The Pulpit Commentary — Matthew — Volume 1 — Section 472

Vers. 7-19.--John and Jesus: children in the market-place. After dismissing the messengers of John, there appeared to our Lord urgent need of indicating with pre- cision the merits and defects of the Baptist's work, so that the people might under- st.and how it was the Baptist was disappointed in the Messiah he had eo enthusiasti- cally heralded, and what were the relations mutually held by the Baptist, the Messiah, and the people. In doing so our Lord touches on- I. Tim GREATNESS OF JoHN AND HIS WORK. He is unhesitating in the praise and admiration be bestows. Challenging comparison with any hero of old time, the con- clusion still is, "There bath not risen a greater." And the distinctive greatness of his character was only in keeping with the unique importnnce of his work. This is indicated when he says of John that he was more than a prophet-a messeng11r prepar- ing the way, an immediate forerunner. Up to John's time the prophets and the Law had prophesied; now the kingdom was not pointed at, but stormed and possessed. It is no longer a hope, it is a present reality; the kingdom is come. The land which had seemed very far off to the older prophets was there for whosoever had faith to win it. By the unusual expression he employs, our Lord apparently intends to emphasize the two ideas, (1) that only men of earnestness and vigour can win the kingdom, .and (2) that in the entrance there is much disorder and tumult. 1. Of the first of these Bunyan is the best expositor, in his picture of the man who with his drawn sword made his way into the palace. Bunyan knew that it is only by the men that can stand blows and the sight of blood that the kingdom is won even now. Many, indeed, are they who still bar the entrance, and they fight with every variety of weapon. 2. In periods when appeal is made to the elementary forces of human nature, much that ls i.ndecoroUB, much that ill illegal, is apt to be done. And when the religious life of a community ill trying to shape for itself new forms, there always come to the front men of violence, men of the type of Luther, who disgust men of taste like Erasmus, but who are the fit instruments for taking by assault the new stronghold in which faith is to find refuge. The Pharisees were shocked to see the kind of people who crowded after Je8U8, and the manner of their following. We are warned, therefore, to jt:dge no movement by its superficial unseemliness and disorderly ways, but by the underlying principles which are really its moving power. II. Diverse as were the types of character exhibited by John and Jesus, and by their message, both were unsatisfactory to the mass of the people. John demanded of them a righteousness which seemed impossible; and Jesus was still more unsuitable, even unintelligibl.-a mere good-natured time-server, indifferent to the sorrows of his- people so long as he could be tolerably comfortable. John has nothing but stem denunciation-we have piped unto him, but not a step will he dance. Jesus goes to the other extreme ; has no ear for any of our national sorrows, and seems quite able to be happy, though overtaxed and under foreign rule--we have mourned unto him, and he has not lamented. 1. There are people who live at feud with their generation because they cannot get their own whim petted, their own idea responded to. They cannot Call in with any of the religious movements of their time, and find in the market-place of life only food for their own disappointed vanity. The children of Wisdom, on the contrary, justify the wisdom which moves religious leaders to adopt differing methods. They see in John a congruity to his work. In one who was impartially to criticize all classes, and be an embodied conscience to the whole com- munity, there was wisdom in showing, even in hie outward aspect, that he was prepared to leaJ the way in stern repression of self-indulgence, and superiority to the influences of fashion and worldly expectation. It ill quite true he is extreme, one-sided, a man of one idea, but much of tho most important work in the world is effected by men of on& idea, who are blind to all else but the one thing they have to do. Similarly, a free, cheerful intercourse with men became him whose work it was, not to reveal one aspeci on. XI, 1-30.J THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW. 469