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The Tragedy of Familiarity: Unbelief and Judicial Hardening (Matthew 13:53–58) · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome back to the show. We're calling this session
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  Reformed Thinking. I am really glad you're here
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  with us, the learner, today. I have to be honest with you,
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  looking at the stack of research we have on the desk, this one
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  feels different. It does, yeah.
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  Usually we're unpacking a complex historical event or, you
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  know, maybe a system of thought. But today, today it feels like
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  we're looking in a mirror. And it is not a flattering
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  reflection. Not at all.
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  It really isn't. It's uncomfortable, and frankly,
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  it should be. We're diving into a concept that
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  is arguably one of the most dangerous paradoxes in human
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  psychology and, well, specifically in theology.
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  The actual topic is what the researchers in our source
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  material call the tragedy of familiarity.
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  Right. And just to set the stage, we're
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  pulling from two really dense, heavy hitting theological
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  articles along with a very close reading of Matthew Chapter 13,
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  specifically the end of the chapter.
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  OK? And the central tension in all
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  these documents is what you might call the near miss.
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  The near miss? That's the core idea.
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  It's the concept that you could be geographically,
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  intellectually and physically close to the source of life and
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  still be dead. Which is that's terrifying,
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  because usually we think the people in danger are the ones
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  far away. Sure, you know the atheists, the
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  people who've never heard the name of Jesus, the people living
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  in a completely secular bubble. But these sources are arguing
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  the opposite. They are.
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  They argue that there is a unique, specific danger to
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  standing right next to the fire. You don't burn, You calcify.
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  You harden. So our mission today is to
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  unpack that mechanism. How does familiarity act as an
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  anesthetic? How does knowing the routine
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  actually stop you from knowing the King?
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  Because we're looking at a story where people saw Jesus face to
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  face and essentially shrugged. It's worse than a shrug.
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  It is a judicial hardening. That's a term we need to get
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  comfortable with today. OK, We need to understand the
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  concept of judicial hardening, where truth that is rejected
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  actually calluses the heart. It makes it harder to hear the
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  next time. I think this is going to be a
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  rough one for the professional Christian.
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  You know the type I mean, The person who's been in the Pew for
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  30 years knows the catechisms, knows when to stand and when to
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  sit. That is precisely who this
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  warning is for. It is not for the outsider.
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  It's for the insider. It's for the insider, It is for
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  the learner who thinks they've already graduated.
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  Well, let's open the text. We're in Matthew 13 and we have
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  to start with verse 53. It says when Jesus had finished
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  these parables, He went away from there.
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  Now if I'm reading this casually, that just sounds like
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  a scene transition, of course, like in a movie script.
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  Script fade to black scene to. It's easy to read it that way,
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  sure, but the commentators point out that Matthew is being
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  incredibly deliberate here. This is what scholars call a
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  seam marker A. Seamy marker.
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  It's a contextual hinge. You cannot understand what
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  happens next to Nazareth if you don't look at the luggage Jesus
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  is carrying with him from the first half of the chapter.
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  You mean the parables? The parables.
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  Think about what he just spent the last, say, few hours
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  teaching. The parable of the sower, The
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  weeds, the net. Right.
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  The sower is the big one. Seeds falling on paths, on rocky
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  ground, among thorns, all that. And what's the core theme of the
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  sower? It's not about the quality of
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  the seed. The seed is perfect.
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  It's about the soil. It's about the reception.
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  It's about the soil. Jesus spends the first half of
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  the chapter explaining, theoretically why some people
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  reject the Kingdom and why others bear fruit.
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  He gives the theology of rejection.
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  OK, so he lays out the theory. He explains that there are
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  different types of hearts. Some are hard, like a path, some
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  are shallow, like rocky ground. It's a diagnostic.
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  It's a total diagnostic. And then immediately, verse 54,
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  Matthew gives us Exhibit A. So he moves from instruction to
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  illustration. That's it.
