The Basis Of The New Kingly Rule - Jesus Now Explains The Future For All Who Fully Follow Him (19:27-29).
In order to fully appreciate what Jesus now says here we need to consider the similar words spoken at the Last Supper as described in Luke 22:24-30. There the context is specifically that of the disciples having false ideas about their future role, and Jesus is warning them that such ideas are to be quashed because they are dealing with something totally different than they know. There it is in the context of Him stressing that it is those who want to lord it over others (by sitting on their thrones) who are the ones who are least like what the disciples are intended to be. He stresses that in the case of the disciples it is the ones who seek to serve all, like servants serving at table, who are really the greatest, and He then points out that that is precisely what He Himself has come among them to be (compare Matthew 18:4; Matthew 20:25-28). And it is in that context that He cites the picture of the apostles as destined to sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel and expects them to understand it in terms of what He has just said (Luke 22:30).
Now taken at face value the ideas are so mutually contradictory that it is incredible. At one moment He appears to be warning them most severely against seeking lordly glory, and at the next moment He seems to be promising them precisely that and encouraging them to look forward to it, knowing that they are expecting His Kingly Rule soon to be manifested. In other words in this view He is depicted as promising them the very thing that He is at the same time trying to root out of them, and making both promises within seconds of each other. He is seemingly inculcating the very attitude that He is trying to destroy. We find this quite frankly impossible to believe. It suggests therefore that in fact Jesus meant something very different than He appears to be saying at face value, and that He expected His disciples to understand it, so that we thus need to look a little deeper at its parabolic significance in order to appreciate its significance (in the case of Luke see for this our commentary on Luke 22).
The second thing that we need to take into account in this regard is Jesus' love for parabolic representation. Regularly in His parables His servants are pictured as men of great importance who are called on to serve faithfully. They are pictured as people placed in great authority, and that on earth for the purpose of a ministry on earth (Matthew 18:23-24; Matthew 25:14; Luke 12:42; Luke 16:1; Luke 19:12-13). They are seen as given positions of great splendour. But in contrast we have already been warned about how they must carry out that service. They are to carry it out by serving humbly (Luke 12:36-37; Luke 22:26-27; see also Matthew 18:4; Matthew 20:26-27). Thus He pictures His servants as on the one hand having great authority and power, and yet on the other as needing to be meek and lowly and menial in serving others. And He pictures the latter as the greatest service that there is, so great that it is what He Himself is doing while on earth (Matthew 20:26-28; Luke 22:26-27), and is also what He will do for them in the future Kingly Rule (Luke 12:37). For He is one Who Himself delights to serve, and is among them as One Who serves, and will go on serving into eternity for God is a God Who delights to serve and to give. He is the very opposite of what we naturally are. That is what He has done through history (note Exodus 20:1-2). So although His authority is total and His power omnipotent he continually serves His own.
Can we really think that the One Who sets such a picture before them of service is going to encourage them by presenting them with a goal that contradicts all that He has said at a time when they are vulnerable to such ideas? If there was one problem that the disciples had at this time above all others it was wrong ideas about their future importance, ideas which were making them almost unbearable (Matthew 20:20-24). Would Jesus really have been foolish enough to feed those wrong ideas by saying, ‘Don't worry, you are going to lord it over everyone in the end'? Quite frankly it is inconceivable.
The third thing that is to be taken into account is that the promises then made to other than the twelve relate mainly to this life (Matthew 19:29). What they are promised is that whatever they lose for His sake they will gain the more abundantly here on earth (this is even clearer in Mark 10:30), as well as eternal life. If He wanted to encourage His disciples by pointing to their future glorified state, why did He not do the same openly with the others? Thus the obvious conclusion is that what He promises to the disciples is parallel with what He promises to the others, and that both therefore relate mainly to this life.
The fourth point to be considered is that these words are followed immediately by a parable that warns against presumption, in which it is emphasised that God promises to deal with all men equally when it comes to ‘reward'. But this sits very uneasily with the idea that twelve of those to whom He has spoken have already been promised thrones as a reward! (Even given that the context is Matthew's arrangement).
And the final point that has to be considered is that when James and John did take Jesus' words here too literally and made their bid for the two most important of the twelve thrones (Matthew 20:20-22) Jesus immediately pointed out what their real destiny was, that they were not to seek thrones, but were to share His baptism of Suffering and to be servants of all as He was (Matthew 20:23-28), and this immediately following the parable where all were to receive equal. If He was really offering them literal thrones He should have been praising their ambition.
Let us now summarise the arguments:
1) The superficially obvious meaning is unlikely in view of Luke 22:24-30 where it contradicts the whole passage (see our commentary on Luke).
2) Jesus regularly speaks metaphorically of His disciples pictured in terms of high status (Matthew 18:23-24; Matthew 25:14; Luke 12:42; Luke 16:1; Luke 19:12-13), although serving in lowliness (Luke 12:36-37; Luke 22:26-27; see also Matthew 18:4; Matthew 20:26-27).
3) What is offered to the ‘others' in Matthew 19:29 relates to a metaphorical picture of blessing on earth prior to their going on to eternal life, depicted in an exaggerated fashion. We would therefore expect that the parallel offered to the Apostles would also refer to a metaphorical picture of blessing on earth depicted in a similar exaggerated fashion.
4) The parable that immediately follows in chapter 20 refers to all receiving equal reward which sits ill with the Apostles having just been promised thrones in a future life.
5) When James and John then take what Jesus has said too literally and seek to get the best thrones they are informed that they are rather being called on to suffer and to serve, and are not to think in terms of enjoying literal thrones (Matthew 20:20-28), and this in similar terms to Luke 22:24-30.
But what then can Jesus mean by the words ‘You who have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit on the throne of his glory, you also will sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel' without it giving the disciples too great a sense of their own importance? What could He be trying to signify to His disciples? In the light of our criticisms above we would expect the obvious solution to be that He was indicating to them their prominent positions of service in regard to their future task on earth. Having that in mind as a possibility let us continue the phrases used and see if they at all fit in with that idea.
This first raises the question as to what Jesus means by ‘the regeneration' (palingenesia). Now in dealing with this question the tendency is to go to apocalyptic passages in the Old Testament as interpreted in the light of Jewish apocalyptic (neither of which used palingenesia) and then to translate them in that light. But if there is one thing that is clear about Jesus it is that He is not tied in to such ideas. Rather He takes them and reinterprets them in His own way in the light of God's programme as He sees it to be. For that is what He has come to bring, regeneration, a new creation (Romans 6:4; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 6:15).
What then is the ‘regeneration' (palingenesia)? The word can simply means ‘a becoming again' or a ‘being born again'. But how is it used elsewhere? It is used by the Egyptian Jewish philosopher Philo of the renewal of the earth after the flood. It is also used by Paul of the ‘renewal' of the Holy Spirit in men's lives when they come to Christ (Titus 3:5). Now if, as seems probable, the dove in Matthew 3:16 was symbolic of the dove returning after the flood, indicating the issuing in of a new age (Genesis 8:11), and thereby indicated the coming of a new age in the coming of the Messiah along with the deluge of the Holy Spirit, this ties in with both Philo's use and Paul's use. Here therefore it will indicate the new age that Jesus is introducing as begun in His ministry and consummated in the coming of the Holy Spirit. A new nation is being brought to birth. Thus it is the time when the Holy Spirit comes to renew men and women (Isaiah 44:1-5; Joel 2:28-29