Outline

«　WEEK 8　DAY 3　»

　　Matt. 4:16 “The people sitting in darkness have seen a great light; and to those sitting in the region and shadow of death, to them light has risen.”

　　9:11-12 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, Why does your Teacher eat with the tax collectors and sinners? Now when He heard this, He said, Those who are strong have no need of a physician, but those who are ill.

　　The Lord took the opportunity given Him by the Pharisees’ question to give a very sweet revelation of Himself as the Physician. In Matthew 9:12 we see the Lord’s reply to the Pharisees’ question: “Those who are strong have no need of a physician, but those who are ill.” The Lord was telling the Pharisees that these tax collectors and sinners were patients, sick ones, and that to them the Lord was not a Judge but a Physician, a Healer. In calling people to follow Him for the kingdom, the King of the heavenly kingdom ministered as a Physician, not as a Judge. A judge’s judgment is according to righteousness, whereas a physician’s healing is according to mercy and grace. Those whom He made people of His heavenly kingdom were lepers (8:2-4), paralytics (vv. 5-13; 9:2-8), the fever-ridden (8:14-15), the demon-possessed (vv. 16, 28-32), those ill with all kinds of diseases (v. 16), despised tax collectors, and sinners (9:9-11). Had He visited these pitiful people as a Judge, all would have been condemned and rejected, and none would have been qualified, selected, and called to be the people of His heavenly kingdom. However, He came to minister as a Physician, to heal, recover, enliven, and save them so that they might be reconstituted to be His new and heavenly citizens, with whom He could establish His heavenly kingdom on this corrupted earth. The Lord’s word here implies that the self-righteous Pharisees did not realize that they needed Him as a Physician. They considered themselves strong; hence, blinded by their own self-righteousness, they did not know that they were ill. (Life-study of Matthew, pp. 311-312)

　　The new King’s ministry for the kingdom of the heavens began not with earthly power but with heavenly light, which was the King Himself as the light of life, shining in the shadow of death. When the Lord began His ministry as light, He made no display of power and authority. He walked upon the seashore as a common person. But as He came to [Peter, Andrew, James, and John] by the Sea of Galilee, He shined upon them like a great light, shining in the darkness and in the region and shadow of death…John the Baptist was a great magnet. But the Lord Jesus is the greatest magnet of all. As He shined upon those four disciples, they were attracted and captured. They immediately forsook their jobs and followed this little Nazarene.

　　In Matthew 4 there is no record, as in Luke 5, of any miracle being done by the Lord when Peter was called. However, in Matthew 4 there was the great light that attracted the first four disciples. This attraction came not from what the Lord Jesus did; it came from what He was. He was a great light, a great magnet, with the power to attract people and to capture them. In this way He attracted and captured the first four disciples. No one who follows the Lord because of what He does can be trustworthy or faithful. The trustworthy ones are those who are caught by what the Lord is. Peter, Andrew, James, and John were attracted and captured at the seashore not by seeing what the Lord did but by realizing what the Lord was. Because they had been attracted and captured, they became faithful followers of the Lord Jesus unto the end. Eventually, they were all martyred because they followed the King of the heavenly kingdom.

　　Moreover, when the Lord Jesus called these four disciples, He did not start a movement or a revolution. Rather, He attracted the disciples to Himself for the establishment of the kingdom of the heavens. (Life-study of Matthew, p. 146)

　　Further Reading: Life-study of Matthew, msgs. 12, 27