Gospel of Matthew Chapter 18 -- John Karmelich

1. Chapter 18 is all about conduct.

a) Matthew is no longer trying to emphasize that Jesus is the Messiah.

b) By this point in Matthew, we now assume that fact.

c) Now we are focusing on what God expects of us in our conduct.

2. This chapter has five different topics that all tie together based on our conduct as believers.

a) The first story focuses on what conduct is required to be “great” in heaven.

i) This is where Jesus states that in order for us to be “great” in heaven, we need to have child-like faith. A small child is fully-dependant upon their parents for their needs. God wants us to have that same attitude toward Him.

b) The second story focuses on our conduct on the avoidance of sin.

i) Jesus teaches that the world is full of stumbling blocks that cause problems in our relationship with God.

ii) God takes these stumbling blocks seriously. This little section is full of graphic illustrations to show just how seriously God wants us to consider the danger of sin. Sin blocks our relationship with him.

c) The third story is about how God cares for all believers. Therefore, our conduct is important on how we treat all other believers.

i) This is the story about the “99+1” sheep. This story is where one sheep gets lost and the shepherd temporarily leaves the 99 to go get the missing one.

ii) The main point is that God cares about all believers. If some are doing better than others, God does not say to the lost, “oh well, too bad, let me focus on the 99”. He is interested in everyone getting saved.

d) The fourth story is about our conduct in church.

i) Jesus gives a set of guidelines on how to deal with an unrepentant person in sin.

ii) First we approach them ourselves. If that doesn’t work, we try again with 2-3 others, and if that doesn’t work we publicly deal with the issue in our church. If that person still doesn’t change, we are to outcast them.

iii) Sin is not to be tolerated in the church. This is not about being perfect; this is about realizing the sin is wrong and confessing that sin. Jesus is teaching that the conduct is not to be tolerated.

e) The final story about our conduct is on the topic of forgiveness.

i) Jesus gives an illustration of a man who forgave a second man of millions of dollars in debt, and that second man refused to forgive a third man of a few hundred dollars in debt. Jesus point is that the Father has forgiven us of tremendous sin, and we need to have that same attitude in forgiving others.

ii) What is important to see is the 4^th and 5^th story tying together.

a) In the 4^th story, Jesus is teaching that we are to judge people of their sin.

b) In the 5^th story, Jesus is teaching that we are to forgive people of their sin.

c) This is not a contradiction. The key is the sinning-person (that’s you and me!) is willing to ask forgiveness and say what we did is wrong. Further we are to ask God to work through us to change that behavior). We as Christians are then required to forgive that person, no matter how much they have hurt us or the church.

f) What one needs to see in all these stories is progression in maturity.

i) The first story talks about salvation itself and what it takes to be “great” in heaven.

ii) The second story teaches on why we are to avoid sin.

iii) The third story focuses on God himself and how he cares for all. Our dependence is upon God to be a better person.

iv) Finally, we have the teachings about judging people and forgiveness. Both are taught in the bible. We need to have proper perspective about when to judge and when to forgive.

v) With the concept of “our conduct” in mind, let’s go to verse 1.

3. Verse 1: At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"

a) Let’s start with the expression, “at that time”.

i) Matthew is emphasizing that this set of stories by Jesus took place around the same time as the events of the previous chapter. Why is that important?

ii) The last chapter had the “transfiguration”, where 3 of the disciples got to see Jesus change to bright-white, with Moses and Elijah appearing for a brief moment.

iii) Further, we had the story of the disciples’ inability to cast out a demon because of their “lack of faith”. Jesus was teaching on persistence of prayer.

b) In Verse 1, the disciples are asking who is the greatest in heaven.

a) Notice Luke’s account of the same story. “An argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest.” (Luke 9:46, NIV)

ii) Remember that in the previous chapter, only 3 of the 12 got to go the mountaintop. Maybe there was some jealously as to why Jesus picked only those three.

iii) Maybe their failure to cast out the demons got them to point fingers at each other. They could have been saying something like, “It’s your fault we couldn’t cast out those demons. I told you we needed to pray more.” J

c) In the final verses of the last chapter, the topic was “denying yourself to follow Jesus”.

i) These disciples gave up everything to follow Jesus.

ii) They may have been cast out from their local Jewish synagogues.

iii) They gave up their livelihood.

iv) It is understandable that they want to know what it takes to be great in heaven. Their focus was on the right place (heaven), but their hearts where in the wrong place (on themselves).

v) The personal application of these verses is coming up. Let’s move on to Verse 2.

