Matthew 20 – Many who are first will be last, and the last, first.
(The cost of being first with God)
Introduction
A. Matthew 20:1 Begins with the word "For" (because). Chapter 19 ends with the statement, "But many who are first will be last, and the last first."
1. The “first” refers back to V. 28, “Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”
2. The Twelve were the apostles who had followed Jesus.
3. Chapter 20 Continues the theme of first and last.
4. Matthew 18 He began with the question, "who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?" The answer was they would be the ones who would humble themselves as a child. He speaks of the "little ones" that God loves and saves. Again, in Matthew 19:14 He repeats, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”
B. Returning to the topic of who would be greatest, Jesus explains that it does not depend on rank or when one would enter the service of the Lord. God is He who chooses, honors, and exalts. God honored Saul of Tarsus and exalted him by making him the prophet of the Epistles of the New Testament, though he became an apostle as "one untimely born," and Jesus appeared to him. Paul said, “For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. 11 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.” (1 Corinthians 15:8-12)
C. Jesus teaches us in this chapter the meaning of being chosen and honored by God.
I. Matthew 20:1-16. "Many are Called, But Few are Chosen. "
A. God does not pay us according to the hours of our service, but according to His own purposes.
1. For men, honors are matters of politics among workers.
2. Men reward partners according to "seniority." Those who have put more hours, days, years, in service anticipate more honor. They say, “These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.”
B. Jesus prepared the apostles for humiliating experiences and what would seem unfair in our life of service to the Lord.
1. God allows the death of many of the very faithful when they are still young.
2. Acts 7, Stephen was stoned.
3. Acts 12, James was decapitated.
II. Matthew 20:17-19. Jesus was to be humiliated, delivered to the Gentiles, and crucified, but on the third day raised from the dead.
A. Jesus fulfilled his purpose in three years and died very young.
B. However, he was exalted to the right hand of God. Philippians 2:5-11
III. Matthew 20:20-24. Who would have the primacy, James, John, or Peter?
A. Jesus did not say who would have the primacy.
B. The mother of James and John, sons of Zebedee, asked Jesus to put her sons on the right and left of Christ when he should establish his kingdom. (V21)
1. Jesus first said, "You know not what you ask." The disciples did not yet understand what the nature of the Kingdom of Christ would be. They thought of an earthly kingdom with the power of physical weapons, and authority and honors as is found in the kingdoms of men.
2. The Kingdom of Jesus and the war to conquer the hearts of men would be a war of evangelism that would fight with words and humble lives. Therefore, the fleshly-minded were going to persecute and afflict the soldiers of the cross.
3. Jesus asked, "Can you drink from the cup that I must drink; And be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? " He did not speak of baptism in water that he had preached and of which they were already baptized. He spoke of a future baptism. He had just repeated his announcement of his own sorrows of the cross: a baptism of affliction. Without thinking about what Jesus implied by that metaphor, the two sons of Zebedee said, "we are able."
4. Jesus said to them, “You will drink my cup.” Jacob was decapitated in Acts 12. John wrote in Revelation 1:9 “I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.” He was in prison and afflicted until the end of his life.
C. “But to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”
1. The wonderful heavenly Father had already chosen who would have such honors and would not give the honor as men might expect think. God looks at the heart and honors the humble. The disciples had to learn that very hard and difficult lesson.
2. The cost of being chosen by God for this honor would be very high, because they would have to suffer enormously and remain faithful until death. He would have to drink from the cup that Jesus was going to drink, of abuse and of humiliation, along with affliction and death.
D. Paul expresses these concepts and received very high honors.
1. The Apostle Paul described himself as “last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.” 1 Corinthians 15:8-9
2. But the grace of God was not in vain with him, because he worked “harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.” 1 Corinthians 15:10
3. He was a soldier of Christ who sowed the teaching of Jesus in the hearts of men in Galatia, Asia, Macedonia, Achaia, and even Rome and many cities unknown. In the struggle to preach the gospel, the rebellious unbelievers, moved by envy, incited persecution.
--1 Corinthians 9:19-27, “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.”
-- 2 Corinthians 11:23-33, “Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. 24 Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.”
-- 2 Corinthians 12:1-10, “I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows. 3 And I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows— 4 and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter. 5 On behalf of this man I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses.”
IV. Matthew 20:25-28 The Lordship of the Kingdom of Christ, the Church.
A. The rulers and the great leaders of the nations lord it over them and assert their authority.
1. The lordship and authority belong to Christ, Matthew 28:18; Ephesians 1:20-23.
2. Not even the apostles were going to exercise lordship and authority. Authority was found in the words of God that they taught by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
-- 2 Corinthians 13:1-10, “This is the third time I am coming to you. Every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 2 I warned those who sinned before and all the others, and I warn them now while absent, as I did when present on my second visit, that if I come again I will not spare them— 3 since you seek proof that Christ is speaking in me. He is not weak in dealing with you, but is powerful among you. … 10 For this reason I write these things while I am away from you, that when I come I may not have to be severe in my use of the authority that the Lord has given me for building up and not for tearing down.
B. The great one will be your servant. Whoever wants to be the first among you will be your slave.
1. Matthew 20:26-28, “It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, 28 even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
--There is no place in the Kingdom of Christ for the vainglory of this life.
--The rank that God recognizes is to be a humble servant, he who is the slave of everyone.
2. 1 Corinthians 9:19-27 “I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.”
V: Matthew 20:29-34 Two blind people asked Jesus to open his eyes.
A. The disciples were stumbling in the darkness of their ignorance of the will of God regarding honor, the honors of the Kingdom of Christ. Matthew 18:1; 19:14; 20:24; Mark 9:33-37; Luke 22:24-27
B. God opened the eyes of the two blind men because he had compassion on them. V34
C. It cost Jesus cost his death on a humiliating cross to open the eyes of the disciples. Eventually, all the apostles accepted the path of shame, affliction, and service, until death.
Conclusion:
A. The cost of being first in the eyes of God, is very high. It cost the apostles the loss of everything they had, but they gained many times more in this life and in the world to come, eternal life.
B. It is very difficult for disciples to learn the humility that endures the shame that men heap on them. There is great need for the light that enlightens the eyes of the blind who have eyes, but do not see.