Matthew 10:26-28 Whispers in the Dark
Format for Your Devotions
Instructions: Do not read my example devotion until you have completed your own devotional time in the scriptures. Reading my thoughts first may limit your own understanding. Let the Holy Spirit speak to you alone before looking to see what anyone else has to say, whether it is me, a Bible commentary, or a friend. Let God speak to you before you let another person speak to you. I have provided a format, but modify it to fit your needs. For example, I usually combine my application and prayer together talking to God about the application to my own life. You can go through this devotion process mentally, speaking out loud, or in writing as you wish. Don’t worry if you are not following this process exactly. Sometimes, I add extra information and sometimes I emphasize one part more than others. However, you should always think about what you learn about God from this passage.
Step 1: Pray–Ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance first of all and that God may reveal the lessons that He wants you to have that day. Request that God protect you from Satan’s distractions (and the devil will try to distract you whether it is pinching the baby or putting you to sleep). Ask to see God more clearly as you read and think about the passage.
Step 2: Read the passage–Read to get an overview of the information first. Then start looking at specific parts after the first reading. You may read a larger or smaller section than I have here because you do not have to follow my organization at all.
Step 3: Understand the passage–You can summarize, ask and answer your own questions about the passage, visualize the story, analyze the characters, and relate this passage to other scriptures and personal experiences.
Step 4: What does this reveal about God?–What do you learn about the Father, Son, and/or Holy Spirit from this passage?
Step 5: Apply this to your own life.
Step 6: Prayer
My Example Devotion: March 10, 2019, Matthew 10:26-28
Note: In the devotion examples, I leave my questions and thought processes in the text because I am trying to demonstrate that a devotional time is a dialogue with God about what you are reading from His word. As such, any questions or ideas that you have should be explored by talking it out with God. These example devotions are not my attempts to teach you what the meaning of a particular scripture is. They are an attempt to teach you the process of devotions, which is a combination of prayer and Bible study where you explore ideas with God as you read His word.
“So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. [Gehenna]
(Understanding the Text) This is the extension of Matthew’s theme of how Jesus’ followers should handle persecution. In verses 21-25, Matthew tells us that not only will we have persecution, but that people we love and trust will be our betrayers. Now, Matthew tells us how to react to betrayal, lies, and persecution.
First, Matthew says for us not to be afraid. His reason is that the acts performed in secret will be known to all. I’m not sure if he means that the horrible acts done against us in secret will be brought to light for judgment or if he means the good acts that have been covered up by other’s lies will be revealed to vindicate the innocent. The only reason that I think the latter is that the next part speaks about what Jesus says in the dark.
The commentaries are just as tentative about this as I am. Guzik ignores it totally. The SDA Commentary says that the darkness part probably means the “comparative obscurity of the small circle of disciples” and the light more than likely indicates “the wide circulation the disciples were to give the lessons of truth they had learned in private.” It uses words like probably to show that the author was not totally confident in his interpretation. Darby seems to go back and forth with this idea. “But there was nothing hid that should not be revealed. They themselves were to hold nothing back, but were to proclaim on the housetops all that they had been taught; for everything should be brought into the light; their faithfulness to God in this respect, as well as all other things. This, while it met the secret plottings of their enemies, was itself to characterise the ways of the disciples. God, who is light, and sees in darkness as in light, would bring all out into the light, but they were to do this morally now.”
(Revelation of God) Jesus says that we are to repeat what he tells us in the dark when it is light, and to shout out what He whispers to us from the housetops. Is this referring to the communication of the Holy Spirit? He sends dreams that we are to tell to others, and His still small voice whispers new understanding to us that we are to proclaim to the world? I don’t know. Meyer says “Christ is often speaking. In the secret chamber of the heart, in the darkness of the night, in the shadowed room of pain and sorrow, in the room which holds all that is mortal of our beloved, hear His voice. It may be in dark sayings, but they are ‘the dark sayings on a harp,’ of which the psalmist sings. There are music, tenderness, love-notes in these dark sayings. And our hearts can receive lasting impressions in the dark.”
(Understanding the Text) The last part of the verses is real clear and real understandable. Being threatened with death means nothing. It is a sleep that will end in a beautiful life without the cruelty of sin when we awaken. Instead, we need to fear God who is our creator and can let us go to the second death if we are not connected to Him through Jesus’ sacrifice. The SDA commentary says “They were not to purchase peace through silence and compromise.”
The Greek word for soul is psuche which has many meanings like life/lives, soul/souls, people, personal pronouns, emotions, natural appetites, the mind, and the heart. I interpret psuche here to mean the very essence of who a person is–personality.
The Greek word for hell here is geenna, also known as Gehenna. This is a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew phrase ge’ hinnom, valley of Hinnom or ge’ ben hinnom, valley of the son of Hinnom. This is “the valley to the south and west of Jerusalem that meets with the Kidron Valley immediately south of the City of David and the Pool of Siloam” (SDA commentary). In Jeremiah 7:32-33 and 19:6, God said that the Valley of Hinnom would become a valley of slaughter because of their worship of Molech and sacrifice of human infants there (SDA commentary on 5:22). “Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when it will no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter; for they will bury in Topheth, because there is no room elsewhere. And the dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the air, and for the beasts of the earth, and none will frighten them away” (Jeremiah 7:32-33). “and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it come into my mind— therefore, behold, days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter” (Jeremiah 19:5-6). Thus, “the fires of Hinnom became symbolic of the consuming fire of the last great day of judgment and the punishment of the wicked” (SDA Commentary). “And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh” (Isaiah 66:24). The Jewish ideas of Gehenna in Jesus’ time had become corrupted by the influence of Greek thinking so that at that time, many Jews thought of Gehenna as “the place where the souls of the ungodly were reserved under punishment until the day of final judgment and rewards” (SDA Commentary). The Greek ideas of the separation of the soul from the body had made inroads into Jewish thinking in Jesus’ day. What did Jesus mean when He was saying the word Gehenna? Maybe, the older truer meaning that the Jewish rabbis had of Gehenna being “a type of the fires of the last day” based on Isaiah 31:9 (SDA Commentary). “His rock shall pass away in terror, and his officers desert the standard in panic,” declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and whose furnace is in Jerusalem” (Isaiah 31:9).
(Application) My application for myself is that Jesus will communicate with me in small whispers and quiet times like in the nighttime, so I need to listen for Him. Then I need to shout the blessings He gives me to the world, i.e. I need to communicate the wisdom and knowledge given to me by Jesus to those around me.
(Prayer) Open my ears so that I can hear Your quiet whispers clearly. Give me the words to share those words with people who need to hear them. Touch my heart with Your love and caring in those quiet moments of communion.