VALUELESS
REFORMATION
Next
Jesus gives one of the most profound and startling parables.
When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he
walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none [Matt.
12:43].
A man has an unclean spirit, and the unclean spirit
leaves him. The man thinks he is all cleaned up. Then what happens?
Then he saith, I will return into my house from
whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept,
and garnished [Matt. 12:44].
In other words, reformation is no good. My friend, you
can quit doing many things, but that won’t make you a Christian. If
everyone in the world would quit sinning right now, there wouldn’t
be any more Christians in the next minute or in the next day, because
quitting sin doesn’t make Christians. Reformation is not what we
need.
Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other
spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there:
and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall
it be also unto this wicked generation [Matt. 12:45].
This same situation is with us today. The hardest people
in the world are unsaved church members because they think they are
all right. They have undergone self–reformation—empty, swept, and
garnished. They are like a vacant house, and all the evil spirits
have to do is move in. The Devil owns them, and they don’t
recognize this fact. Reformation means death and destruction.
Regeneration means life and liberty.
The final section of this chapter is even more
startling, and it belongs with what has immediately preceded. There
is a relationship that is greater than mother and son and even blood
brothers! This is a relationship which is established with God
through Jesus Christ by faith in Him.
While he yet talked to the people, behold, his mother
and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him.
Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy
brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee.
But he answered and said unto him that told him, Who
is my mother? and who are my brethren?
And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples,
and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! [Matt. 12:46–49].
The Lord is saying that the strongest relationship today
is the relationship between Christ and a believer. Friend, if you are
a child of God and you have unsaved family members, you are closer to
Jesus Christ than you are to your own kin, including the mother that
bore you. You are more closely related to other believers than you
are to unsaved members of your family. This is tremendous! He is
talking about a new relationship.
For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is
in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother [Matt.
12:50].
And
what is the will of the Father? That you hear the Lord Jesus Christ,
that you accept Him and trust Him1
Many misconceptions about salvation abound, and one is
that when we are born again, we are restored to the condition of
innocence that Adam and Eve enjoyed before the fall. According to
this view, salvation is paradise regained immediately. After all,
Jesus paid for our sins, so we must be innocent in the sight of God.
But if the only thing that has happened to us is that Jesus has paid
for our sins, we will not get into heaven. Jesus’ atoning death
took care of the negative problem of our sin. However, God requires
not only that we be innocent of sin but that we come into His
presence with true righteousness. That’s why I stress the double
transfer that is involved in our salvation—our sins are imputed to
Jesus on the cross and His righteousness is transferred to us by
faith. Therefore, when I put my trust in Christ, He takes my sin and
gives me His righteousness, so that when I stand before God, I stand
clothed in the righteousness of Christ.
But even that is not all that happens. When we are
converted, the Spirit of God comes to live inside of us. Every
believer is indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and where the Spirit of God
dwells, no demon can take up residence. I do not believe that demons
can possess genuine Christians. They can harass, tempt, and annoy
Christians, but they cannot possess them. In the Christian life,
there is no such thing as a vacuum, because God Himself has come into
that life.
However, some people have a false sense of repentance, a
repentance of the flesh—self-reformation, if you will. This is what
Jesus was warning the Pharisees about. It was as if He were saying to
them: “You men are dedicated to the achievement of holiness and
righteousness, but you think you can be righteous on your own. If you
have a bad habit, you confess it and break it. But you’ve never
come to Me. You are resting on your own righteousness, your own
performance. You’re like this man who had a demon. The demon left,
so he cleaned up his house. But he had no way to keep the demon from
returning. That’s you. You’re empty inside.”
Jesus then spelled out the danger of leaving the house
empty: “Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more
wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last
state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with
this wicked generation” (v. 45). Jesus did not say why the
demon gathers seven other demons more wicked than itself; there is no
indication that the demon needs help to move back into the man. In
any case, the man ends up far worse off than he was before. Then
Jesus added, “So shall it also be with this wicked generation,”
that is, the Pharisees. The obvious message is that self-reformation
was not enough. The Pharisees needed a reformation from above, a
conversion, a new birth. So, this was a stern warning, a forceful
call to repentance.
