Matthew 16:1-4: The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times? An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away.
Recently, I spoke about the danger of unbelief in our series on the promises of God. It is the mother of all sins. Unbelief is the root cause for the fall of man and original sin. Unbelief is not only the mother of all sins, it is like a crawling snake in our heart that lays many eggs for all other sins in our lives. This is the reason why God’s chosen people, Israel, after being delivered from Egypt and walking in the parted sea, went as far as the border of Canaan, but did not enter. They wandered for 40 years, and their bodies were scattered in the wilderness; only two entered Canaan. What was the reason? Unbelief.
Today, the danger of unbelief in our heart is very terrible. It is the cause of all sins. It fills us with worldly worries and chokes the Word, so there is no fruit. Instead of filling our mouth with praise, it fills it with murmurs and doubts about God. If unbelief is in our heart, even if God parts the sea before us, speaks through the thunders of Sinai, and redeems us from the 10 plagues, and even if the greatest preacher like the Son of God comes and preaches about hell to us, we can remain as if we have a cow skin—no feeling, no fear, no shaking. We continue walking in our evil ways. How can many believe even after hearing the Son of God, yet still go to hell? I will tell you; it is because if the heart is surrounded by a big Jericho wall, covered with elephant skin, or many layers of mud like unbelief, all the messages, promises, and threats are prevented from having any effect upon him.
You come and sit with unbelief, even if God is moving here powerfully this morning. God may be speaking powerfully to your brothers, but unbelief makes you sit here in times of revival and of the outpouring of God’s grace, unmoved, uncalled, unsaved, yawning, and sleepy. That is the power of unbelief. James says whatever is not of faith is sin. Just think about it: our worship, prayer, singing, and good works, if not done in faith, are done in unbelief, and it is sin. It is impossible to please God without faith, says Hebrews.
Hebrews warns us so much: if those in the Old Testament did not believe Moses’ words, God punished them severely. God speaks to you from heaven today through the Holy Spirit. If you are careless about such great salvation, how will you escape punishment? There is one sin for which Christ never died; there is no atonement: it is the sin of unbelief. There is an atonement made for the unbelief of the elect because it is temporary; he repents and grows in faith. But for the final, permanent unbelief—there is no atonement. This is sin against the Holy Spirit, and this is what each of us should be alarmed about. Be careful; if you have a continuing unbelief, it can become permanent unbelief. By that, we show we were not saved at all and not elect at all. We prove we are truly saved by continuing faith. Continuing unbelief leads to permanent unbelief. So, continuing unbelief is very dangerous.
The passage we will look at today in Matthew 16:1-4 shows in a graphic way how a continuing unbelief becomes a permanent unbelief. Today, as we look at this passage, I will show you what the signs of continuing unbelief are. You have to examine your hearts and see if you have these signs, and repent and pray to God. Otherwise, this will become permanent, and then there is no salvation.
Those of you sitting here, you may come every week and keep hearing and going, and you are not even aware you are living in unbelief. You wonder why sermons don’t affect your life; it’s just a Sunday religious show. If you continue in unbelief, it will not keep you at one stage. See the stages it will take you:
Three Stages of Unbelief
- Unbelief will make you reject all truth and seek fellowship with the dark world.
- Unbelief will make you attack the truth to justify yourself.
- Unbelief makes God lose His patience with you, permanently give you blindness, and cause you to be abandoned by God.
Unbelief Will Make You Reject All Truth and Seek Fellowship with the Dark World
The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven.
We saw last time that our Lord was in the Gentile region, doing amazing miracles. After that, the end of chapter 15 in verse 39 says, “He came to Magadan,” the other side of Galilee. As soon as He gets out of the boat, He’s back in Jewish territory. Now, as soon as He steps on the Jewish shore, He is immediately hit by His enemies. They are just waiting, and very directly and aggressively come to Him. These are men who have seen and heard of all the miracles that He did in their Israel. They heard the truth from His mouth, saw all the miracles, and now would have also heard about all His works on the other side. In spite of all the teaching and miracles that gave testimony to His truth, what did they do? They wanted to continue in willful unbelief. These people, continuing in unbelief, teach us how continuing unbelief can lead to permanent unbelief.
If you continue in unbelief, it will make you blind to all the truth and seek the fellowship of the dark world. Look at these people, who the Pharisees are coming with. Verse 1 says, “The Pharisees with Sadducees came.”
If you lived in Israel those days, you would not believe this happened. You would rub your eyes and think this is some printing mistake. The most marvelous, amazing, and unbelievable thing about that is that the Pharisees and the Sadducees could get together to do anything. The Greek language uses “with,” as if they were hand-in-hand, not separated.
