The road to hell is paved with good intentions is a proverb or aphorism. It is thought to have originated with Saint Bernard of Clairvaux who wrote, "L’enfer est plein de bonnes volontés et désirs" (hell is full of good wishes and desires) From our own experiences and observations we can see that many individuals may do bad things even though they intend the results to be good. A good example is the economic policies of the 1920s. These were intended to be a prudent response to the economic turmoil following World War I and the Wall Street Crash but they resulted in the Great Depression and World War II in which millions of people suffered and died. [2] Studies of business ethics indicate that most wrongdoing is not due directly to wickedness but is performed by people who did not plan to err. We rely on proper authorities in Government, the Military, Business, and other fields to exercise their expertise in things we do not have the day to day expertise. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_road_to_hell_is_paved_with_good_intentions)
The question of proper authority was important for the Jews of the day. They held that they were the people of God, and they therefore detested their Roman overlords. Of necessity they submitted to them, but they did not believe that the Romans had the right to govern them. They were God’s own people, and their human lords were God’s high priest and those associated with him in the appointed assemblies, the great Sanhedrin and the lesser councils throughout the land. People like John the Baptist and Jesus presented problems because they did not fit into this picture. They were not like the Romans, who ruled unjustly but had the military backing that enforced their demands. And they were not like the high priests and other officials, who because of their official position were regarded as authoritative persons by official Judaism. What authority, then, did they have? (Morris, L. (1992). The Gospel according to Matthew (532–533). Grand Rapids, Mich.; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press.)
People in North America pride themselves on their own autonomy. , which is a word properly defined as the combination of auto (self) and nomos (law or authority). In essence, the more we become our own authority, or literally, law unto ourselves, we assume, the happier we seem to be.
In things of belief, regardless of our intentions, when we become our own authorities, we by definition, reject God and His authority.
In Matthew 21:23-32, the conflict in this encounter between Jesus and the religious leaders was over the issue of authority, specifically Jesus’ authority, which they questioned and which they feared would threaten their own positions of authority.
1) The Confrontation (Matthew 21:23)
Matthew 21:23 [23]And when he entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came up to him as he was teaching, and said, "By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?" (ESV)
These things took place on the way from Bethany to Jerusalem on Tuesday and Wednesday of Passover week (compare Mark 11:12–14, 20).
After Jesus and the disciples had passed the fig tree He cursed the day before and found it completely withered (vv. 18–22; cf. Mark 11:20–21), He entered the temple with them (Boice, J. M. (2001). The Gospel of Matthew (454). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books.).
The group of chief priests and the elders of the people may have included the high priests Caiaphas and Annas, who served concurrently for several years (Luke 3:2). Because of the seriousness of their confrontation of Jesus, it is likely that at least the captain of the Temple, the second highest official, was present. The elders of the people comprised a wide variety of religious leaders, which definitely included Pharisees (Matt. 21:45) and scribes (Luke 20:1), and possibly Sadducees, Herodians, and even some Zealots and Essenes. Although those groups had many differences from each other and were constantly disputing among themselves, they found common ground in opposing Jesus, because He threatened the authority of the entire religious establishment.
As He had the day before, when He so dramatically cleansed the Temple, Jesus now took center stage there again and was teaching as He walked about the courtyard (Mark 11:27). Jesus was teaching, no doubt, in one of the “porches,” “porticos” or “halls” of the temple. These porches were beautiful and huge. They were covered colonnades that ran all around the inside of the wall of the vast temple complex. Or, to put it differently, these halls were bounded on the outside by the temple wall, on the inside by the Court of the Gentiles (Hendriksen, W., & Kistemaker, S. J. (1953-2001). Vol. 9: New Testament commentary : Exposition of the Gospel According to Matthew. New Testament Commentary (776). Grand Rapids: Baker Book House.).
It seems certain that those whom He had driven out for making His Father’s house a den of robbers (Matt. 21:13) had not returned, and the entire spacious Court of the Gentiles was now available for those who came to worship. Many of them had probably followed Jesus there when they saw Him come into the city that morning.
