00:00 (upbeat music)

00:15 - Welcome to the life of Christ,

00:16 according to the gospel of Luke.

00:18 My name is Eric Sorensen.

00:19 I'm a pastor of Epiphany Church in New York City,

00:22 an associate pastor of Hillside Church

00:24 in Roxbury, New Jersey,

00:25 and co-host of 30 Minutes in the New Testament

00:28 with my teaching partner here.

00:30 I'm the director of Christ Hold Fast and the event coordinator for 1517.

00:36 I also host a podcast 30 minutes in the New Testament and 40 minutes in the Old Testament.

00:42 So over the next number of sessions, six to be precise,

00:46 we're going to be doing sort of a broad overview of the life of Christ for you.

00:51 The first session will begin sort of as an origin story.

00:54 We'll talk about his birth and the predictions that led up to it as well as John the Baptist.

01:00 to who Jesus says he is and why he says he came.

01:05 And then in the third session,

01:06 we'll talk a little bit about some of the actions of Jesus,

01:09 his miracles and his healings and things like that.

01:13 - Well then move on to the teachings of Jesus,

01:15 his ethical teachings, his theological teachings,

01:18 some of the parables that he taught.

01:20 Well then look at the Passion of Christ,

01:21 the Upper Room discourse, the Last Supper,

01:24 the betrayal, arrest and eventual trial

01:26 and crucifixion of Christ,

01:27 and finish up with the resurrection and ascension.

01:30 The theme verse if we had one for this entire series is Luke 951, which is Jesus set his face towards Jerusalem.

01:40 Now at first upon hearing that theme verse, you might wonder why we picked it because it doesn't sound all that dramatic.

01:47 But the reality is quite dramatic in Luke's narrative because all throughout the gospel what Luke is pointing us to is the reality that ultimately the reason Jesus has come

02:00 to save sinners in that the means by which he will save sinners is by going to Jerusalem

02:06 to be crucified on their behalf.

02:09 And so that's why we pick that verse.

02:10 I think you'll see as we go through each session that the cross is sort of the shadow

02:15 looming in the background behind each and every part of Luke's gospel.

02:20 So we're excited to have you guys with us on this journey as we look at how Luke has

02:30 and we're excited for you to join us for session one coming up right now.

02:45 Welcome to the life of Christ as we look at it through Luke's gospel.

02:51 What is Luke's gospel exactly?

02:54 What do we mean when we say gospel, at least in this context?

03:00 have to start right at the very beginning. And so I want to read verses one through four

03:04 of Luke chapter one to start us off. It reads like this.

03:09 \"Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished

03:14 among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word

03:21 have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely

03:30 orderly account for you, most excellent theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things

03:39 you have been taught in the reading. So right at the outset, Luke tells us his goal in writing

03:47 his gospel. It is to produce an orderly narrative about the life and work of Christ,

04:00 Theophilus, and for that matter, the rest of us.

04:05 Now, who is this Theophilus?

04:07 Well, it literally means,

04:09 the word literally means lover of God.

04:12 And so some have suggested that this might be a benefactor

04:15 that's supporting Luke's journalistic work

04:17 as he investigates the life of Jesus.

04:20 And others have suggested,

04:21 well, maybe this is just sort of a nickname for the church.

04:24 Either way, Luke's goal in writing this

04:30 of all the things Jesus did in his life.

04:34 This immediately tells us a few things about Luke's gospel.

04:39 First of all, because it is orderly and narrative,

04:42 it means that Luke does not include everything

04:46 that Jesus did, but a lot of the important things

04:49 that Jesus did.

04:50 He doesn't give us an exhaustive list.

04:53 The Apostle John says that if everything were written down

04:56 that Jesus did, there wouldn't be enough books on earth

05:00 tell the story. And so Luke is giving us a narrative, an orderly account of what Jesus

05:07 accomplished in his ministry and the things that he believes are the most important for

05:12 the church to know. Now, why would this come up at this time? Well, probably around

05:18 the time that Luke was writing his gospel, there was probably a number of stories popping

05:24 up about Jesus and he really wants to separate facts from fiction. It's just that simple.

05:30 And for that matter, he does an incredible job at it.

05:33 The apologist and noted author Dr. Norman Geisler once noted about Luke,

05:37 inciting 32 countries, 54 cities, nine islands, and several rulers,

05:44 Luke never once makes a mistake.\"

05:48 So how did he do this?

05:52 Well, he tells us in the opening verses,

06:00 \"I witnesses like perhaps Mary, his mother.

06:04 \"After all, how else would he get all the info

06:06 \"that he compiles for us in the first few chapters

06:09 \"about the birth of Jesus and the announcement

06:11 \"from the angels about Jesus?

06:15 \"He'll talk to Jesus as relatives, his brothers.

06:18 \"He'll talk to his friends,

06:19 \"and he'll talk to his disciples,

06:22 \"and from that he will compile this orderly narrative.

06:27 \"And Luke certainly is not the only author

06:30 New Testament that makes a big deal of all these things being based off actual witness

06:35 accounts.

06:37 You can hear the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 make his case for the reality of the resurrection

06:43 of Christ by the fact that he appeared to all the disciples and even to 500 plus at one

06:49 time, even challenging the readers of the letter to the Corinthians to go and talk to

07:00 Listen to the Apostle John in 1 John 1 through 3.

07:05 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard,

07:09 which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands,

07:15 concerning the word of life.

07:17 The life was made manifest and we have seen it and testified to it

07:21 in proclaimed to you the eternal life which was with the Father

07:24 and was made manifest to us.

07:30 also to you so that you too may have fellowship with us and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with the Son Jesus Christ.

07:39 That he hear all the words that relate to one's senses John uses in those first few verses of his first epistle.

07:48 That which we have seen and that which we have heard and that which we have touched.

08:00 experience in space time history.

08:04 Peter, in Acts chapter 4 verse 20, when he's asked to give an account for why he keeps on

08:10 preaching the gospel in the face of threats from people that do not want him to preach

08:15 the gospel simply says, \"We cannot help but speak of what we have seen and heard.\"

08:24 And I could go on and on.

08:25 There's many more verses where the apostles and the disciples talk like this, but you

08:30 This stuff that we're telling you about Jesus really happened. Thus the purpose

08:38 of Luke's gospel from the very beginning he says is that we might have

08:43 certainty about the life and ministry of Jesus, that we might know for certain

08:49 that yes these things actually took place. So with that by way of

09:00 of Scripture, namely the genealogy of Jesus. In the New Testament, there are two different

09:08 genealogies for Jesus, presented one in Matthew's gospel and one in Luke's gospel.

