The religious leaders asked Jesus, “By what authority are You doing these things? Who gave You this authority?” There, they said it! In that question, they asserted that Jesus didn’t have the authority to do what He was doing. After all, THEY were the religious authorities, and they didn’t give Jesus permission to do what He was doing.
Who does this Rabbi from the northern hick country think He is? He rides into Jerusalem like He’s the Messiah. He turns over the tables of the money changers where the Gentiles had a place in God’s Temple. Hah, the Gentiles aren’t God’s holy people. And this rabbi has the nerve to call the Temple, “His house”? Who does this Jesus think He is, walking about the Temple and teaching as if He did own the place, as if this WAS “His house”?
So, it all comes down to authority. Does Jesus have the authority to do what He is doing? In one way, the religious leaders are right. In God’s way of doing things, someone does need to have the proper authority. Self-made, lone rangers who have no need for authority have no need for God’s authority either.
The key word is “authority.” We often think that “authority” has to do with power–the power to do this or that. But it’s more than that: authority is also a matter of permission. To have authority is to have permission from some greater authority to speak or act in a particular area. For example, when I forgave your sins at the beginning of the service, I did so based on the authority that Jesus gave to the first pastors in His New-Covenant Church. You can read about that in John, Chapter 20.
As Americans, we often think that each of us can do whatever we want, for each person often sees himself as his own authority. But think of this: Imagine a SWAT team busting down your door down at three in the morning. They arrive unannounced, ransack your house, looking for drugs. But did they have the authority to do that? Not if they went to the wrong address. So authority does matter!
In our nation, someone doesn’t just decide to become president one day, and he is. He (or she!) receives authority to be president, in this case, from the people. It’s the same with a pastor. A pastor isn’t authorized to do what he does unless he has received such authority from Christ, through the Church. Our Thursday Bible classes on the book of Acts are clearly showing that to be so. That’s what call and ordination have been about since the beginning of the Church.
The religious authorities weren’t wrong recognizing that someone needs the authority to do what he does. They were wrong by using such a question to assert that Jesus didn’t have the authority to do what He did. So, where did Jesus get His authority?
Although we know that Jesus got His authority from God the Father (Matthew 28:18), He also taught as someone who had authority in Himself, based on who He was. Jesus had the daring to stand before a crowd and say, “You have heard that it was said to those who lived long ago … But I say to you …” (Matthew 5:21-22).
Jesus’ words and works testified to the authority that He had. If you don’t believe Jesus’ words, then look at His works. That was the purpose of His miracles. Jesus healed the sick, testifying to His authority to heal our bodies for eternal life. Jesus cast out demons, showing that He had the authority to subdue Satan even in the eternal realm. Jesus stilled storms and walked on water, showing that He had authority over creation, even to create a new heaven and a new earth on the Last Day. Jesus raised the dead, showing that He had authority over physical death, so our eternity will be one of body and soul. Jesus is His own badge of authority.
2,000 years ago, the people of Judea knew the words and works of Jesus. For in today’s Gospel reading, Jesus had been publicly preaching and teaching for three years. He has done so since John’s baptism, where the entire Trinity revealed Himself. Then, God the Father spoke: “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).
But the religious authorities would have none of that. They refused John’s baptism of repentance. After all, why did they need to repent, or so they thought? And their hearts only got harder as Jesus preached, healed, showed compassion, and loved.
Unbelief is that way, for unbelief makes its own rules and creates its own authorities. That’s why you can’t reason someone into believing. That’s why you can’t convince someone that Jesus is the One to trust. That’s why you can’t answer every objection that someone might have; your answers will never be good enough.
Unbelief starts from where the person is, in his unbelief and fallen convictions, and demands that his ever-changing measurements, whatever they may be, must be met. How can it be otherwise if you are both judge and jury?
That’s how it was with the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. But Jesus wouldn’t play the game of bantering back and forth to convince. He would say it like it was, do some teaching, and then end the conversation. Sometimes, He would heal someone to show that He had such authority. In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus doesn’t answer their questions. Instead, He backs them into an uncomfortable corner.
Jesus did that by asking them about the authority for John the Baptizer to baptize? But how could the religious leadership safely answer that question? If they answered by saying that John’s authority to baptize came “from heaven,” they knew that Jesus would ask: “Then why didn’t you believe him? Why did you refuse his baptism, if it came from heaven?” And they would’ve been left all wet, dripping in a puddle of their own unbelief.
But the religious leaders also knew that John was a popular man whom the people revered as a prophet sent from God. So if they said that John’s baptism was based on human authority, the crowds would turn on them. How could they possibly answer?
So, they did the politician’s dance. They answered Jesus in a way that they thought would leave them wounded the least. They said, “We don’t know.” John came preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins to prepare the people for the long-promised Messiah. And the best you could do was, “We don’t know”?
I suppose some could ask that same question about baptism today. Is the baptism that Jesus instituted from God or man? (Matthew 28:18-20) Is it, as some say, only an outward sign to show that you are a Christian? Or does baptism save by giving us a clean conscience before God? (1 Peter 3:21) Is it the washing of rebirth and renewal, through which the death and life of Jesus come to you? (Titus 3:5) Like the religious leaders in Jesus’ day, saying, “We don’t know” doesn’t cut it.
Unbelief is stubborn and is not self-healing. That’s why we cannot by our own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ our Lord or come to Him. He must come to us. He engages us. He deals with us by Word and Spirit, baptizing, forgiving, and feeding us through His Church. He must break down our self-made walls of skepticism, our darkened thinking, and our unwillingness to go beyond what we choose to allow. That you can even believe is a gift of God’s undeserved goodness.
Like the religious leaders in Jesus’ day, we also are inclined to ask such questions from a questionable heart. I’m not talking about the questions of faith that want to learn more of the one, true faith. That’s having a child-like faith, which Jesus praises. I’m talking about the questions that put you on the throne, based on a skeptical heart.
Let’s think about a question we see others often express, since that’s always an easier place to start. For some, what God says about baptism doesn’t satisfy their demands that they should baptize infants. After all, they stubbornly say, “Where does it say specifically that we have to baptize infants?” (Ironically, Jesus doesn’t specifically command adults to be baptized, either.)
What Jesus does command is that His Church baptize all nations; that’s ethnee in the Greek: Gentiles, people. Faith says “yes,” recognizing that Jesus commands young and old, infant and aged, to the waters of baptism when He uses the word “all.” But unbelief demands that God meet your level of convincing or you just won’t go along. That’s making yourself lord over God in that particular area. That’s idolatry.
So, in what areas have you approached the Faith and said, “I won’t believe this or that, or won’t do this or that, until my self-made criteria are met.” Such a condition starts with you at the center, instead of Jesus. You then become the center of the faith in that one area, instead of Jesus. And yes, that’s also idolatry. It’s not the not knowing that makes you idolatrous; it’s putting yourself on the throne of judgment that does so, expecting your expectations to be met before you will change.
Did you notice that Jesus didn’t play that game with the religious leaders of His day? So, why would He be any different with us? As they needed to repent, so, too, do we!
When you look at Jesus, what do you see? Do you see Him as Lord over all? Do You also view His teachings as authoritative over all? God’s holy will is not met in your self-convinced rightness. It’s met in the One who has all authority in heaven and earth, Jesus. Only in Him, in Jesus, do you find life, life in all its fullness.
And you find Jesus where He promises to come to you. So come now to receive Him, leaving your self-made conditions and benchmarks behind, giving Jesus His rightful place on the throne. For King Jesus wants to serve you, not some of you, but all of you. For Jesus is Lord over all of you, not just part of you. Amen.