We are not told what Jesus was teaching on this occasion, but He was likely reiterating some of the more important truths He had taught many times before. We can be sure that whatever He said was related to His kingdom, the subject with which His ministry began (Matt. 4:17) and ended (Acts 1:3). In His parallel account, Luke reports that Jesus was “teaching daily in the temple, … preaching the gospel” (Luke 19:47; 20:1), which was sometimes called “the gospel of the kingdom” (Matt. 9:35). Whatever His specific theme, “all the people were hanging upon His words” (Luke 19:48).
The primary question the Jewish leaders now had for Jesus was the same as it had been from the beginning, “By what authority are You doing these things, and who gave You this authority?” (cf. John 2:18).
By these things, they probably meant everything Jesus had been teaching and doing, but they particularly had in mind His abrupt and, in their eyes, utterly presumptuous cleansing of the Temple the day before. This northern villager, proclaimed by his followers as a prophet (v. 11), is assuming an authority which challenges the duly constituted leadership of the official guardians of the temple and of the religious life of Jerusalem.
They could hardly ignore such a challenge. His behavior is not only highly irregular; it is a threat to their position (France, R. T. (2007). The Gospel of Matthew. The New International Commentary on the New Testament (796–797). Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publication Co.)
In the rabbinic schools it was necessary to cite some previous rabbi if one wished to obtain a hearing. Jesus had had no ordination based on the Jewish system. By what authority, then, the leaders asked, did He not only teach and preach but even heal the sick, cast out demons, and raise the dead? Most especially, why had He presumed to take upon Himself-an untrained, unrecognized, self-appointed rabbi-the task of casting the merchants and moneychangers out of the Temple? Although not themselves religious leaders, those men were operating their businesses under the auspices of the Temple authorities. “Who gave You … authority to throw them out?” those authorities asked Jesus. His action in the temple implies a claim to authority greater than that of the priests who were responsible for its affairs. They had given him no such authority, so who had? (Morris, L. (1992). The Gospel according to Matthew (533). Grand Rapids, Mich.; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press.)
They were saying, “Show us your credentials!” It was an attempt to embarrass Jesus. By not assaulting him directly, for example by having him arrested, they reveal that they are afraid of him because of his following If he admitted that he had no credentials the people could be expected to lose respect for him (Hendriksen, W., & Kistemaker, S. J. (1953-2001). Vol. 9: New Testament commentary : Exposition of the Gospel According to Matthew. New Testament).
In asking Jesus to identify His authority, those leaders probably hoped He would say, as He had many times before, that He worked under the direct power and authority of God, His heavenly Father. That would give them another opportunity to charge Him with blasphemy, and perhaps to succeed in putting Him to death for it, as they had tried to do before without success (John 5:18; 10:31).
• One of the most dangerous doubts that we can have about ourselves is the need for official recognition or title before we act. Although God has gifted certain individuals with particular gifts and expects His church to have certain officers responsible for certain tasks, He expects all of us to be about the work of His kingdom. There are powers and responsibilities that we equally share as citizens of the Kingdom of God.
• Just as not everyone carries a gun as a soldier or police officer in society, we all have a responsibility to live peaceably.
We have seen: 1) The Confrontation (Matthew 21:23) and now:
2) The Counter Question (Matthew 21:24–27)
Matthew 21:24-27 [24]Jesus answered them, "I also will ask you one question, and if you tell me the answer, then I also will tell you by what authority I do these things. [25]The baptism of John, from where did it come? From heaven or from man?" And they discussed it among themselves, saying, "If we say, ’From heaven,’ he will say to us, ’Why then did you not believe him?’ [26]But if we say, ’From man,’ we are afraid of the crowd, for they all hold that John was a prophet." [27]So they answered Jesus, "We do not know." And he said to them, "Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things. (ESV)
In response to their double question (“what authority, and who gave it?”) Jesus poses “just one” question, which is in effect the same question but focused now not on himself but on John the Baptist: where did his authority come from?
Jesus answered the question of the chief priests and elders with a query of His own. He was not being evasive and had no reason to be, having given the answer to their question countless times before. And if they answered His question now, He would answer theirs, telling them again by what authority He did these things. A counter-question in place of a direct answer was an accepted pattern in rabbinic debate, where the second question further opens up the subject raised by the first (D. Daube, Rabbinic Judaism 151–155). We have seen an example already in 15:3, and another will follow in 22:20; cf. also Mark 10:3. In none of these cases does Jesus’ counter-question change the subject, but it substitutes dialogue for simple assertion and so answers the question more obliquely where a direct pronouncement might have been used against him (France, R. T. (2007). The Gospel of Matthew. The New International Commentary on the New Testament (798–799). Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publication Co.)
