Faith Presbyterian Church

Lord’s Day February 15,2026

No Doubting King Jesus

Matthew 11:1-6

When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in their cities.

2 Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples 3 and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” 4 And Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5 the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. 6 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

Introduction:

In our text this morning we have Jesus continuing his preaching and teaching, previously he has sent out his 12 apostles with full authority to heal and cast out demons, he has sent them out as sheep in the midst of wolves and He has detailed all the issues that will come with this authority. In the previous chapter Jesus tells His disciples that they will find their enemies in their own households. Coming into Chapter 11 we will see another enemy that comes to us as believers.

This morning we are beginning in Chapter 11 as Jesus prepares us for the human emotion of doubt.

Doubt is something that we all have experienced, whether it was momentary or lasting, we have gone through it. Doubt comes when we are challenged by the world or our circumstances. POW’s in the Vietnam War relate some of their experiences with doubt, many tell the story that their faith had taken a hit when they were captured by the North Vietnamese and tortured, they wondered whether God was really there, whether or not God really cared for them. In almost all of the accounts of POW’s in the Vietnam War there is a doubting, but then there is a clearer picture of who God is, how He is there in really bad situations. Captain Carlyle “Smitty” Harris tells the story of this same situation, of doubt and despair, upon being dumped into a North Vietnamese prison. He felt there was no hope until he remembered a code that was taught to him years before, a simple code he could teach to the other POW’s. Harris knew when men were taken to the painful interrogations and they became unendurable, when they returned to their cell he would tap out “God Bless You” understanding that hope was there, God was there and their doubts about their own survival would be eased.

Section 1

Two distinct principles are here for us this morning, first our battles with doubt and second, how we reject doubt through trusting the Word of God and the love of Jesus for us.

We are all susceptible to doubt, in His ministry Jesus is proclaiming the truth of God through the preaching and teaching of God’s Word.

Looking at our text this morning and verse one we can see the truth set forth through Christ, He is teaching and preaching, removing doubts and announcing the Kingdom of God.

1When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in their cities. It’s important to note that the teaching that Jesus does is instrumental in relieving the doubts about Himself and the gospel of salvation that He preaches. Previously Jesus instructed his disciples and others through announcing that the Kingdom of God was at hand and now as we go on to verse two, John the Baptist plays a pivotal role here in our two key thoughts for this message today. Doubt is our human condition, but rejecting doubt lies with knowing Jesus.

2 Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples 3 and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”

These verses have been looked at by many in our reformed circles in different ways, Calvin, Augustine and others see it this way:

that John wanted his disciples to have their own doubts dismissed through Jesus.

I have to disagree with these men, I know it may be shocking to disagree with them, but looking at Scripture and knowing the doubts we all have John is just like all of us. Without Jesus we can be lost in our doubts. John “heard about the deeds of the Christ” and it was his questioning “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” that sent his disciples to ask of Jesus, to dispel his own doubts.

God had put Adam and Eve into a beautiful garden but doubt crept into that place,

Gen. 3 (Adam and Eve)

He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?

1 Kings 19:9-10 (Elijah)

9 There he came to a cave and lodged in it. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 10 He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Elijah had just killed the prophets of Baal and fought against every evil in Israel, but yet he is holed up in a cave bemoaning the circumstances he is in. He is in doubt, a great prophet of the Lord reduced to hiding in a cave. Anyone can have doubts. Doubters are in good company.

So we have many people in Scripture who doubted, Abraham, Moses, David and others, so why should John the Baptist be different?

There are three major reasons for understanding why John doubted. Physical reasons and Spiritual reasons.

1: He was in prison.

2: He was left emotionally drained

3: John had expectations for Jesus that were not being filled

Let’s look at number 1, being in prison. The place where John was, wasn’t anything like the prisons we know today. Many of these places were just holes in a floor where the prisoner was thrown into, or a barren room with no water or food.

According to Josephus, who writes about John in his Antiquities, Herod had imprisoned John in the fortress of Machaerus (modern Khirbet Mukawer), about five miles east of the Dead Sea, a particularly hot and desolate environment

When we see someone such as John, we see a man who prized his freedom, being separated from his disciples and people, this had to be particularly depressing for him. When we are separated from others and placed in a foreign environment our own doubts grow bigger and bigger in our thinking.