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  That's the key. Oh, I see where you're going.
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  Nazareth isn't just a stop on the tour.
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  No, Nazareth is the living, breathing embodiment of the bad
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  soil. Wow.
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  Jesus explains that the how in the parables, and then Nazareth
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  demonstrates the what in real time.
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  It's a deliberate juxtaposition. It couldn't be more intentional.
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  So the placement of the story is an accidental.
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  It's not just. And then this happened.
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  Not at all. It's proving the point he just
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  made. OK, the theological implication
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  is that the word does not just inform us, it divides.
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  It acts like a fan that separates wheat from chaff.
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  And notice the setting. I mean, this is critical.
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  Where does this rejection happen?
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  It says he taught them in their synagogue, right?
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  This is not a Pagan street corner.
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  This is an Athens where Paul's debating philosophers who have
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  never seen a Bible. No, this is their homecourt.
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  It's the center of covenant life.
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  Yeah, this is where the Scriptures were read every
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  Sabbath. These are the insiders.
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  That makes it tragic. Makes it terrifying.
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  The rejection comes from the very people who should have been
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  most ready to receive the Messiah.
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  They had all the background. They had the scroll of Isaiah,
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  they had the Torah, they had the history, they had everything
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  except a receptive heart. So Jesus walks into the
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  synagogue, he starts teaching, and verse 54 says the people
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  were astonished. Now I have to be honest in my
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  circles, if the congregation is astonished, we think the pastor
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  did a great job. Oh, absolutely.
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  We think the Spirit is moving. We treat astonishment as a
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  positive metric. That is a very common
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  misconception in modern evangelicalism.
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  We often mistake an emotional or intellectual reaction for a
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  spiritual one. So what's happening here?
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  Well, let's look at the Greek word used there it is Ek plus
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  on. Ek plus on my.
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  That sounds intense. It is intense.
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  It comes from Ek meaning out of and plus on meaning to strike.
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  So struck out of. Literally, it means to be struck
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  out of one's senses. In the vernacular, we might say
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  their minds were blown. OK, it suggests a violent mental
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  impact. Imagine watching a car crash.
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  You're astonished. You're struck, but you're not
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  necessarily pleased. You're not changed in a good
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  way. So it's a shock to the system,
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  not necessarily a pleasant. One, it's a paralysis.
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  The mind admits the phenomenon. We see the power, we hear the
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  wisdom, but the heart is not submitting.
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  It is a form of intellectual stupor.
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  Intellectual stupor. That's a fascinating phrase.
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  Break that down for me it. Means they were paralyzed by the
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  spectacle but unmoved by the truth.
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  So they're stunned. They're stunned.
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  They admitted the facts, but they hated the implication of
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  those facts. They were dazzled, but they were
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  not converted. And that's a danger for us.
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  I think it's a huge danger for us.
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  We could listen to a podcast like this or hear a sermon and
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  say, wow, that was deep. We feel struck.
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  But did we repent or? Were we just entertained?
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  Or were we just entertained by the intellectual weight of it?
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  That's the question. That hits home.
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  We confuse enjoying the analysis with submitting to the king.
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  Precisely. And you can see that disconnect
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  in the questions they ask. They're astonished.
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  And then immediately they ask, where did this man get this
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  wisdom in these mighty works? Look at what they're admitting
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  in that question, though. Yes, they admit two things.
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  First, they admit wisdom. They recognize that his teaching
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  is penetrating and authoritative.
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  It's not like the scribes who just quoted other rabbis.
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  Right, he wasn't just recycling material.
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  No, Jesus spoke with inherent authority.
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  They heard it. And they admit the mighty works.
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  Yes, the Greek is dunamis, palpable miracles.
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  This is the external call of the gospel.
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  They aren't denying the supernatural power.
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  They aren't saying, oh, he's faking it.
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  No, the reality of it is not in question for them.
