Go and Tell John: The Messiah and the Re-Genesis of the World

Deep Studies (Matthew 11:2–6 with Isaiah 34–35)

Sep 20, 2025

Each month on Deep Word I share a longer essay (or more) that digs deeper into Scripture: engaging with the biblical text, its original language, historical and cultural context, and insights from scholars who have shaped my own study. These are pieces to sit with, to wrestle over, and to let stretch your understanding of God’s Word. If the shorter reflections are meant to encourage you midweek, Deep Studies is an invitation to linger at the table of Scripture a little longer.

When John’s disciples arrive with a hard question, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”, Jesus does not argue a doctrine. He points to signs and to Scripture. “Go and tell John what you hear and see.” (Matthew 11:2-6) That reply is a breadcrumb trail into Isaiah. If we follow it, we discover that the Messiah’s work is nothing less than new creation, a re-Genesis of a world unraveled by sin.

**This essay adapts and expands an earlier teaching I shared at Denton Christian Church.**

Why Jesus’ answer sends us to Isaiah

Matthew compresses Jesus’ reply into Isaiah-saturated language: the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and good news comes to the poor (cf. Isa 35:5–6; 61:1). Luke adds narrative force to this by noting that before answering, Jesus heals many in front of John’s messengers. The point is pastoral and prophetic: look at the works, then look at the Word. The works match the Word, so you know the Messiah has arrived.

Isaiah 34-35 as a unit: De-Genesis and Re-Genesis

De-Genesis — Isaiah 34

Isaiah 34 reads like creation run in reverse. The prophet uses Genesis 1 vocabulary and imagery to portray judgment as un-making. In 34:11 God lays over the land a “line of tohu and stones of bohu”, the exact chaos pair from Gen 1:2 (“formless and void”). In Genesis, God measures, separates, and orders; here, the measuring line and mason’s stones, normally tools of construction, plot out deconstruction. The cosmos follows suit: “all the host of heaven shall rot away, and the skies roll up like a scroll” (34:4), a poetic undoing of Day 1-4, i.e., light, firmament, celestial bodies.

Creation’s life-systems collapse. Rivers turn to pitch and soil to sulfur (34:9-10), a Sodom-like inversion of waters that should sustain life (contrast Isa 35:6-7, where the desert gains streams). The land yields thorns and nettles and becomes a haunt for wilderness beasts (34:13-15), evoking the Gen 3 curse and the return of untamed, chaotic creatures to once-ordered spaces. Even social order unravels: “her nobles-there is no one there to call it a kingdom” (34:12). In the Bible’s imagination, human evil never remains “private”, it corrodes the creational fabric until the world looks like pre-creation chaos.

Importantly, Isaiah 34’s focus on Edom gives the scene both specificity and symbolism. Edom is a real neighbor and a type of God-resisting power; judgment on Edom becomes a canvas for portraying the Day of the LORD in cosmic colors. That cosmic de-creation is precisely why Isaiah 35 can answer with re-creation: eyes open, ears unstopped, the lame leap, waters burst forth, and a Way of Holiness carries exiles home. The pairing is intentional- 34 shows the world unmade; 35 shows God making it new.

Re-Genesis — Isaiah 35

If Isaiah 34 is creation run in reverse, Isaiah 35 is creation run forward…again. The chapter sings with Edenic restoration and New Exodus movement as God personally arrives to save (35:4). Where judgment left tohu va-bohu, renewal brings ordered shalom: “The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus” (35:1-2). Creation itself becomes liturgy—it rejoices—because the Holy One’s glory returns to the land (35:2). The curse imagery of thorns and burning pitch gives way to fertility and festival; what was scorched now flowers.

Re-Genesis touches bodies and communities. Weak hands are strengthened and feeble knees made firm (35:3); anxious hearts hear, “Be strong; fear not” (35:4). Then come the Isaianic Messiah-signs: blind eyes opened, deaf ears unstopped, the lame leaping like a deer, the tongue of the speechless singing (35:5-6). These are not isolated miracles but a pattern: the human creature restored to wholeness under God’s reign. The land mirrors the people: waters burst forth in the wilderness, streams in the desert; burning sand becomes a pool, and the haunt of jackals becomes a reed-filled spring (35:6-7). Where Isaiah 34 populated ruins with wild beasts, 35 domesticates the wild: even the road is safe- no lion, no ravenous beast there (35:9). Creation’s environment is retuned to human flourishing because its King has returned.

