Matthew 13:54-14:21

In chapter 13, Matthew gathered together a broad group of Jesus’s parables.  Now, from Matthew 13:54 through chapter 14, Matthew gathers together some of Jesus’s actions that might be thought of as living parables: stories that reveal something bigger than just what happens in the story.

Matthew 13:54-58 Rejection in his hometown of Nazareth

What does verse 54 tell us that Jesus does?

How do the people react?

At root, what is the reason Jesus is not accepted in Nazareth?

What is beneath their doubt?  Is it jealousy?  Insistence on upholding the accepted social hierarchy?  Something else?

Do you think the proverb quoted in verse 57 is true most of the time, or only occasionally?  Explain.

Verse 58 says Jesus did not do many miracles there.  Why?

Read Mark 6:5-6, which provides a bit more detail.  Why do you think that some people who were sick were able to be healed by Jesus?

Matthew 13:58 says that Jesus did not do many miracles there, but Mark 6:5 says that Jesus was not able to do many miracles.  Most scholars believe Mark’s Gospel was written first, and that Matthew drew from Mark.  There are a variety of places where it appears that Matthew made edits to Mark’s words as he incorporated them into his Gospel.  In this case, perhaps he did not want to imply that Jesus could be limited.

Do you think the reason so few miracles were done was because Jesus did not want to heal people who didn’t believe in him, or because their lack of faith did not provide the right conditions for him to act?  Explain.

How might we be preventing God from acting mightily in our lives due to our lack of faith?

How is this reaction of the people of Nazareth a living example of the parable of the sower and the soils?

If we take this story as a living parable illustrating a bigger point for the early church and for us, what might that point be?

Matthew 14:1-12 The death of John the Baptist

Herod the tetrarch was a son of Herod the Great (the one who tried to have Jesus killed as a baby) and inherited one fourth of Herod’s territory – including Galilee.

What happened to John the Baptist?

Why had John criticized Herod?

Why was John the Baptist killed?

According to Jewish historian Josephus, Herod had John killed because he was afraid that John had become so popular that he could start a rebellion (Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 2, pp. 103-104).  Is that plausible?

From Herod’s perspective, why was John killed?

From Herodias’s perspective, why was John killed?

From Salome’s perspective, why was John killed?

From the perspective of the early Christians, why was John killed?

From Herod’s perspective, the matter is political and personal, and eventually touches on his ego and his social standing.

From Herodias’s perspective, the matter is personal and also touches on her legitimacy as Herod’s wife, so it is vindication.

From Salome’s perspective, it is something she can do for her mother, and also possibly for power.

For the early church, John’s death is a passing of the torch and is also a foreshadowing.

John was committed to speaking the truth and died honorably for it.  Herod was committed to upholding a foolish vow even though it meant an innocent man would die.  Staying true to your word doesn’t make you honorable if it means doing something wrong.  How do you know when you should stick with a commitment?  Should you ever let a commitment go unfulfilled?

If we follow Jesus’s command to not swear by anything (Matt. 5:34-37), we will never be in a position where we have to choose between going back on an oath or doing something evil.

Some people think Herod was experiencing guilt for what he had done, and that is why he imagined that Jesus might be John, raised back to life.

John the Baptist was Jesus’s cousin.  They probably had times together when they were growing up.  How might Jesus have reacted to John’s execution?

According to John 1:35-42, some of the disciples started out as followers of John.  How might they have reacted to John’s death?

If this story is a living parable illustrating a bigger point for the early church and for us, what might that point be?

Matthew 14:13-21 Jesus feeds 5,000

We use the shorthand phrase that Jesus fed 5,000 people, but verse 21 tells us that it was 5,000 men, plus the woman and children who accompanied them; so it was actually far more than 5,000 people.

Why do you think Jesus withdrew to a deserted place?

How do you think he felt when the people found him so quickly?

When Jesus saw the crowd, he had “compassion” for them.  What does this say to you?

What happens in this story?

What does this story tell us about Jesus?

What does this story tell us about the crowds of people?

They were focused on wanting to be with Jesus, so focused that they chased after him and didn’t pack their bags first.  They may not have always been thinking clearly, but they were orderly and open to God.

What does it tell us about the disciples?

They were caring and practical, even though they didn’t have a miracle in mind.  They didn’t know Jesus would care so much.  They were instruments of God’s miraculous work.

Put yourself in this story.  Where would you have been, and what would you have been thinking about what happened?

What do you think God wants us to learn from the fact that there were so many leftovers?

What do you think God wants us to learn from the fact that so many people were fed?

What does this overall story say to you?

Why do you think God doesn’t multiply food all the time?  Hundreds of millions of people go hungry every day.  Nine million people die from hunger every year, including 3 million children.  Why do you think God doesn’t feed them all, as Jesus fed everyone here?

Note that although God doesn’t fix everything for us, he always welcomes what we bring to him and seeks to transform it to do more – when they said they had 5 loaves and 2 fish, Jesus said, “Bring them here to me” (Matt. 14:18).

This story is so central to story of Jesus that it is the only miracle (other than the Resurrection) that is told in all 4 gospels.

Christians of all stripes see this story as far more than just a story about a good thing happening to 5,000+ people.  It illustrates much bigger points about God and our relationship with God.

If this story is a living parable illustrating a bigger point for the early church and for us, what might that point be?

From this story, people often draw lessons about the power of God, God’s provision for us, God’s love for us, how much can be done when we take what little have and hand it over to God to what he wants with it, etc.

There are some bigger points here as well:

First, this story is an anticipation of the Eucharist (Communion), through which God feeds us spiritually today.

The language in Matthew 14:19, where Jesus “looked up to heaven” (perhaps in prayer), “blessed and broke the loaves,” and “gave them to the disciples,” is very similar to the actions he took at the Last Supper when he instituted the Eucharist/Holy Communion (Matthew 26:26).

What connections would you make between this miracle and the Eucharist/Holy Communion?

Second, it can be interpreted as a foreshadowing of the eternal banquet which we will enjoy with God forever in heaven (see Matt. 8:11; Rev. 19:9).

What connections would you make between this miracle and the heavenly banquet God is preparing for us?

Take a step back and consider this:

The Bible shows that God loves situations where lots of people are fed:

• We see this in the scenes where Jesus feeds thousands of people (Matt. 15:29-39 as well as Matt. 14:13-21).

• We see it in Jesus’s imagery of heaven as a place where feasting is the norm (Matt. 8:11; Matt. 26:29; Luke 22:29-30; Matt. 22:1-14).

• We see it in John’s vision of heaven (Rev. 19:9).

• We see it in the Old Testament, in God’s provision for the Israelites in the dessert (Ex. 16), in the celebration of the Passover feast (Ex. 12:1-28; Num. 9:1-14; Deut. 16:1-8), and in prophecies of the future (Isaiah 25:6).

Clearly, God loves feasts and wants us to associate good eating with him.

How can you make every meal a reminder of God’s love and a celebration of God’s provision for us?