Tongue Tamers, Pt. 5

Ryrie

• (8-9) “Travel lightly.” In fact, the disciples “are to travel light; perhaps it was a quick journey. They could count on traditional hospitality at the hands of many devout Jewish householders.”
• Notice, though, that the instructions later changed from take nothing to be prepared when Jesus sent them out again. Clearly the situation changed.
• (11) Shaking the dust off was “an action that symbolized a complete break in fellowship and a renunciation of all further responsibility.”

Henry

• The disciples which Jesus commissioned had spent time with him, sat at his feet and learned from him, seen his miracles, etc. Now, Jesus is going to use them. “they had received, that they might give, had learned, that they might teach; and therefore now he began to send them forth.”
• “They must not always be studying in the academy, to get knowledge, but they must preach in the country, to do good with the knowledge they have got.”
• “They went two and two to a place, that out of the mouth of two witnesses every word might be established; and that they might be company for one another when they were among strangers, and might strengthen the hands, and encourage the hearts, one of another; might help one another if any thing should be amiss, and keep one another in countenance.”
• “Christ would thus teach his ministers to associate, and both lend and borrow help.”
• “He commissioned them to attack the devil's kingdom, and empowered them, as a specimen of their breaking his interest in the souls of men by their doctrine, to cast him out of the bodies of those that were possessed.”
• “That he commanded them not to take provisions along with them, neither victuals nor money, that they might appear, wherever they came, to be poor men, men not of this world, and therefore might with the better grace call people off from it to another world.”
• “They preached that men should repent (v. 12); that they should change their minds, and reform their lives, in consideration of the near approach of the kingdom of the Messiah.”
• “Note, The great design of the gospel preachers, and the great tendency of gospel preaching, should be, to bring people to repentance, to a new heart and a new way. They did not amuse people with curious speculations, but told them that they must repent of their sins, and turn to God.”
• “Some think this oil was used medicinally, according to the custom of the Jews; but I rather think it was used as a sign of miraculous healing, by the appointment of Christ, though not mentioned; and it was afterward used by those elders of the church, to whom by the Spirit was given the gift of healing, Jam. v. 14. It is certain here, and therefore probable there, that anointing the sick with oil, is appropriated to that extraordinary power which has long ceased, and therefore that sign must cease with it.”

Reflecting God

• (7) “The purpose of going in pairs may have been to bolster credibility by having the testimony of more than one witness, as well as to provide mutual support during their training period.”
• (8) The disciples “were to depend entirely on the hospitality of those to whom they testified.”
• (9) “At night an extra tunic helped to protect from the cold night air, and the implication here is that the disciples were to trust in God to provide lodging each night.”
• (11) To shake the dust off the feet was “a symbolic at practiced by the Pharisees when they left an 'unclean' Gentile area. Here it represented a solemn warning to those who reject God's message.”
• (12-13) “This mission marks the beginning of the disciples' own ministry in Jesus' name, and their message was precisely the same as his.”