Matthew 11:1-15 Expectations and Doubts

When Jesus had finished giving instructions to His twelve disciples, He departed from there to teach and preach in their cities.  Now when John, while imprisoned, heard of the works of Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to Him, "Are You the Expected One, or shall we look for someone else?" Jesus answered and said to them, "Go and report to John what you hear and see:  the  blind receive sight and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the  poor have the  gospel preached to them .  And blessed is he who does not take offense at Me."   As these men were going away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John, "What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?...Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist! Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.  From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force.  For all the prophets and the Law prophesied until John.  And if you are willing to accept it, John himself is Elijah who was to come.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear. [Matthew 11:1‭-‬15 NASB]

John the Baptist had his doubts, even though he was a prophet, and had recently testified about Jesus that He would be baptized in fire and the Holy Spirit, and even though he saw the Holy Spirit descend upon Jesus like a dove and remain.

The wording of this passage reveals what the problem is. In spite of his status as a prophet, John did not understand the nature of the kingdom of God. John was a prophet under the Old Covenant, and was not a part of the New Covenant kingdom of God. As Jesus said, "Among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist! Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he."

The prevalent belief of the time was that the Messiah would come to overthrow the Romans, and establish a kingdom in Israel.

When John was thrown into prison, he apparently began to doubt his own testimony about Jesus. After all, Rome was still in power, there was no Jewish army being raised, and John remained imprisoned. He began to despair. So he sent his disciples to ask Jesus. Paraphrasing, he said, "Hey! Are you going to step up and overthrow the Romans, or should we be looking for someone else to be the Messiah?"

Jesus did not condemn John for his doubts. If fact, He did something for John that he refused to do for the religious leaders: He defended His ministry. "Go and report to John what you hear and see:  the  blind receive sight and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the  poor have the  gospel preached to them .  And blessed is he who does not take offense at Me." In essence, Jesus is saying, "I am the one, but my mission is not the one you were expecting."

The Greek word that is translated "to take offense" is "skandalizo", from which we get the English "to be scandalized".

Sometimes, Jesus doesn't meet our expectation of what we expect from Him. Perhaps we've prayed for a healing that didn't come, or a ministry that never materialized. When a prayer appears to not be answered, it is easy to become discouraged.

There are two very important things to remember.

First, Jesus will not condemn you for your doubts. It is a part of human nature to have doubts. When we get discouraged, we should do what John did - take it to Jesus. Tell Him about your doubts, and allow him to encourage you.

Second, we need to understand that if Jesus doesn't meet our expectations, the problem is with our expectations, and not with Jesus. If you are discouraged because it seems that Jesus didn't keep a promise, then study the scriptures. Allow the Spirit to teach you. I will go out on a limb and say that the expectation of the promise doesn't match the actual promise in the Bible.

It may be that a promise is based on a condition. Or maybe you've had poor teaching. For example, a commonly quoted scripture is "Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." So you ask yourself, "Since I love the Lord, why don't I have that Lamborghini that I desire?" Perhaps it's because you overlook the first part of the verse. If you truly delight yourself in the Lord, then what you desire will be the Lord. In other words, if you delight yourself in the Lord, then He will give you Himself. If your delight is in the Lord, then He will be you desire.

Always be willing to adjust your expectations to match Jesus. Don't expect Him to change in order to match your expectations. If you do this, you will have no reason to doubt.