09:14 In Matthew's gospel, he traces Jesus' genealogy back to Abraham. Now, why is that? Well,

09:22 it's pretty simple. Matthew's point in writing his gospel is to convince a primarily Jewish

09:30 Messiah. And so he goes back to the father of the Jewish people, Abraham, to make his point and shows that yes, he is

09:39 his offspring.

09:41 Luke, on the other hand, is a little different. He has a different goal in mind.

09:47 He goes all the way back to the very first man, Adam.

09:51 And the goal here is probably twofold. First of all, it's to show that Jesus is not merely the

10:00 Messiah, the world's Savior, since Adam is the father of us all.

10:06 And secondly, we can't help but be reminded by this that Jesus is in fact the true and

10:11 better Adam, which we will discuss more and more as we go through this course together.

10:17 When Luke comes to the conclusion of his genealogy, he refers to Adam as the \"son

10:22 of God.\"

10:30 But the New Testament will go on in places like the book of Romans

10:34 to make the case that Jesus is the true and better son of God,

10:39 who unlike Adam will not ever fall into sin

10:43 and will indeed do all of his father's will perfectly.

10:47 Luke's genealogy like Matthew's highlights Jesus' fulfillment of prophecy,

10:52 with it being noted that he is the offspring of David,

10:56 as was told in the Old Testament in 2 Samuel 7

11:00 through 17, that he's the offspring of Judah, as was prophesied by Judah's father Jacob,

11:07 found in Genesis chapter 49, verses 9 through 12, and of course, the offspring of Abraham

11:14 that we're first told about in Genesis chapter 12. And yet, this list of names in the genealogy

11:22 of Jesus reminds us of something very important, and that is that the people in the genealogy

11:30 are people that are far from perfect. They are sinners, imperfect people just like you and me.

11:39 Even amongst the heroes of the faith that I just mentioned, somebody like David, for example,

11:46 we can't help but remember that this man murdered and committed adultery with Bathsheba, among many other failings.

12:00 thought was an encounter with the prostitute, yeah, he gets to be mentioned in the genealogy.

12:05 It was that offspring that eventually would bring Jesus to fruition.

12:11 And of course, we know that Abraham repeatedly fell short of believing God's promise to him

12:16 would actually really come to pass.

12:20 And so because of the imperfection of the people of the genealogy of Christ, Luke is

12:25 careful to note at the beginning something interesting about Jesus.

12:30 this. He says, \"Joseph, it was supposed was his father.\" It's a parenthetical statement

12:37 at the beginning of the genealogy. And what that's a clear allusion to when he says it

12:43 was supposed that he was his father is that Luke indeed teaches us that Jesus was virgin

12:50 born. Well, what is the significance of the virgin birth?

13:00 King think it's extraordinarily important. Once asked if he had the choice to interview

13:06 one person in all of history who he would choose, not too surprisingly he said Jesus,

13:13 but then asked what he would actually want to ask Jesus. The question he had of all the

13:18 questions he could ask was, \"Were you really virgin born?\" And then he followed that up

13:30 But then on the other hand, in recent times, many have urged the church to do away with

13:36 such a doctrine of virgin birth because well, it's obviously supernatural and frankly,

13:42 hard for us to fathom how it could come to be.

13:45 And there are some, there have been some especially in the last 100-150 years or so

13:49 in the church's history that have tried to make the Bible less supernatural and more

14:00 have none of that. For Luke, it's very significant. The significance of the

14:07 virgin birth for Luke is really pretty simple. It's to highlight number one that

14:12 yes, that's what the eyewitnesses most likely, again including Mary, report, but

14:19 then two, to reveal that Jesus as the sinless Son of God really is untouched

14:30 at according to Luke, and the virgin birth signifies this profound difference between

14:35 him and all other human beings.

14:40 It's emphatically clear that Luke teaches that it happened.

14:42 He does this by reporting an angelic appearance to Mary found in Luke 1 verses 26 through

14:50 33.

14:51 It reads like this, \"In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city

15:00 a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David. And the Virgin's name was Mary, and he came

15:07 to her and said, \"Greetings, O favored one, or O graced one, the Lord is with you.\" But she was

15:15 greatly troubled at the saying and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be,

15:20 and the angel said to her, \"Do not be afraid, which incidentally is the most common command in all

15:30 found favor with God.

15:33 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.

15:39 He will be great and he will be called son of the most high, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,

15:47 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.

15:54 And Mary said, How will this be since I am a virgin?

16:00 When the angel answered her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the most

16:06 high will overshadow you.

16:09 Therefore the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God.\"

16:15 It's amazing what we learn about Jesus already in the first chapter of Luke's gospel, just

16:24 from the angelic announcement to Mary about what this child will be.

16:30 will be called the son of the Most High, clearly referencing that this is a divine being.

16:39 We also learn that he is the Davidic king.

16:43 Again prophesied in 2 Samuel 7, very, very crucial in a Jews' understanding of what

16:48 the Messiah would be was this understanding that he would take over the throne of David

16:53 one day and rule forever.

17:00 His reign will have no end. He will be holy. He'll be pure and spotless.

17:06 Later on when angels are announcing to shepherds out in the field Jesus' actual birth,

17:13 he tells the shepherds that Jesus has not just come for the Jews only but that he is for all the people,

17:21 that he is in fact born in the prophesied city of David, namely Bethlehem,

17:30 that He is Savior and Christ the Lord.

17:36 And so from the very beginning,

17:38 we are hearing Luke set up for us

17:40 exactly who this Jesus is.

17:42 He is both Son of God and Son of man.

17:45 We'll spend a lot of time digging into that

17:48 over the next number of sessions,

17:50 but we'll move on to Dan's next session right now.

17:55 (upbeat music)

18:00 ♪ I see you in the dark ♪

18:06 - And before we get into the ministry of Jesus,

18:09 we have to talk a little bit about his second cousin, John.

18:12 commonly known as John the Baptist or John the baptizer.

18:16 John is the son of Mary's cousin Elizabeth

18:18 and her husband, Zachariah, who was a priest.

18:21 Now, Angel comes to Zachariah while he's in the temple

18:24 and foretells the birth of John.

18:30 foretelling the birth of Jesus. Now John's birth is also miraculous in the way

18:35 that Zechariah and Elizabeth were both advanced in years and also that Elizabeth

18:41 was barren. Now the angels announcement to Zechariah, we see it in the first

18:46 chapter of Luke verses 13 through 17. It reads like this, \"Do not be afraid

18:51 Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear a

19:00 and many will rejoice at his births, for he will be great before the Lord.

