Sermon from 23rd of May 2008 by Eddie Yeo

Jesus and False Teaching (EDDIE YEO)

Matthew 16:1–23

Preacher’s Note: This does not mean that our binding will overrule heaven’s will.

1. The False Teachers came to Discredit Jesus

The Pharisees and Sadducees never accept each other: they are divided in thinking, in doctrine, in school, etc. Cf. how Paul takes advantage of this in the Book of Acts.

Yet these two groups come in great unity to oppose Jesus: birds of a feather flock together. What is the main impetus for uniting against Jesus? Probably, unity will bring strength to them, as their united opposition will bring defeat to Jesus. People would have expected Jesus to lose.

The question they ask Jesus appears deceptively simple. Their question did not stem from a genuine desire to learn, but was an attempt to discredit Jesus. Indirectly undermining all the miracles of Jesus as being of no consequence, their act was an act of despising Jesus’ healings, raisings from the dead, etc. This shows their arrogance and wickedness, as Jesus healed more than any other prophet. Jesus alone has the authority to grant salvation to man, and this counts as the greatest miracle Jesus can offer, and the Pharisees and Sadducees’ fixation on some dramatic sign shows how blinded they were to this central miracle of Jesus’ ministry.

Jesus compares them to weathermen, and shows that they are about as effective and as good as weathermen. Jesus did not enter into a theological debate with them, but instead made a reference to the story of Jonah, where the people did not wait for a dramatic sign from heaven to repent. They repented straightaway at Jonah’s preaching.

Jesus thus shows us what false teachers do: they create doubts to prevent us from doing what the Scriptures command us to do (turn to God).

2. Jesus in turns warns his disciples to watch out for the “leaven of the Pharisees”.

Jesus used “leaven” to refer to the teachings of the Pharisees. The leaven referred to a piece of fermented dough kept over from a fermented baking. Leaven is something not allowed to be used in any sacrifice to God, and in the Passover, only unleavened bread is allowed. This is because leaven’s fermentation process is symbolic of corruption. Just like leaven is hidden and mixed inside the bread, you cannot tell its presence is there, and you can only know that the leaven is there once the bread is baked. Once the leaven and the dough are mixed, they become inseparable.

This is why Jesus told them to watch and be careful. To watch means to watch at a distance: you don’t need to listen to them, you don’t need to read their books, and you just watch their fruit to see what they are producing. The kind of fruit teachers are producing will tell you what kind of teachers they are. Are they practicing what they are preaching? What kind of disciples are they producing? There are a lot of teachings that are coming out in the church today, whereby a lot of corrupted teachings are mixed with pure doctrine today. It is very hard to totally dismiss false teachings because they often mix the true in together with them, which cause people to fall for them.

Jesus warns his disciples to stand at a distance, “to take heed”, “to properly stare”, “to discern”. You cannot watch if you are already inside: it is very hard to disagree if we are already immersed. We must put some kind of guard against false teachings to let them into our hearts and into our churches: we need a good antivirus software.

3. Yet, Jesus wanted to know what people thought of Him.

This is not because Jesus is not being insecure about Himself, but because Jesus is trying to make a point to his disciples in light of the wide range of interpretations as to who He was. People back then gave him so many names and titles, just like how people have so many competing interpretations as to who He is. Yet, these descriptions are good for men only, but they are not faithful to the nature of Jesus Christ: they are, in essence, false teachings as well. It’s not important what people think about Him, but it is important that His disciples Know.

Peter is seen to be a remarkable character here: he is the only one who dared to speak out when the rest did not dare to. This question is remarkable: even the rabbis did not believe that Jesus is the Messiah, so who are these uneducated fishermen to give a proper answer to this question? This explains why they largely kept quiet. Yet, we see that God chose to reveal the identity of Jesus to one of the disciples. We must not come to a conclusion that Peter is set on a pedestal above the other disciples. Jesus states Himself that He is going to build His church and not Peter’s church. Peter was not singled out as special, but his boldness is put on display here. The massive growth of the church is a good example of how Jesus’ prophecy was fulfilled. At one sermon, 3000 got saved. This is a massive outstanding feat. And the church multiplied daily.

Authentic and genuine teaching will produce real disciples. A real disciple is a disciple who is bold. I would add that a real disciple is a disciple who is full of faith. Peter is the only one, for instance, who actually walked on water. In addition, I would also say that a real disciple is one who perseveres.