Why does Jesus warn us about false prophets?
Text: Matthew 5:1-16, 7:13-29
Hosts:
J. Kent Edwards
Vicki Hitzges
Nathan Norman
Narrator: Brian French
The CrossTalk Podcast is a production of CrossTalk Global, equipping biblical communicators, so every culture hears God’s voice. To find out more, or to support the work of this ministry please visit www.crosstalkglobal.org
Produced by Nathan James Norman/Untold Podcast Production
© 2024 CrossTalk Global
Brian: On the morning of April 19, 2024, the driver of a blue Jaguar S type was headed northbound on the outskirts of Kansas City, Missouri, slightly late for work. But when a Union Pacific Railroad freight train approached a crossing ahead of him, the driver ignored the warning lights and clanging bells, went around the lowered train warning arms, crossed the first set of tracks, and then tried to cross a second set. He didnt make it. According to the police report, the driver of the jaguar was struck by the front engine of an oncoming train and killed instantly. In the local paper, the police chief urged drivers to take train crossing warnings seriously because the cost of ignoring them could be their lives. Jesus gives an even stronger warning in the sermon on the mount when he tells his disciples, enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life. And only a few find it. Ignoring Jesus warning could cost you more than your life. It could also cost you your eternity. Join Kent Edwards, Nathan Norman, and Vicki Hitzkis and listen and learn from the passionate conclusion of Jesus Sermon in Matthew, chapter seven, verses 13 to 29. Welcome to Crosstalk, a christian podcast whose goal is for us to encourage each other to not only increase our knowledge of the Bible, but to take the next step beyond information into transformation. Our goal is to bring the Bible to life, into all our lives. I'm Brian French. Today, doctor Kent Edwards, Vicky Hitskis, and Nathan Norman continue their discussion through the gospel of Matthew. If you have a Bible handy, turn to Matthew, chapter seven, verses 13 to 29 as we join their discussion.
Kent: Nathan, you're a preacher and Vicki, you're a professional communicator. What is the best way to conclude a speech or a sermon? I mean, when it comes to the end, what principles would you recommend to our listeners?
Vicki: Well, it depends on what you're talking about, but generally you summarize what you've been talking about. If you believe in big idea, which is you drive home one big idea, you repeat that, and then if you can, you save your best story for last because that's what they're going to remember and that's where they feel the emotion and you want to appeal to their head, but the best way to get into their head is going through their heart, and if they feel what you're talking about, it'll stick with them.
Nathan: Well said.
Kent: Yes, and I think that's why Jesus, when he heads into the conclusion of this amazing sermon on the Mount of, he cranks up the emotion. He wants people to know how important it is to pay attention to what he said. Starting in verse 13, this emotion is, well, it starts to build. Vicki, would you mind reminding us those two verses that Brian read earlier?
Vicki: You bet. He says, enter through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction. And many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
Kent: Wow. That's Jesus use of metaphors there is pretty powerful, isn't it?
Vicki: Yes.
Nathan: It causes you to pause.
Kent: In the mountains north of Los Angeles, a bridge was built in 1936 to span the San Gabriel river in order to join two communities. It was built right after a great flood came and washed away one of the connecting highways. So today there's a beautiful, strong, two lane arch bridge that goes nowhere. If you drive over it, you'll fall a hundred of feet to your death. That's the kind of imagery that Jesus is using here. There are bridges and there are bridges, there are roads and there are roads. But there are some roads that although they're wide and beautiful and may have a nice arch in them, they lead to destruction. There are two kinds of religions. Jesus is saying, the most popular religions, the widest road leads to death. And what he's saying to his listeners is, don't go for a walk on a bridge to nowhere. Choose carefully the path you take with your faith. Why would you want to take that wide road? Why would you want to take that wide road? Well, verse 15, he says, what the temptation is.
Vicki: He says, watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.
Kent: Watch out for false prophets, okay? Because they get you onto wide roads that go to nowhere. But what's a false prophet?
Nathan: It is someone who speaks falsehood, and usually in God's name. It sounds good, but it's not true. Or they have 99% truth and they bury the 1% lie within it that will damn you to hell.
Kent: A little bit of arsenic in your tea.
