Episode 73 Matthew 14-15

Dan: (00:00)
Hi, everyone. And welcome to training for life redeemed. I’m your host, Dan, and as always, I’m joined by my father, David Jackson. We’re continuing our series today. Looking through the book of Matthew. Today, we’re actually gonna look at two chapters, gonna look at chapter 14 and 15 as Jesus basically does one miracle of he feeding 5,000 he’s then gonna travel across the sea of Galilee, travel up north to Tyre and Sidon, and then come back down to the sea of Galilee, get back in his boat and travel back home to Capernaum or to something else and Magdalan or something. But back to the other side, where home is right so he does a fair bit of travel in these two chapters. Dad, Why is Jesus traveling? Let’s start there. He’s hiding. He’s hiding. hiding. How is he hiding? There’s 5,000 people. And then there’s 4,000 people. He’s not doing a good job. If he’s hiding,

David: (00:51)
It’s pretty difficult, isn’t it? This hits the crisis because, John, the Baptist just got his head cut off. And that means that Herod has basically given people license, to go after Jesus. Herod thinks Jesus is John the Baptist back from the dead . If Herod hasn’t finished with John the Baptist and he’s after Jesus, life is getting a little bit heavy and Jesus knows where this is heading. So, it’s time to bug outta town. And it’s also a time to grieve. when your cousin gets his head cut off under those circumstances, there’s an emotional kick.

Dan: (01:37)
Yeah.

David: (01:38)
So he goes up up a hill and, has a little talk to his heavenly father as you do. I call it howling on the father’s knee. and then things take off from there.

Dan: (01:53)
Yeah. So we have some pretty famous miracles happening in these passages. So we have Jesus feeding 5,000 and then later he’s gonna feed 4,000. Why, why are there two events of this? It seems to, is it just something Jesus did often or is it significant that one was done over in Capernaum where it’s like part of Israel and then the other side of the lake is Gentile territory, basically. Yeah. So is that why?

David: (02:17)
So we’re playing this thing about the Jews. Who’ve had the scriptures, all these centuries the Pharisees, the Bible teachers are hounding him. They want him arrested. They wanna find evidence to charge him, but the Gentiles. Yeah. They have a very different response. And so we’ve got this thing happening between the clean and the unclean, the religious and the pagans, and all of these people are having these different reactions. So he goes from grieving over John the Baptist, being executed by Herod and having gone away by himself of course the crowds catch up with him. So you’ve got a scene in the wilderness, just out of, pretty sure this is just around Bethsaida of that area. north of Capernaum, if you got five it’s 5,000 men , but he Matthew and Mark, and Luke, they write these up so that you get the hint Jesus is doing in the wilderness.

David: (03:25)
What Yahweh did with Israel when he brought them out of Egypt. So the, the thing with the manna in the wilderness, Jesus is repeating that miracle. And you’ve got lots of hints in there. you only count the men. Mark tells you they were seated in groups of tens and fifties and so forth, which is they’re laid out in 12 tribal groups, just like Israel and the wilderness. So this is a very, I describe miracles as parables without words. So you’re doing a riddle and people. If they have their code book of the old Testament are going, oh, Yahweh fed Israel manna in the wilderness, Jesus fed the same layout of Israelites manna in this case, bread and fish in the wilderness,

Dan: (04:20)
No quails,

David: (04:22)
No quails, but, but the same thing, you got the, the manna equivalent and you got the meat equivalent. So if it’s not manna and quails, it’s bread and fish. Yeah. They”re a pair, they’re a pair. and having done that miracle, which the crowds didn’t see, but the disciples did. So we’re again doing this riddle thing. You get to see the secret. They don’t. but they’re all fed and they’re all healed and they all go home and then Jesus takes off and he goes to the most unclean, I guess, place you could go. He goes to the place where Jezebel came from. So if you think back to Jezebel is the woman who tried to kill Elijah mm-hmm and she killed the prophets of Yahweh in the old Testament, in Ahab, this wimpy hopeless looking bloke was a king husband, Jezebel, Ahab, and now you’ve got Herod and Herodias and Herodias is a second generation Jezebel. So Jesus, it’s not a coincidence. He goes back to where Jezebel came from. If you didn’t see the parallel with Herod and, Ahab, now you’re gonna, we’re gonna drive it home to you. What happens when we get to tie inside and

Dan: (05:42)
Tyre and Sidon is where Jesus is gonna call em dogs. Isn’t it? that’s right.

David: (05:49)
That’s right. He goes, it’s

Dan: (05:50)
Kind of the curse that Jebel had dogs will lick up your blood

David: (05:53)
that’s right. And it was a nickname that the Jews used to abuse Gentiles. So if you think of Israel as God’s sheep, then all the Gentile nations that attack Israel are like dogs attacking sheep. So the Jews refer to Gentiles as dogs. And Jesus goes to a place in Tyre and Sidon, and some woman offers him hospitality. She invites him in. She asks him to heal her daughter. So again, we’ve got the most unclean of the unclean. You’ve got a Tyrian woman, a Canaanite woman, her daughter, not her son is demon possessed. Mm-hmm . I mean, how much further down the unacceptable line can we go? And she says, please heal her. And Jesus says, well, I’m not supposed to give the food. We just did the manna. Yeah.

David: (06:46)
They, the, the children’s food goes to Israel. You want me to give it to the dogs? And she doesn’t say, how dare you call me a dog? She says, yeah, but dogs get crumbs and you go, wow. There’s a difference in attitude to Jesus. The Messiah king here is a gentile saying, you can call me a dog. I don’t care. Just, you know, yeah. Show me some grace. I don’t deserve anything. And the contrast with the Jews is ridiculous. Yeah. So of course he heals them, heals her and then trundles back, to where they park the boat. And now they’re on the other side. Oh, they catch the boat, go to the other side. And on the other side, they’re in Gentile territory. Well, Gentile territory, the Gentiles crowds come

Dan: (07:41)
4,000 men,

David: (07:42)
4,000 men. That’s right. And you know, we don’t need many fish this time. It’s, , that’s all good. But he, he repeats the miracle that belongs to the people of Israel for the Gentiles in the Decapolis. And that’s gotta be scandalous. You know, we are doing the same thing for non-Israel as we did for Israel. And of course the next step is the Pharisees are gonna come along and say, you are not doing all the food laws and you are not washing your hand. Yeah, the, yeah. What’s with the, the food and the unclean food business. And that leads us straight into that conversation.

Dan: (08:28)
Well, Dad, I think that brings us to the end of this episode. If you would like to come and grab the study notes for this episode, please head over to trainingforliferedeem.com/73. If you enjoy the episode, please leave us a review. And of course, make sure you hit the subscribe button, come back and join us next week while we continue to look through the book of Matthew.