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  They see it. So they have the evidence, they
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  have the wisdom and the works right in front of them.
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  But look at the question again. They asked where?
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  Where did this man get this? Why does that matter?
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  Why is where the wrong question? Think about it, if you see
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  someone raise the dead, or heal the sick, or speak with words
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  that Pierce your soul, the logical question is who are you?
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  Or how can I know this God? Right.
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  They should have asked is this the Messiah, or what must we do
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  to be saved? Instead, they're obsessed with
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  the source because they're offended by the vessel.
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  They are suspicious, deeply. They're acting as judges.
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  They're standing over the word rather than sitting under.
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  It that's a great way of putting it.
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  By asking where they were implying that there's a
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  discrepancy. We know where he comes from,
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  Nazareth, so this power cannot be from God.
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  Therefore it must be from somewhere else.
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  It's the seed of the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, isn't it?
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  Attributing God's work to a sinister origin.
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  It's right there because if they can find a flaw in the source,
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  they don't have to obey the teaching.
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  It's a defense mechanism. Completely.
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  If I can critique the preacher or the style or the background,
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  I don't have to change my life. And that leads us right into the
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  next section, verses 55 and 56. This is where the astonishment
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  curdles into skepticism. It does.
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  They start listing his resume. Is not this the carpenter's son?
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  Is not his mother called Mary? This is the mechanics of
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  contempt. This is how it works.
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  They are weaponizing familiarity.
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  It feels like they're trying to make him small.
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  They're trying to put him in a box they can control.
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  They're engaging in reductionism.
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  That's the philosophical term for it.
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  First, they reduce him to his social class.
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  Is not this the carpenter's son? The Greek word is tectum.
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  It means a builder, a Craftsman. It could be wood, it could be
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  stone. So a general laborer.
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  It's honorable work, but it's manual labor.
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  It's the working class. It is not the elite.
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  They wanted a king and they got a contractor.
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  They wanted political splendor, They wanted elite credentials,
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  They wanted someone from the rabbinical schools of Jerusalem
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  with, you know, long list of degrees.
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  And instead they got a guy with calloused hands from the
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  neighbor. This guy who probably fixed
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  their neighbour's roof and that was a problem for them.
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  And then they bring up the family is not his mother called
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  Mary? And they list the brothers
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  James, Joseph, Simon, Judas. Why list the names?
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  Why is that so specific? To emphasize his commonness, his
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  ordinariness. We know these guys.
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  We know Jays, we know Simon. They were just regular guys.
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  They buy bread at the market, they walk the same streets.
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  The logic of the crowd is this. We know his origins, therefore
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  there is no mystery. We know his family, therefore he
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  cannot be God. We know him.
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  That is the trap. It is the we know trap.
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  They assume that because they possess information about Jesus,
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  his history, his biology, his siblings, that they actually
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  know him and they don't. They don't have a clue.
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  And this connects to a huge theological concept, doesn't it?
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  The incarnation. The scandal of the Incarnation.
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  Theologically, we talk about the hypostatic union, that is, the
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  doctrine that Jesus is true God and true man. 100% both. 100%
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  both in one person. Nazareth stumbled over the true
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  man part. They couldn't accept that the
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  infinite could be contained in the finite it.
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  Reminds me of that verse in Isaiah.
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  Isaiah 53.2. He had no form or majesty that
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  we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire
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  him. That's it right there.
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  God hid his glory in a vessel that looked completely ordinary
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  and that is offensive to human pride.
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  Why is it offensive? You would think we would love a
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  relatable God. We always talk about wanting a
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  God who understands us. We say we want a relatable God,
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  but we really want a God who reflects our own ideas of glory.
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  OK, We want a God who is impressive by worldly standards,
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  so that believing in him makes us feel impressive.
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  But a Carpenter? A guy from a backwater town.
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  It requires humility. To worship Him requires
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  humility. It requires admitting that God's
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  values are different from our values.