Now, unless you know a little bit of the background, you’re not going to understand the importance of this. They hated each other; they were mortal enemies. Compared to the Sadducees, the Pharisees were much better; they believed the Old Testament. The lowest level for them was to join the Sadducees, like joining the worldly men who don’t believe anything. They were completely opposite.
The Pharisees were fundamentalists and legalists. They believed the entire Old Testament and a literal interpretation of the law; they were theologians. But their problem was they also believed in the traditions, yet were very strict and outwardly religious.
The Sadducees were liberals, completely worldly, luxuriant, and lived for this world. They didn’t believe the entire Old Testament, only the five books of Law, and even those they gave a spiritual meaning to, so they had not much effect. They rejected traditions, which the Pharisees kept strongly. So, they were even outwardly very sinful and cheating, adjusting with politicians and the Roman government, agreeing to anything the government said. One of their daughters married Herod. That is why Rome liked the Sadducees but hated the Pharisees. That is why they allowed the High Priest to be a Sadducee. Sadducees always lived with rich people, the aristocrats; Pharisees were common people. Pharisees wanted to live outwardly pure and not mingle with Gentiles. The Sadducees loved to get mingled up politically with the Gentile culture. They were compromisers. They were politicians. They were whatever was expedient—opportunistic worldly men.
While the Pharisees believed in angels, spirits, and the resurrection of the dead, the Sadducees did not. But both groups fought against each other for the dominance of their views over the hearts and minds of the Jewish population. They had very strong disagreements, and would even catch throats and fight, especially about the resurrection. Sadducees never believed and thought it foolish, but Pharisees believed it.
In fact, there’s kind of an amusing incident in the life of the apostle Paul where he was on trial late in the book of Acts. He was on trial before the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and to sort of redirect everybody away from him, he just said, “I believe in the resurrection,” and the battle started between them. Since the Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection, they didn’t believe in the soul, angels, or after-life. They did not believe in immortality. What did they believe? Actually, nothing. “Eat, drink, and enjoy, for tomorrow we die,” that was their life—completely worldly. They were theological liberals. The Pharisees were theological conservatives. And all he had to do was say, “I believe in the resurrection,” and they were at each other’s throat, and it says there was a great dissension and the whole place was divided. Now, that’s just a little insight into how those groups got along. Not well.
Most times, they were opposite and unadjustable parties, like Congress and BJP now. These two parties were literally at each other’s throats, and the amazing thing is that they got together here to come to Jesus to attack Him. How come? It is like two dogs fighting each other who both see a big cat cross the trail. And all of a sudden their fight ends as they pursue the common goal. And so they stopped their own war.
See what unbelief has done to the Pharisees. They knew the Old Testament prophecies, and they were at least outwardly religiously living. If they had opened their hearts in belief, they could have come to the light. Instead, they continued in unbelief. After seeing all Jesus did and hearing all the truth, their unbelief makes them seek fellowship with those sinful, political, dark Sadducees who don’t believe anything—completely worldly men. They seek fellowship with the world, and instead of seeking the light, instead of coming to Christ, they go back into the pit of darkness.
That is what happens to people with willfully continuing unbelief. They do not come to the light for the answer; they go back into the dark, worldly pit to justify themselves. They are not willing to admit their sinfulness and come to truth.
I wonder why so many people don’t take any effort to know more of God’s word or learn the promises. All their delight is in worldly friends and relatives, and they waste so much time in the darkness of worldly entertainment, mobile use, and fellowship of darkness. We tell them to spend time with God’s word and learn from pastors and other brothers, but they continue in dark, worldly fellowship and avoid close contacts with pastors, church people, or trying to understand the truth. They maintain distance, just coming on Sunday and escaping. They seek fellowship with the dark world but avoid spiritual fellowship. I wonder we have these weekly meetings; people regularly come and want to learn and grow, which is such a blessing. But a few of you avoid them. Have you asked why? Could it be that there is continuing unbelief in your heart? I understand sometimes it is not possible because of certain reasons. But when you regularly avoid them when we ask you to read and prepare and come, you avoid. Have you asked why you love worldly fellowship so much, not spiritual fellowship? Why you have so much worldly interest, spending so much time in those things? Why you are unable to spend time in God’s word? Why you have no spiritual interest? James says friendship with the world is enmity against God. One proverb put it this way: Birds of a feather flock together. Seeking worldly fellowship instead of spiritual fellowship. Be careful. It is a sign of someone with willful continuing unbelief. Beware so it doesn’t become permanent unbelief. I notice some of them, after some time, very sadly fall away. It may take years. I speak as a pastor with a burden: some of those who left our church—I could see this as the first sign: more worldly fellowship, avoiding meetings, avoiding coming to these meetings, and slowly becoming irregular to church, morning but not evening. Then you hear, they are gone with the world.