We must be very careful about what kind of repentance we
manifest. It must not be merely repentance of the flesh. It must come
from the heart. But it will come from the heart only if the Holy
Spirit has taken up residence there.2
Again, think with me and follow the flow carefully.
Jesus here is indicting this wicked generation, saying, “Although
you might have cleaned yourself up from the idolatry that once
plagued your country and have had reformation, you haven’t
experienced regeneration. Although you’ve swept your nation clean
of idols, seven times as many demons will flood you because you are
rejecting Me.”
Jesus is speaking primarily of the nation of Israel. But
He also speaks to me personally and to us as a church corporately
because we must be careful that we do not seek to get people to
merely “clean up” their lives. There’s a move today to try to
bring reformation to our communities in the name of Jesus. Our
communities do not need reformation. Our communities need
regeneration. People need to be born again. The work of the gospel is
from the inside out. Jesus called us to be fishers of men, and you
can’t clean the fish until you catch them.
People who try to clean up their lives or their
communities through reformation will sweep the house clean, but seven
times as many demons will come back. The evil that follows will be
greater than the initial evil unless there is rebirth. Do you really
think we’re going to stop drug abuse by trying to eradicate the
fields of coca in South America? Do you really feel that militarily
or politically or through slogans like “Just Say No,” we’re
going to rid ourselves of cocaine nationally?
We tried in Prohibition. “We’ll sweep it clean,”
we said. “We’ll close down the distilleries. We’ll board up the
breweries. We’ll change this country through legislation.” But do
you know what followed? For a while, alcoholism seemed to ebb, but in
its place came cocaine and heroin—seven times the greater evil.
We need to take the words of Jesus to heart. We must be
about regeneration—not reformation; rebirth inwardly—not reform
outwardly. Should we not then be involved in community activities and
political undertakings? Of course. But as you are involved, you must
realize your ultimate goal is to see people changed through the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. You must be salt and light—drawing people
to and reflecting Him.3
Reformation
is not salvation, regeneration, or redemption. It may, in fact, work
toward the very opposite by entrenching a person in self-satisfaction
and blinding him to his need for God’s mercy. In order to have
salvation there must be a new and right relationship to God, which
comes only as a sinner humbly confesses and turns from his sin and
receives Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
The arrival
of Jesus’ family gave Him the perfect opportunity to give a graphic
illustration of the need for personal relationship to Him. While
He was still speaking to the multitudes
in a
house (see 13:1), His
mother and brothers were standing outside, seeking to speak to Him.
When Jesus was informed of this, He
answered the one who was telling Him and said, “who is My mother
and who are My brothers?”
By this time
Joseph had probably been dead for many years, and Jesus’ immediate
family consisted of His
mother,
Mary, his half brothers
(James,
Joseph, Simon, and Judas), and His half sisters, who are not named
(Matt.
13:55-56).
After the
resurrection, Jesus’ brothers
eventually
came to believe in Him, His brother James becoming the head of the
Jerusalem church (see Acts
15:13-22)
and author of the epistle that bears his name. But during Jesus’
preaching and teaching ministry there is no clear evidence that any
member of His family other than Mary fully understood who He really
was or trusted in Him as Savior. We are told specifically that His
brothers
did
not believe in Him (John
7:5),
and it may be that even His
mother—despite
the revelations to her before and after Jesus’ birth and her
magnificent confession at that time (see Luke
1:26-2:38)—did
not yet personally trust in Jesus as her own Lord and Savior.
We are not
told (cf. Mark
3:31-32; Luke
8:19-20)
why Jesus’ mother
and brothers were … seeking to speak to Him,
but it seems reasonable to assume that they were greatly concerned
about His welfare and perhaps even feared with some of His home town
friends that He had “lost His senses” (Mark
3:21).
His condemnation of the scribes and Pharisees continued to grow in
intensity and seriousness, and those leaders, in turn, were accusing
Him of doing His work by Satan’s power. Their plan to destroy Jesus
(Matt.
12:14)
was probably already rumored among the people. Jesus’ mother
and brothers were
therefore hoping to dissuade Him from continuing His work and perhaps
hoped He would flee to a safe place until the religious leaders
forgot about Him or lost interest. His family was on a rescue mission
to save Him from imminent death.