Doubt and despair are our company when we distant ourselves from others and neglect who we are in Christ. We make our own prisons and we become our own judges when we find ourselves in hard situations, we can pull away from the antidote for doubt, which is Jesus, and get deeper into our own doubt and despair. Sometimes our words can echo John’s, “Are you really the God who saves? Or should I look for another?” Charles Spurgeon comments on this text:

Dark thoughts may come to the bravest when pent up in a narrow cell. It was well that John’s question was put, that it might receive a distinct reply; re-assuring for himself, and instructive for us.

Dark thoughts strain our emotional health and emotions become front and center when they are raw and exposed.

Number two reason: John was emotionally drained

John had been calling out the Pharisees, the elders and King Herod. Every day was filled with accusations against the way that they had been living.

Daniel Doriani:

John languished in jail for months. Humans are more than thinking machines. We are physical, emotional, and spiritual beings. Prison wounds both the body and the emotions. It is human nature to have doubts when we suffer intensely.

When we are dealing with the pain of this world, whether it be family, relationships health or circumstances, there is a breaking point, a point in our lives that we are just exhausted from dealing with all of it. The exhaustion can drive us to doubt, but it is just a temporary situation where we are overwhelmed with it. Have you ever been in that place where all seems dark with no escape? I think we all have and we all have experienced the Baptist’s emotional despair.

It is in these times that we are looking for what we thought would happen, and are discouraged because what we wanted to occur has not come about.

3: John’s had expectations for Jesus that were not being filled:

Judgement plays a big role in how first century jews viewed the coming of the Messiah. There would be a “Ministry of Judgement” as James Montgomery Boice tells us in his commentary on Matthew. John’s own words reflect this in Matthew 3:12 as he speaks about Jesus baptizing with the Holy Spirit and fire:

12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

John is sitting in prison because he rightly told Herod that he was going against God’s law. The entire culture had been taken over by godlessness with their abominations and sacrifices. Why has all the injustice not be cleansed?

D.A. Carson helps us here:

It was all right to heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons, still storms, preach righteousness, and announce the kingdom; but where was the judgment? Had the corruptions and cruelties of Caesar been abruptly shut down? Had the hypocritical temple leaders been banished? Had the disgusting corruptions of Herod Antipas been confronted? Why was he, John the Baptist, languishing in the stifling heat of the prison at Machaerus fortress for challenging the morals of Herod, while Jesus the alleged Messiah did nothing about this injustice?

2 D. A. Carson, God with Us: Themes from Matthew (Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, 1985), 62.

So far in His ministry Jesus has only brought truth and grace, He has promised to free the captives as He reads the scroll of Isaiah: Luke 4:18-19

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

because he has anointed me

to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives

and recovering of sight to the blind,

to set at liberty those who are oppressed,

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Imagine John rotting in this prison seeing all the things Jesus is doing, but still not understanding the situation and most likely feeling as if he is forgotten. The Psalmist feels this way in Psalm 42:9-10

9 I say to God, my rock:

“Why have you forgotten me?

Why do I go mourning

because of the oppression of the enemy?”

10 As with a deadly wound in my bones,

my adversaries taunt me,

while they say to me all the day long,

“Where is your God?”

All is not lost for the Baptist, doubt is temporary (2x)but in the temporary we can forget the permanent, the eternal son of God Jesus Christ. How many times have we’ve seen what John is seeing? We see the world falling apart, loved ones experiencing pain from illness, relationships destroyed and generally we can be in despair.

We wonder where is God is all of this? Doubt is not an overriding aspect of the Christian life, it is temporary, fleeting and most of all it is healed by the words of Jesus that we will explore in the next set of verses.

Our healing of doubt in Christ.

Section 2(Our antidote to doubt)

4 And Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5 the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. 6 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

I have to state this now for all of you, the Bible is an awesome supernatural Word. All through Scripture God puts the “problem” first for us to examine, then He gives us the “solution”. It’s no different here in Matthew’s gospel. “Go and tell John what you hear and see…” Jesus states that John needs to hear and see, use the physical abilities that God has given him to evaluate the situation that he is in. It’s not about John, it’s all about Jesus and what He is doing. The Kingdom of God is being proclaimed and the good news of the gospel is being preached. The good news of the gospel is what Jesus wants John to hear and see, that because of Christ there is new life, that because of Christ there is salvation for sinners, and because of Christ eternal life awaits us. Doubt is eliminated through the work and grace of Jesus, not because of what we do, its because of His obedience to willingly go to the Cross and fulfill the work of a Holy God. Jesus’ answer to John doesn’t just involve him hearing and seeing, it goes beyond that to John examining everything that Jesus has done and will do, specifically here in verses five and six.

