When Jesus Denounces a City

Day 16: Matthew 11:7-30

“Then he began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent.” - Matthew 11:20 ESV

Everyone likes free stuff. I mean, the T-Shirt canon at a Pacers' game evokes screams of passionate fans who will do anything to get their hands on an XXL shirt that they'll never wear.

What about something that will cost us? We are much more skeptical and reluctant. These people that Jesus was pouring out all kinds of healing upon still didn't "repent." This word in Greek is metanoeo, and it is used 34 times in the New Testament. It can also be translated as “to change one's mind.”

Jesus' miracles were not enough to change these people's minds (I can't believe I just typed that). Did they appreciate the change in their conditions? Why, yes. Did they benefit? Again, yes. Did it cause them to alter how they lived? No, it didn't.

If our minds are unaffected, our behavior will be left unchanged as well.

So, what does it take to see minds/lives change?

It takes a willingness to trust God enough to surrender all of our agendas to His. Unfortunately, most of us stuck in lifestyles of sin can only be shaken from our behavior by a jarring event that causes us to reevaluate everything. On this side of eternity, God will allow pain in our lives to help us see what the best life really looks like.

May we see the consistency of repentance in our lives and those we are trying to reach as well.

"When one recalls that Jesus’ message about the kingdom necessarily entailed the exhortation to repent (4:17; cf. 3:2), it is clear that the refusal to repent in the face of Jesus’ “mighty deeds” is the result of a failure to interpret Jesus’ deeds in terms of their disclosure of God’s presence. While his miraculous deeds were a source of interest and wonder, they cannot be separated from the demands of his message." - Chouinard, L. (1997). Matthew (Mt 11:20)