So we see ritualists Pharisees and Sadducees join hands to come and attack Jesus.
Continuing Unbelief Attacks the Truth
Next, we see that continuing unbelief not only seeks dark, worldly fellowship, but to justify themselves, those with unbelief will attack the truth.
Verse 1: The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven.
Jesus was becoming more and more famous among the people, and His enemies were losing popularity. In spite of seeing such divine miracles that prove He is none other than God, they did not believe. The reason was that in their heart they knew if they believed, they would have to leave their hypocritical religion, repent, and come to Christ humbly. To avoid that, instead of doing that, continuing in unbelief, and wanting to justify themselves, they came and attacked the truth.
See these people; they came and asked Him for a sign. Now, to appreciate what an outlandish, foolish request this is, you have to put things in their context. Jesus had just performed a wonderful miracle. He had fed a multitude of people—4,000 men, plus the women and children—with a few loaves of bread and a few small fish. Prior to that, He had fed 5,000 men, plus the women and children, through a similar miracle. Where did He get that food? Not from the earth. There were many times that Jesus had healed great multitudes of sick people and cast out demons. He had cleansed lepers with a touch, given sight to the blind, and cast out demons with but a command. And these miracles all testified together to the fact that Jesus Christ is the long-awaited, promised Messiah—through whose ministry the Scriptures said that “the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf hear. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing” (Isaiah 35:5-6). What’s more, these were not things that He did in hiding. He did them publicly.
If this deputation of Pharisees and Sadducees had sincerely wanted a sign from heaven, they had already been given many. Specifically, one very notable sign in public: We’re told that, at Jesus’ baptism, “the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased'” (Matthew 3:16-17). This became the testimony of John the Baptist to some of these same inquisitors; for he said, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God” (John 1:32-34).
But in spite of all this, they still demanded more. In any event, they weren’t satisfied with how Jesus had already proven Himself. They were not satisfied with what God had already done to testify of Him. They demanded “a sign from heaven.” Continuing unbelief will always keep asking for more and more evidence.
Perhaps they wanted Him to cause the winds to blow down from the clouds and part the sea, as it did in Moses’ day. Perhaps they wanted Him to cause the sun to stand still in the firmament, as it did in Joshua’s day. Perhaps they wanted Him to cause fire to come down from the sky and consume an offering, as it did in Elijah’s day. They wanted more. They despised the healings and the feedings of poor people as a “small thing.” For them, they were big leaders, so He should “show big.” They wanted something big and dramatic—not just something “on earth.” They wanted to dictate the terms and demanded a sign from heaven of their choosing. The very fact that they asked that question is indicative of the fact that they had rejected every single thing He’d already done as being anything evidential of His Messiahship. If they had an open heart like Nicodemus, they would have said, “We know that no man can do what you do except God be with him” (John 3:2).
Finally, notice the motive behind this demand for a sign. It wasn’t because they truly wanted a sign so they could believe. The text tells us they came “testing Him.” They didn’t want to test and see and believe He was truly the Son of God. They were growing in unbelief and had already said, “He casts out demons by the ruler of the demons” (Matthew 9:34). Rather, they were seeking to trap Him in order to discredit Him in front of the crowds and to justify their hard-heartedness toward Him.
When they made this request, they already knew what His response would be, because they had already asked this sort of thing of Him once before. Remember Matthew 12:38? Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:38-40).
Our Lord never did miracles for show or to please men. He declared, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19). Only at the pleasure of the Father did our Lord perform miracles—never to be showy or to appeal to the crowds or even to draw a crowd. A “sign” was useful to authenticate the ministry of the Messiah, and certainly that had adequately taken place! Yet signs were never done promiscuously for men’s entertainment or crass motive. They knew Jesus would not do the sign they wanted, as He didn’t last time. By using His denial, they planned to discredit Him before the crowd. They were trying to get Him to do something He wouldn’t do, so He could be publicly shamed and embarrassed.
In their continuing unbelief, they rejected all revelation of truth, but to justify themselves, they came and attacked the truth. If you are sitting here and you see in your life that when God’s truth is revealed, you should bow your head humbly, repent, and change yourself. But do you attack the truth to justify your sin, habits, or unbelief? You can do this subtly by attacking the pastor or church, or by offering excuses. If that is the case, you may be having continuing unbelief. Continuing unbelief will not leave at one stage; first, it seeks fellowship with the dark world, and then to justify yourself, it will make you attack the truth. That is the next terrible stage. This can grow and reach a stage where you attack the whole truth.