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  It requires bowing down to someone who looks like he should
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  be serving you. And they were not willing to do
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  that, no. And this mirrors the doctrine of
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  total depravity. The human heart uses facts to
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  suppress the truth. How so?
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  They use the fact of his humanity to deny the fact of his
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  divinity. They use the truth to tell a
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  lie. He is a man, so he cannot be
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  God. It's a perversion of logic
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  driven by a rebellious heart. That brings us to the climax of
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  the scene in verse 57. And they took offense at him.
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  That phrase took offense is crucial.
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  The Greek word is scandalizu. Where we get the word scandal?
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  Yes, but in the biblical sense it's much more specific.
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  A scandal on referred to the trigger stick of a trap.
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  Oh wow. You know like a box trap where
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  you put bait on a stick. When the animal touches the
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  stick, the trap snap shut. So they were trapped by their
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  own expectations. They were.
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  Tripped up. They stumbled.
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  It's not just that they were annoyed.
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  It's not just that they disagreed.
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  They felt a moral revulsion. A moral revulsion they were.
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  Vandalized by his claim to authority.
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  To them, it was almost blasphemous that this nobody,
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  this Carpenter, was acting like God.
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  It's like they were insulted that he would dare to teach
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  them. Who does he think he is?
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  We saw him grow up. We saw him playing in the
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  street. Exactly.
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  They're stumbling over the stone that God laid in Zion, the very
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  thing that should have saved them.
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  God coming near, became the rock that crushed them.
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  And Jesus has a response to this.
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  He doesn't just, you know, walk away silently.
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  He quotes a proverb. He does.
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  A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and in
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  his own household. He's identifying with the
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  prophets. Jesus is identifying himself
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  with the long prophetic line. If you look at the Old
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  Testament, Israel constantly rejected the messengers God
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  sent. Jeremiah comes to mind.
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  Jeremiah was persecuted by his own people.
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  Jesus is saying this is what you always do, You kill the
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  prophets. He's putting their reaction into
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  its proper historical and theological context.
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  But there is a specific sting to the hometown part.
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  It's the irony of the covenant. The people most responsible for
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  receiving the messenger, the household, the hometown, the
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  chosen people are the most hostile.
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  You'd expect the Gentiles or the Romans to reject him.
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  You expect the Romans to reject him.
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  You do not expect his neighbors to reject him.
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  That's the deep sadness of it. So just to be clear, it's not
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  that they lacked evidence. We established that they saw the
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  denim as the mighty works. No, they did not stumble over a
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  lack of evidence. They stumble over the form of
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  God's salvation. The packaging.
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  The packaging They refused to be ruled by one of their own peers.
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  They could not submit to a God who looked like a neighbor.
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  And I think we have to pause and ask ourselves, do we do this?
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  How so? Well, do we reject God's word
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  when it comes in a package we don't respect?
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  Oh, absolutely. Yeah.
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  Maybe it's a pastor who isn't eloquent.
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  Maybe his style isn't what we. Like or maybe it's a fellow
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  church member who rebukes us, but we think I know your sins.
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  Who are you to tell me what to do?
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  Right, we use the vessel to invalidate the message.
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  It's the Nazareth trap all over again.
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  That is a convicting thought. We judge the messenger to avoid
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  the message. And this leads to the
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  consequence. And this is where the theology
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  gets really deep and honestly a bit frightening.
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  Verse 58. And he did not do many mighty
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  works there. Stop there, he did not do and
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  then the reason? Is in their unbelief.
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  OK, we need to unpack this carefully.
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  Because of their unbelief. Does that mean Jesus's power is
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  fueled by our faith? Like if we don't believe he runs
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  out of gas. That's how it's often preached.
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  I've heard people say you have to activate God's power with
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  your faith. Like he's a battery and we are
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  the switch. That is the Armenian view, or
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  even a Word of Faith you that God is handcuffed by human free
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  will, That God is sitting there wishing he can do miracles, but
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  he can't because the people are blocking him.
