Building Up John

Matthew 11:7-19

After gently admonishing John and his doubts, Jesus turns his attention to the crowd and admonishes them about their response to John. It seems that Jesus' perception is that the people listened to John because of the spectacle that he was and that they had completely missed his message about the coming Messiah. Jesus tries to help the people put John's ministry in perspective in terms of the overall redemption narrative: if John is the promised "Elijah" then the implication is that Jesus is the promised Messiah. Therefore the use of the phrase, "if you are willing to accept it". In other words, "if you are willing to accept that John is the Elijah, you will accept that I am the Messiah."
Jesus also reveals the fickle tendencies of the people. John didn't feast or drink and he was accused of being mad or having a demon. Jesus feasts and drinks and he is accused of being a glutton and a drunkard.
There are two lessons I glean from this passage: one is that I should be careful not to miss the messengers of God. I need to make sure I don't get sucked in or distracted by the spectacles out there and learn to discern the quiet voice of God in the middle of all the noise. I don't want to miss the message, direction, instruction, etc. that God is bringing my way.
The second lesson is that I must not entrust myself to people. If I try to please everyone I will never get it right: I'll be accused of partying too much or not enough, being to strict or too lenient, being too conservative or too liberal, being to exclusive or too universal, emphasizing proclamation or emphasizing social action. I'll never get it right. The only person I must get it right with is God and I can only do that through the work of his Son. I pray that God will help me learn to live only for him, his glory and his kingdom.