4. Verse 2: He called a little child and had him stand among them. ³ And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. ⁴ Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

a) In this room where Jesus was talking, there was more than just Jesus and the disciples.

i) There was apparently at least one child in the room, maybe more.

ii) Some logically speculate that it was the child of one of the disciples.

iii) Paul commented on the fact on how some of the apostles had “believing wives” in 1^st Corinthians 9:5.

b) One interesting bit of trivia is the bible never mentions anywhere that Jesus ever smiled.

i) If you want to attract a child to walk toward you, smiling is a requirement. I am as positive that Jesus was smiling in this scenario to the child.

c) Remember the disciples were arguing over who would be greatest in heaven.

i) One thinks that “greatness in heaven” requires much study, much prayer, and many works for God. The logical speculation is that to be great in heaven is to do lots of things for God. Jesus gave the exact opposite idea. To be great is to be child-like. I’ll explain the meaning of this on the next page.

d) One thing I wrote in my bible many years ago is “God is not impressed with my resume”.

i) God is not impressed by our years of education, or how many good deeds we have done for other people. Getting into heaven has nothing to do with “our good deeds outweighing our bad deeds” as many people wrongly think.

e) So what does Jesus mean by being “child-like”?

i) First of all, it is not about being childish. Temper tantrums don’t get you extra points in heaven. J

ii) To be child-like is to be totally dependant upon other people.

iii) Think about the worries of a little child:

a) Do they worry about the mortgage?

b) Do they worry about if there is enough food in the refrigerator?

c) Do they worry about politics?

d) They are fully dependant upon their parents or caretakers for their survival and their happiness.

e) When they need something, they come to their parents.
(Ok, they cry and whine sometimes, but that’s beside the point. J)

iv) Jesus says in Verse 3 that unless you become as little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

a) Let me paraphrase from the point of view of someone wanting to be saved. “God, I don’t understand all of this stuff about Jesus. I just know that I’ve messed up my life and I can’t fix it without you. I want to be a better person and I can’t do it on my own. I want Jesus to pay the price for my sins and change my ways”.

(1) That prayer is a great first prayer for a new Christian. If someone prays that prayer sincerely and starts changing their life based on that belief, they will now have eternal life.

b) That is being child like. You aren’t trying to fix it yourself, you are asking God to take over. Like a little child dependant upon their parents, you are dependant upon God for our lives and look to God for daily guidance.

v) Jesus then says in Verse 4 that whoever humbles himself as this little child will be the greatest in heaven.

a) The topic is our dependence upon God.

b) To be child-like is to be fully dependant upon God.

c) Growth and maturity as a Christians is not only to confess sins when we mess up, but also to find new areas of our lives where we are trying to live our lives without God’s help.

(1) Even after many years of following Jesus, I find different aspects of my life where I am trying to “do it myself” as opposed to letting God take over. Maturity as a Christians is growing in our dependence upon God for every aspect of our life.

d) Does this mean that whoever is the most “child-like” is #1 in heaven?

(1) I don’t think so. This is not about who gets to sit next to Jesus in heaven for eternity. This is about our stature as believers.

(2) God wants us to mature as believers. Maturity is to grow in our dependence upon God. To be “great” as a Christian is to fully depend upon God for every aspect of our lives.

f) What Jesus is trying to teach here is about humility.

i) I used to wrongly think that humility was to think little about yourself and think more about others. That is the wrong attitude.

ii) Humility is to not think about your own needs.

iii) It is about putting others before yourself.

iv) Please think about this in perspective. God does want us to pray for our own needs as well. (“Give us this day our daily bread”.) Humility before God is to be in service and to put other’s needs before our own. God does care for our needs and wants us to pray for them. It is about balance and perspective.

5. Verse 5: "And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me.

a) This is a good verse to place on the wall of the room where the small children are kept during church service.

b) This verse teaches us not to look down upon believers because they are immature in their faith. It further teaches the importance of how we are teach little children.

c) Most people who commit their lives to serving Jesus do so as teenagers.

i) Statistically, the older you get, the lower the odds of you turning your life over to Jesus. The majority of Christians made that commitment as teenagers.

a) What does that say about the importance of teaching our youth?

b) What does that say about the importance of youth ministry?

c) What does that say about “welcoming” little children as you do adults?

d) Notice the words “like this” in Verse 5. Whoever welcomes a little child “like this” welcomes Jesus. What does Jesus mean by “like this”?

i) It ties back to the earlier verses. It is about our full dependence upon God.

ii) When adults or children are willing to commit their lives to be fully dependant upon God we are to welcome them. Christianity is never designed to be an exclusive club for existing members.