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  But that is not what the reformed understanding of the
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  text implies. Not at all.
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  We have to be clear, it is not that Jesus could not as in he
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  lacked the ability or raw power. The Son of God doesn't lack
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  ability, is that he would not. This is a judicial restraint.
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  Judicial restraint. Break that down.
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  God is a righteous judge. The Westminster Confession
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  speaks to this. When people persistently reject
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  the light, God punishes that rejection by withholding further
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  light. So it's an act of judgement.
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  He gives them over to the darkness they love.
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  His withdrawal is the judgement. So by not doing miracles, he's
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  actually judging them for their unbelief.
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  Yes. Think about it.
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  Miracles, somaya or signs. They aren't just magic tricks.
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  They aren't for entertainment. They point to something.
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  They authenticate the message. They are the King's seal on his
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  own word. If a people have decisively
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  rejected the King, why would he continue to stamp his seal on
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  the decree? If the message is rejected, the
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  signs are withdrawn. Precisely to continue performing
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  miracles for people who have already taken offence would only
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  increase their condemnation. It would make them more guilty.
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  It would be casting pearls before swine.
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  It would be heaping up judgement upon them.
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  So in a strange way, his withholding of miracles is also
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  an act of mercy, preventing them from incurring even greater
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  guilt. Wow, this really refutes that
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  idea of pragmatism we see in the church today.
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  How so? You know, the secret sensitive
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  model, the idea that if we just put on a big enough show, if the
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  music is cool enough, if the miracles are flashy enough, then
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  the skeptics will believe Nazareth proves that model is
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  dead wrong. Jesus refuses to market himself.
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  He does not say, oh, you guys are skeptical.
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  Watch this. I'm going to float in the air.
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  I'm going to turn the synagogue into gold.
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  He doesn't double down on the spectacle.
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  He does not try to win them over with a spectacle.
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  He doesn't try to win them over at all.
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  He leaves. He leaves.
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  Hardened hearts can watch miracles and still hate the
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  king. That's a sobering thought.
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  Pharaoh saw the Red Sea part and still chased Israel.
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  The Pharisee saw Lazarus race from the dead and plotted to
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  kill Jesus. Signs do not create faith in a
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  dead heart, only the Spirit does that through the Word.
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  So when Jesus stops doing mighty works, it's the sovereignty of
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  no. That is a great way to put it,
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  the sovereignty of no. We love the sovereignty of yes
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  when God answers prayers and heals the sick.
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  But God is equally sovereign when he says no, when he
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  withdraws his hand. And that withdrawal is a
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  terrifying judgement. This brings us to the So what?
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  We've analyzed the text, We see the tragedy of Nazareth, but you
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  know, we're not in 1st century Nazareth.
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  We're here. But are we not?
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  The geography is different, but the spiritual condition it can
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  be the same. So we need to talk about this
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  near miss. We need to talk about the near
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  miss in the context of the modern church.
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  The near miss? It is the terrifying reality
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  that one can be at the gate of heaven, sitting in a solid
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  church, listening to a biblical podcast, owning 10 Bibles and
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  refused to enter. This warning is not for the
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  atheist. No, the atheist is not listening
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  to Reformed thinking. This is for the religious
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  insider, the professional Christian.
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  Let's paint a picture of the professional Christian.
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  Who is this person? It's the person who has learned
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  to function within the culture of Christianity without the life
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  of Christ. The motions are all there.
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  All the motions. It's the covenant child who grew
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  up in the church. They know the facts.
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  They know Jesus's brothers and sisters, metaphorically
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  speaking. They could pass the.
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  Test. They could ace the theology
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  exam. They know the doctrines of
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  justification and sanctification.
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  They know the order of service. They know when to raise their
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  hands and when to say Amen. But they are bored.
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  That is the symptom. Boredom.