5 the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. 6 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

“The blind receive their sight…” Jesus had given the blind their ability to see again and these verbs in the original greek suggest ongoing present miracles that are occurring. What is really astounding is that we don’t see the blind receiving their sight in the Old Testament, but it has been foretold by Isaiah 29:18 and other passages.

18 In that day the deaf shall hear

the words of a book,

and out of their gloom and darkness

the eyes of the blind shall see

Only King Jesus can do all these miracles, the prophetic Messiah who has come to the world to bring peace and justice and judgement.

Daniel Doriani explains:

Further, each of these passages (in the OT)also mentions the judgment of God. By this, Jesus slips John the essential hint: he has not forgotten judgment; he has delayed it.

Physically people have been given their sight back, but more importantly spiritual blindness is being lifted. Just as the feeding of the five thousand relieved people of their hunger in a temporary way, the feeding of the gospel quenches hunger and doubt eternally.

When were your eyes opened for the first time? Can you remember when everything seemed very different before God justified your heart? When our eyes are opened we see Jesus very differently than we did before, He becomes our King and our Savior, and when we see that, all our doubts are anilated

(2X)Doubting becomes something of our past not our future.

Jesus not only opens our eyes but gives us the ability to walk in the light of Christ and respond to the gospel. We preach the good news to all because we have been resurrected because of Christ. Once dead, now alive.

“and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.

Jesus is informing John of the physical aspects of the redeeming gospel, but also we cannot leave out the spiritual aspects Jesus is proclaiming the miracles He has done fulfilling prophecy. The lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear.

B. B. Warfield

WHEN our Lord came down to earth He drew heaven with Him. The signs which accompanied His ministry were but the trailing clouds of glory which He brought from heaven, which is His home. The number of the miracles which He wrought may easily be underrated. It has been said that in effect He banished disease and death from Palestine for the three years of His ministry. If this is exaggeration it is pardonable exaggeration. Wherever He went, He brought a blessing:

Warfield brings the miracles of Jesus that He relates to John into a clear picture of who Jesus is. It is enlightening that Warfield rights this in his opposition to modern day faith healers.

Proof of Jesus is set down in these miracles, but more importantly there is the spiritual side. How do we “walk” now that we have been released from the bondage of sin? Like a person released from prison after a long stretch behind bars, that person walks differently because there is a freedom they haven’t known for a long time, they are exuberant because a weight has been lifted off of their back. If you have ever read Pilgrims Progress then you would know the character “Christian”. In the third stage. Christian comes upon the cross and the tomb of Christ and he is carrying a heavy load on his back. The Cross relieves him of his burden and in response to this we read:

Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said with a merry heart, “He hath given me rest by his sorrow, and life by his death.” Then he stood still a while, to look and wonder; for it was very surprising to him that the sight of the cross should thus ease him of his burden.

Has the burden of doubt been lifted off your back? Doubt is cancelled by the work of Christ and now we walk with a different step, no longer lame, but joyful. The voices that we heard when we were in doubt are now silenced as the burden is lifted from us. We are walking differently and hearing differently.

and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.

Doubt comes when we are not close to God, John lying in prison didn’t feel very close to God for the reason we have stated before, he needed a “refresher course” in who Jesus is. The deaf are now experiencing sound for the first time. Recently medical science has restored hearing to people who for their whole lives never could hear anything. I’m sure you have heard of the mother who was given these ear implants hearing their child speak for the first time, and then crying tears of joy in experiencing this wonderful sound. It s the same with Christians as we go through the joys of Scripture, seeing the grace of God revealed for the first time in this Word. Our ears are opened as we hear the words of John’s Gospel. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”(John 1:1) Doubt has no chance when we begin to mine this one verse. Besides hearing being set right, another miracle is proclaimed, the raising of the dead fulfilling prophecy once again.

