You strike first.
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  You call the guards, you mobilize your base.
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  You get loud. You go on the offense.
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  You. Crush the opposition before they
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  can crush you. That is how the kingdoms of this
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  world operate. Power meets power, force meets
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  force. But the sources highlight this
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  counter intuitive response of Jesus and it takes us to section
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  two of our outline, the withdrawal.
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  Verse 15 says Jesus, aware of this, withdrew from there.
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  Now, we need to be very, very careful with how we interpret
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  this. The Greek verb is anechrosen,
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  OK? And a lot of people read this
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  and they think Jesus is scared. They think he's running away to
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  save his own skin, that this is a retreat.
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  Is he? Is he afraid?
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  Absolutely not. This is not fear, it is
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  prudence. The sources are clear.
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  This is prudent obedience to the Father's timeline.
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  We talk about the sovereignty of God a lot on this show.
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  This feels like a key moment for that doctrine.
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  It it's inaction, You see, men cannot set the Messiah's
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  calendar. The Pharisees wanted a showdown
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  right then and there on their terms in that synagogue.
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  But that wasn't the plan. It wasn't the Father's plan.
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  The Father had appointed a specific time and a specific
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  place for the climax of this story at Passover on a cross
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  outside Jerusalem. So Jesus withdraws to preserve
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  the path to that specific divine appointment.
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  He refuses to be maneuvered into a premature death.
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  So he leaves the area but he doesn't like go into a bunker
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  and hide. No, not at all.
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  The very next phrase in the text is many followed him and he
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  healed them all. All of them.
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  All of them. The source material calls this
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  unthrottled compassion, and I just love that phrase.
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  Even though he is deliberately removing himself from the
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  hostility of the leaders, he remains completely available and
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  accessible to the needs of the common people.
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  That's a massive contrast. The Pharisees are in a backroom
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  plotting destruction. And Jesus is out in the open,
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  multiplying restoration. So the opposition actually
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  clarifies who he is. It doesn't make him bitter or
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  hard. Not at all.
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  A lesser leader, a human leader, would probably say, you know
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  what? You people aren't worth it.
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  I'm trying to help you and your leaders want to kill me.
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  I'm done. Right, I'm out.
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  But Jesus just keeps healing. His compassion isn't dependent
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  on their reception of Him. But then he does something
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  strange again. Verse 16.
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  After healing them all, he ordered them not to make him
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  known. The command for silence, the
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  so-called messianic secret. OK, why?
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  I mean that this seems even more counterintuitive if you're the
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  Messiah. Isn't publicity the goal?
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  Don't you want a trend? Don't you want your message to
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  go viral? Not if the viral message is the
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  wrong message. The source here discusses the
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  real danger of publicity driven momentum.
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  What does that mean? You have to remember what the
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  people in that crowd wanted. They weren't looking for a
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  suffering servant who would die for their sins.
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  They couldn't even conceive of that.
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  They wanted a geopolitical superhero, right?
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  Someone to kick out the Roman? Precisely a new King David, a
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  military conqueror. If Jesus allows the crowd to
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  define him based on these spectacular healings, they will
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  try to make him a military king. They.
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  Actually try to do that later, don't they?
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  They do after the feeding of the 5000, and he withdraws again.
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  He has to, because that kind of kingship, that political
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  movement, it completely evacuates the true meaning of
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  his mission. He refuses to accept the crowd's
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  terms for who he is. The outline calls this
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  theological realism. Yes, Revelation requires the
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  right framework. You can't just have raw power
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  and excitement. You need truth.
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  If they try to crown him now as a political king, they will miss
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  the cross. And without the cross there is
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  no salvation. So he has to suppress the fame
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  to protect the mission. It's so backwards from how we
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  think. We think more publicity is
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  always better. He's playing a much longer, much
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  deeper game. And this leads Matthew, the
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  author of the Gospel, to to basically pause the story.
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  He realizes this behavior is confusing.
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  The king is withdrawing. The miracle worker is asking for
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  silence. Yeah, his Jewish readers would
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  have been scratching their heads.
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  It doesn't look like any Messiah they were expecting.
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  So Matthew quotes the Old Testament to explain it, to give
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  the divine logic behind it. This moves us into Section 3,
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  the identity of the Servant. Matthew quotes a long passage
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  from Isaiah chapter 42, and the source calls this Heaven's
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  commentary on Earth's events. I like that.
