Welcome to Form Now. I'm Tim Gray, president of the Augustine Institute, and joining me is Dr. Michael Barber,

professor of scripture at the Augustine Institute, and we're going to continue our ongoing Bible study

through the Gospel of Matthew. So last time we left off about halfway through Matthew chapter 21.

So we're going to pick up in verse 23, and we just covered Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem,

and all the events and the significance of that, the cursing the fig tree, and now he comes back and enters the temple.

And of course, now, you know, he's really the crowds, the disciples, there's a lot of enthusiasm,

there's a lot of expectation and hope.

And yet the leadership of Jerusalem is not so excited. And so they've been preparing how they're going to deal with this. And so they've got a big question for our Lord, don't they? Right. Well, the question is, by what authority are you doing these things? And specifically, acting in the temple, right? Who do you think you are? You're not a Levite, you're not a priest.

You're not part of the Sanhedron here. Right. Who do you think you are? And so Jesus turns tables on them and says, well, I'll ask you. He says, I also will ask you one question. And if you tell me the answer, then I will tell you by what authority I do these things. And then he asks him whether John the Baptist's baptism came from heaven or whether it was

of men, as he puts it.

Which means basically, you know, was John the Baptist really commissioned by God?

Is he a prophet, official prophet of God?

Or was he just trying to be a holy man bigger than his britches and he wasn't really sent by God?

That's right.

And they are now in a bind and they recognize this.

They say, if we say it's from heaven, he will say, well, why didn't you not believe him?

But if we say from man, we are afraid of the crowd because they all think that John was a prophet.

And so they...

And you know, the beautiful thing about this is they didn't recognize John the Baptist. They didn't get behind him. They didn't acknowledge them. And they, as they positioned themselves here, they kind of try to stay neutral, right? That's right. But it's exactly the example that Jesus needs to show them by what authority he does these things. That's right. Because by even bringing up John the Baptist, who is a prophet sent by God, right? He is saying basically, you know, where did I get my authority? From heaven. That's right. I didn't get it from you. I didn't get it from the Sanhedron. I got to the same place John the Baptist did, because John the Baptist just summoned all of Israel.

And he wasn't given licensing and privileges

from the temple or from the Sanhedrine.

So it's an interesting.

...