His question was simple, as recorded in verse 25, : “The baptism of John was from where/what source did it come, from heaven or from man?” Because John the Baptist had started his ministry first, the religious leaders had rejected him even before they began to reject Jesus. The baptism of John referred to His entire ministry, which was characterized by his baptizing those who repented of their sins (Matt. 3:6).
As the chief priests and elders quickly realized, Jesus’ question put them on the horns of a great dilemma. As they discussed it/began reasoning among themselves, they saw they would be in trouble for whichever answer they gave. If they were to say, “From heaven,” Jesus would then say to them, “Then why did you not believe him?” It was not simply that they had rejected John himself but that they had also rejected John’s clear testimony about Jesus, whom that prophet had openly acclaimed to be “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” and the very “Son of God” (John 1:29, 34). To have accepted John as a prophet from heaven would have required accepting Jesus as the Messiah; and that they absolutely would not do. No amount of testimony from John or evidence from Jesus Himself would bring them to recognize Him as Messiah. They were trained to discount or explain away facts as well as scriptural truths that were not consistent with their humanly-devised religious beliefs and standards.
As the religious rulers continued to discuss Jesus’ question, they realized that if they answered the opposite way they would also be in trouble. If they said John’s ministry and message were from man as it notes in verse 26, they would lose what little credibility they had with the people and would even incite their ire, because the crowd/multitude still considered/all hold John to be a prophet. They themselves firmly believed that John was not a prophet, but they did not dare state that belief in public. Their only recourse, therefore, was to confess with embarrassment in verse 27, We do not know.
Consequently Jesus replied, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.” As Jesus well knew, had He given them an answer, they would only have used it against Him. They were not interested in learning the truth about either John or Jesus. Their sole purpose was to induce Jesus to again claim messiahship and divinity so they would have grounds for putting Him to death for blasphemy (cf. John 5:18; Matt. 22:15).
The religious leaders persisted in rejecting the light Christ sent them, and He therefore turned it off. He had no more teaching for the scribes, Pharisees, chief priests, and others whose self-satisfaction blinded them to the truth of the gospel and their own need for it. For them there would only be further warning and condemnation. In a long series of woes, Jesus was about to declare judgment against them for doing their deeds to be seen of men, for refusing to enter the kingdom themselves and for hindering others from entering, for being blind religious guides, for being outwardly righteous but inwardly wicked, for honoring the ancient prophets in name but being of the same mind as their forefathers who killed the prophets, and for being a brood of vipers destined for hell (Matt. 23:5, 13, 16, 27, 30, 33).
Please turn to Luke 19
When a person steadfastly refuses to hear God’s truth and to receive His grace, God may choose to withdraw Himself. In face of the unrelenting wickedness of humanity in Noah’s day:
Genesis 6:3 [3]Then the LORD said, "My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years." (ESV)
The Lord finally said of unrepentant Ephraim: “Ephraim is joined to idols; leave him alone” (Hos. 4:17), and in relation to rebellious Judah, “He turned Himself to become their enemy, He fought against them” (Isa. 63:10).
Even as Jesus approached Jerusalem during His triumphal entry:
Luke 19:41-44 [41]And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, [42]saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. [43]For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side [44]and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation." (ESV)
We have seen: 1) The Confrontation (Matthew 21:23) 2) The Counter Question (Matthew 21:24–27) and briefly:
3) The Characterization (Matthew 21:28–31a)
Matthew 21:28-31 [28]"What do you think? A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, ’Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ [29]And he answered, ’I will not,’ but afterward he changed his mind and went. [30]And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, ’I go, sir,’ but did not go. [31]Which of the two did the will of his father?" They said, "The first." (Jesus said to them, "Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you). (ESV)
In this short parable Jesus characterizes two contrasting responses to the gospel. And once again He gives His opponents the opportunity to condemn themselves out of their own mouths.
Here is a man who has two “sons,” and he addresses each as such.