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  It's like the narrator stepping in to say, OK, here's what's
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  really going on. Verse 18 starts Behold my
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  servant whom I have chosen. Let's stop right there and look
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  at that word servant in the Greek, it's pace, pace and it
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  translates the famous Hebrew phrase ebed, Yahweh, the servant
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  of the Lord. Now for US servant can sound
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  demeaning, but that's not the idea here.
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  This means a high official, a trusted envoy, the Prime
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  Minister of the Great King. And then whom I have chosen.
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  The notes bring up a really heavy theological concept here
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  called the pactum salutis. The covenant of redemption, and
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  this is vital for our Trinitarian understanding of
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  salvation, this choice that the Father makes of the Son to be
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  the servant. This didn't happen when Jesus
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  was baptized in the Jordan. River When did it happen?
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  It happened in eternity past, before the foundation of the
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  world. In this eternal covenant, the
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  Father chose the Son to be the Mediator, the Redeemer for a
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  specific people. And the son willingly accepted
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  that role. Willingly and joyfully.
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  And the Holy Spirit agreed to apply the work of the Son to the
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  hearts of the chosen. So when the text says my chosen,
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  it's referencing that eternal inter trinitarian agreement.
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  This is not Plan B. This has always been the plan.
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  Then it continues, my beloved, with whom my soul is well
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  pleased. Again, just think about the
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  contrast on Earth in Matthew 12. The Pharisees are conspiring to
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  murder him. They hate him.
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  They are displeased with Him. But in heaven.
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  The Father is looking at his Son who is perfectly carrying out
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  this eternal plan, and he is filled with absolute delight.
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  We hear this at his baptism. We hear it at the transfusion
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  configuration. The Father's love and pleasure
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  in the Son is the fuel for the Son's mission.
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  That is so huge because it means the cross isn't Jesus trying to
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  convince an angry, reluctant Father to love us.
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  No, that's a terrible distortion.
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  The cross is the son executing the will of a father who already
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  loves his people and who loves his son.
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  They are perfectly united in the work of redemption.
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  The verse goes on. I will put my Spirit upon him.
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  Now here's a question the sources flag, and it's a big
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  one, the Christological question, right?
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  If Jesus is God, if he's the eternal Son, the second person
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  of the Trinity, why does he need the spirit?
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  Doesn't he have all the power and ability he needs in himself
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  that? Is the $1,000,000 question isn't
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  it? It seems redundant.
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  Why does he need help? This brings us to a crucial
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  doctrine called kenosis. It comes from Philippians
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  chapter 2 where it says Christ emptied himself.
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  OK, what does that mean? Emptied himself?
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  Did he stop being God? No, absolutely not.
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  He never ceased to be fully God. But what he did was he
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  voluntarily laid aside the independent use of his divine
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  attributes. He chose to live within the
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  genuine limits of a human being. So he wasn't walking around,
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  just playing a God card when everything's got difficult.
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  Exactly. He didn't just snap his fingers
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  and have perfect knowledge of every situation.
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  He learned. He grew in wisdom.
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  And when he performed his miracles, when he resisted
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  temptation, when he preached with authority, he did it not by
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  simply flexing his own innate divinity, but by relying on the
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  person and power of the Holy Spirit.
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  That makes his obedience, yeah. It makes it actually matter to
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  us. It makes him a real example.
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  It does if he just cheated, you know, if he just toggled on God
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  Mode to get through life, he couldn't be our representative,
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  he couldn't be our high priest who's is tempted in every way as
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  we are, right? But because he lived his perfect
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  life and the power of the Spirit, he shows us how we are
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  to live. The source makes a fantastic
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  application here. If the sinless Son of God needed
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  the Spirit for his life in ministry, how much more do we?
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  We can't do it on our own. It's impossible.
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  And notice what the Spirit produces in him.
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  It doesn't produce, you know, disorderly theatrics or chaos.
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  No, it produces obedient, compassionate fidelity.
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  Which leads us directly to the method of the servant in Section
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  4. So the Spirit is on him.
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  And what is the result? What does he do?
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  Verse 19. He will not quarrel or cry
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  aloud, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets.
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  Let's breakdown those 3 phrases, they're so important.
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  OK, first he will not quarrel. The Greek term is erisae.
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  It comes from the word eris, and it means strife, wrangling
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  contentious debate. It's the kind of argument where
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  the only goal is to win and to humiliate the other person.
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  We we see a lot of Eris today. It is the currency of our
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  culture. Social media, cable news,
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  political debate, it is all Eris.
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  But Jesus refuses it. He possesses the truth.
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  He is the truth, but he refuses to get dragged down into petty
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  wrangling or ego driven debates that are just about about
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  scoring points. He argues, but he doesn't
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  quarrel. That's a great way to put it.