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  They treat the sermon as a performance to critique rather
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  than a summons to obey. They sit there thinking, I've
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  heard this before, I know where the pastor's going with this
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  point. The illustration was a bit weak.
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  The Greek exegesis was sloppy. That is the Is not this the
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  carpenter's son of our day? Exactly.
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  Is not this just another sermon? Is not this just bread and wine?
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  Is not this just the same old liturgy?
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  You're just categorizing everything.
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  It's using doctrinal knowledge as a shield against spiritual
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  vitality. You use what you know to protect
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  yourself from being changed. You categorize the truth so you
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  don't have to feel the truth. I think we've all been there.
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  You sit in church and you are grading the sermon rather than
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  letting the sermon grade you. And that is the danger of
• 20:01
  familiarity. The gospel becomes common, and
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  when it becomes common, we treat it with contempt.
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  Maybe not overt contempt, but the contempt of indifference.
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  We lose the fear and trembling. So if I'm listening to this and
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  I feel a twinge of conviction, if I realize I've become a
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  critic rather than a worshipper, what is the antidote?
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  How do we move from this dangerous familiarity back to a
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  real relationship? We need to move from
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  echelosomae, from that intellectual astonishment to
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  metanoia, to repentance. Repentance, the antidote to
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  familiarity, is adoration. We have to recognize that the
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  Carpenter is the king of glory. We have to stop analyzing the
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  vessel and start submitting to the authority.
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  We have to recover the wonder of the Incarnation.
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  We have to stop asking where did he get this and start asking,
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  Lord, what do you want me to do? Yes.
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  We have to pray for God to give us fresh eyes.
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  We have to warn against quenching the Spirit through
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  indifference because the text warns us if we persist in this
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  indifference, God may withhold His mighty works from our lives.
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  That connects back to the judicial hardening.
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  It does. Have you ever wondered why your
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  spiritual life feels barren? Why you don't sense the presence
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  of God? Why you don't see prayers
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  answered? Why victory over sin seems
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  impossible? That's a hard question, but a
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  necessary one. It's possible, and I say this
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  was trembling, that it's because of your unbelief.
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  Not a lack of knowledge. Not a lack of knowledge, a lack
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  of receptive faith. It's possible that God is
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  withholding the sense of his presence because you have been
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  treating him with contempt. You have been treating him as
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  common and the sovereignty of NO is active in your life.
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  That is heavy, but it's necessary.
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  We need to check our hearts. Are we good soil, or are we the
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  hard path of Nazareth? And we need to ask God to break
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  up the fallow ground, to give us eyes to see the glory in the
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  ordinary, to see that the man on the cross is the God of the
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  universe, to be astonished in the right way.
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  You know, as we wrap this up, I'm thinking about the silence
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  of God. We often complain that God is
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  silent. We do, We say, God, show me a
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  sign. Prove yourself.
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  If you do something big, I'll follow you with more passion.
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  We demand our own dunamis. But based on this text.
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  Based on this text, if the listener feels God is distant or
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  silent, is it possible they're standing in Asworth?
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  Is it possible that the silence is not God's absence, but God's
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  judgement? Is it possible he has spoken
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  clearly in His Word and we ignored it so He has stopped
• 22:30
  speaking to our hearts? That is a provocative thought to
• 22:33
  leave on. We need to stop asking God to
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  prove Himself and instead start submitting to His revealed
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  authority. We have the Word.
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  We have the testimony. The question is not can God
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  speak? The question is, are we
• 22:46
  listening? I think that's where we leave
• 22:48
  it. This deep dive into Matthew 13
• 22:50
  has been, for me at least, a real wake up call.
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  It's a call to look at the familiar things, the Bible on
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  your shelf, the church you go to, the prayers you pray and see
• 22:58
  them with fresh eyes, to see the glory of the King in the face of
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  the Carpenter. Amen.
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  Thank you for listening, We'll see you next time.