Nathan: Right? Right. And so they. It's dangerous teaching because they appeal to our sinful proclivities. They apply to our sinful desires, and that will look different to different people. That's why there's a different variety of false teachers, right? There are some that will try. They're false teachers because they embrace the sinful vices of the world. And they will say, hey, no, you can embrace all of your sexual impulses. Those are natural, those are good. And people hear that and especially right now in our culture, where there's a large push to be able to embrace all of your sexual impulses and to not call any kind of sexual relationship as long as there's consent, sin, the pressure to embrace that kind of ideology is incredibly high. And so it's like, so a lot of people say, yeah, I find that appealing because I'll no longer be called a hateful bigot if I follow down this path. There are other false teachers that they appeal to people's fear or anger. Right? Oh, they're changing. The world is changing. The country is changing. And it's all because of these horrible people. And I. And they won't say hate because we still can't say that. But they give passive permission to hate the other and hate the people who embrace their sexual deviance or sexual sins. So hate them and fight against them. And there are the enemies of you and there are the enemies of God. Well, that person is equally a false prophet as the one saying that it's okay to embrace your sins as the one saying, well, go ahead and hate the sinners. No, they're both false prophets and they're doing the same trick. They're appealing to your sinful impulse to try and get you to act.
Kent: Yeah, and let's not minimize the dangers that those false prophets, those bad teachers have on us, because do you notice the metaphors that Jesus uses at the end of verse 15, Vicki?
Vicki: He says, watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.
Kent: Sheep's clothing. So you won't recognize them. Right.
Vicki: And what's cuter than a sheep? I mean, seriously. Yeah.
Kent: So they'll look good. They may graduate from the same schools that you think a good teacher should graduate from. They'll know the words to all the songs. They'll fit in. You will. They're incognito, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. Have you ever seen a wolf?
Nathan: I have. I've seen wolves in captivity, which is not the same. I've lived up in northern Michigan for a while and I had friends who saw wolves. I only saw coyotes. So at my previous church, we'd have a coyote thumping stick right next to the door. So if you're walking to your car and you're afraid of the coyotes, you could kind of walk to your car and protect yourself.
Kent: Yeah. So, but wolves, they really are the apex predator. They will take on grizzly bears. They will take on moose. They will take on anything. They fight in packs. They are vicious. They are strong, they're fast. They're perhaps the most deadly adversaries you can face.
Nathan: And I think that's an important point for our listeners to remember. They fight in packs, so they're not faster than the moose, they're not faster than the deer, but they'll have one main runner, and they chase the deer down. And when that one gets tired, the other ones continue the chase. And so even though they're not faster than the animal they're chasing, they eventually wear them down because they're working together to wear you down.
Kent: Yes. And imagine what would happen if wolves caught a sheep. Imagine if, you know, two weeks after that attack had taken place and you found the where that encounter happened. What would you see on the ground? What would be left of that sheep?
Vicki: Sheepskin, hoofs, maybe? Yeah, not much.
Kent: Imagine the stink of death. The maggots crawling through whatever was left, the flies buzzing. Perhaps they might have skipped ahead because there's not much meat on it. And all you could see was a surprised look on the sheep's face. You need to think of that kind of devastation, because Jesus says false prophets will do that to you spiritually. They will absolutely tear you to pieces, and it will be an ugly disaster. So that's great. Thank you, Jesus. These wolves are out there, and I can't recognize them. Well, that's not very helpful. But it is, because in verse 16 and following, he tells us that although we can't spot them, identify them physically, there's another way we know whether this person is a true prophet or a false prophet.
Vicki: He says, look at their fruit. He says, by their fruit, you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit, you will recognize them.
Kent: So in my backyard, I have an orange tree. Guess what it produces.
Vicki: I'm guessing oranges.
Kent: Hmm. In my backyard, I have a lemon tree. Guess what it is.
Vicki: I'm guessing lemons.
Kent: And they never get mixed up. Like, the lemon tree never has oranges, and the orange tree never has lemons. It's completely distinct. Why?
Vicki: Because they bear what they are.
Kent: Right. The fruit is genetically determined. Right. Bound up in the essence of each of those trees is the fruit that it will produce. So what is the fruit of a preacher? What he's saying here is that the fruit of the preacher is the preaching. And if the preaching is false, then their heart is false.