See the hardness of continuing unbelief; it makes you reject all evidence and truth, even when the Son of God preached. And then you attack the truth. When you get to that stage, it is very dangerous; you are close to becoming fixed in permanent unbelief. Like Pharaoh, God kept demonstrating His power, and Pharaoh kept hardening his heart once, twice, rejecting all truth. The third time, it says God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Finally, God just devastated the whole kingdom.
You see, unbelief will always find a way to reject the truth. Always. Even today, people are sitting here, and God has given all truth authenticated by miracles and signs. Why do some of you not believe them? God says if you don’t believe what God’s Word says, the problem is not with the truth, but with your heart of unbelief, which makes you reject all the truth and blinds you, making you seek dark, worldly fellowship.
Ask your heart: sometimes, don’t you attack the truth to justify yourself instead of bowing and repenting? Why is there no growing holiness, peace, forgiveness, or love growing? Now you may be biting your teeth and controlling, or ignoring. If you get an opportunity, you will attack the truth. Examine yourself; that is because your heart has this terrible disease of continuing unbelief. I know someone who has been with us and learned so much truth, but is now rejecting all that, and I can imagine them coming and attacking the truth and saying, “I know there is still tongues; we are wrong.” That is true. In their conscience, they know they are justifying that to cover up their sin and love for the world. Just to justify their continuing unbelief, they have now gotten to the stage of attacking the truth. Dangerous stage.
You see, if you continue in unbelief, it will not keep you at one stage. First, it seeks fellowship with the dark world, and rejects all truth, and then to justify yourself, it attacks the truth. When someone gets to that stage, see what the Lord does. He loses patience, blinds them, and abandons them.
Unbelief Makes God Lose His Patience
Let us look at the Lord’s answer. It is masterful. If you compare it with Mark, He gives three responses: emotional, verbal, and physical.
Emotional Response
It says there, in Mark 8:12, Mark says, “He sighed deeply in His spirit.” Those are the kinds of things in the Bible that intrigue my imagination. I can hear what Jesus says, and I can understand it, but when I read that, “He sighed deeply in His spirit,” I wonder what His emotions were. I wonder what He was feeling, what kind of pain. It is the sort of “Ugh,” the sort of exhaustion that comes when you’ve done everything you can do, and all you get is this, and you sigh because you know the fate. Great emotion gripped His heart.
If we sigh when we have had enough, who can read when the Son of God sighed? It means He sighed and groaned from the depths of His spirit. There was deep emotion, a sign of deepest grief and indignation at the continuing, willful unbelief. Oh, what hatred and frustration! Seeing what their willful unbelief would bring upon them, and what horrible judgment would come on them, He sighs with deepest grief. In spite of your depraved condition, instead of plunging you into the deepest hell, I myself come in all humility and reveal the truth. Instead of falling prostrate and repenting, you live in continuing unbelief, seek the dark world to avoid the truth, and then reject all truth and attack the truth to justify yourself. It makes Him see you and sigh. Oh, so deep that must be! This is the beginning of His weeping over the city of Jerusalem, seeing their impending judgment. This is a sigh mingled with grief and anger, righteous indignation. These blind leaders of the blind, in their blind indignation and prejudice, how much terrible judgment will come on them! In spite of all the truth, they come and ask for a sign. It is as if there was a deep volcano inside that deeply sighs and comes out. The Lord first responds with the deepest emotion of a sigh. He deeply sighed; He lost it; it was over for them. They made the Son of God sigh over their case. That is why I said continuing unbelief makes God lose His patience.
Verbal Response
With a sigh, He rebukes them in an artistically masterful way. Look at verse 2.
But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times?
Those days, there was no weather forecast, right? So even today, many can see the sky and predict the weather. That is what He says. “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening’”—that’s a poor man’s weather report.
Luke records a similar instance: “Whenever you see a cloud rising out of the west, immediately you say, ‘A shower is coming’; and so it is. And when you see the south wind blow, you say, ‘There will be hot weather.’”
We do that, right? We look at the weather before washing clothes to see whether to wash them or not. We will look at the weather: “No cloudy, not dry, so tomorrow.” We had a program in our house after Friday night for men, but I saw the weather continuing rain from Monday to Friday, so I canceled Thursday. But it didn’t rain on Thursday.
You are so careful about worldly signs, but you call yourselves spiritual men, yet cannot discern the signs of the times?
They ask for a sign. He severely rebukes their pretense in seeking a sign from Him. You Pharisees and Sadducees, calling yourselves spiritual leaders and guides, you ask me for a sign from heaven. You say you are so spiritual and godly. You have the ability to read the sky. They could take a look at the signs that were already “in the heavens” and could make accurate predictions and affirmations about the weather. They are so clever and sharp with worldly signs. But calling yourselves spiritual guides, you are unable to discern “the signs of the times.”
