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by Charlie Wolcott

One of the biggest misconceptions about Jesus is that He is just love, mercy, and compassion, but He is not about judgment and wrath. Jesus said He did not come to condemn the world but to save it; however, in the very next sentence, He said the world is condemned already. He simply is not adding to it. It’s already there. We have already sinned, and therefore, Jesus does not need to come around and bring judgment. However, Jesus does warn of that judgment that is already due, but in that judgment, He offers peace, hope, and salvation – the one means of escape from that judgment. A clear case study of this is found in Matthew 11:20-30.

In the first part of this passage, Jesus condemns three towns: Bethsaida, Corazin, and Capernaum, all towns in which Jesus had based His Galilean ministry and where He spent most of His time in ministry for three years. They all saw Him and heard Him, and yet there was no change in how the towns as a whole operated. They came for a spectacle, to get what they wanted, and then went right back to their lifestyles as though Jesus never was there. And this made Jesus mad and sad.

Many say Jesus was fond of using hyperbole, but I find many times people will argue that to try to lessen the sting of the message. The Bible is full of very strong language, equating witchcraft to idolatry, comparing our own righteousness to menstrual rags, and even making Ezekiel, Isaiah, and Hosea do some very strange things to showcase just how graphic the nature of sin is. I think the Bible actually holds back on the severity of sin because we simply don’t have the language to understand it. I don’t believe Jesus is using hyperbole here. I believe Jesus did believe Sodom, Gomorrah, and Nineveh would have repented had they seen Jesus in action. And because the towns who saw Him in action, the very Son of God on display, nonchalantly went about their way, what else would it take? This is the same thing Jesus confronted the Pharisees with in Matthew 12 with the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. As John MacArthur put it, “If after you have seen what I do and heard what I say and all you can do is conclude this to be the work of the devil, then you are beyond the possibility of being saved. There is nothing more you could receive.”

Judgment was coming, and because Jesus was rejected, there was nothing more that could be done. This is also why God condemned the pre-Flood world, why He condemned Sodom and Gomorrah even with the hope of finding ten righteous men, and why He condemned the adult generation leaving Egypt. Because they did not receive the message, and even if God the Father had come down and shown all His glory to prove Himself to them, they would only hate Him all the more.

But with this condemnation that Jesus is merely stating is already there, Jesus offers hope. To come to Him, to be with Him, to take your yoke upon Him because every person’s daily life is simply brutal. When we find rest in Jesus, He does the heavy lifting. I don’t get how people think they can survive without Christ because they simply aren’t. They may put on a good façade, and they may have deceived themselves into being fine, but human life is not designed to operate without God. And Jesus doesn’t call for us to pull our fair share of the load. He simply asks us to come alongside Him and let Him do all the work.

Jesus did not want to condemn anyone; He wanted to save people from condemnation. He offered life and life abundant, but to acquire it requires denial of the old life. To get the new life, you need to get rid of the old life. And the new life is so much better than the old life. I have heard it said that the world is simply amazed at how Christians can engage in parties and enjoy company without the use of beer or drugs. Why? Because we have a source of joy that far supersedes any temporary pleasure the world offers.

What Jesus offers is the best thing that could be offered. I am reminded of what God offered Israel as they entered the Promised Land: life for obedience or death for disobedience. Such an easy choice… or more accurately, such an obvious choice which one would be better. But what did Israel do? They chose sin and death. Then they blamed God for it, and we are no different. So many times, we go back to the very vomit we throw up, and I am reminded of what Paul says in Romans 6: We are to be dead to those things. We were supposed to have given those up, abandoning the old life to embrace the new life. I am so grateful to have a God who doesn’t give up on me. Because He very well could. He gave up on three towns that saw Jesus in the flesh. He gave them over to eternal judgment, though obviously, there were individuals who escaped and believed.

We can desire to see someone saved all we want, but there does come a point when God says: “They are finished. They are dead. There is nothing more that can be done.” Yes, God could just snap His fingers and “save everyone,” but that is not how He designed things. Why would sinful people want to spend eternity with the very God they hate anyway? They want paradise but not God. And only those who want God are getting in. Do we want Him? Or do we just want what He offers? The towns Jesus cursed only wanted the show, the miracles, and the feel-goods. They didn’t want Jesus, and they didn’t want to give up their lives to Him. But those who did found rest and comfort. They found a load in life that was easy and light, lighter than anything they could ever find anywhere else. And they would never go back.

Find your rest in Jesus. And while it sounds cruel, the dead cannot be saved; you have to let them go. That is what Jesus did. They refused to get on the “ark,” and when the Flood came, there was nothing more that could be done. Don’t reject the message. Come to Christ before it is too late.

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