6. Verse 6: But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

a) Let’s jump ahead to Verse 10 for a second. It ties together with Verse 6:

i) “See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.” (Matt. 18:10, NIV).

ii) God is perfect. A perfect God loves everyone perfectly and judges everyone perfectly. Since a little child doesn’t have the abilities to defend themselves against (spiritual) attacks, God cares more about them in the sense they don’t have the ability to help themselves. This is about a perfect God helping those who can’t help themselves.

b) Remember that Jesus is speaking to disciples, not to non-believers. With that in mind, how do we cause these “little ones” to sin?

i) Jesus is teaching of our responsibilities as believers to the next generation.

ii) Kids watch what we do far more than what we say.

a) If we teach the importance of prayer, going to church and bible reading, yet don’t do it ourselves, they remember that far more than anything you make them do as children.

b) If kids watch us sin and we don’t tell them “I messed up, will you forgive me?” They recognize hypocrisy and won’t take God seriously.

c) At the same time, we need to look at other Christians and realize, they are not the model for us to follow, Jesus is. People mess up. We’ll deal with that later in this chapter.

d) Here, we are talking about little children. We as Christians are giving the responsibility of being role models and teaching the next generation how to grow in their maturity as believers.

c) Let’s talk about the “large millstone around the neck and thrown in the sea”.

i) Sounds like a mafia killing doesn’t it. J

ii) Jesus is using an illustration here. God is not calling upon us to go drown false-believers in the ocean.

iii) Jesus is talking about how seriously to take the issue of helping young children to grow in their faith. The topic is our responsibility to children and not how to punish those who fail to do so.

d) Another idea to get across here is that one can take the idea of “children” as being spiritual-children and not just physical-age-children.

i) When people first commit their lives to Christ, no matter what the age, they are often nicknamed “baby Christians”. It has nothing to do with how old they act;
it is about their maturity level as a Christian.

ii) Personally, I love to be around “baby Christians”. They have no idea if they are “pre-trib or post trib”. They have no idea if the gift of tongues is for “today” or just the early apostles. They have no idea whether or not dancing is appropriate for a Christian. They have no idea where they stand on the “pre-destiny versus free-will” debate. All they know is that Jesus is God and loves them very much. They are happy to be forgiven and happy to be saved.

a) All churches need to have baby Christians around. That energy level of those who first learn to love God is contagious and keeps us veteran Christians in proper focus.

iii) My whole point here is that when Jesus is teaching on the importance of not letting “one of these little ones stumble in sin”, you can take that application to not only refer to young children, but also young in the faith. Jesus is teaching to help them mature in their beliefs and not cause them to go down the wrong path.

7. Verse 7, first sentence: "Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin!”

a) You never read anywhere in the bible once that you get saved, and no bad things ever happen to you again.

b) In fact, just the opposite is true. The bible teaches that Christians are persecuted for their faith. Satan does not want you to be a good witness for Jesus. Satan’s time on earth is fixed based on a certain-number of people becoming Christians. Nobody knows that exact number. Therefore, the longer Satan can prevent new people from becoming Christians, the longer time he has. By persecuting Christians, he tries to make them in effective witnesses for Jesus.

i) Among Satan’s methods for preventing additional believers is to either tempt or persecute existing believers so that they don’t become good witnesses for Jesus.

ii) Which leads us back to Verse 7. Jesus says, “"Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin!

iii) Jesus is not condemning children or believers, he is condemning the world.

iv) The “world” refers to non-believers.

a) I would expand that to say that their interest in things other than God is what causes them to sin.

b) Sin is described as “missing the mark”. A great lesson to learn in life is “without God, we can’t”. We can’t live life to please God without getting God involved in the process in the first place.

8. Verse 7, second sentence: Such things must come, but woe to the man through whom they come!

a) Let me paraphrase this, “You can’t go to court and say, “Your honor, it is not my fault that I robbed that bank. The devil made me do it and I couldn’t help myself”.

i) Is Satan behind sin? Of course. Does that mean we’re not accountable? No!

ii) This is why Jesus says in effect, “Woe to the person through sins come!”

iii) God still holds you accountable when you give in to sin’s temptation.

