Seeking Another Sign

After Jesus feeding the five thousand attracted a large following.  In another effort to discredit him the came asking of a sign as Matthew 16:1 describes.  “The Pharisees also with the Sadducees came, and tempting desired him that he would show them a sign from heaven.”   In essence, they were asking him to prove again that he was the Messiah, Just as Satan did when he tempted him.  Jesus didn’t fall for their request either. 

Instead, he pointed out that they did not need some miraculous signs to predict the weather, because certain natural events lead naturally to a certain result, as he pointed out in Matthew 16:2-3.  “He answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather: for the sky is red.  And in the morning, It will be foul weather to day: for the sky is red and lowering. O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times?”  When the sun heats the ground and the air above it, the heated air rises, carrying moisture from the surface with it, and allowing cooler air to flow in and take its place.  As the hot air rises, it cools, and flows toward the place where the cooler air was originally.

Since the sun moves from east to West, surface winds tend to flow from west to east, while upper winds flow from east to west.  Red skies indicate light shining through very humid air.  As the air cools that humidity will condense and fall as rain.  Storm clouds tend to follow the upper level winds, so a red sky in the evening indicates the storm has already passed by, while a red sky in the east indicates rain clouds which are coming toward you.   Thus one can predict rain with a reasonable degree of accuracy near the ocean or other large bodies of water.  The farther one is from such bodies of water the less water is available, so it becomes less predictable.  Israel sits right on the Mediterranean coast and such predictions can be quite accurate. 

If the Jews could predict something as changeable as the weather by simply observing what was going on around them, why couldn’t they see the trends of much less volatile events and understand what was going on?  They had hundreds of prophecies describing what would be happening when the Lord came, and had seen many of those prophecies fulfilled. 

Jesus described their constant looking for more signs as being like an unfaithful wife who repeatedly threatens to leave her husband if he doesn’t prove his love by giving her what she wants, In Matthew 16:4.   “A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. And he left them, and departed.”  He told them that there would be no special signs.  They would have to decide whether they wanted to be God’s people or not on the basis of the things he had already done for them.   

Like the unfaithful wife, as long as they were depending on another sign to keep them there, there was danger that someone else would come along with another offer and they would turn away from God.  Mark 13:21-23 warns, “…if any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ; or, lo, he is there; believe him not: For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.  But take ye heed: behold, I have foretold you all things.”  People who are constantly looking for another sign that this is of God are susceptible to false teachings just as an unfaithful or uncommitted wife is susceptible to being seduced by someone other than her husband.  The refusal to commit is wicked.