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From Heaven With Love
Then with His disciples, Jesus crossed the lake to Magdala. In
the border of Tyre and Sidon His spirit had been refreshed by the
confiding trust of the Syrophoenician woman. The heathen people
of Decapolis had received Him with gladness. Now as He landed
once more in Galilee, where most of His works of mercy had been
performed, He was met with contemptuous unbelief.
The Aristocracy of the Nation Challenge Christ
The two sects—Pharisees and Sadducees—had been at bitter
enmity, but now they united against Christ, asking for a sign from
heaven. When Israel went out to battle with the Canaanites at Beth-
horon, the sun had stood still at Joshua’s command. Some such sign
was demanded of Jesus. But no mere external evidence could benefit
them.
“O ye hypocrites,” said Jesus, “ye can discern the face of the
sky,”—by studying the sky they could foretell the weather—“but can
ye not discern the signs of the times?” Christ’s own words, spoken
with the power of the Holy Spirit, were the sign God had given. The
song of the angels to the shepherds, the star that guided the wise
men, the voice from heaven at His baptism were witnesses for Him.
“And He sighed deeply in His spirit, and saith, Why doth this
generation seek after a sign?” “There shall no sign be given unto
it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas.” As the preaching of Jonah
was a sign to the Ninevites, so Christ’s preaching was a sign to
His generation. But what a contrast in the reception of the word!
The people of the great heathen city humbled themselves; the high
and lowly together cried to the God of heaven, and His mercy was
granted them. “The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this
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generation,” Christ had said, “and shall condemn it: because they
repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas
is here.”
Matthew 12:41
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Every miracle Christ performed was a sign of His divinity, but
to the Pharisees these works of mercy were a positive offense. The
Jewish leaders looked with heartless indifference on human suffer-
ing. In many cases their oppression had caused the affliction that
Christ relieved. Thus His miracles were to them a reproach.