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Blessed is he who is not offended in Me.
Luke
7:23
"WHY should I be treated like this?" Much
as I regret to do so, I have to confess that this
has been the sort of question which from time to
time has simmered within me when I have been under
pressure. I have no doubt that many other Christians
have had similar controversies with the Lord. For
this reason I draw your attention to what happened
to John the Baptist. It may throw light on our
problem. At least it may comfort us to know that he
also had good cause to pose the same question.
The
Baptist's Complaint
For him everything had gone wrong. He who
had lived a completely open-air life from his
childhood was now shut up in an irksome prison from
which there was to be no escape. The fearless and
faithful herald of God's Christ was seemingly
forgotten by his Master. Everybody else was enjoying
miraculous help and deliverances through Jesus, but
nothing at all was done for him. No wonder he was
despondent! No wonder he sent his disciples to Jesus
to enquire what had gone wrong with everything. So
to me this question is no surprise. In his place I
might well have done the same thing. I, too, have at
times felt disappointed with the Lord because of His
strange ways with me.
The startling surprise is in the rather astringent
reply which was sent back to him by the Lord. It is
true that this reply contained a sort of promise of
blessing, but it was nothing personal for John,
being stated in merely general terms. It certainly
gave no encouragement to self-pity. "Blessed is he
who is not offended in me". Is that all that the
Lord had to say to His devoted servant in a time of
acute stress? Apparently it was. And we may well
have to admit that we have passed through times of
deep testing and looked for some token of success or
encouragement from the Lord to console us but have
looked in vain. Just as John's disciples were given
no hint of a lessening of the pressure, so we may be
left with little or no indication that the Lord is
paying any special attention to us.
Encouragement
to the Sinner
In Luke's Spirit-led arrangement of Gospel
incidents, the next section of this chapter deals
with the outcast woman in the house of Simon the
Pharisee. The story is full of spiritual
significance, but in my present quest for comfort,
what strikes me is the way in which Jesus went out
of His way to voice His praises of her. He spoke
very appreciatively of what she had done, gave her a
personal blessing of peace and drew Simon's
attention to the fact that this woman, whom he and
his kind despised, was outstanding for her great
personal love for Him.
He not only did this, but He did it to her face:
"Turning to the woman, he said to Simon..."
(v.44). "See this woman...?", He enquired of him. It
was as though He wished publicly to vindicate her as
well as explain His own behaviour, and was glad for
her to hear how she had touched His heart. "Look at
this woman", He urged the Pharisee, "See how she has
compensated for all your surly insults. One thing is
obvious from it all and that is that she is a great
lover of her Lord". For my part I can conceive of no
higher praise. If I could ever hear the Lord telling
everybody that He greatly appreciated my service and
recognised that I was a man full of love to Him, I
feel that I could ask for no greater encouragement.
And it is encouragement that I so greatly need.
He gave warm encouragement to the woman but He does
not give it to me. Well, He did not give it to John
the Baptist. If ever a man needed reassurance and
promise of help, John did when he sent his
messengers to the Lord. But he did not get any words
of appreciation. There was no message of that kind
to help this great man, even though he was in danger
of losing heart and almost regretting his
championship of Jesus.
Testing
of the Servant
Some will object, 'Yes, but the Lord did
say some most complimentary things about John. He
spoke to the people around Him about the Baptist in
glowing terms'. That is true, but I have had my
attention drawn by Luke to when He did this: "When the messengers of John were
departed..." (v.24). He did not begin His eulogy
of John until the Baptist's two disciples were
well out of earshot. It is true that the Lord had
some wonderful things to say about His Forerunner,
speaking of him in superlative terms, (24-28), but
so far as we know John never heard these words and
did not know how Jesus had praised him.
Here, then, is an extraordinary contrast. A
grateful sinner, just beginning a new life by
simple faith in Him, receives public recognition
and striking commendation, such as were calculated
to thrill her soul, whereas a most loyal and
devoted servant who was unique in his faithful
obedience to his calling, was only warned that if
he wanted blessing he must go on suffering without
question or complaint. In terms of human logic,
this makes no sense; in terms of divine wisdom,
however, it is full of significance.
This is not only how the Lord dealt with John; it
is typical of how He treats us all. Are we
penitent sinners? Then He has immediate comfort
for us. Are we tested servants? He just reminds us
that it is not our part to understand, but to
obey. At first this may sound harsh, but on
consideration we see in it an indication of how He
trusts us. If we can only appreciate it, the Lord
was paying John the highest compliment of all.
Just as God boasted to Satan about Job - "Hast
thou considered my servant Job? ...there is none
like him in the earth" - so the Lord Jesus glories
in the virtues of John - "A reed shaken by the
wind? Far from it! A prophet? Much more than that.
I say to you, Among them that are born of women
there is none greater than John..." - "I'm telling
you", Jesus repeatedly insisted, "this is the
greatest servant that God ever had. There is
nothing shaky or soft about John. He is
magnificent".
Naturally we think that it was a pity that Jesus
waited until John's two emissaries had returned
before He said this. Luke makes it very clear that
this is what He did. If only John had known! For
that matter, if only Job had known! Come to that,
if only we could know. If we could receive some
marks of God's appreciation instead of being
exposed to all the winds of adversity, how much
more bearable life would be. What a pity! we
think, but no, it is not a pity but the greatest
compliment that our Master can pay us. If we need
pats of encouragement and endearing words of
praise, we are still spiritual infants. We must
grow up. We must learn to live without immediate
vindication and face the present trials or
disappointments as those who are the blessed
unoffended. It gives me new dignity to realise
that my heavenly Father trusts me not to need
spiritual petting any longer.