19:04 He must not drink wine or strong drinks. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit

19:08 even from his mother's womb, and he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God.

19:14 He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah,

19:17 to the hearts of the fathers and their children, from the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, and to make ready

19:24 for the Lord of people prepared.

19:30 What it's saying is that John is going to be set apart to be the forerunner for the Messiah.

19:35 We see this when he is called Elijah.

19:39 But John is the fulfillment of something huge, something that Israel has been waiting for for

19:44 a very long time. The very last words of the Old Testament, spoken by the prophet Malachi,

19:49 are this, \"Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the

20:00 and the hearts of the children to their fathers,

20:02 lest they come and strike the land

20:04 with the decree of utter destruction.

20:06 Now Elijah represents the prophets.

20:09 He's the prophet that didn't die.

20:10 He's the prophet that was taken up in the whirlwind.

20:13 He's the prophet that could perceivably come back.

20:16 Malachi says at the very end of the Old Testament

20:19 that Malachi will come before the great and awesome day

20:23 of the Lord.

20:24 That is before the Messiah.

20:27 The angel of Son Zechariah that John, his son,

20:30 miraculously born son is that coming of Elijah.

20:34 Now John is not actually Elijah,

20:37 but he comes in the spirit of Elijah

20:39 that is to say in the spirit of all the prophets

20:42 who are pointing towards Christ.

20:44 He comes as the last prophet before the Messiah

20:47 ultimately appears.

20:48 In fact, Jesus will say that John is not only

20:52 the greatest of all the prophets,

20:54 but the greatest man ever born to women.

21:00 in a way that Moses represents the law.

21:03 We see this in the amount of transfiguration in Luke 9.

21:07 So Moses as a representation of the law

21:10 and Elijah as a representation of the prophets

21:12 both appear with Jesus at the amount of transfiguration.

21:17 And it's clear that Jesus is the end of both the law

21:21 and the prophets when the disciples are not permitted

21:24 to make permanent dwelling places for Moses and Elijah.

21:30 that Jesus is now the chosen one,

21:32 and that he is the one that they should now listen to.

21:36 Now there's a lot we could say about John,

21:39 even though we don't have a lot of information about him.

21:42 In fact, his entire narrative is really confined

21:45 to the third chapter of Luke.

21:46 He comes up one more time before he dies,

21:48 where he's questioning if Jesus really is the Messiah.

21:54 Now, if you really wanna know what John is all about,

21:56 I think it's most clear from the mouth of his father,

22:00 born. This is what Zacharias says about John at his birth. \"And you, child, will be called the

22:07 prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give

22:13 knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins. This is who John

22:19 ultimately is. He is the last of the prophets. He is the one who prepares the hearts of the people

22:30 salvation in the forgiveness of their sins.

22:34 And Luke three is where we see the short ministry

22:36 of John begin and end.

22:39 Luke reports at the beginning of Luke chapter three

22:41 that the word of God came to John,

22:43 the son of Zachariah in the wilderness,

22:45 and he went into all the region around the Jordan

22:47 proclaiming a baptism of repentance

22:50 for the forgiveness of sins.

22:53 This is what his father said of him,

22:55 that he would prepare the way that he would in fact,

23:00 the salvation that God was bringing.

23:02 He concludes his ministry in Luke,

23:05 the same chapter, chapter three, 21 and 22,

23:08 where it says, \"And the people were baptized.

23:10 \"When they had heard this,

23:12 \"Jesus was also baptized and was praying,

23:14 \"and the heavens were opened,

23:15 \"and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form,

23:19 \"like a dove, and a voice came from heaven,

23:21 \"you are my beloved son with whom I am well pleased.\"

23:26 John is preparing the way for the one

23:30 through the forgiveness of sins.

23:32 He is baptizing people for the forgiveness of sins,

23:35 but he is also baptizing the one

23:37 from whom he prepared the way.

23:39 This is why Jesus is baptized as John

23:42 as the final act of John's ministry.

23:46 But why is Jesus baptized by John?

23:47 Really?

23:49 Jesus has no sins.

23:50 He comes to take away sins.

23:51 He's the one that John is preparing to wait for,

23:54 the real salvation, where forgiveness really dwells.

24:00 Well, the reason for this is that as the people are coming down and being baptized

24:05 for their sins, they're coming down into the Jordan and they're going in dirty and

24:09 they're coming out clean.

24:11 And Jesus becomes the only person ever to be baptized who goes into the water clean

24:16 and comes out dirty.

24:17 He comes out bearing the sins of the world.

24:19 He comes out bearing the sins that were left there by any number of sinners before

24:24 him.

24:30 Beheaded in a real way the baptism of Jesus ends the ministry of John and

24:37 Begins the ministry of Jesus, but there's one more thing that Jesus does before his ministry really starts in earnest

24:45 He goes into the wilderness to be tempted

24:49 Luke chapter 4 begins this way and

24:53 Jesus full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was led by the spirit into the wilderness and for 40 days

25:00 Being tempted by the devil, he ate nothing during those days.

25:04 And when they were ended, he was hungry.

25:07 The wilderness temptation is interesting for a number of reasons.

25:12 One, you have this dissimilarity between Jesus going out into the wilderness to be

25:18 tempted by the devil. It's similar to Adam being tempted

25:23 in the garden. What Adam cannot resist in a garden where he has plenty of food,

25:30 Jesus can do in a desert wilderness, in a world that's fallen while he is hungry.

25:38 The atom was tempted by the devil in a garden full of food and ultimately failed.

25:42 What sinless Adam could not do, Jesus the second Adam, who comes to take away and forgive sin,

25:49 does in the wilderness, resists the devil's temptation.

25:53 There's also a correlation between Jesus and the wilderness for 40 days

26:00 And what this signifies is that he is the fulfillment of everything promised to Israel,

26:06 including the ultimate fulfillment of the promised land fully realized in the kingdom

26:11 of God that Jesus comes and brings and spends a great deal of time in his teaching talking

26:16 about.

26:18 When you think about the fall, and you think about the world that Jesus is born into, it's

26:30 pain. And in the wilderness before he starts his ministry, he goes and experiences what

26:35 it's like to live in a fallen world and to be tempted by the devil. And he comes out

26:42 victorious. The devil tempts Jesus with three things. Food, turn these stones into

26:48 bread. He knows that Jesus is hungry. He's had nothing to eat for 40 days. And he says,

26:53 turn these stones into bread. He tempts him with hunger. He tempts him with all the

27:00 He says worship me and I will give you everything the world has to offer.

27:04 He tempts him with power.

27:07 And three, he tempts him to prove his identity.