This intends to bring out the idea that because they were born to their father, he held them dear, and, because they were his children, they should hold him dear. Fatherly and filial love is the bond between them, and this involves the most tender obligation on their part. This relation between the children and their father is the basis of what is here presented (Lenski, R. C. H. (1961). The Interpretation of St. Matthew’s Gospel (829–830). Minneapolis, MN.: Augsburg Publishing House.)
Notice that it is the father who went to his sons (he went) and not the other way around. God always takes the initiative in His relationship with us. What we say and what we do is always a response to what God has said and done (Albrecht, G. J., & Albrecht, M. J. (1996). Matthew. The People’s Bible (304). Milwaukee, Wis.: Northwestern Pub. House.).
In various translations, the order is reversed, but in the first instance in verse 29, the son at first refused to go, saying, “I will not,” but he afterward regretted it and went. In the second instance in verse 30, the son who was asked to work … in the vineyard told his father, “I go/will, sir,” but he did not go. The implication is that he had never intended to go and lied to his father to give the false impression of obedience.
Quote: Gordon Allport has said, “One’s intentions for the future have more power to shape his life than the experiences of the past.” Persons who say yes but do not obey God’s will have missed the meaning of the kingdom. Jesus said, “Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matt. 7:21, KJV). Persons who hear Jesus and follow as disciples, regardless of their past failures, share the kingdom of God. The judgment is upon those who say “Yes, yes” intellectually but do not identify (see Jer. 7) (Augsburger, M. S., & Ogilvie, L. J. (1982). Vol. 24: The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 24 : Matthew. The Preacher’s Commentary series (18). Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson Inc.).
When Jesus asked the chief priests and elders in verse 31, “Which of the two did the will of his father?” they gave the obvious answer, “The first.”
The son who said he would obey his father but did not actually do it represents the chief priests and elders; they had a reputation for being God’s servants, but they rejected the prophets. The son who rejected his father’s command but later did what his father wanted represents the tax collectors and prostitutes, who had been in rebellion against God’s standards but who in many instances repented of their particular sins and came to Jesus.
Moreover, since the command of the father was to work in the vineyard, this is a parable not merely of salvation—that is, of believing on Jesus—but also of Christian service. It asks, “Who are those who truly serve?” as well as “Who are God’s children?” Or we could put it this way: “What is the fruit of true religion?” Christ’s answer is in terms of doing or failing to do the will of the father, rather than other matters (Boice, J. M. (2001). The Gospel of Matthew (458–459). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books.).
Jesus’ point in this story is that doing is more important than mere saying. It is, of course, best for a person to say he or she will do God’s will and then do it. But it is immeasurably better to at first refuse His will and then repent and do it than to hypocritically agree to do it but not. In this context, the doing of God’s will relates to acceptance of the gospel, of receiving Jesus as the Messiah and as Savior and Lord.
In the Warrant for the command, if we are Sons of God, then He has supreme authority to direct our actions. In the Work of the command, the word translated “work” means “labor” (Thayer). This is not easy work. Perspiration is involved. Likewise, God’s commands are not easy to do. They involve industry and labor. If you are looking for an easy road in life without difficult duties, you will not be employed in service for God. Finally in the When of the command, the sons were commanded to “Go work today” (Matthew 21:28). The emphasis is on “today.” Thus there is urgency in the command. Anyone connected with agriculture knows there is often urgency in farm work. “Make hay while the sun shines” expresses the urgency principle well. Likewise we need to be urgent about spiritual matters. We must work “while it is day; the night cometh, when no man can work” (John 9:4) and “Now is the day of salvation” (II Corinthians 6:2) (Butler, J. G. (2008). Analytical Bible Expositor: Matthew (353–354). Clinton, IA: LBC Publications.).
We have seen: 1) The Confrontation (Matthew 21:23) 2) The Counter Question (Matthew 21:24–27) 3) The Characterization (Matthew 21:28–31a) and finally:
4) The Connection (21:31b-32)
Matthew 21:31-32 [31](Which of the two did the will of his father?" They said, "The first.") Jesus said to them, "Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. [32]For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him. (ESV)
After His opponents gave the only possible answer to His question, Jesus showed them their connection to the parable. He informed them that, although their answer to His question was right, their response to Him and His ministry was wrong and wicked. Their own words condemned them. They did not correspond to “the first” son, who did the father’s will, but to the other, who did not do it. “They:
Matthew 23:3 [3]so practice and observe whatever they tell you--but not what they do. For they preach, but do not practice. (ESV)
They claimed to obey God, but their actions denied that He had any place in their hearts. They claimed to be longing for the Messiah and lauded His name; but when He came, they would not have Him.
