“You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” The first recorded use of that saying was in a sermon preached in 1175. Here’s a version from 1602 (in the play Narcissus): “They can but bringe horse to the water brinke / But horse may choose whether that horse will drinke.”
I think if that saying had been around in Jesus’ time, we would have found it in this section of the Sermon on the Mount. It really is what Jesus is saying: “I can bring you the good news of God’s love and show you how to live it, but I can’t make you do it.”
Now I think that Jesus is getting a little impatient by this point in the day. He has been preaching for hours (we probably only have, in the gospel, the short summary of his teachings that day – the Coles note version or the twitter feed.) Jesus has been telling stories and sharing all that he knows, but deep down he is starting to wonder if the people will ever understand. He sees the few in the crowd who have that spark in their eye, that wonder on their face, that says they are understanding what he is sharing. But most of the crowd, he knows that they just don’t get it. They are so used to their old ways, following the rules precisely and thinking that’s what God wants, that they can’t hear his vision of the kingdom, of God’s justice and compassion. How can he say it in another way?