Spiritually, you don’t recognize the times you are living in. They were not recognizing what the apostle Paul later affirmed, that “when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son” (Galatians 3:4). Prophecies in the book of Daniel had already specified—centuries prior—the very time when the Messiah would come and lay down His life. In Daniel 9:25-26, from the command to restore and build Jerusalem until the Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; “And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off…” They should have been watching for Him, for the signs of the times pointed to His coming. Nor had they recognized the promises in the Old Testament about the coming of John the Baptist, “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness” (John 1:23), who was promised in Isaiah 40:3-5. He gave testimony to Christ.
Even in those times they were living, there were ample signs available to them, if only they had a believing heart. Oh, they could see all the signs of the times! Even the wise men far away in Persia, with little Bible knowledge, knowing the time and seeing the stars, came looking for Christ and worshipped Him. It is their continuing unbelief that made them blind. He calls them hypocrites. They are spiritual phonies. If you had a believing heart and were really spiritual men, like Simeon and Anna, who even when Christ was a baby, recognized Him as the Messiah and knew it was the time of the Messiah, but you are not only blind to the signs of the times, but even after seeing all these miracles, the signs of the Messiah that prove without doubt my identity, your unbelieving hearts make you blind. You are hypocrites.
Oh, you are so good at telling the weather, so accurately with worldly things. You’re real good with the physical perceptions. You can see the sign, the clouds and the red sky, and you can say so and so about the weather, but you hypocrites, you can discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times.” And what He is saying to them is simply this: Your sensitivity to weather makes a mockery out of your insensitivity to God’s Kingdom, because you are not meteorologists. You pass yourselves off as theologians, and frankly, you’re better at the weather than you are at theology. What an indictment!
You are so shrewd and experts in worldly things, so careful, but blind and senseless when it comes to the Kingdom of God. They were experts in the physical realm, but blind as a bat in the spiritual realm.
You can’t know what a blast that was, because the one thing they thought they knew was the spiritual. They knew what God was doing. They are teachers in Israel; they know everything about God’s plan and the Messiah. They were the religious experts, the theological experts, the experts on the Kingdom movements of God, and all of that, and Jesus said, “You haven’t got a clue. You don’t even know what’s going on. You are blind to all the prophecies of the Messiah—His coming, His mission. You didn’t recognize John the Baptist. You didn’t recognize the Messiah. You didn’t know what the miracles meant. You didn’t know what My teachings meant. You missed the whole thing.” What a rebuke! Foolish fellows.
Then verse 4: An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away.
Unbelief Makes God Abandon Them
Here we see the third point: Unbelief makes God lose His patience; He permanently blinds and abandons them. Those continuing in unbelief will be permanently made blind and abandoned by God.
He calls them wicked because they’re so morally evil, and adulterous because they have defected from their relationship to God. They are an unfaithful wife, so they’re adulterous spiritually. You wicked, unfaithful people are seeking a sign.
This generation has a heart that is morally evil and perverse, and a religiously adulterous relationship spiritually with God. In the midst of this kind of heart, Mark puts it as a question: Why does this generation seek a sign? With this heart, what can any sign do to such a heart? They should repent first of their state. Instead of that, in their pride and arrogance, they seek a sign.
How much more “wicked” can a generation be than to persistently reject and harden itself against the “signs of the times” that God had been setting before them? And how much more of an “adulterous” ‘covenant-breaking’ generation can a generation be than to reject the very Messiah God had promised and had authenticated before their very eyes? Only a “wicked” and “adulterous” generation would continue to ask for signs in such a context—only proving that they were never really interested in signs at all.
The reason anyone continues in unbelief is because they have a wicked and adulterous heart. Such a heart, bent on wickedness, in an adulterous relationship, always wanting to stray away from God to other idols, such a heart, instead of believing, will always keep asking for more signs and signs, and never believe. Again, examine your heart: why don’t you believe? Are you waiting for some sign from God before you believe and turn? The deception of the heart makes you continue in unbelief and live a wicked and adulterous relationship with God.
Well, no sign will be given you. I’m not giving any special signs to wicked, adulterous, unbelieving people. The point there is God doesn’t go around trying to convince the willfully unbelieving heart that seeks fellowship with the dark world and attacks the light. There’s no sign. The only sign, and that’s going to be a sign for everybody, is the sign of the prophet Jonah. What is that? What is the sign of the prophet Jonah? Back in chapter 12, verse 39, He says, “An evil and adulterous generation seek after a sign. There shall no sign be given it but the sign of the prophet Jonah.” Listen. “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. And the men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation and condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, a greater than Jonah is here.”
