Primitive Baptist Church Notes on the Book of Matthew Elder Vernon Johnson

Matthew, Chapter 11

Matt. 11:12-14

Matt. 11:12 "And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. 13 For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. 14 And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come."

"And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force." There has been a lot of speculation about the kind of violence the kingdom of heaven has suffered. Some have pointed to the various persecutions that went forth against the church. However, this does not seem right as the persecutions from the time of John the Baptist until Jesus spoke those words were relatively minor in relation to the persecutions that came later after Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection. Actually, there are very few biblically recorded persecutions from the time of John until when Jesus spoke these words.

According to Luke 16:16 "The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it." This points us to the time that the Kingdom of heaven was first preached. It began to be preached by John as he baptized in the river Jordan. From the time that John began to preach until the time the Lord spoke those words, men were pressing into the kingdom of heaven. The Greek word for "presseth" is "biazo" meaning to force, i.e. (reflex.) to crowd oneself (into), or to be seized:--press, suffer violence. "Biazo" is the same Greek word that is translated "suffereth violence" in Matt. 11:12 above.

When a person hears and believes the gospel, he does not necessarily come forth immediately and asks to join the church. Usually an individual must first go through a spiritual warfare before he comes forward and asks to be baptized. According to Gal. 5:17 "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would." Our flesh nature has many objections to us becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ. We must overcome these objections if we are to forcefully press into the kingdom of God. Each child of God' who hears the gospel and believes, has that warfare to fight if he is to press into the kingdom of God. This warfare often rages in the heart and mind of the child of God before he makes the decision to enter into the kingdom of God. In this scene of spiritual warfare raging in the heart and mind of the child of God, the child of God forcefully through the indwelling spirit presses into the kingdom of God despite all the fleshly objections not to.

"For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. 14 And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come." The prophets and the law prophesied of the coming of the kingdom of heaven and of the Messiah. This prophesy continued until John came on the scene and then with John the kingdom heaven began to be ushered in. John was the fulfillment of the prophecy in Mal. 4:5 "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: 6 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." As Elijah was the forerunner of the prophet Elisha, so John was the forerunner of the greatest Prophet Jesus Christ who was also the Messiah, the King, the High Priest, etc.

Matt. 11:15

Matt. 11:15 "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear."
This is not talking about having natural ears. Every person I have ever seen has natural ears, whether they are functional or not. To say, "He that hath natural ears to hear, let him hear" would make no sense for everyone has natural ears. It makes sense when it is applied to spiritual ears. To say, "He that hath spiritual ears to hear, let him hear" would make sense because not every one has spiritual ears. A person who does not have spiritual ears is unable to hear spiritual things. This is consistent with 1 Cor. 2:14, "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." Only that person who has been born of the Spirit has spiritual ears in which to discern spiritual things.

When the Lord said, "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear," he was referring to those that have been born of the Spirit of God. Prov. 20:12 reads, "The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, the LORD hath made even both of them." The Lord makes the spiritual ear and the spiritual eye when a person is born of the Spirit. With the spiritual ear, a person is able to hear the spiritual things of God. In the above passage, the Lord is telling those who have spiritual ears to use them to discern spiritual things.

This admonition of the Lord is very important as it appears in the gospels eight times and a similar admonition appears in the book of Revelation eight times. We are reminded repeatedly that we who are born of the Spirit of God need to use our spiritual ears to discern spiritual things.