For most men
such an incident would have been embarrassing in the extreme, but
Jesus was neither embarrassed nor resentful. He loved and cared for
His family, and He understood their concern, misguided as it was. He
did not, in fact, respond directly to the request of His family but
rather used the occasion to teach an important truth: And
stretching out His hand toward His disciples, He said, “Behold, My
mother and My brothers!”
Jesus was not
renouncing His family. He loved them even more than they loved Him.
His last request from the cross was for John to care for His mother
(John
19:26-27),
and through His gracious love His brothers eventually came to believe
in Him as their Lord and Savior (Acts
1:14).
The Lord’s
purpose in referring to His
disciples as
His mother
and brothers
was to
teach that He invites the entire world into His intimate and divine
family. Anyone can enter His spiritual family by trusting in Him, and
the family of God is the only family that ultimately matters.
Even being a
member of Jesus’ own earthly family did not merit salvation by
virtue of that relationship. Jesus’ invitation therefore extended
to His natural mother and
half brothers,
because
they, too, needed to be saved from sin. Apart from personal faith,
they were no more spiritually related to Him than any other human
being. “All of those, and only those, who believe in Me are
spiritually related to Me” He was saying. For
whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother
and sister and mother.
The whoever
indicates
the universality of the invitation. No one who believes is excluded.
And, on the other hand, no one who does not believe
will be included. God’s first and most absolute desire and
requirement for mankind is belief in His Son. “This is the work of
God,” Jesus said, “that you believe in Him whom He has sent”
(John
6:29).
Until a person believes in Christ, God cannot give him any spiritual
help, and that person cannot give God any spiritual service.
At Jesus’
baptism God declared, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am
well-pleased,” (Matt.
3:17)
and at the transfiguration He spoke the same words to Peter James,
and John, adding, “Listen to Him” (17:5).
God’s supreme will for mankind is for them to be well-pleased with
the Son, just as He is—and to trust in Him, listen to Him, follow
Him, and obey His Word.
After
declaring, “For the Son of Man has come to save that which was
lost” (Matt.
18:11),
Jesus told a parable explaining the Father’s great love for mankind
and His desire that they be saved. “What do you think?” He asked
rhetorically. “If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has
gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and
go and search for the one that is straying? And if it turns out that
he finds it, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over
the ninety-nine which have not gone astray. Thus it is not the will
of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones
perish” (vv.
12-14).
Many years later the apostles echoed that truth. Paul wrote, “God
our Savior … desires all men to be saved and to come to the
knowledge of the truth” (1
Tim. 2:3-4),
and Peter declared that the Lord does not wish “for any to perish
but for all to come to repentance” 2
Pet. 3:9.
Being rightly
related to Christ, however, requires more than a mere verbal
declaration of loyalty. “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord,
Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven,” Jesus warned; “but he
who does the will of My Father who is heaven. Many will say to Me on
that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in
Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’
And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me,
you who practice lawlessness’” (Matt.
7:21-23).
Saving relationship to Jesus Christ comes only from submissively
believing in Him and receiving the gift of salvation He offers.
“There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name
under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be
saved” Acts
4:12.
At best,
reformation changes only the outside of a person; at worst it becomes
a barrier to his being changed on the inside. A right relationship to
Christ, however, brings completely new life, both inside and outside.
All the rest of Scripture surrounds the central truth that Jesus
Christ came into the world to save sinners—to transform them, not
reform them. Until a person claims that truth, no other can be of any
benefit.
The great
message of the gospel, and therefore of the church, is not a call to
morality but a call to deliverance from sin through the Lord Jesus
Christ.
1
McGee, J. V. (1991). Thru the Bible commentary: The Gospels
(Matthew 1-13) (electronic ed., Vol. 34, pp. 172–174).
Nashville: Thomas Nelson.
2
Sproul, R. C. (2013). Matthew (pp. 403–404). Wheaton, IL:
Crossway.
3
Courson, J. (2003). Jon Courson’s Application Commentary
(pp. 91–92). Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
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