Here’s the sign. The sign is the sign of Jonah, which is the resurrection. Jonah was a type, or an example, or a model, or an illustration of Christ going into the grave and rising. The only sign you’re going to see is the resurrection. Jonah, having been spit up by the great fish and walking around alive in Nineveh, was a sign to the Ninevites. And Jesus, having been raised out of the tomb on the third day and presenting Himself alive in Jerusalem, was a sign to that wicked and adulterous generation.
Imagine how it will be for Sadducees who don’t believe in the resurrection, and Pharisees who believe in the resurrection. That is the point that terribly separates you; that will be the only sign for you I will give. For the Sadducees, that will throw all false teaching to the gutter. For the Pharisees, that will show how hypocritical your belief and religion is. Though you claim belief in resurrection, you will not believe.
In fact, it is a sign to the whole world. As he writes in Romans 1:4, he speaks concerning God’s Son Jesus Christ, “who was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.” As Paul said to the Athenians in Acts 17:31, God has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness “by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.”
The Pharisees and Sadducees came to test Jesus. But the resurrection is what tests all people. To those who seek a sign in order to justify their unbelief, the resurrection of Jesus is the only sign that they will be given. Only Jonah’s generation will be better off than you are, because Jonah’s generation repented, and you won’t. And they didn’t, did they?
Did they repent at that sign? What did they do when they heard of the resurrection? In fact, these same religious leaders, when they knew of the resurrection, took money and bribed the soldiers not to say anything about Him rising. That’s how blind and hardened they were. Even when the resurrection happened, they bought off the soldiers’ silence with money.
So the Lord says that is the only sign, and notice what He does after that. The end of verse 4: “He left them and departed.”
That is a severe word. Emphasis falls solemnly on the main verb. Having left them with resolution, using the same word the disciples used when they left their nets to follow Jesus. And again saying, He departed. He went away decisively, resolutely, and determinately. He refuses to talk and make any more influence on them. He leaves and departs. He abandoned them. And when God abandons somebody, that is the most severe of all acts, and that’s what happens to people who are continually unbelieving, seek fellowship of the dark world, attack the truth to justify themselves, and God loses patience and permanently blinds them, and abandons them. They’re abandoned by God. What a sad ending.
Applications: A Sobering Warning Against Unbelief
I have tried to show you throughout this sermon how dangerous continuing unbelief is. What a sobering warning! I don’t know how you feel, but this sigh of Jesus should haunt us. We need to keep remembering that the Son of God, mixed with grief and anger, sighed. It should repeatedly haunt us. Why did He sigh, rebuke so terribly, and turn His heel and leave them?
See the repulsive power of unbelief. This is the Jesus who was never repulsed. When He looked at lepers full of wounds, bleeding pus and blood, when they cried, He drew near and even touched them. Forget the Jews; no decent person would do that. He was not repulsed when the harlot was completely degraded and useless; He allowed her to come to Him. He allowed one of them to wash His feet with tears and wipe them with her hair. He was not repulsed by the demon-possessed man, Legion, but healed him and showed mercy to all.
But see how terribly He was repulsed by continuing unbelief that caused Him to deeply sigh, turn His heel, and depart. That is a preview of hell: “Depart from Me.” Oh, the repulsive power of unbelief! This was the last overture of mercy. Oh, how frightening it can be! The Son of God, who saw the worst sinners and was not repulsed, was so angry at unbelief. How different His reaction here! When He saw the Canaanite woman, He said with joy, “Woman, let it be done as you wish.” Here, He says, “You will not get anything—not even a sign,” and leaves them.
Examine Your Heart
Each of you, examine your heart and dread unbelief in your heart. It will drive Christ away in anger, hate, and frustration. You will never experience any grace from Him; you will not know His forgiveness, mercy, peace, or the sweetness of His presence. “He that believeth not shall be damned.” Oh, let me plead! This sigh should make you dread unbelief in your life more than anything.
It is not just saying, “I have faith.” How is your faith exercised? If it is living faith, it will grow. It is only dead faith that, no matter how much truth you hear, doesn’t change you in any way. Instead, you seek fellowship with the dark world, and at a point, even attack the truth to justify yourselves, and you become permanently unbelieving and blind.
If you are a person who is regularly hearing God’s truth, is your faith growing? Or do you come, hear, and go, and seek worldly fellowship, completely focused on the world, just outwardly coming once a week to church? Do you see how this passage shows there comes a point God may sigh and lose patience with you, permanently blind you, and even abandon you?
Why should you continue in unbelief? What else do you need to come to true, living faith in Jesus Christ? How else should He prove He is indeed the Son of God? He has proved Himself by His works that He is the Son of God.
