Intro to Matthew 9:36-38

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/2/2021 8:06 AM

 

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus: Introduction to Matt. 9:36-38

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference: Matthew 9:36-38

 

            Message of the verses:  “36 Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then He said to His disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. 38 “Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.’”

 

            We began our study of Matthew chapter nine on April 30, 2021 and in our SD for today we begin looking at the final three verses in this wonderful chapter of Matthew, a chapter that has taught me many great things, especially getting more insight into the miracles that Jesus did and why Matthew chose those miracles to include in his gospel writings.  I also think that as we look at these final verses we may find something that perhaps will be a surprise to us as we look at verse 38.

 

            John MacArthur entitles this 10^th chapter in his second book of commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew “The Harvest and the Laborers.”  As we begin this section we will see that Matthew has concluded the section on Jesus’ attestation of His divine authority and His messianic credentials as seen in chapter 8-9.  Now in chapter 10 of Matthew we will see him focuses on Jesus’ commissioning of the disciples and His initial instruction and training for their public ministry, after all after Jesus leaves this earth at His resurrection those men that He taught will be the ones who will begin the gospel message to the entire world, and by the time all of these men are put to death the gospel will have reached the entire Roman world, and that is a very large part of our world even today.  MacArthur writes “Verses 36-38 of chapter form a bridge between these two sections, as Jesus temporarily turns away from His public ministry to the multitudes and begins to concentrate exclusively on discipling the inner circle of twelve.”  As I have looked at these chapters I think that this also will end His Galilean ministry which went on for an extended portion of His ministry while on planet earth and in that ministry region there were living some three million people at that time.

 

            MacArthur goes on “This text marks a significant transition of Jesus’ ministry.  Until this point His disciples have simply been listeners and onlookers, observing and learning.  All of the actual ministry—teaching, preaching, and healing—has been performed by Jesus Himself.  Now Jesus shows the reason and need to begin involving the disciples (compare 9:35 and 10:1, 7-8, 27).  In the three verses of our text, we are given a glimpse of Jesus’ motives and methods in preparing the disciples for their joint ministry with Him.”

 

HIS MOTIVES

 

            This section includes 9:36-37a and is the first main section of MacArthur’s commentary on these verses.  I will include his introductory comments on this first main section and then in our SD for tomorrow we will begin to look at the first sub-section “Christ’s Divine Compassion” which will take a few days to get through.

            “Here is a marvelous disclosure of our Lord’s heart, a revelation of His divine motive for ministry.  We discover what prompted the Son of God to come to earth to teach, preach to, and heal a sinful people who deserved only the condemnation of hell.  Three elements of that motivation are His own divine compassion, man’s lost condition, and the coming consummation of judgment.”

 

            I have listened to the sermon on this section and have used parts of it in our revival prayer meetings as I believe that these motives, especially His compassion are wonderful reasons to pray for revival as they must be demonstrated in the hearts of true believers who are actually the body of Christ on planet earth at this time of what we have called “The invisible Kingdom,” something that we can also learn from the book of Ephesians.

 

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Living in a sinful body it is not always easy to show compassion to others living in sinful bodies, but in order to be more like Christ, compassion is something I need to show to others regularly.

 

My Steps of Faith for Today:  I trust that the Lord will use my life to show compassion to others in order to show the love of Christ as He did while on planet earth.

 

7/2/2021 8:35 AM