Jesus reveals His true Identity

Matthew 12:1-14 At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat.
2 But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day.
3 But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him;
4 How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests?
5 Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?
6 But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple.
7 But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.
8 For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.
9 And when he was departed thence, he went into their synagogue:
10 And, behold, there was a man which had his hand withered. And they asked him, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath days? that they might accuse him.
11 And he said unto them, What man shall there be among you, that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out?
12 How much then is a man better than a sheep? Wherefore it is lawful to do well on the sabbath days.
13 Then saith he to the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it forth; and it was restored whole, like as the other.
14 Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might destroy him.

It is often affirmed in places that Jesus was poor and probably unlettered. Nothing could be further from the truth. One coming out of God only needed to take what is necessary for His earthly life and Mission and nothing more. The quotes here proofs that not only was He well informed and educated, He was very articulate in the way He rebuffed His adversaries using the law that these people thought they knew best against them.

“Something greater than the Temple is here.” How many of us have thought about the significance of this statement. With this statement, He revealed His identity. While the scribes would quibble about mundane things; the Son of God Himself is here amongst them. What is the Sabbath or a Temple when a Part of the Creator Himself was in their midst.

In any case it would have required spiritual insight to understand these words and of course these people possessed nothing of the sort. They were parched men of intellect whose radiation out of their spirits had been completely choked off through excessive intellectual activity. They would rather pay attention to unimportant details of the Sabbath and the Temple than listen to the Word of God with their spirits.

In the way of all intellectuals, the attention and obsessive clinging to details obstructs the broader view of life. The free comprehensive view which they lacked. They were so small in mind that in the presence of greatness all they saw was the Sabbath. The Lord Who instituted the Sabbath, which they thought they understood stood in their midst, but they were so blind that they could not see Him. Even the greatest tribulation is still not enough to wake up people who had so gone under that they could only turn their gaze downwards, squatting about dejected on the ground.

They would go so far as to prevent Him from performing an act of mercy to another human being because it was on the Sabbath. If indeed God has instituted and decreed that we should never do anything at all on the Sabbath, then it would have been alright. But there was no such decree. This decree of not undertaking any activity whatsoever on the Sabbath was man-made. It was written by man and had not originated from God. They would use what they had thought out and what they had devised with their own brains against the Son of God, passing off such laws as coming from Him.

At this stage, as far as they were concerned, He had broken the ultimate law. He had to go. He had to be destroyed. They had their excuse because He was meant to have broken one of their sacred laws. They now would seek council and begin to plot ways to destroy Him. They would from now on look for opportunities to entrap and at the first opportunity kill Him.

Matthew 12:22-32 Then a blind and dumb demoniac was brought to him, and he healed him, so that the dumb man spoke and saw. (23) And all the people were amazed, and said, “Can this be the Son of David?” (24) But when the Pharisees heard it they said, “It is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons, that this man casts out demons…… (32) And whoever says a word against the Son of man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”

In spite of all the mighty Works by Jesus and the casting out of demons, His enemies still had something to say against Him. They would never be satisfied. And Jesus knew exactly how to answer them. It would be impossible for Satan to cast out Satan. What would he achieve by trying to do so. What would he achieve by working against himself. Jesus here alluded to the fact that He first had to conquer Lucifer before He could carry out His work. He alluded to the strong man who first had to be bound before his house could be robbed. Meaning that in the final analysis Lucifer would have to be rendered powerless before his servants and his effects could be defeated.

If Jesus was using the Power of God in His activity and His detractors had indeed intended to mislead the others into believing that He was not, then they would have to take responsibility for such an untruth. Not only would they have to pay for the blasphemous offence of denying the Power of God, they would also have to account for every soul that they tried to mislead. Then He went on to say that sins against Him personally could be forgiven but never those against the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit activates the Laws of this creation and if these Laws are contravened, then it is a sin against the Holy Spirit. Sins against individuals can be forgiven by those individuals, even those personally against the Son of God, the Son of God could forgive because it is a personal sin against Him. A sin, however, which acts generally contrary to the Laws of God would have to carry the full retribution against the perpetrators.

An intentional trying to mislead the people into not taking the Word of God seriously and attacking this Word falls under this category of sins against the Holy Spirit. God through His Laws had allowed Jesus to come for the sake of an extension of knowledge for mankind through the teaching of these Laws. Knowledge of these Laws would allow us to change our ways and attain to salvation. Anyone who fights against this God-given activity which had been brought about through the Will of God as revealed in the Holy Spirit sins against this Holy Spirit and would have to bear the consequences unconditionally.

No individual will be able to forgive him his sins until he has passed through the mills of the Laws of God and has come to realize what he had done and atoned for these sins. There can be no subterfuge. He has obstructed the Will of God and would have to face the retribution which is the lot of those who do this.

He warned that those who are not with Him are against Him. There can be no in between with the Laws of God. It is either or. There can be no sitting on the fence with His Word. It is either we accept it and as such we are counted as belonging to Him or we reject it and are counted as belonging to Lucifer. It is said that even the lukewarm shall be spewed out. That is how it is with God. This is the reason for Jesus saying that he who is not with Him is against Him and he who does not gather with Him scatters.

The Laws of God make it impossible to sit on the fence, indifferent. Indifference is tantamount to a rejection, a negation. It is simply impossible. One is categorized automatically, either as belonging or not. One indeed may see oneself as neutral but the opinions of one of oneself do not count as far as the Laws of God are concerned. It is how the Light sees us that counts.