If you are still continuing in unbelief today, hoping God will do some special sign, and from that day you will believe and change, you will never have that sign, because the one final sign He has already given. He says that no sign would be given to that generation “except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” If a man doesn’t believe and repent in this sign, he has an evil and adulterous heart; nothing else will make him repent.
Never expect God to do anything for you if you don’t believe and repent. The rich man in hell said, “Send somebody to tell my brothers,” and the Lord says, “Well, if they don’t believe Moses and the prophets, they’re not going to believe that somebody rose from the dead.” If you don’t believe the resurrection of Christ and His gospel, nothing else will save you. No other sign; that is the greatest sign. Do you see how unjust your continuing unbelief is? Oh, repent of it!
Resurrection is the one sign that validates the effectiveness of Christ’s death as a substitute for us before the judgment of God. When God raised Him from the dead, it was enough. Do any of us need more than the resurrection of Christ to believe in Him? What does this resurrection declare?
- It declares that God has accepted Christ’s death on our behalf so that in Christ, our sins have been paid, God has been propitiated (or satisfied), and there is nothing more to add (Romans 3:24-26; Hebrews 10:11-14).
- It proves the Bible is absolutely true and the Word of God, because the Scriptures said He would rise.
- It proves He is indeed the Son of God.
- It proves all those who believe in Jesus Christ will rise like Him.
- It proves there is going to be an inevitable judgment. Therefore, everyone should repent now right away.
What else can God do?
Soliloquy: The Serpent of Unbelief
Oh, my soul! Does this serpent of unbelief crawl in our hearts? What is the root cause of so few spiritual experiences? He who believes in Him, rivers of living water flow. Where is the living water? What is blocking that water? Why so little growth in grace? Why so little victory in prayer, so little belief in promises, so little comfort, peace, and joy of the Holy Spirit in my life? What is the cause of all these troubles, worldly worries, worldly-mindedness, and spiritual blindness? Is this not unbelief? Oh Lord, deliver me from this poisonous serpent that is poisoning my soul!
Unbelief Reveals a Wicked and Adulterous Heart
Secondly, this passage teaches that those who continue in unbelief have a wicked and adulterous heart. Why don’t you believe? Ask yourself honestly, is it not because you don’t want to leave your fellowship with the world and sin? You want both God and the world. That is why your heart is adulterous, living with two husbands. God hates that. You have to repent and come to Christ wholeheartedly. May God help you to see the wickedness of your heart and the spiritual adultery you are living in.
Worldly Skill vs. Spiritual Blindness
Third, what a rebuke this is for people who have so much skill in worldly things but so poor spiritual perception.
You know there are so-called Christians who have so much knowledge about so many things: ask them about politics, where the best discount sale is, where to get good food, gold prices, the stock market, real estate, what the latest movies are, when they will be released—eagerly waiting—latest fashions, dress, trends in entertainment. They know so many things going on in the physical world, but have zero spiritual perception and have no clue about the times or opportunities in the Kingdom of God. How sad that you are so wise about these temporary, perishing things, but zero perception on the eternal Kingdom of God!
He gave the weather example to the Pharisees. What would Christ give you? You don’t know so many things in the Bible. There is no progress in your spiritual life, but you know so much about movies, sports, fashion, and how to manage finances. You are so lively and make so much effort with worldly things, but are as if dead in spiritual life. Why is your spiritual perception so poor? Don’t make any effort to make progress in spiritual life.
Do we recognize the signs of the times now? By reading God’s Word, in prayer, and watching world events, do we recognize what the signs in the Kingdom of God are? Do you know what period in the flow of redemptive history we live in? You know so many seasons and times.
They do not know what time it is. Think about how foolish a man will be if he doesn’t know what time it is. He will go wrong in everything—unprepared and late. Office at the wrong time, leaving at the wrong time, will not finish anything on time, cannot attend. On Sunday, he may think it’s Monday, so confused. In the same way, in spiritual life, do we know what time it is in redemptive history? We will be wrong in everything.
Time refers to an event or an opportunity. Do we recognize that we are living in the period between Christ’s first and second coming, and what great gospel opportunities we have? This is a great acceptable time. Do we recognize the signs of the times in our days and live accordingly? Do we recognize with spiritual perception what God is doing in the world now? Are we blind as bats? When God is doing something glorious, we are stuck in worldly things in unbelief. In Revelation, we see glorious events happening before our eyes in the spiritual world, but we can be in a state of unbelief: “You cannot distinguish what is happening right before your own eyes!” Something so significant, so incomparable, is happening, and you are oblivious to it!