Vicki: Okay.
Kent: It's going the other direction.
Vicki: I'll give you that.
Kent: It's going the other direction, so I can tell whether someone is good, is evil or good.
Vicki: Does it line up with scripture based on their teaching?
Kent: Right.
Vicki: Okay.
Kent: Because if they're twisting scripture, then they've got a twisted heart. I can't tell by their. How they display their actions. They're going to wear the right clothes. They can put on an act. They can deceive us easily externally, but the proof is in the pudding. The proof of a preacher is in the content of what they say. Does that make sense?
Vicki: Yes.
Kent: What is our defense? As a sheep in a place filled with wolves, what is our defense? How do we know whether we're being destroyed or I helped in our spiritual life?
Vicki: Well, we need to know scripture, and if we hear a false teacher, we need to not sit under that teacher.
Kent: Absolutely. I think we need to be critical, listeners. Critical, not in the sense that we're bad mouthing or want to look for faults all the time, but we need to be critical in the sense that when a pastor says something, when a prophet comes along and says, thus saith the Lord, do they have their finger on the Bible?
Vicki: Right.
Kent: Can I see it in the Bible? If I can't see it, and you can't show me and explain to me why what you're saying is actually what God inspired in his word, I'm going to run. Because out of the heart, the mouth speaks. And when I see someone not saying what God said, there's something wrong with their heart, and this could destroy me.
Nathan: Yeah. One of the things, actually, two of the things I'll see often is the very abusive topical sermon which wants to make a point and then pulls five proof texts to tell you this is what it is. But they have nothing to do with the context of that text. And that one's hard to discern in the moment because they're just moving on. Right. They're moving on really fast. You don't have any time to read through the text and see if what they're saying is true about the text. But then the other one is why Jesus very plain words are not what he actually meant. There's a movement that the great commission was only for the original twelve disciples and not for all believers for all time. And we'll get there eventually here. And that's a teaser for a few months down the road when we get to the end of Matthew. But I've gotten in arguments with people. No, it's just for the twelve. And Jesus didn't actually mean what he said very plainly. That's also a sign when people have to. Now, sometimes there's context within a text that we don't fully understand as westerners. And so you unpack it, and so it gives a fuller meaning. That's not the same where they say, well, you know, and James says, the fruit of our faith is work. What he really meant, it just matters what's on the inside, and you can live however you want. Right? That's a false teacher.
Kent: But in this context, who are the false prophets Jesus is talking about? He warns them about false teachers. Right? They're like wolves who will destroy you. Do you think he's got anybody in mind?
Vicki: I'm guessing here.
Nathan: The Pharisees.
Vicki: Yeah, the Pharisees and the sadducees. Huh?
Nathan: Teachers of the law.
Kent: Isn't that how it began? Back in Matthew 520, Jesus was really clear when he says, I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. These people, the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, obviously very religious, very knowledgeable, but their teaching was so bad that if they followed that teaching, they would not enter the kingdom of God. And what was wrong with their teaching? Remember, they were teaching an external righteousness, where Jesus was talking about an internal righteousness. He says, if you think you're in right relationship of God because of your religious acts, because of the duties that you perform, that does not indicate that you are on the right road. You're on a bridge to nowhere, buddy. You're walking and you're doing all the right things externally. But if God doesn't have your heart, if God's word is not transforming your life inwardly, then you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. That's scary to me. Every world religion, and we've seen this in past podcasts, every world religion has religious activities, right?
Vicki: Yes.
Kent: We've seen how they give. We've seen how they pray, we've seen how they fast. But none of them are creating the internal righteousness that Jesus is talking about. They're a bridge to nowhere. We do that often, even in christian circles, don't we? We judge someone's spirituality by the acts that they do. Are they giving? How often do they go to church? Do they come to prayer meeting? It's external. All those things are wonderful, but that is to come from the heart, not to be just ritual, we've got to get beyond external, between doing the right stuff and allowing God to transform us inwardly. As Jesus talks about in the sermon on the mount, that's why he says very clearly in verses 21 and 23.
Vicki: He says, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons, and in your name perform many miracles? And then I will tell them plainly, I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers.
Kent: That's scary, isn't it?
Nathan: That's horrifying.