We were dead, and here Jesus proclaims the physical resurrection of the dead and the spiritual resurrection of the dead. Dead to sin and alive to Christ. All of these texts are Messianic texts especially the news given to the poor.

Isaiah 29:19

19 The meek shall obtain fresh joy in the Lord,

and the poor among mankind shall exult in the Holy One of Israel.

and the poor have good news preached to them.

This good news given to the poor is central to the ministry of Jesus, the poor matter to Jesus, they hold a special place in his preaching. These are the people whose hope has been lost and who really doubt that anyone should care about them. This is a reversal of the accepted norm and Jesus wants John to especially hear this. In all the gospels the poor are featured prominently against the background of the rich. Jesus informs the rich man in Luke 16 about all the things he did to the poor beggar Lazarus. In Mark 10 we hear how difficult it is for a rich man to come to the Kingdom of God. But we have to see the spiritual component here, this news is not solely given to those who are without money, but to those whose spirit is bankrupt apart from Christ, where doubt and hope don’t exist. Jesus proclaims a blessing for these people in the sermon on the mount, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven”. Does doubting cause us to be poor in spirit? I think it does, and the only way to climb out is to acknowledge that we have been given the entrance to the Kingdom of Heaven. Practically, when doubts arise a big part of the healing of doubt includes hearing the good news preached to us. The Word preached has the power of God to correct our thinking and put us back to where we must be.

2 Tim 3:16-17

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Our fleeting doubts are removed as we see, hear and trust in the work of Christ alone. Trust is the final medicine we need to inject here in our message on doubt today. Trusting in Jesus, resting in Jesus and finally knowing Jesus brings us to our Lord’s benediction here in verse six.

6 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

Blessings come from the joy that that is in us as we recognize that we are in Christ and He is in us. Our trust in Christ results in our doubts being gone.

The verb translation here in verse 6 of “offended” is better said to mean being “tripped up” or stumble because of me.

Leon Morris in his commentary on Matthew helps us here:

And that joy will come on the person who sees Jesus for what he is and not as “a stumbling-block” (NEB). The verb translated tripped up is a difficult one.12 It is a passive with a meaning like “is not stumbled, is not tripped up on account of me”;13 Jesus is thus speaking about the person who trusts him (has “no doubts about me,” GNB) and does not take offense at who he is and what he does.

12 σχανδαλίζω, a frequent verb in Matthew (see on 5:29). It is connected with the bait stick of a trap and comes to have the meaning of triggering off trouble in any one of a variety of ways.

All of the situations we find ourselves in can cause us to doubt, doubt that can leave us as if we are in solitary confinement, doubts that make us question God’s love for us, doubts that can make us think thoughts that the love of God has disappeared from our lives. Charles Spurgeon perfectly puts us right:

That man is blessed who so believes, that his faith cannot be stumbled. A hint for John. John had not fallen, but very possibly he had stumbled. He had been a little put to it, through a sense of non-deliverance in time of need, and therefore he had asked the question. Blessed is he who can be left in prison, can be silenced in his testimony, can seem to be deserted of his Lord, and yet can shut out every doubt. John speedily regained this blessedness, and fully recovered his serenity.

Lord, grant me to be firmly settled in my convictions, that I may enjoy the blessedness which flows from un-staggering faith. May nothing about thee ever cause me to stumble at thee!

Conclusion:

In just these six verses today, God has revealed to us our own human doubt. The Lord has described not just one man, the Baptist, but many others in Scripture who have had doubts. Fear plays a big role in doubt, our own fears about the future and our fears about our current situations. Fear not, is a repeated phrase in Scripture from Angels and from God, He tells us to trust Him and to believe His Word which never fails. Today, beloved, realize that we are sinners changed by the obedient work of Jesus, acknowledge your fears, and look at the definition for the word acknowledge. Acknowledge is a verb, an action word and the dictionary tells us that it means to

“Verbally recognize authority”. Your authority is in Christ all others are submissive to Jesus. Doubt is temporary and going through it increases our faith and strengthens us. Look at doubt as a temporary aspect of how we are pressed down and in despair. Look at doubt as a time of renewal, making our faith stronger and being able to withstand the arrows of Satan. See your past doubts as grace filled times that brought you closer to Christ. Place your eyes on the King. Look to King Jesus and live.