Looking at history, for how many years did people not have the Bible? Do you realize the importance of these moments that we share together in God’s Word? This is one of those events, happenings, and opportunities in the providence of God to hear, think, and respond to the revelation of Christ.
Do we recognize that in a country filled with all false Arminian teaching, what a great privilege it is to hear and be blessed by pure reformed truths and be in such a church? Do we recognize what God is doing through us?
These Pharisees had signs all over the place about the coming Messiah and His works, but missed it. Are we living like that? We believe in the second coming of Christ. The signs are everywhere. Do you know what they are? Do you know the hour in which you live? Do you know we are living in the last days? Do you know the characteristics of the last day and how the Bible tells us to live in the last day? Ah, all that I don’t know, but I know what time the news comes.
If you start looking at the signs, they’re all over the place, and if Jesus says here, “You should know the signs of the times,” then, boy, we ought to know them now. We ought to know what time it is.
The disciples in Matthew 24 said to Him, “Lord, what are the signs of the coming of the Son of man? What do we look for?” And He said to them, “Well, there’ll be wars and rumors of wars.” We see that. “There’ll be pestilence, earthquakes, famines.” We see that. Never have we seen such pestilence just before our eyes. What does this teach about the last days? Will you continue in unbelief even during this time, be blind, and never let it affect your heart and life? There are rumors of wars between countries. Our country and China—is that not happening right before our eyes? “There’ll be false prophets and false christs arise.” And the world is proliferating itself with all these false religious leaders.
And here we are alive in the time when these things are happening. Many things in Revelation are happening before our eyes: Babylon, world economic systems falling down. Everyone in the world will see what is happening. Mass media and communication are making it possible: one ruler and kingdom, the Antichrist, increased knowledge, globalization, one world ruler. This is the end of the age, and I hope you see the signs of the times.
I hope you’re more interested in looking at the Bible than you are looking at the TV and mobile, not to be blind like those Pharisees. Looking at the Bible than you are looking at the headlines. Finding out what God is doing, because the truth is it doesn’t matter what men are doing. Only what God is doing matters. Do you know the time according to God’s clock? That is most important. We should not live lively to the physical and dead to the spiritual. Examine yourself; unbelief can make us like that.
The Church’s Duty
Fourth, this passage teaches an important principle about our duty. We must never allow unbelieving men to dictate the terms on which they will accept the credibility of the claims of Christ. Jesus came doing God’s will and revealed Himself in miracles, teaching, and life as the Father planned. The Pharisees came and said, “Not enough, we need a sign from heaven.” Jesus never allowed them to dictate. He says, “Never.” “I do My Father’s will. If My Father’s way of revealing Myself is not enough, then perish in your continuing unbelief.”
We need to remember this. If the world claims, “If you are saying the gospel on which my eternal state depends, then prove it to me; do some miracles and we will believe.” Where does the Bible say we should do miracles as a church to make disciples? The world keeps telling us, “If the church has to be heard, then solve our social problems, politics problems, economic problems, war problems, then we will listen.” We have to say, “No, truly I say to you, no.” Just as the Father had given Jesus a task to reveal Himself, we have a task to make disciples, not by solving social problems or doing miracles, but by preaching the gospel and His resurrection. We have to shine before men in holiness, as lights blameless in a perverse generation. That is how we make disciples. Oh, never allow the world to dictate to us what we should do if they have to believe us. The idea that men will believe if we give more signs was born in hell. It was the rich man’s idea in hell who said if someone goes from hell and tells, what does Abraham respond? “If they don’t believe the Bible, they will not believe even if someone rises.” They may be excited and may come regularly, but truly to be regenerated and saved, it is only the testimony of the Bible about what you are as a sinner under the wrath of God, God’s love for sinners in the person of Christ, and the provision of forgiveness. If that testimony is not brought home with power, ten billion people can be raised from the dead, and you will still love your sin and perish in unbelief, marveling that so many were raised from the dead.
Oh, how much of the church has listened to this lie from hell and listened to the world’s demands! “Oh, if we have to believe Christ, we need to see miracles in the church. We have financial problems, so church, yes, Jesus can solve that; do miracles.” “If I can have health, wealth, luxury, and money,” the church said, “sure,” so we have the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel church. “If you do social service, then we will come.” “Okay, social gospel.” “Okay, if we have to believe, we should have dance and hard rock music in the church.” “Okay, church with rock music and dance.” “We like homosexual sins. If you tell us we can continue, then we will come.” So they have homosexual sins. All these are violations of this principle. The world is dictating to the church, “Do this, then we will accept.” You have to accept Christ only on the basis of what this Book says. On the basis of His death and resurrection, if you don’t bow, you will meet Him in hell. Oh, may we never listen to the world, but believe this.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 