Matthew 21: 23 – 27
What are your credentials
23 Now when He came into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people confronted Him as He was teaching, and said, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority?” 24 But Jesus answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one thing, which if you tell Me, I likewise will tell you by what authority I do these things: 25 The baptism of John—where was it from? From heaven or from men?” And they reasoned 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 men,’ we fear the multitude, for all count John as a prophet.” 27 So they answered Jesus and said, “We do not know.” And He said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
Now for your personal biblical development regarding the Gospels I want to give you the same situation given in the other Gospels. When we put them together we get a fuller understanding of what went on.
Mark 11 27 Then they came again to Jerusalem. And as He was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to Him. 28 And they said to Him, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority to do these things?” 29 But Jesus answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one question; then answer Me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things: 30 The baptism of John—was it from heaven or from men? Answer Me.” 31 And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ He will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ 32 But if we say, ‘From men’”—they feared the people, for all counted John to have been a prophet indeed. 33 So they answered and said to Jesus, “We do not know.” And Jesus answered and said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
Luke 20, 20 Now it happened on one of those days, as He taught the people in the temple and preached the gospel, that the chief priests and the scribes, together with the elders, confronted Him 2 and spoke to Him, saying, “Tell us, by what authority are You doing these things? Or who is he who gave You this authority?” 3 But He answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one thing, and answer Me: 4 The baptism of John—was it from heaven or from men?” 5 And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ He will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ 6 But if we say, ‘From men,’ all the people will stone us, for they are persuaded that John was a prophet.” 7 So they answered that they did not know where it was from. 8 And Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
What your Credentials? They often refer to academic or educational qualifications, such as degrees or diplomas that you have completed or partially-completed. "Credentials" can also refer to occupational qualifications, such as professional certificates or work experience.
Credential innovation is a hot topic in higher education, from micro credentials to digital badges, from competency-based and clickable transcripts to stackable credentials.
While numerous articles have been written and conferences held on credential innovation, for many people in academe the concepts are new, with an emerging vocabulary that includes both familiar and unfamiliar terminology. Of those terms, “stackable credentials” is perhaps the most commonly and differently used. The term itself is clever, invoking the image of Lego blocks and the metaphor of assembly. But assembly of what? With what linkages?
The most common description of stackable credentials goes something like this: over a lifetime of learning, individuals can assemble, or stack, a series of traditional degree-based and/or nontraditional credentials -- certificates, certifications, licenses, badges, apprenticeships and more -- that recognize achievements and provide an accurate assessment of knowledge, skills and abilities. The more credentials learners accumulate and stack, the more they increase their currency in our knowledge economy, creating more direct pathways to better jobs and higher wages. While that narrative captures several key ideas, it glosses over important differences in what credentials are being stacked and why.
Attainment of the four-year degree has increasingly become the primary focus of higher education, as evidenced by the shift of many two-year institutions toward transfer-friendly programs for learners whose final aspirations are a bachelor’s degree. At the same time, the longer history of community colleges, as well as many land-grant and technical four-year institutions, has been to provide educational programs and credentials tied to occupational fields at the certificate level, tied to a certification or, at the associate level, with a tight vocational focus. Those distinct types of educational programs and pathways have given rise to distinct forms of credential stacking.
In short, credentials can be stacked in many ways. We think the best framework is vertical, horizontal and value added, although we are not sure who coined these terms.
Vertical Stacking. The original and more traditional version of credential stacking, vertical stacking, thinks about credentials in a hierarchy -- with one level building on another, enabling the learner to progress toward a higher degree. For example, a high school graduate earns an associate degree with a specialty, followed by a four-degree in a selected industry, like engineering, and finally an M.B.A. in preparation for a corporate upper-management position.
Horizontal Stacking. With horizontal stacking, the level of the credential is less important than the subject matter. Learners expand their subject matter expertise by earning credentials in related fields that, collectively, prepare each person for a specific type of job. Unlike vertical stacking, there is no explicit ordinal ranking or prerequisites, although some credentials may build on others.
For example, many highly skilled, highly sought after and highly compensated IT professionals don’t follow a traditional baccalaureate path, stacking degrees vertically. Instead, they build a series of nondegree certificates and certifications horizontally across an occupational field.
Value-Added Stacking. Combining the concepts of vertical and horizontal credential stacking, value-added stacking is when a learner adds an area of expertise to an existing two- or four-year degree with shorter-term credentials to prepare for a specific type of job. Many of today’s health care professionals follow this path. A learner could add medical field certificates to an associate degree or supplement a bachelor’s degree in health management with an information services certificate.