27:10 He takes him to the temple and says, throw yourself off this.

27:14 The Word of God says that angels will protect you.

27:18 The devil ultimately fails to undermine Jesus in the wilderness.

27:23 He fails to make him question his identity.

27:26 He fails to make him fall the way the first Adam did.

27:30 tempt him with power that Jesus already possesses.

27:35 But who is this Jesus, this second Adam,

27:39 this Israel reduced down to one man?

27:41 Who is he really?

27:42 Who does he say that he is?

27:44 And what does he say that he's come to do?

27:47 Jesus is headed into ministry,

27:49 and he is going to answer those questions

27:52 in our next session.

27:53 (upbeat music)

28:00 (upbeat music)

28:07 - Well, so we've just finished session one

28:09 of our series in the Gospel of Luke,

28:12 looking at the life of Christ.

28:14 Today, just to kind of recap what we went over,

28:16 we of course talked first about why Luke wrote his gospel

28:20 and the desire to get facts as certain as possible

28:24 so that we would be confident

28:26 in what we hear about Jesus and his ministry.

28:30 looked a little bit at his genealogy and the significance of him being both born as

28:35 a human being, but yet not the normal way that a human being is born and that led us to talking

28:41 about the virgin birth of Christ through his mother, Mary.

28:45 Yeah, we also talked about a second miraculous birth, his cousin John the Baptist.

28:51 We got to look at his short but important ministry leading up to the baptism of Jesus,

29:00 Old Testament, Tines to Adam, and Jesus is about to start his ministry now, leading out of the wilderness.

29:07 So we hope you'll join us for the second session and look forward to being back again with you next time.

If you've taken a 1517 Academy course with us before, you may notice that this one is a little different. Erick Sorensen and I will be co-teaching this course, so each session will include an introduction, a 'part one' by Erick, a 'part two' by me, and a conclusion.

In this first session, we'll begin by asking the question: \"Why Should We Study Luke's Gospel?\"

- Dan and Eric

I hope you enjoyed session one of The Life of Christ According to Luke. In this session, we will look at the claims of Jesus and ask two main questions:

1) Who is Jesus?
2) Why did He come?

I also want to remind you that we have also gone through the Book of Luke on our podcast, 30 Minutes in the New Testament. If you're interested in supplementing this course with a more in-depth study of Luke's account, I highly encourage you to join us. You can find all of our episodes here: https://www.1517.org/podcasts/30-minutes-in-the-new-testament

- Dan and Eric

00:00 (upbeat music)

00:14 - Welcome back to our series in the life of Christ,

00:17 according to the gospel of Luke.

00:19 We're about to enter session two here,

00:20 but before we do that today,

00:22 we wanted to just give a brief recap

00:25 of what we went over in our first session.

00:28 Of course, in our last time,

00:30 origin story of the life of Christ. We talked about his birth, we talked about his genealogy,

00:37 and we talked about why Luke wrote the gospel. Relying heavily on eyewitness accounts and making

00:44 sure that he had gotten all the facts straight. Of course, one of the big reasons for that is

00:48 because it didn't take long after Jesus had risen and ascended that there were all sorts of stories

01:00 to make sure that for his readers that he had an accurate account so that they would be,

01:06 he uses the word certain of what they're reading, certain of what they hear is actually true about Jesus.

01:14 Yeah, we also covered the birth of Christ, the birth of John the Baptist,

01:19 the short ministry of John the Baptist, how this dovetailed into the ministry of Christ,

01:24 how the Christ was driven out in the wilderness, how this connected him with the Old Testament,

01:30 And now as we head into these, the actual ministry of Christ,

01:34 we need to look at who Jesus says He is

01:38 and what He says He's come to do.

01:40 - Yeah, and it is an interesting thing,

01:42 even though as we noted in the first session,

01:45 the angels basically tell us all sorts of things

01:48 about the identity of Jesus.

01:50 We're going to hear throughout Luke's gospel,

01:53 this identity reiterated over and over and over again

01:56 in various ways.

01:58 And it's a good thing for us to do

02:00 As you might have recognized, if you look, for example,

02:03 at the three ecumenical creeds, the historic creeds

02:06 of the Christian church, the Apostles' Creed,

02:08 the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed,

02:11 the person of the Trinity that always gets the most space

02:16 in these creeds is indeed the person of Jesus.

02:19 And the reason for that is because there was lots

02:21 of controversy over who He actually was.

02:25 And so we're gonna take Luke's gospel account of that today

02:30 as accurately as we can so that we can see that indeed what those people that had written

02:36 the creeds for us so many years ago were pulling from themselves and why we confess

02:42 them as accurate and true today.

02:44 And then we're going to spend a little time looking at the purpose of Jesus' ministry

02:47 and Dan's going to be talking about that in today's session.

02:50 You know, Luther was fond of saying that he knows no other God except for the God revealed

02:54 in the crucified Christ.

03:00 Because that is the fullest revelation of God that we have.

03:03 If you wanna know what God is like,

03:04 you look at what Christ is like.

03:06 If you wanna know what God is about,

03:08 you look at what Christ says He's come to do.

03:10 And that's what we're gonna do in this session.

03:13 (upbeat music)

03:26 So who is Jesus?

03:30 If you were to Google just that question alone, you would come up with millions, maybe even

03:36 hundreds of millions of possible responses.

03:41 After all, just about everyone it seems wants to have Jesus on their team advocating for

03:48 their thing, aligning himself with their political issue.

03:52 You name it, Jesus seems to find a way into just about every social sphere there is.

04:00 A while back, I just did a brief sort of compilation of different pictures you can find of Jesus on the Internet that proves this point.

04:11 I found, for example, an ad campaign called \"What Would Jesus Drive?\"

04:17 With Jesus, of course, driving a clean air vehicle because we know that if he was around today, that indeed is what he would be driving after all.

04:25 A Prius or something like that, the ad said.

04:30 Numbers of toys made with Jesus in them. There was kung fu action Jesus and I'm not making this up. That really was

04:40 Something that existed and maybe still exists today. I don't know

04:45 There was Jesus shaving. I found Jesus shaving. I don't even know what they were trying to sell there. It's just weird

04:53 There was communist Jesus, of course, and there was also

05:00 that illustrate him being on either side of that economic debate. And then of

05:06 course NRA Jesus, which shows Jesus, totem, a large weapon, and then maybe a

05:13 more popular version of Jesus nowadays. You have Buddy Jesus, of course, from the

05:20 movie Dogma. But we want to actually know who Jesus says he is in the gospel

05:30 To get to answer that question,

05:32 I've chosen five titles of Jesus

05:35 found in Luke's gospel that I hope to cover with you today.

