Matthew 12:38

38. Master, we would see a sign This asking for a sign seemed to be a standing demand, made at different times; by the scribes and Pharisees, as here; by the Pharisees with the Sadducees in Matthew 16:1; Matthew 16:4; and by the people in Luke 11:16; Luke 11:29. See also John 6:30; 1 Corinthians 1:22. Our Lord uniformly not only refused compliance, but rebuked the request. From this, some skeptics have boldly inferred that our Lord could not furnish the sign; and that he really performed no miracles; since miracles are signs. To these cavils, perhaps answers will appear in the course of our remarks. But we may here remark that although a miracle is in a true sense a sign, yet there is a difference between a miracle and a sign. A miracle is a work going forth from our Lord’s own power and act. A sign would be some divine token, given from some other source, as a confirmatory seal of his Messiahship. Now, as miracles going out from our Lord’s power were proper and true manifestations of himself, it was upon proof of those that our Lord rightly held that he was to be received. He claimed to be accepted for what he himself was or did. What the Jews at this time sought, as appears from Luke, was a sign from heaven; and it is probable that they had in their minds what in Matthew 24:30, is called “the sign of the Son of man in heaven;” that is, the glory of his approaching presence, preceding and betokening him. And this is explained in Daniel 7:13, where the Son of man, with his glory in the heavens, is described, exhibiting the Lord in the same array of state, though not upon the same occasion. The Jews may have identified this glorious manifestation in the skies with the Messiah’s first advent or coming. And as it was, possibly, this sign of the Son of man, or manifestation in the heavens, which the Jews now had in their thoughts in asking a celestial sign, so hence we have a good reason why our Lord does not grant their request. It was out of the divine order; inasmuch as that glorious appearing belonged to his second coming in power and judgment, and not to his first coming in humiliation and for salvation. But see notes on Matthew 16:1-4.