9. Verse 8: If your hand or your foot causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. ⁹ And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

a) Well now, that doesn’t sound very pleasant. J

b) If you get a sense of déjà vu’ reading these verses, it is because they are almost identical to those taught in the “Sermon on the Mount” in Matthew 5:29-30.

c) Is Jesus being literal? The answer is no. Let me get back to a previous illustration:

i) “Your honor, I didn’t mean to rob that bank, it was my arm’s fault. My arm grabbed that gun and dragged me into that bank. My arm forced me to rob the bank, so I am innocent.” J

a) Or try this one, “Your honor, I didn’t mean to get drunk last night. My arm forced me to drink while the other hand opened my mouth. “ J

ii) My point is sin doesn’t originate in your arm or your eyes. It originates in your heart. Do you really think you could not sin by plucking out your eye or cutting off an arm or a leg? Of course not. Therefore, Jesus is using an illustration by saying in effect, “if you hand or foot causes you to sin, cut it off”.

iii) Jesus is teaching you how seriously to take sin.

iv) Jesus is teaching you how seriously to take eternity in hell.

v) Life without a body part is better than to commit that sin in the first place.

vi) Jesus is not saying, “Well, you’ve sinned now. Better cut off that hand so you won’t do it again”. God does not want us to harm our bodies; God wants us to take sin seriously. He wants us to avoid it, and when we do fall, to confess it.

10. Verse 10: See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.

a) Verse 10 states that “these little ones” always see the face of my Father in heaven.

i) Does this mean prayers of little children somehow, get priority?

ii) Does this mean that prayers of adults can somehow “delayed”?

iii) Does this verse support the idea of everybody having a “guardian angel”, especially for little children?

iv) I’ll try to tackle some of these ideas over the next few paragraphs.

b) First of all, you get the impression in the bible that God cares deeply about those who cannot defend themselves. Here is a sample verse:

i) “Do not take advantage of a widow or an orphan. If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry. My anger will be aroused, and I will kill you with the sword; your wives will become widows and your children fatherless. (Exodus 22:22-24, NIV).

a) John’s very loose translation: Don’t mess with the less fortunate!

ii) God is perfect. A perfect God is going to help more those who can’t help themselves. A perfect God is going to defend the less fortunate.

iii) We can all think of examples of children being murdered or a poor widow being robbed. What we have to remember is that we worship a fair and just God. Just because we don’t see the punishment doesn’t mean it isn’t going to happen.

iv) The question for our time here on earth is not what is God going to do about, but what are we doing about it. Jesus is teaching in these verses to take care of these “little ones”. The concept is we, as Christians need to give special care to those who are less fortunate. We are to care about the things God cares about. If God cares greatly for those who cannot defend themselves, so should we.

c) Now let’s talk about the idea of “guardian angels”.

i) Many Christians do use this verse as support of the idea of guardian angels.

ii) If you read through your entire bible, you will not find a verse that teaches the idea of “one person, one angel”. I’m not saying that isn’t the rule. I am saying that the bible never states or implies that ratio.

iii) One can easily interpret this verse as being “a group of angels” is assigned to children, and that group of angels gets God’s priority over others.

iv) Angels are messengers dispatched from God to do his will.

a) There is a strange comment by Paul in 1^st Corinthians that says we as believers are going to judge angels in heaven. (Ref: 1^st Cor. 6:3).

(1) Just how and why we are to judge angels is not stated.

(2) My speculation is that angels are dispensed to watch over us and guard us. Somehow, we are to judge their performance.

b) Another common view is that the “fallen” angels who choose to follow Satan will be judged. Somehow we are judges for that trial.

c) Again, we don’t exactly know what it means. It is all speculation.

d) Last, let’s talk about children getting “priority prayer time with God”.

i) First of all, if you think that God only has time for children’s prayer and we as adults have to “wait in line until their done”; your concept of God is too small. J

ii) God is all-powerful. A perfect God has the time and power to hear all the prayers that call to him. There is no waiting time for prayer lists.

a) God does not answer prayer like a butcher shop with numbers on the wall. “Now serving number 87. Next please! J

iii) My view of this verse has to do with how God wants to train and mature us.

a) Children don’t understand theological issues. Children don’t understand how God wants to train them and mature them.

b) God works with us on our level. If we are at the maturity level of a little child, God works on that level. If we are adults and have been Christians for a while, God wants to mature us more and grow in our faith.

c) As adults, God often delays answers to prayers as to test our faith. God often delays answers to prayers as God desires full submission. I have seen God do his best work when we have exhausted every other optio