05:40 So the first one, the first one that is used most often

05:44 is the title \"Son of Man\", \"Son of Man\".

05:48 The title itself comes from the Old Testament.

05:51 It's primarily used in the prophetic writings

05:54 and there are really two ways the title is used.

05:57 First of all, the one way found in places

06:00 in abundance is simply a way of saying one is the offspring of a human being.

06:05 It's really just like it sounds, a son, of man. It's sort of an obvious

06:11 connotation. But as obvious as that is, this title and that understanding of it

06:18 becomes actually very important, especially in the early days of the

06:22 church, to defend against various heresies about Jesus. Because believe it or

06:30 various Gnostic teachings propped up, denying that Jesus was in fact really human.

06:37 I've always found it interesting that the earliest heuracies had no problem with the claims that Jesus was God,

06:44 but they had all the problems claiming that Jesus was human.

06:49 And so to fight back against their claims, the early church would say,

07:00 really human. But he is not any other human like us as we started to talk about in our

07:08 last session. He is the perfect human. And that leads to the second way that that term

07:14 is used in the Old Testament. In Daniel's writing, chapter 7, verses 13 and 14, he writes

07:22 this, \"I saw in the night visions, and behold with the clouds of heaven there came one like a

07:30 and he came to the ancients of days, another name for God, a title for God, and was presented before him.

07:38 And to him was given dominion and glory, and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him.

07:47 His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away in his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.

08:00 son of man, to describe a man who is presented before Yahweh as the perfect representative,

08:08 and as such, has been granted a kingdom that shall have no end.

08:13 On top of this, the son of man will not merely be the king of Israel, but in this passage

08:19 he is the king of all people.

08:22 Thus, when Luke has Jesus using this title of himself in his gospel some 27 times,

08:30 and readers of the gospel would have had these images in their minds.

08:36 This is why when Jesus is on trial in Luke chapter 22 verses 66 through 70 and he admits

08:42 to being the son of man, the Jewish courts instantly convict him of blasphemy.

08:50 They know what he's claiming.

08:51 He is claiming to be divine in some sense with that title.

09:00 the familiar title \"Son of God\" or \"Son of the Most High\", which is the second title

09:04 we'll discuss now. Luke uses both sort of interchangeably.

09:08 Now we might not recognize the weight that would come with such a title

09:12 today because frankly a lot of us would become familiar with cliches that tell us

09:16 you know we're all children of God and I understand what

09:20 that means. I mean in one sense since we're all created by

09:24 him, yeah, we're all children of God. But the

09:30 much more important meaning in the ancient world for sure.

09:35 In the Old Testament, the title \"Sons of God or Sons of the Most High\" is rarely used,

09:41 but when it is, it's almost always speaking of either angelic beings, or it is sometimes

09:47 used as a synonym for those who are placed in a position of authority or rulers, like,

09:52 for example, a politician.

09:54 Psalm 82, verse 6 would be a good example of such a use.

10:00 That said, Luke uses a slightly different title for Jesus.

10:04 In Luke, Jesus is not one of many sons of the most high

10:08 or of God, but he is the son of God,

10:13 whose origin is before this world,

10:16 predates this world.

10:17 As the angel proclaims in the birth prophecy found

10:20 in Luke chapter one, verses 30 through 35,

10:24 he is the direct article, Son of God,

10:30 power of the Holy Spirit.

10:34 That leads to the next claim that Jesus makes about himself

10:38 and that is made about him from others,

10:40 and that is the title, Son of David.

10:43 Now again, that title originates in the Old Testament,

10:46 specifically in Second Samuel chapter seven

10:48 verses 11 through 13.

10:50 We talked about it a little bit in our last session,

10:53 but there, just by way of reminder,

10:55 King David has promised that one day there will be one

11:00 spring that will rule on his throne forever.

11:04 In Luke's gospel, it is used in chapter 18

11:06 verses 35 through 43, really in an interesting way.

11:11 There's a blind beggar on the side of the road

11:13 who hears the sounds of a great crowd coming by

11:17 and so he asks what's going on.

11:19 And they inform him that Jesus of Nazareth is passing by

11:24 but instinctively he does not call out Jesus of Nazareth

11:30 have mercy on me.\" Well, the title like \"Son of David,\" a regal royal title one

11:39 might expect that he'd be too busy to deal with such an insignificant person,

11:45 especially at that time in the ancient world. Indeed, the crowds around Jesus

11:51 thought that very thing and essentially tell him to shut his mouth that he's

12:00 He's calling out to his king.

12:02 Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.

12:06 And Jesus reveals to him and the crowd

12:09 what kind of king he will be.

12:11 Oh yes, he'll be powerful.

12:12 He'll sit on the throne forever.

12:14 No one will ever defeat him,

12:15 but he will also be the kind of king

12:17 who brings healing and mercy to the marginalized

12:20 and the broken and the outcast in the center.

12:26 The fourth title Luke uses is of course the Christ.

12:30 After nine verse 18, Jesus asks his disciples

12:33 a very important question,

12:35 \"Who do the crowds say that I am?\"

12:38 And they answered John the Baptist, Elijah,

12:40 or one of the other prophets has risen from the dead.

12:44 And then Jesus said to them,

12:45 \"But who do you say that I am?\"

12:48 And you're probably familiar with Peter's

12:50 favorite, famous answer,

12:53 \"You are the Christ, the Christ of God.\"

12:57 \"The Christ or the Messiah, God's anointed one

13:00 the world's Savior.

13:03 Indeed, for us, that last word might be the most important title of all that Luke uses.

13:10 Savior, why?

13:13 Why can he be our Savior?

13:18 Because he is indeed the perfect Son of Man who has fulfilled all of God's law in his

13:22 life.

13:30 delivered in his name.

13:33 [MUSIC PLAYING]

13:47 Why did Jesus come?

13:49 Seems like a good question.

13:51 In ways you've already answered that question,

13:53 we've said that He's come to save.

13:54 He's come to be salvation.

13:56 He's come to go to Jerusalem.

14:00 Luke's report. If someone handed you a copy of the gospel according to Luke,

14:04 and that's all you had, what conclusion would you come to?

14:07 That's what we're going to do now. We're going to look at why Jesus has come from

14:12 Jesus' own lips. Why does He say He's come? What are the

14:16 perfect statements that He makes throughout Luke's record?

14:20 One of the first times we hear Jesus' state why He has come is after calling Levi,

14:25 also known as Matthew, the tax collector, to be his disciple.