It is a matter of spiritual growth. John had had
his moments of triumph, as we all have. He had
been acclaimed by the crowds. He had been thrilled
by Christ's words about fulfilling all
righteousness. He had actually seen the Holy
Spirit descend in bodily form like a dove upon the
Son of God. We, too, have had our thrills. We have
seen marvelous answers to prayer. For many of us
our earlier Christian service was so manifestly
blessed of God that it was almost as though in our
case the Lord were going out of His way to
vindicate us. Just as long ago He had said: "See
this woman? ...she loved much", we felt that He
was giving us the public recognition which shows
how pleased He must be with us. Well, no doubt He
does find pleasure in owning our ministry before
men, though in fact He never promised to do so.
What He did say was that He would give us heavenly
commendation: "Everyone who confesses me before
men, him shall the Son of Man confess before the
angels of God" (Luke 12:8). If praise is due it
will ultimately be given, but not necessarily now
or here. With some of His most favoured servants
the Lord gave little, if any, evidence of His
appreciation at the time. He trusted them to trust
Him.
God's servants must be men and women of faith.
They must be spiritually adult, not expecting to
be constantly patted on the back or praised to
their face, but content to persist in faithful
devotion to their God-given task without any
outward evidence of the Master's approval. So I
have found it, and so you may now be doing. This,
surely, was what Jesus wished to convey to John:
"Blessed is he who is not offended with Me".
Back
to the Word of God
I realise that I have passed over the
earlier part of the Lord's message to John which
reads: "Go your way, and tell John the things you
have seen and heard..." (v.22). For one thing John
had already heard of the miracles - that was what
provoked him to send his deputation - and in any
case it would be likely to aggravate his personal
problem to be reminded that Jesus was
doing miracles for others and would do no
delivering miracle for him, nor even promise
one. If it were not the Lord Jesus, I would
imagine that this was about the most tactless
and unhelpful message that could be sent. How
could it help a man in his predicament and with
his grim prospect to know that other people were
being liberated and blessed?
Since, however, there can be no questioning of
the wisdom of our Saviour, I look again to
discover what lay behind His words and realise
that they were calculated to refer John back
again to the Scriptures. It was as though Jesus
was saying, 'Don't be governed by your
experiences but rather by the Word of God'. This
is excellent advice to us all. Now in John's
case there is a special sense in which his call
and ministry were based on the prophecies of
Isaiah, as he himself disclosed (John 1:23).
What he had to do was to go back again to those
prophecies and in them he would find described
the exact events which the Lord Jesus listed.
Isaiah 35:5 and 61:1 foretold the activities of
the One whose way he had prepared. In them we
find mention of the blind, the lame, the deaf
and the poor. God's Word, then, was being
fulfilled. This seems to have been the point of
Christ's reply to his worried Forerunner. He
needed to get back to the Word of God.
The Lord's servant bases his life on the
Scriptures. John did just that, and had no
difficulty in identifying himself in them. He
was more than a prophet, for he himself was the
subject of prophecy. If he could accept that the
works which Jesus was doing were exactly
according to the revelation given of the will of
God, then that would silence his questionings
and deal with his personal grievances. What he
had to do was to get back to the Word and in it
find a sheet-anchor for his storm-tossed soul.
The same is true in our case. I know that my
soul is more likely to get into a tension if I
begin to argue from what is happening - or not
happening - in my own case, than if I quietly
meditate in the Word. This is especially so if,
like John, I see God doing things for other
people that He refrains from doing for me. It is
then that I am capable of taking offence. The
certain remedy, and the only one, is to get busy
with the Word of God and there to "feed on His
faithfulness" (Psalm 37:3 R.V. margin). May we
not, then, interpret the Lord's words as an
appeal to him to reconsider Isaiah's prophecies
and to find comfort in them? This is a lesson
which we all need to learn. We can identify
ourselves in the Bible, though not in the
specific way in which John was described. We can
also find there a full revelation of God's Will
in His Son. In fact much more is said about us,
and very much more about Christ, than ever John
knew. Why, then, do we tend to take offence?
Simply because we pay more attention to things
and people around us than to God's speaking to
us in the Scriptures.
Strange
Answers to Prayer
A further factor in this
story, though it is not dealt with by Luke, is
that John was suffering because of his own
prayers. No doubt he might have considered that
his prayers were not being answered, but he
needed to go back a little and think again of
how he had prayed. Had he not sought Christ's
greater glory? Had he not asserted: "He must
increase, but I must decrease"? (John 3:30). It
seems reasonable enough to suggest that his
personal eclipse in Herod's prison was the
answer to his request that he might diminish in
order that his Lord should grow in greatness.
Fancy a man not recognising the answer to his
own prayers! Well, is that so very unusual? I,
for one, make no claim to be different from him
in this respect and I often observe the same
phenomenon in others. Is it not a fact that in
wondering why events take the course they do we
often fail to realise that God is allowing
things to happen which represent the answer to
our prayers? Filled with love for Him, we have
prayed for His glory "at any cost", only to
start complaining when even a little of the cost
has to be paid for by us. What a blessing for
John to accept this and to determine not to take
offence at the Lord's strange ways with him!
"He must increase, but I must decrease."
"Blessed is he who is not offended in Me."
Perhaps these two Scriptures go together.
Perhaps they apply to you and me as much as to
John the Baptist. So whatever your present trial
may be, don't be offended!
Related articles:
He Must
Increase
The Blessedness of
the Unoffended
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