At the center of this renewal stands a road, the Way of Holiness (35:8). This is Exodus language transposed into Eden keys: a sanctified highway for the redeemed to come home. The unclean do not wander there, not because the path is elitist, but because salvation purifies travelers. The journey ends in Zion, the opposite of Edom’s desolation: “everlasting joy shall be upon their heads… sorrow and sighing shall flee away” (35:10). In other words, Re-Genesis is not merely the repair of nature; it is the restoration of worship, fellowship, and joy; a people, in God’s presence, in God’s place, under God’s rule. Exactly because Isaiah 34 showed the world unmade, Isaiah 35 can unveil the world remade, and it is this remade world that Jesus begins to enact when he tells John’s disciples what they have “heard and seen.”

Matthew 11 in that light: New creation in motion

Read Matthew 11 with Isaiah’s canvas behind it:

The signs Jesus performs are not random wonders. They are Isaiah’s markers that new creation has begun.
The poor hear good news. Kingdom reversal reaches those the old order left behind.
A highway home emerges in Jesus himself. He is the road back to God, the Holy One’s presence with his people.

Jesus does not merely solve religious problems. He undoes de-Genesis and launches re-Genesis. What sin disintegrates, Messiah re-integrates.

Reading the New Testament with the Old: How metalepsis works

When the New Testament quotes or alludes to the Old, it rarely aims only at the exact words cited. It often invites you to step through the citation into the whole passage, its context, images, and storyline, and then return to the present text with that fuller picture in mind. Many scholars call this metalepsis: a brief signal that evokes a larger Old Testament scene.

Think of a citation as a hyperlink. You click it not to read a single line but to load the whole page.

A simple method for metaleptic reading

Spot the signal. Look for direct quotes, unusual phrases, or clusters of shared words/themes (for example: blind see, deaf hear, lame walk, good news to the poor).
Load the source in context. Read the Old Testament passage in full. Note what comes before and after. Ask what movement the text traces (judgment to renewal, exile to homecoming, desert to garden).
Trace the motifs. Gather the images and promises. Let the Old Testament’s symbol system fill in the New Testament scene.
Note textual texture. If wording differs, the New Testament may be echoing the Greek (LXX) form or blending multiple passages.
Bring it back. Ask how the Old Testament context reframes the New Testament moment. What expectations does it confirm, correct, or expand?
Apply pastorally. Let the integrated picture shape discipleship. This is not only “a verse fulfilled,” but a story continued.

Metalepsis in Matthew 11

Signal: “Go and tell John what you hear and see…” followed by Isaiah’s constellation of signs.
Source in context: Isaiah 35 (with resonances of 61) promises that when God comes to save, eyes open, ears are unstopped, the lame leap, deserts bloom. All this answers the de-creation of Isaiah 34.
Reframing: Jesus is not offering random proofs. He is performing Isaiah’s future in the present. With Isaiah 34-35 behind it, his ministry announces that re-Genesis has begun and that the Way of Holiness is opening before exiles.
Pastoral lesson: John asks from a prison cell. Isaiah’s wider context shows why Jesus answers with signs: God is remaking the world even if Herod’s dungeon still stands. The desert has started to sing.

When expectations crack

John’s expectations collide with his reality. Jesus’ answer does not minimize the pain; it reframes it. Look again. The kingdom is not spectacle for the powerful but restoration for the broken. New creation can begin in quiet places long before old prisons fall.

For us, the logic holds. When the world feels unmade by injustice, illness, anxiety, look for re-Genesis: reconciled relationships, bodies and minds healed, dignity restored, repentance and forgiveness taking root, communities walking the Way together. These are not small things. They are Messiah’s signatures.

Walking the Way: Practices of re-Genesis

Name the de-Genesis around you: places where creation’s goodness has frayed. Pray Isaiah 34 honestly.
Participate in re-Genesis: offer concrete acts of healing, mercy, and justice that echo Isaiah 35’s signs.
Keep to the Way of Holiness: discipleship is a road, not a moment. Travel it together.
Bear witness: when you see deserts bloom, “go and tell” what you hear and see.
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