I have served as a Pastor with a Christian church for over 35 years. Many times, people will ask what my credentials are. What Christian college did I attend and how high a degree did I obtain. My question to them is why do you ask? Have I shared anything that conflicts with doctrine of the Word of God?
Today we are going to learn about religious men who have the credentials but not the heart of being a co-shepherd of our Lord Jesus Christ. They wanted to humiliate Him in front of the people when they approached Him and demanded what was His credentials which gave Him the Authority to what He was doing.
People look for the outward signs of authority – education, title, positions, connections and influences. Our Lord Jesus’ Authority came from Who He Is not from any outward and superficial trappings.
The idea that the leadership of Israel were in fact only a sham is now emphasized in this incident. In it the leaders of the people, the religious authorities of the Temple (the chief priests) and the lay authorities of Jerusalem (the elders of the people), challenge Him about His authority, and as a result He demonstrates that they are not really suitable people to decide about such things, because their hearts are hardened and they are not willing to respond to the truth.
We must see this as at least a semi-official approach from the Sanhedrin, the Jewish governing body, for these people, along with the Scribes (included by Mark), were constituent parts of the Sanhedrin. They had seemingly been waiting for His next visit to the Temple, and approached Him as soon as He began teaching. We should note that He was there to pray and to teach, as the Scribes also did (Luke 2.46). He made no attempt to hide Himself, for His challenge was now open and bold. So, they came to Him with the deliberate purpose of showing Him up before all the people, for they knew that it would be necessary to get at least the tacit support of the people for what they wanted to do to Him. Thus their first aim was to demonstrate to the crowds that he had no demonstrable authority.
Their question seemed reasonable. All knew that it was their responsibility to check the credentials of any who claimed religious authority, and that they were also responsible for public order, especially in the Temple, and that He had after all caused some disarray and had challenged that authority, even if He had done it as a prophet. So, there could be no criticism of their checking up on Him. But it was the way in which it was done that proved that it was not genuine. They had had plenty of opportunity for questioning Him and weighing Him up beforehand, had they really wished to do so, and they could easily have spoken with Him in private. However, their aim was not to discover truth, but to openly confront and denounce Him, and the way in which Jesus dealt with them demonstrated that He in fact saw their challenge at this point as hostile, and not neutral.
That their approach was over more than just His actions in the Temple comes out in the strength of the deputation. His act in the Temple could have been dealt with discreetly by the Temple police, and with a warning. It was His whole activity that was in question and the challenges that He was thus making.
The approach was high handed and officious. ‘By what authority -- who gave you this authority?’ Their first hope was that He would have no answer and be caught unprepared. Then the people would see by His hesitation that He was a charlatan. Alternately they were hoping to make Him declare Himself, and say something ‘foolish’, possibly even something that could be portrayed as blasphemous, and whatever He said they would then be able to use against Him. They could then accuse Him of self-exaltation, or worse, of being a false prophet, a Messianic claimant or a rebel. The question was, what was He claiming Himself to be? Was He claiming to be a prophet? Was He claiming to be the Messiah? Was He claiming to be the coming Elijah? And if He was not claiming to be anyone important how could He claim to have God’s personal authority for doing what He was doing? Compare 6.15; John 1.19-25. Had He responded as they expected by claiming to be acting in God’s Name with no one to back up His position they would then be able to demand from Him a sign from Heaven, their favorite response to any such claims (compare 16.1).
23 Now when He came into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people confronted Him as He was teaching, and said, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority?”
Matthew here omits mention of the Scribes. Matthew’s emphasis is on the civic authorities. While present the Scribes were secondary. In Jerusalem these were the two ruling groups who held civic authority, the chief priests, and the lay princes and aristocracy. Thus, this was an official deputation, and they were questioning His right to preach in the Temple and to behave as He was doing in Jerusalem. Their questions were twofold, firstly as to the central source of His authority, did He claim that it came from God? And secondly as to who had authorized Him to act with that authority. For if He claimed that His authority came from God He had then to be able to produce sufficiently reputable authorities to back up His claim. Who then were His authorities? Let Him name them. They hoped by this to bring Him to a standstill so that they could then forbid Him to preach.
