Big Idea: Rejection of Jesus as God’s wisdom both deserves judgment and fits a divine pattern in which truth is hidden from the wise and revealed to unexpected ones.

Understanding the Text

In this passage Matthew’s Jesus critiques various Galilean towns for failing to respond to his message of repentance (see 4:17). As in 11:2–5, the miracles that he has done are directly linked to this message and his identity (11:21–24), so their rejection of his miracles is an implicit rejection of his message and self. In contrast to the judgment that they will experience (11:22, 24; cf. 12:39–42), Jesus praises God for those “little children” who have responded rightly to Jesus’ message (11:25–27). Matthew here begins the motif of hiddenness and revelation, which will recur later (chap. 13; cf. 16:1…