Vicki: It is scary.
Nathan: I mean, cast out demons, right?
Vicki: Yeah.
Nathan: In your name. I never knew you.
Kent: Jesus can use even evil people to do his work. Just because God chooses to use you doesn't mean that you have the internal righteousness that he wants you to have. These things are external. Jesus is looking for the internal. Can you imagine the untold millions who will suddenly discover their religion is worthless, who cross into the next realm of life and they discover that the religions that they devoted themselves to are now just vacuous. They give no help to people as they enter eternity. No hope. Even Jews and Christians will face the same awful reality, that their religious actions were futile. And there will be those who will be greeted by Jesus as he says to them, I never knew you away from me, you evildoers. In case Jesus hasn't raised the emotion to the highest level possible, he continues to give a visceral and visual picture of the consequences of anyone who would ignore this sermon.
Vicki: He says, everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house. And yet I it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house. And it fell with a great crash.
Kent: So what will happen if we choose to ignore the Jesus sermon on the mount? Cataclysm eternal.
Nathan: Our whole eternal life will crumble to nothing.
Kent: Do you think Jesus is bluffing?
Vicki: No, he wouldn't bluff about that. That's why he came.
Kent: So why is he speaking with such frightening clarity and raw emotion?
Nathan: It's the same reason as why when my two year old is running for the road, I yell at him in my deepest, scariest voice because I love him and I don't want him to get hurt.
Kent: And the consequences cannot be undone if he doesn't obey. Right?
Nathan: Right.
Kent: Jesus says, you've got we have to put into practice his words in the sermon on the mount. What did he say? You remember, he began with the beatitudes, where he defines what it means to be his disciple. We have to recognize in those, as he points out in the beatitudes, the reality of the depth of our sin, that there is no part of us that is righteous, that we surrender our lives to him. We are meek. We give our lives to him, and that results in transformation. Now that is what it means to enter into a discipleship relationship with Jesus. And our job is to be salt and light. We are to be agents of transformation in a dark and decaying world. And the only way that we can have that kind of influence is to develop what the Pharisees didn't teach, an internal righteousness. Our faith is to change who we are and not just what we do. The rest of Matthew five talked about how, as we root out sin in our lives by applying the law and the prophets to ourselves, how all of our relationships with other people will be transformed. That internal righteousness will show on the outside. People will take note. In Matthew six, he says, as our internal righteousness grows, our relationship with God will be transformed. It will become not external, but personal, and people will take note. And later in Matthew six and early in chapter seven, this internal righteousness will affect all of our life, our finances, and our ability to discern how to deal with difficult people. And people will notice. And this transformation means that we can share the gospel with others every time they see Christ in us. And when we do, we can be salt and light in our spiritually dark communities. But internal righteousness isn't only beneficial to others as we see at the end of chapter seven. It also puts our souls on a solid foundation and ensures our eternal future. How important is it for Jesus disciples to apply God's word to the innermost parts of their lives? The future of our society and our souls depend on it.
Brian: It is crucial for christians to apply gods word to the innermost parts of our lives. Thats because the future of our society and our very souls depend on it. I trust that todays discussion of gods word has been helpful and served as an encouragement to not just be hearers of the word, but doers together. Lets bring gods word to life to our lives. This week, the Crosstalk podcast is a production of Crosstalk global, equipping biblical communicators so every culture hears God's voice. To find out more about this educational, nonprofit organization, please visit www.crosstalkglobal.org. you can also support this show by rating it on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're enjoying it. Be sure to listen next Friday as we continue our discussion of the gospel of Matthew. You won't want to miss it.
Kent: Nathan, you're a preacher, and Vicki, you're a professional communicator. What is the best way to conclude a speech or a sermon? I mean, when it comes to the end, what principles would you recommend to our listeners?
Nathan: Hold on 1 second. Before we finish this, just hear the subtlety in Kent's question. Nathan, you're a preacher, and Vicki, you're a professional communicator.
Vicki: That's right. You know what you're doing.
Nathan: Not like that knuckle dragging idiot Nathan and all. I just. And it's accurate. It is true. If you guys go and find Vicki talking, she is far more effective than I am. But I just wanted to make that clear.
Kent: Somebody tells me this is going to be an add on at the end of this podcast.