The application which Jesus makes of the parable shows that “work” should here not be restricted to good works as distinct from faith. The father means, “Child, go show thyself as a child today by helping in my vineyard!” In the application Jesus speaks of those who “go into the kingdom,” and of those who “believed” John. So we must combine faith (John 6:40) and good works (John 15:8) (Lenski, R. C. H. (1961). The Interpretation of St. Matthew’s Gospel (830). Minneapolis, MN.: Augsburg Publishing House.).
The Lord therefore said to them, “Truly I say to you that the tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.” No rebuke could have cut them deeper or infuriated them more, because in their eyes, tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots were the scum of society perhaps even worse than Gentiles. Tax-gatherers not only were merciless extortioners but were traitors to their own people, Jews who bought franchises from the Romans to collect taxes from their own people to support the Roman occupation. Prostitutes/harlots were the epitome of gross immorality. If any people were totally outside the pale of God’s mercy, the self-righteous Jewish leaders thought, it was those two groups.
The men who now stood before Jesus, on the other hand, were the religious elite, the interpreters of God’s law and the keepers of God’s Temple. They claimed to give their lives in obedience to God and lived under the self-serving illusion that, because of their exalted positions and their many religious works, they were of all men most pleasing to Him.
Yet Jesus declared to those proud leaders that tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots who chose to disobey God but later repented would go into the kingdom of God before they would. The tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots were nearer the kingdom than the chief priests and elders, not because they were inherently more righteous or acceptable to God, but because they were more ready to acknowledge their need for God’s grace than the self-satisfied priests and elders. Jesus’ point was that claims to religion do not qualify a person to enter the kingdom, and even gross sin, when repented of, will not keep a person out.
Jesus then continues in verse 32, “For John came to you in the way of righteousness,” Jesus continued giving the answer to the question His opponents had earlier refused to answer. To say that John came … in the way of righteousness was to say not only that his ministry was from God hut that he was a godly man. He was a holy, righteous, virtuous, Spirit-filled man whom God had sent to prepare the way for His Son, the Messiah. He preached a righteous message and lived a righteous life.
Jesus affirmed:
Matthew 11:11[11]Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. (ESV)
Please turn to Matthew 3
Jesus said that the chief priests and elders did not believe him,” because the Jewish leaders had been skeptical of John from the beginning, having sent a group of priests and Levites to question him (John 1:19–25).
John told them what real repentance should be about:
Matthew 3:7-9 [7]But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? [8]Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. [9]And do not presume to say to yourselves, ’We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. (ESV)
“But the tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots believed him,” Jesus said. Some of the tax-gatherers had been open to the gospel even in its incomplete form taught by John the Baptist. As evidence of their sincerity in being baptized for the repentance of their sins, they asked John, “Teacher, what shall we do?” (Luke 3:12). Although no specific instance is mentioned in the gospels, Jesus makes clear that among the multitudes who were baptized by John there were also some prostitutes/harlots who believed him and who, like those tax-gatherers, confessed their sins and were forgiven (see Matt. 3:5–6).
Concluding His indictment, Jesus said, “And even when you saw it , you did not afterward change your minds/feel remorse and believe him.” They did not believe John’s message when they heard it themselves and did not even believe him when they saw the transformed lives of the tax-gatherers and prostitutes/harlots who had believed. In other words, they would not be convicted either by the truth of the message or its power to transform sinners.
• Regardless of our intentions, God calls sinners to repent and believe the Gospel. Repentance means turning from sin and towards God as saviour and Lord. If we expect Him to be our saviour yet refuse to have Him be our lord, then He shall be neither. But to those who follow Him as Lord, He shall eternally deliver them from their sins.
(Format Note: Outline & some base commentary from MacArthur, J. (1989). Matthew (Mt 21:23–31). Chicago: Moody Press.)
