Why Did Jesus Send ‘Em Packing?

"Jesus feeds the multitudes"

On the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee, in the region of Capernaum and Bethsaida, Jesus miraculously fed a crowd of more than 5,000 with, essentially, the wave of his hand (Luke 9:10-17). Shortly thereafter, he shamed and condemned most of those very same people in that region to future destruction ….

[There are some Biblical ‘red letters’ passages that don’t seem to fit the contemporary ‘Jesus, meek ‘n’ mild’ scenario.]

“Even wicked Sodom will be better off than such a city on the Judgment Day. What horrors await you, you cities of Chorazin and Bethsaida! For if the miracles I did for you had been done in the cities of Tyre and Sidon, their people would have sat in deep repentance long ago, clothed in sackcloth and throwing ashes on their heads to show their remorse. Yes, Tyre and Sidon will receive less punishment on the Judgment Day than you. And you people of Capernaum, what shall I say about you? Will you be exalted to heaven? No, you shall be brought down to hell.”
—Luke 10: 12-15

Question: If Jesus were really the “social justice warrior”…(as defined for us today)…., why didn’t he continue to feed, heal, and patiently prove himself to these Galilean people? And why on earth did he condemn these same folks, …these followers, his neighbors (!) in such a harsh and…dare I say it…”judgmental” way?

Where was the love and mercy in that? Where was the justice (“social” or otherwise)?

Bottom line, why did Jesus preach those adoring, appreciative, and grateful crowds away? Why did he excoriate them in such a compassionless and mean-spirited manner? Why did he offend them so?

After all, wasn’t there a “mega-church” revival going on right then and there? Weren’t the crowds delighted and growing?

What, in heaven’s name, was he thinking?!

Why was Jesus so unfeeling?... So uncaring?...So hateful and “legalistic”?

Who on earth did He think He was!!!? (Inquiring minds want to know…)

Why Did Jesus Send ‘Em Packing?

We thought he had all the answers…
We thought Jesus knew the way!
We thought he was fair and caring,
Ethical and “A-OK”!

Why did Jesus send ’em packing?
Why did Jesus curse them so!?
We thought He was more progressive….
We thought he was “in the know”!

We thought he was more like us, man!
We thought he had seen the light!
We thought he was so much nicer,
We thought he was… (mostly)… right!

But now, we’re not sure at all, sir….
(We thought Jesus knew what’s best!)
We’re afraid that Jesus really
Flunked our Social Justice Test.

Could it be we’re missing something?
(Like the scribes and Sadducees?)
Could it be we’re not that diff’rent
From the blind guide Pharisees?

The honest way to commend God’s revealed truth to an unbelieving generation is not to disguise it as a word of man, and to act as if we could never be sure of it, but had to keep censoring and amending it at the behest of the latest scholarship, and dared not believe it further than historical agnosticism gives us leave; but to preach it in a way which shows the world that we believe it wholeheartedly, and to cry to God to accompany our witness with His Spirit, so that we too may preach ‘in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.’

The apologetic strategy that would attract converts by the flattery of accommodating the gospel to the ‘wisdom’ of sinful man was condemned by Paul nineteen centuries ago, and that past hundred years have provided a fresh demonstration of its bankruptcy.....

The world may call its compromises ‘progressive’ and ‘enlightened’ (those are its names for all forms of thought that pander to its conceit); those who produce them will doubtless, by a natural piece of wishful thinking, call them ‘bold’ and ‘courageous,’ and perhaps ‘realistic’ and ‘wholesome,’ but the Bible condemns them as sterile aberrations. And the Church cannot hope to recover its power till it resolves to turn its back on them."
—JI Packer

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God."
—John 3: 16-18