‘These things’ probably included His triumphal ride into Jerusalem, His actions in purifying the Temple, His preaching in the Temple (which they considered to be their territory), His healing of the lame and the blind in the Temple, and His allowing Himself to be hailed as the Son of David. It was apparent from these things that He was claiming great authority. Who then was there who would back up His authority? There was nothing outwardly wrong with their action. They were responsible for what happened in the Temple. What was at fault was their attitude.
24 But Jesus answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one thing, which if you tell Me, I likewise will tell you by what authority I do these things: 25 The baptism of John—where was it from? From heaven or from men?”
Jesus replies by diverting the question away from Himself. He does not want the crowds to think that He has no answer. So He asks them to explain to Him the origin of John’s baptism. Was it from Heaven or from men? This was not a diversionary tactic. Replying by a counter-question was a typically Rabbinic way of proceeding, and their reply would in fact be vital to His answer, for John was one who above all had pointed to His authority and had testified of Him (John 5.30-37). Yet His question was cleverly worded, for both He and they knew that they were surrounded by people in the Temple courtyard who had been baptized by John and held that baptism as sacred. Such people would not take kindly to anyone who depreciated it, especially in their present state of religious fervor and excitement at the festival. Furthermore, by referring to ‘the baptism of John’ Jesus was not just asking their opinion about John’s baptism, His question included their opinion on all the preaching that lay behind it.
This method of dealing with a question by a question was a regular Rabbinic method of arguing, and usually the question had an obvious answer. And that was the problem in this case. For this question did have an obvious answer and the crowds knew what it was. Almost as one man they believed fervently that John was a prophet, and they were still even now appalled at the treatment that had been meted out to him. Indeed, his reputation would have increased with his death. They did not blame these leaders for that. That lay squarely on the shoulders of Herod. But if these leaders gave a negative answer now it would be their aligning themselves with Herod. And that could have caused all kinds of trouble. And yet the problem for the leaders was that it was the negative answer that they wanted to give.
…And they reasoned 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 men,’ we fear the multitude, for all count John as a prophet.”
The religious leaders tried to trap the Lord Jesus through their trick question. If the Lord Jesus said His Authority came from God, they would accuse Him of Blasphemy. If He said He was acting in His own authority, they crowds gave greater authority to the religious leaders. The Lord answered their question with another question. They really didn’t want the truth. It was to them only good if it supported their views and causes.
The leaders recognized that they were trapped. They dared not say that John’s baptism was not from Heaven (from God), for the crowds around them held John to be a genuine prophet and believed firmly in his baptism. They believed that God had spoken to them through John. Were these leaders to deny John’s authority as being from Heaven and say that it was simply ‘from men’, they would immediately lose their own authority in the eyes of the crowd and might even be attacked by the more fervent amongst them, which could lead to anything. Yet if they did say that his authority was from Heaven Jesus would ask why they had not then believed him, for the attitude of the leaders towards John had in fact, overall, been one of stubborn disbelief. The only other alternative was to say that they ‘did not know’. But that would be to lose all right to act as judges about Jesus’ authority. It would ignominiously expose them to the crowds as being incapable of making such judgments on their own admission.
27 So they answered Jesus and said, “We do not know.” And He said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
In the end they opted for the answer that they felt would embarrass them least. They replied that they did not know. This basically disqualified them from being judges on the question of authority, certainly in the eyes of the crowd. If they could not tell whether John’s baptism was from Heaven, how could they hope to tell whether Jesus, Who had been testified to by John, was from Heaven or not (John 4.1-2)? The crowds, of course, knew that Jesus had been backed by John. Thus, they would recognize that His authority was on the same basis as John’s.
So Jesus was able to emphasize that in view of their own admission that they could not tell whether John was from God or not, there was no point in His putting forward the evidence of His own authority, which was partly based on John’s. The leaders must have been furious. They had simply made themselves look fools and had sowed in people’s minds the thought that they were unable to discern the mind of God, and that in total contrast with Jesus, Whose association with John proved that He did know the mind of God.
The importance of this episode must not be underestimated. The Jews were proud of the fact that they saw themselves as the people of God. And they looked with awe to their High Priests Annas and Caiaphas who led their worship, and to their Teachers who interpreted to them their Scriptures which brought to them the voice of God. Thus the undermining of their confidence in the ability of either of these groups to speak authoritatively concerning the truth about God and His authority would bring home to those who could ‘see’ how false their position was, and would shake their faith in them, resulting in religious disillusionment. It would thus hopefully point them towards Jesus.