14:30 this. Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at a tax

14:36 booth and he said to him, \"Follow me,\" and leaving everything he rose and

14:41 followed him. And Levi made him a great feast in his house and there was a large

14:46 company of tax collectors and others reclining that table with him and the

14:51 Pharisees and the scribes grumbled at this saying, \"Why do you eat and drink with

15:00 have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.

15:03 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.\"

15:09 Jesus has come for the sick and to call sinners to repent. This is what He says.

15:15 He has come for those who are spiritually sick, those who are not well, those who are dying,

15:20 those who are ill, and He has come for sinners. He has come to call specifically sinners to

15:30 righteous. This is his first purpose statement. \"I have not come to call the righteous but sinners.\"

15:38 Jesus has also not come to hang out with people of good reputation. He's not coming

15:43 to hang out with all the right people. He's not come to establish some kingdom that here

15:48 on earth. He's not come to establish something that people would look at and say, \"That's

15:52 the kind of person I want to follow.\" Nor is he concerned about his reputation. He is

16:00 his witness. This is not something that he has on his mind. He does not mind

16:04 associating with sinners, tax collectors, spiritually sick people, people of whom

16:10 other people find of ill-repute and people that they would never hang out with.

16:14 The reason why he doesn't have a problem with this is that it is in fact his

16:18 purpose to call them. Another example of this, and also a very clear mission

16:30 this story growing up, if you were raised in Sunday school about a wee little man in a big,

16:35 big tree trying to get a glimpse that Jesus he passed by. But there's a lot going on with

16:40 the story of Zacchaeus that you don't see on your Sunday school felt board. It reads like this,

16:46 \"And behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, and he was a chief tax collector and was rich.\"

16:52 And he was seeking to see who Jesus was. He wants to know who this Jesus is. And he is

17:00 to find out. But on account of the crowd, he could not because he was small in stature.

17:06 So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him. And as Jesus was

17:12 about to pass that way and Jesus came to the place and he looked up and said to him,

17:16 \"Zekias, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today.\" So he hurried

17:22 and came down and received him joyfully. And when they saw it, they all grumbled. He

17:30 man who is a sinner and Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord,

17:34 behold, Lord, half my goods I give to the poor. And if I have

17:39 defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it full fourfold. And

17:43 Jesus said to him, today, salvation has come to this house,

17:47 since he is also a son of Abraham, for the son of man came to

17:51 seek and to save the lost. Now this word is very interesting.

18:00 necessary that is necessary that I eat with you.

18:04 He says this multiple times, and we're going to look at a couple of other times that Jesus says this,

18:07 but this is a purpose statement.

18:09 Jesus says that he is necessary for him to go and die with Zacchaeus.

18:17 Jesus is the guest of sinners and the subject of the grumbling and gossip of the righteous.

18:24 This is who he is and this is what he has come to be.

18:30 as we saw with Matthew, and we see that repentance has come

18:35 in the house of Zacchaeus.

18:36 Zacchaeus is repenting all over the place,

18:38 but how does this repentance work?

18:41 Disrepentance works this way.

18:42 Jesus calls sinners to repent by saying,

18:46 come, follow me.

18:50 The appeal to come be with him causes one to repent.

18:56 He also causes sinners to repent when he says,

19:00 I be with you.

19:02 It's not that I would like to be with you.

19:05 It's not that it's a good idea, if I am with you,

19:08 that is necessary that I be with you.

19:12 This results in Zacchaeus repenting all over the place.

19:15 As soon as Jesus says these words that I must be with you,

19:19 Zacchaeus starts saying that he will give half

19:21 of everything he has to poor people,

19:23 that if he is defrauded to anyone,

19:24 he will pay it back fourfold.

19:27 This repentance is worked out in this way,

19:30 Jesus not telling him to do something but telling him that it is necessary that he come and dwell with him a sinner

19:40 Salvation has come to this house Jesus says

19:43 That's an interesting way to say that

19:46 Salvation has come to this house. Well who has come to this house? It is Christ

19:50 It is Jesus in that house Jesus says it is necessary that I come to your house

20:00 itself has come to your house.

20:04 Why has it come to that house?

20:06 Well, he says, \"Because I have come to seek and to save the lost.\"

20:14 This necessary word shows up again in Luke 22,

20:18 when Jesus tells you how it is that he's going to save these lost sheep that he seeks.

20:30 be fulfilled. It's that same word. It is necessary for scripture to be fulfilled in me.

20:38 And this is the scripture that he quotes from Isaiah and he was numbered with the transgressors.

20:45 He has come then to fulfill Isaiah 53 12. It is necessary. It is part of his purpose that that

21:00 with the law breakers, with the sinners.

21:04 This happens by the world numbering him with the transgressors,

21:08 as we've already seen. So people all the time say, \"Why is he eating and drinking with sinners?

21:12 Why is he dwelling with sinners?\" So the world itself numbers Jesus with the transgressors,

21:18 but this happens even more fully as God numbers him with the transgressors.

21:24 Isaiah continues, if you read the full verse, Jesus only quotes half of it,

21:30 He was numbered with the transgressors,

21:32 yet he bore the sins of many

21:36 and makes intercession for the transgressors.

21:39 So Jesus has come not only to forgive sins,

21:43 he has come to bear sins,

21:45 he has come to seek and to save sinners,

21:47 but he will save them by burying their sins,

21:50 by being a, being the absorber of sins.

21:54 He will bear them all, he will take them as his own.

21:57 The wages of sin is death.

22:00 Jesus has then ultimately come to die.

22:06 It is necessary as he states in chapter nine, verse 22,

22:13 which reads like this, \"The Son of Man must.\"

22:18 It is necessary again, same word.

22:21 It is necessary that the Son of Man

22:24 suffer many things and be rejected by the elders

22:30 killed and be raised on the third day.

22:34 This is what is necessary.

22:36 This is what I have come to do.

22:38 I am the only one to do it.

22:40 I do this to save sinners.

22:45 We will get into the death and resurrection more later on.

22:49 But the answer to the question, why did Jesus come,

22:52 is to call sinners to himself, to save the lost,

22:56 to be counted among the transgressors,

23:00 and to be rejected until by the religious leaders

23:03 and to be raised on the third day.

23:08 But we're not there yet.

23:11 (upbeat music)

23:24 - Well, we've officially just finished session two

23:26 and I love being able to talk about

23:30 issues that Dan and I talked about today,

23:32 I got to cover a little bit of the identity of Jesus,

23:36 and then Dan, you wrapped up with why Jesus came,

23:39 and I really appreciated what you said today

23:42 about the necessity of Jesus being with

23:46 and being even numbered among transgressors.