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  He presents truth, he asks penetrating questions, but he's
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  not in it for the fight itself. OK, second phrase, he won't cry
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  aloud. The word is kravgasse.
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  It's a very strong word. It can refer to a guttural
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  scream, a barking, the shouting of an angry mob.
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  So he's not a shouter. He's not trying to win by being
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  the loudest person in the room. His authority doesn't come from
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  his volume. And then the third part.
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  Nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets.
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  The streets here is the Greek word platia.
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  It means the broad streets, the public squares.
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  This was the theater of public opinion.
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  It's where the demagogues and the revolutionaries would stand
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  on their soapboxes to whip up the crowd and start a riot.
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  So Jesus is not a rabble rouser. He's not a political agitator.
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  He refuses the method of spectacle, he refuses noise as
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  the way to advance his Kingdom. His Kingdom is not of this
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  world, so he doesn't use this world's methods of power
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  grabbing. The source makes a really
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  stinging application here for the modern church.
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  It says we shouldn't rely on marketing tactics or viral
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  stunts or outrage driven engagement.
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  That hits close to home, doesn't it?
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  It is so tempting to think that to save the world, we have to
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  copy the world's methods. We think we need to be louder,
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  flashier, more outrageous to get noticed.
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  We. Think we need to out shout the
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  culture? But Isaiah tells us, and Matthew
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  confirms, the Kingdom does not advance by volume.
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  It doesn't advance by fighting fire with fire.
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  It advances by the Spirit. By the quiet, steady, consistent
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  power of truth and mercy. Which brings us to the heart of
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  this passage, Section 5. For me, this is the most
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  beautiful and comforting part of the text.
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  Verse 20 describes the kind of people Jesus came for.
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  A bruised Reed he will not break and a smoldering Wick he will
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  not quench. Let's just sit with these
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  metaphors for a minute. First, the bruised Reed.
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  What are we looking at here? What is this image?
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  The Greek is Calamos sintetrimenon.
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  A Reed was a common plant that grew in marshes.
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  It was hollow, so it was naturally fragile.
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  Kids would make little flutes out of them.
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  Shepherds would use them as simple walking sticks.
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  But they broke easily. Very easily they would crack or
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  bruise or get crushed. And once a Reed is bruised or
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  cracked, it's useless. You can't make music with it.
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  No, it just wheezes. You can't lean on it for
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  support. It just collapses.
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  If you're a gardener or a farmer, you don't try to fix it.
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  You just snap it off and throw it in the fire.
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  It's. Trash.
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  So who is the bruised Reed, theologically speaking?
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  It is the person whose conscience is tormented, the
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  person who has been crushed by the demands of the law.
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  It's someone who feels shattered by life or by their own repeated
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  sin. They feel structurally useless
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  to God and to everyone else. They feel like they should just
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  be thrown. And the text says Jesus will not
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  break it. And this is a figure of speech
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  called litotes. It's a beautiful device.
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  It affirms a strong positive by denying the negative.
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  When it says he won't break it, what it really means is he will
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  do the opposite. He will gently bind it up.
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  He will splint it. He will handle it with care and
• 18:20
  restore it so it can make music again.
• 18:22
  That is the complete polar opposite of the Pharisee.
• 18:25
  The Pharisees are like heavy boots.
• 18:26
  They see a bruised Reed and they step on it.
• 18:28
  They snap the weak with impossible burdens and
• 18:30
  accusations. Jesus says if you are broken,
• 18:33
  you are safe with me. Then we get the second image,
• 18:36
  the smoldering Wick. The Greek is linen tithomanon.
• 18:40
  Yeah, picture an ancient oil lamp.
• 18:43
  It's just a simple clay dish with a flax Wick floating in
• 18:46
  some olive oil. As long as there is oil, it
• 18:48
  gives light. But when the oil runs low, the
• 18:51
  flame dies down, the Wick gets charred and it starts to smoke.
• 18:55
  And that smoke is awful. It's not a pleasant smell.
• 18:58
  No, it's acrid. It stings your eyes.
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  It fills the room with a bad smell.
• 19:01
  A smoldering Wick gives no light, only stink and
• 19:04
  irritation. So who does this represent?
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  This is the believer with weak faith, the one who is in a state
• 19:11
  of spiritual decline. Their prayer life is
• 19:13
  inconsistent. It's sputtering.
• 19:15
  Their witness to others is smoky.
• 19:19
  It's not clear. It might even be a bit
• 19:20
  offensive. They're messy.
