Teachings of Jesus: Matthew 10:23-27

Jesus offers a fundamental image of His Kingdom. You cannot hope to understand the Covenant, Jehovah, the Messiah or following Christ unless you understand the concept of eastern feudalism. The primary issue in eastern feudalism is that everything is personal. It’s all about people, not physical property or ideas. The core of Creation’s truth is the Person of the Living God.

The Lord told His disciples that they need not worry about leaving an unfinished task in any town or village. Don’t think in terms of performance, with scheduling and checking off each task in each place. If persecution arises, hit the road and visit the next place on your route. If the Twelve spent their whole time running from town to town, they still wouldn’t have time to finish the mission before Jesus was ready to reveal Himself as Messiah. The mission actually didn’t rest on their shoulders; they were merely participants in something too big for any human or group of humans to accomplish.

What did they suppose was the point of this exercise? It was to learn how to be like their Master. Here’s the very soul of feudalism in a Hebrew society: seek to emulate your Lord. Insofar as it is possible, a disciple would become a carbon copy of his teacher. It was the same with the sheikh and his household. The duty of anyone serving someone else was to absorb the character and purposes of their master. How do you suppose you get promoted to those plum assignments? You think and act so much like your master, instinctively representing his interests, that he could trust you with great measures of his authority.

Then Jesus makes a sarcastic comment about how the Pharisees accused Him of being Beelzebub (a nickname for the Devil). If they called Him Beelzebub, whatever it is that earned Him that label should characterize His disciples, too. Let these men learn to emulate Him by going out among their nation so that when the Messiah declares His reign, they can be ready to assume high positions of authority in His domain. It’s more important that the disciples do the job right than rush to do it everywhere they could possibly go. Don’t worry about resistance to the message.

This is not some secret mission on behalf of a secret plot to overthrow the current government of the Jewish people. There’s no reason to sneak around; be bold. The only reason this might appear covert is because nobody seems to understand the Covenant any more, and they certainly wouldn’t recognize the Messiah, the guy they keep calling Beelzebub. It’s more important that the disciples do the job right than rush to do it everywhere they could possibly go. Don’t worry about resistance to the message. Publicize everything about the Messiah; hide nothing. Promote your Master’s reputation.