23:49 I think that's so important for us to see

23:52 as sort of central to all of Jesus' ministry.

23:56 - Yeah, well, it seems that the word necessary

24:00 and when we translate it sometimes must or a need.

24:05 Must seems like it's something you have to do

24:08 or maybe it's important for you to do.

24:09 Necessary, maybe it's the same,

24:11 but you're the only one that can do it.

24:13 And this is certainly true of Christ.

24:15 He comes to do something that only he can do.

24:17 And it's necessary also because the Old Testament

24:21 does have promises that God says he's going to fulfill

24:25 in Christ.

24:26 And lest God be a liar, Christ must do these things.

24:30 transgressors coming to seek and save the lost are those kinds of things in your talk to we also all of this stuff

24:37 Really bolsters what you were talking about

24:39 Which is the idea that Christ gets to establish who he is for himself all the time we want to make Jesus

24:45 The way we want him to be we want to we want to make him into something that we would like him to be

24:51 But we let him speak for himself when we find out as you as you showed in your in your talk

24:57 Exactly who he is

25:00 that everybody wants to sort of have Jesus on their team no matter where you're at in the world,

25:05 no matter where they're at, and everybody sort of wants to find a way to Christianize whatever

25:10 other beliefs they have. And so, you know, as I showed at the beginning of my talk, you know,

25:15 you can find any number of advocacy groups, commercials, you name it, that try and make Jesus fit

25:21 into their mold. But in fact, the titles of Jesus have very specific meaning in Luke. You know,

25:30 that he is indeed human, but he's also fulfilling the prophecy that was given to Daniel,

25:35 that he's the son of God, the son of the most high God. And so we know that he's

25:39 divine at the same time. We saw with the son of David that even though he's going to be a king

25:44 that will rule on David's throne forever, he's a king that's filled with compassion,

25:48 and that makes him so fit to be our Christ and ultimately our Savior, which I argue is maybe

26:00 of my life, I still need a Savior.

26:03 - Yeah, it turns out that the Jesus that is best

26:06 is when you let Jesus describe in his own words,

26:08 who he is and what he's come to do,

26:09 which is that he is God in the flesh

26:11 and that he's come to save sinners.

26:13 - Yeah, and that's enough.

26:17 - Thanks so much for joining us for this session.

26:18 We'll be back next week for session three.

26:21 (upbeat music)

26:30 [MUSIC PLAYING]

Nice work on completing session 2! In this session, we'll continue our examination of Luke by honing in on the miracles of Jesus. This includes two types of miracles He performs:

1. Miracles of Healing
2. Miracles of Power (specifically, over nature and substance)

Let's get started!

- Dan and Eric

00:00 (upbeat music)

00:15 - Welcome again to session three

00:17 of the life of Christ,

00:18 according to the gospel of Luke.

00:21 If you've been with us for the first two sessions,

00:22 you know we've talked about the origin of Jesus,

00:25 who he is, why he's come.

00:27 Today we're gonna be looking at the miracles of Jesus,

00:30 In my time, I'm going to be looking at the miracles of healing that he did.

00:34 At least some of them, we won't have time to go over all of them.

00:37 And why it's significant that he does so much of that in his ministry.

00:41 We're also going to be looking a little bit at his exorcisms, because that is a very common practice in Jesus' ministry.

00:50 He's not just healing diseases, but he's also freeing people up from spiritual oppression

00:56 and causing them to become his disciples.

01:00 They don't involve exorcisms, demons, or illnesses.

01:04 Some of them involve nature, they involve wind, waves,

01:07 and they involve hungry people and food.

01:10 And so we're gonna take a look at all that.

01:12 Let's get into it.

01:13 (upbeat music)

01:27 In our last session, we talked about

01:30 and why he has come.

01:33 And of course we saw that he says he is the son of man

01:36 and the son of God, the son of David,

01:38 the Christ and ultimately our savior.

01:41 And then Dan pointed out why he is come.

01:43 And that was really to show that he was here

01:46 to seek and save the lost

01:47 and to save those who knew they needed a savior.

01:51 Those who Jesus refers to as sick or lost out there.

02:00 Jesus did to back up his claims about himself

02:03 throughout his life and ministry as is recorded

02:06 in the gospel of Luke, because that's really essential.

02:10 It's not just that Jesus claims to be somebody,

02:13 but he also does things to back up

02:16 that he is who he says he is,

02:18 that he is in fact the divine son of man's son of God.

02:22 And so today I'm gonna be focusing in my part

02:25 of today's session on Jesus' works of healing

02:30 exorcism. From the very beginning of Jesus' public ministry, he promises that part of

02:37 what he is here to do is to in fact heal people. You can read in Luke chapter 4 right

02:44 near the beginning, verses 16 through 20, it says this, \"He came to Nazareth where he

02:50 had been brought up, and as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day,

03:00 was given to him. He enrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,

03:05 \"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to proclaim

03:11 good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and

03:16 recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to

03:30 gave it back to the attendant and sat down.

03:35 In other words, Jesus basically drops the mic.

03:38 Not only was he clearly announcing

03:41 that the messianic prophecies made in Isaiah

03:44 are fulfilled in his coming,

03:46 but he is also letting everyone know

03:48 that what he is here to do is to begin the process

03:52 of putting things back together that have been broken

03:55 as a result of mankind's fallen to sin.

03:58 And so from this moment on,

04:00 over and over and over again Jesus bringing healing wherever he goes.

04:05 Now, we're prone to seeing Jesus healing work as \"supernatural.\"

04:11 And I guess technically by our definitions that might be true.

04:15 But I like to think of it more as theologian Jürgen Moltmann does when he says this, \"Jesus

04:20 healings are not supernatural miracles in a natural world.

04:30 unnatural, demonized, and wounded.

04:34 Indeed, beginning in Luke 4, we see Jesus heal diseases, fevers, leprosy.

04:42 He even eventually resuscitates people back to life who have died.

04:48 One of my favorite stories of Jesus' miraculous ability to heal comes out of Luke chapter

04:52 5, verses 17 through 26.

05:00 of the law were sitting there who would come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from

05:04 Jerusalem. And the power of the Lord was with him to heal. And behold, some men were bringing on a

05:12 bed a man who was paralyzed and they were seeking to bring him in and lay him before Jesus.

05:18 But finding no way to bring him in, because of the crowd they went up on the roof and let him down

05:23 with his bed through the tiles into the midst before Jesus, and when Jesus saw their faith,

05:30 Your sins are forgiven you.

05:35 Now, let's just pause there for a second.