• 19:21
  Frankly, they can be annoying to other stronger Christians
• 19:24
  because they just can't seem to get their act together.
• 19:27
  And the natural human impulse is to quench it.
• 19:29
  Put it. Just snuff it out.
• 19:31
  It's making the room smell bad. Get rid of the problem.
• 19:33
  He will not quench it again. That latotes.
• 19:36
  He does the opposite. He doesn't snuff it out.
• 19:39
  He gently tends the lamp. He comes and he pours in the
• 19:42
  fresh oil of his spirit. He carefully trims away the
• 19:45
  charred, burnt out parts with the truth of his word.
• 19:48
  He fans it back into a bright clean.
• 19:51
  Flame. This right here feels like the
• 19:54
  absolute core of the distinction between law and gospel.
• 19:57
  It is the heart of reform mythology.
• 20:00
  The law, when applied wrongly, like the Pharisees did, comes to
• 20:03
  the bruised Reed and the smoldering Wick and says you are
• 20:06
  broken, you are smoky, you are useless, be discarded.
• 20:10
  But the gospel. The gospel comes and says, the
• 20:12
  servant was bruised for you on the cross, so that you might be
• 20:15
  mended. The servant entered the darkness
• 20:18
  and the smoke for you so that you could be fan into flame.
• 20:21
  It changes everything about how you relate to God.
• 20:23
  He isn't standing over you looking for a reason to fire
• 20:25
  you. No, he's the great physician.
• 20:27
  He's bending over you looking for a way to restore you.
• 20:30
  He doesn't turn away patients because they're sick.
• 20:32
  That's the whole reason they come to him.
• 20:34
  However, and we have to maintain the theological balance here,
• 20:38
  Section 6 of the outline reminds us that this gentleness isn't
• 20:41
  the whole story forever. There's a goal, there's a
• 20:44
  direction to this gentleness. Right.
• 20:46
  The end of verse 20 is crucial. He does all this tender work
• 20:49
  until he brings justice to victory.
• 20:51
  That word until. It signals perseverance, but it
• 20:55
  also signals a limit. The gentleness is the method for
• 20:58
  now, but it's not moral passivity.
• 21:01
  It's not indifference to sin or injustice.
• 21:04
  The goal, the end game, is crisis, which brings justice,
• 21:08
  judgement, the final rectification of all things, the
• 21:10
  setting right of the entire cosmos.
• 21:12
  So the Kingdom arrives in meekness with this quiet
• 21:15
  servant. But it is consummated in
• 21:17
  triumph. That is the great paradox.
• 21:19
  The victory is achieved through the cross by the Servant
• 21:21
  absorbing the blow of Justice himself rather than by wielding
• 21:25
  a sword. But make no mistake that justice
• 21:27
  will be brought to victory in the end.
• 21:29
  And the scope of this victory is not just for Israel, 1st 21
• 21:33
  says. And in his name, the Gentiles
• 21:34
  will hope. The F new the nations, everyone
• 21:38
  who isn't a Jew. The source needs the
• 21:41
  dispensational aspect. Here Israel's leaders, the
• 21:44
  Pharisees, are rejecting their king.
• 21:46
  So the focus of the story begins to widen dramatically.
• 21:49
  This is the beginning of the times of the Gentiles.
• 21:51
  In a sense, yes. And Matthew wants his Jewish
• 21:54
  readers to know this wasn't a Plan B.
• 21:56
  This connects all the way back to the Abrahamic covenant.
• 21:59
  In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
• 22:02
  It was always the plan for the servants work to be global.
• 22:05
  And it says they will hope in his name.
• 22:08
  That's so specific. Our hope is not in a concept,
• 22:11
  it's not in a social program, it's not in Western civilization
• 22:14
  or any political ideology. Our hope is in the person and
• 22:17
  the finished work and the authority of Christ the servant
• 22:20
  King. And we are literally seeing this
• 22:21
  happen in real time, aren't we? The massive shift of global
• 22:24
  Christianity to the global S to Africa, to Asia, to Latin
• 22:28
  America. This is the fulfillment of this
• 22:30
  verse. It absolutely is.
• 22:32
  The Gentile are hoping in his name.
• 22:34
  The Pharisees are long gone, the Roman Empire is in ruins.
• 22:38
  But the name of this quiet servant is being sung today in
• 22:41
  thousands of languages all over the globe.
• 22:43
  So we've covered the history of the theology of the prophecy.
• 22:46
  Let's try to land this plane. Section 7.
