27 ¶ And they come again to Jerusalem: and as he was
walking in the temple, there come to him the chief priests, and the scribes,
and the elders,
28
And say unto him, By what
authority doest thou these things? and who gave thee this authority to do these
things?
29
And Jesus answered and said
unto them, I will also ask of you one question, and answer me, and I will tell
you by what authority I do these things.
30
The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men? answer me.
31
And they reasoned with
themselves, saying, If we shall say, From heaven; he will say, Why then did ye
not believe him?
32
But if we shall say, Of men;
they feared the people: for all men counted
John, that he was a prophet indeed.
33
And they answered and said
unto Jesus, We cannot tell. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Neither do I
tell you by what authority I do these things. (Mark 11:27-33)
Many
commentators like to go into great depth about the trap laid for Jesus in their
question. They also usually point to Jesus’s counter-question as a brilliant
defense by which He puts them all in their place.
Yet something
about it struck me as odd. I began to wonder what we are supposed to learn from
this incident that can help us. Are we to learn that Jesus can unequivocally
win arguments and devastate the opposition? Is winning the argument His
goal? Does this help us in our conversations
about the gospel?
It seems to
me that when faced with a question about His authority, Jesus’s major goal would
be persuading someone to recognize His power to redeem. The question in His
mind would be, If I tell you, will you
acknowledge my authority and allow me to save you? He might want to know if
they were asking sincerely or out of bad faith. Because He wants to save
everyone, He has to assume sincerity until they prove bad faith.
He asks a
question to learn from them. I see this incident as instance in which Christ
demonstrated His meekness and lowliness of heart. He didn’t ask, “Why do you
want to know?” He asked whether they thought John’s baptism was from heaven or
of men. His question is meant to discern their level of sincerity and belief. He knew their
ability to respond positively to a prophet in their day would determine their
ability to respond to the Messiah.
It is interesting
that the reasoning of the chief priests, scribes, and elders was captured in
the record in verses 31-32. (As an exercise, just try reading the account
without that reasoning inserted, and you’ll see how it might have looked to
everyone else who wasn’t privy to the motivation coloring the answer of those
leaders.)
Their
reasoning indicates that they thought His question was a trap. This was pure
projection on their part. They thought Jesus was doing to them what they were
trying to do to Him. If they had been sincere, they might have seen His question
for what it really was. And I hardly think they’d want such a blatantly
self-interested politically-obsessed thought process to get about, but someone overheard, and now it is
memorialized for all time.
Since they
claimed they couldn’t tell whether John’s baptism was from heaven or men, Jesus
knew then that they’d be similarly obtuse in public about Jesus’s authority. He
probably said to Himself, I can’t do
anything with people who ‘can’t tell,’ when it’s so obvious, so I guess I can’t
tell them anything about my authority either because they won’t get it. And He wouldn’t push His
authority on them; He wouldn’t want to condemn them so quickly. He’d want to
give them more time in hopes that He could save them later.
One thing I
learn from this incident is that Jesus chooses whether to answer a question
based upon the receptiveness of the hearer. Even though those leaders thought
they were saving face by refusing to commit, they actually disqualified
themselves from receiving a real answer. Seeming wishy-washy or obtuse marked
them as having spiritual problems, even if they concealed for a time that their
problem was outright hostility. It is particularly sad that these were chief priests, scribes, and elders, men
who should have been most spiritually mature and receptive.
Jesus’s test
question is still a good one for today. How we respond to a modern prophet
determines how receptive we’d be to Jesus Himself. If we ‘can’t tell’ if a
modern prophet is from God, when his goodness has been demonstrated over years,
then our ability to receive revelation is diminished. On the positive side, if
we respond to the modern prophet and apostles, we will be receptive to
revelation and receptive to Jesus Himself.
I also think
that Jesus’s willingness to take time and ask questions of the questioner to
gauge where they were at is a good pattern to follow in gospel conversations.
If people ask us questions about the church or the gospel, maybe it would be
wise to first take time to ask them
questions about what experiences have brought them to us or what they believe
so that we can better meet them where they are spiritually.