• 22:48
  Contemporary implications. What does this mean for us on a
• 22:51
  Monday morning in 2026? Well, the sources identify a few
• 22:55
  key groups this speaks to. 1st for office bearers and leaders
• 22:59
  in the church. Pastors.
• 23:01
  Elders. The shepherds, yes.
• 23:02
  And the temptation for any leader, in any field really, is
• 23:06
  to adopt pharisaic methods to bully, to use a loud voice, to
• 23:10
  crush spirits in order to get things done it.
• 23:13
  Works, doesn't it? In the short term, fear is a
• 23:15
  pretty great motivator. It is temporarily, but it
• 23:17
  destroys the flock. This text warns us.
• 23:20
  True Christ, like authority, is found in a gentleness that
• 23:23
  restores. We have to learn to distinguish
• 23:25
  between righteously contending for the faith and just selfishly
• 23:29
  quarreling for our own ego. What about for families?
• 23:32
  For parents. Oh, this hit me hard reading the
• 23:34
  notes. We deal with bruised reeds in
• 23:36
  our own homes constantly. Our children.
• 23:39
  They struggle with sin, with foolishness, with big
• 23:41
  overwhelming emotions. When they're acting like
• 23:43
  smoldering Wicks, stinking up the house with bad attitudes and
• 23:47
  disobedience, what do we do? Is our first impulse to snap
• 23:50
  them, to crush them with harsh words or impossible standards?
• 23:55
  The text calls us to something different.
• 23:57
  We have to discipline. Yes, the servant brings justice
• 24:00
  to victory, but the goal of our discipline must always be
• 24:03
  restoration, not just punishment.
• 24:05
  We cannot be the Pharisees to our own kids.
• 24:08
  And finally, for the bruised believer who might be listening
• 24:10
  right now, the one who feels like they're hanging on by a
• 24:14
  thread, like they're totally useless to God.
• 24:17
  For them, this passage is pure comfort, absolute comfort.
• 24:20
  Christ does not despise your weakness.
• 24:22
  It is the very reason He came. He is not disgusted by your
• 24:25
  smoke. He is not going to snuff you
• 24:27
  out. You and your weakness are safe
• 24:29
  in His gentle hands. But there is a warning in here
• 24:32
  as well for the unbeliever. Yes, because of that crucial
• 24:36
  word. Until he is gentle and patient,
• 24:40
  until he brings justice to victory, there is a deadline.
• 24:44
  The day of the gentle tending of the smoldering Wick does not
• 24:47
  last forever. There's a coming day when the
• 24:49
  gentleness gives way to final judgement.
• 24:51
  So the invitation is to trust in his name now.
• 24:54
  While it is still the day of salvation to run to the gentle
• 24:57
  servant before he returns as the conquering king.
• 25:00
  As we wrap up, I just want to summarize this central paradox
• 25:02
  one more time. We have this quiet, tender mercy
• 25:06
  now, but we have certain total victory ahead.
• 25:10
  The world measures success by noise, by power, by crushing the
• 25:13
  opposition. God advances His Kingdom through
• 25:16
  the obedient compassion of a servant who dies in order to
• 25:19
  live. And I want to leave you with one
• 25:21
  final provocative thought that comes in the notes.
• 25:24
  It mentions the practice of table fencing.
• 25:26
  Yes, in our Reformed tradition, before we take the Lord's
• 25:29
  Supper, the minister often fences the table.
• 25:31
  He warns the unrepentant and unbelieving not to partake for
• 25:34
  their own good. And it can sound very severe,
• 25:37
  very harsh. Like you have to be perfect to
• 25:39
  come to the table. Exactly.
• 25:40
  But the source reflects on this beautifully.
• 25:43
  It says the Lord's Supper is for the weak.
• 25:46
  It is specifically not for the self-sufficient.
• 25:49
  If you're a Pharisee, if you think you have it all together
• 25:51
  and don't need a doctor, then the table actually isn't for
• 25:54
  you. But if you know you are a
• 25:56
  bruised Reed, if you feel the weight of your sin and your
• 26:00
  weakness, if you know you're a smoldering Wick who needs the
• 26:03
  fresh oil of the Spirit, that is exactly who the servant invites
• 26:07
  to his table. The bread and the wine are for
• 26:10
  broken people who know they need to be made whole.
• 26:12
  That's a wonderful place to end. The servant meets us right there
• 26:15
  in our brokenness. Thank you for joining us on this
• 26:18
  deep dive into Matthew 12. It has been a real pleasure.
• 26:22
  We'll see you next time on reformed thinking.