05:38 This is of course not what the friends

05:42 or the paralytic man had in mind

05:44 when they came into the presence of Jesus.

05:48 Surely they came to him with the hopes

05:50 that the paralysis would be zapped away

05:53 as they had heard he could do.

05:57 But Jesus begins his interaction with them

06:00 really stating what he's ultimately here to do, which is bring forgiveness of sins.

06:08 Well, the Pharisees and the scribes who were sitting there, as Luke tells us in the

06:13 beginning, immediately recognized the implications of his declaration of absolution to this

06:19 man.

06:20 And the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, saying, \"Who is this who speaks

06:30 Indeed, if Jesus is not God, then he has no business declaring forgiveness to this

06:38 man.

06:40 The famed writer and Christian apologist C.S. Lewis understood this well.

06:45 He wrote, \"One part of the claim of Jesus' claim to be God that tends to slip past us

06:51 unnoticed because we've heard it so often that we no longer see what the amounts do

07:00 any sins. Now, unless the speaker is God, this is really so preposterous as to be comic

07:07 Lewis says. We can all understand how a man forgives

07:10 offenses against himself. You tread on my toe, and I forgive you. You steal money, my

07:15 money, and I forgive you. But what should we make of a man himself,

07:21 unwrobed and untrodden on, who announced that he forgave you for treading on other men's

07:30 money.

07:32 Asinine Fatuity is the kindest description we should give of His conduct, yet this is

07:38 what Jesus did.

07:40 He told people that their sins were forgiven and never waited to consult all the other

07:46 people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured.

07:51 He unhesitatingly believed, as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person chiefly

08:00 This makes sense only if he really was the God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin.\"

08:13 And so we continue on with the story.

08:15 When Jesus perceived their thoughts, talking about the Pharisees and the scribes, who think he's blaspheming, he answered them.

08:30 forgiven you were to say rise and walk.

08:33 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.

08:40 He said to the man who was paralyzed, \"I say to you rise, pick up your bed and go home.\"

08:48 And immediately the man rose up before them and picked up what he had been lying on and

08:52 went home.

08:53 \"Glorifying God!\"

08:54 An amazement seized them all and they glorified God and were filled with awe saying, \"We have

09:00 extraordinary things today.

09:03 And you see what Jesus is doing here.

09:07 To back up his claim that he really actually does have the authority to declare forgiveness

09:14 to people, he performs acts of healing that only divinity could do.

09:24 Therefore, throughout Luke's gospel, to validate the claims that Jesus makes about himself,

09:30 to heal every kind of disease humanity comes across.

09:35 But of course, Jesus doesn't just heal people's infirmities.

09:39 He also displays power over his enemies.

09:43 And for that matter, our enemies in the demonic realm.

09:47 And that's where we'll discuss his exorcisms for a bit.

09:52 One of the more famous stories of demonic exorcism in the life of Jesus

10:00 It says, \"When they sailed to the country of the garrisines, which is opposite Galilee,

10:06 Jesus had stepped out on land and there met a man from the city who had demons.

10:12 For a long time, the man had worn no clothes and he had not lived in a house but among the

10:17 tombs.\"

10:18 So right off the start, the story is startling in its detail.

10:24 The man that Jesus comes across, has possessed and has had it so bad that he's been living

10:30 in the midst of nothing but death.

10:33 And yet, look at the man's reaction to the presence of Jesus.

10:39 Verse 28, \"When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell down before him and said with a loud

10:45 voice, 'What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?

10:51 I beg you, do not torment me.'

10:54 For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man.

11:00 He was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds

11:05 and be driven by the demon into the desert.

11:09 Jesus then asked the man or the demon, \"What is your name?\" and he said, \"Legion, for many

11:15 demons, have entered him.\"

11:19 Now we might skip over that part in the course of the story a little too quickly.

11:23 So it's important to note just how powerful this demonic presence is that Jesus comes

11:30 A legion in Roman times was a battalion of some 6,000 soldiers.

11:35 Now we don't know for sure that the demon is saying that there is 6,000 demons in this man,

11:41 but the point is, is there's a lot of possession and oppression going on

11:46 that seems to be utterly unbreakable, and yet with all of the demonic presence there,

11:53 they are terrified in the presence of Christ.

12:00 to command them to depart into the abyss.

12:03 And a large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside

12:06 and they begged them to let them enter these

12:09 so he gave them permission.

12:11 Then the demons came out of the man and entered the pigs

12:13 and the herd rushed down the steep bank

12:15 into the lake and drowned.

12:18 When the herdsmen saw what had happened,

12:19 they fled and told it in the city, in the country.

12:22 Then people went out to see what had happened

12:24 and they came to Jesus and found the man

12:26 from whom the demons had gone,

12:28 sitting at the feet of Jesus,

12:30 in his right mind, and they were afraid.

12:36 And those who had seen it told them how the demon possessed man had been healed, then

12:40 all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasines asked him not to stick around

12:46 to continue helping them with problems like these, but to depart from them, for they were

12:53 seized with great fear.

13:00 It's an interesting thing to me that you see that response, but it's not all that surprising.

13:06 You see this throughout the gospels, you see this throughout the life of Jesus

13:10 when someone gets a glimpse of his glory and his power, most often the first responses go away.

13:18 We don't want you.

13:20 Sometimes because they become utterly aware of their own sin.

13:30 with the loss of the pigs.

13:33 And so it concludes the man from whom the demons had gone beg

13:36 that he might be with him, but Jesus sent him away saying,

13:40 return to your home and declare how much God has done for you.

13:46 And he went away proclaiming throughout the whole city

13:49 how much Jesus had done for him.

13:52 The point of the story is the absolute power

13:55 and authority of Jesus over even the most horrific things

14:00 This man went from roaming around nude in a cemetery all day long and every day,

14:06 oftentimes driven out to the desert to harm himself

14:10 to instantly becoming a devout worshipper of Jesus

14:15 by a mere command from the lips of Jesus.

14:19 And what is the result of Jesus freeing him from the suppression?

14:24 Well, he becomes a major evangelist for Jesus to his pagan neighbors.

14:30 So I wanted to close out my session today with just a little interesting fact that I

14:35 found out in researching this particular issue that I think is inevitably the result

14:41 of what happens when Jesus brings healing and when he brings freedom to those who are

14:45 oppressed.

14:47 At this point in the story, in this large area known as the Decapolis that Jesus had

14:55 just healed in.

15:00 was the only Christian that we know of.

15:05 Jesus gives him the call to go share with others

15:07 what he's done for him.

15:08 And the next thing we know, he's going out,

15:10 telling everyone indeed what Jesus had done.

15:14 And then we don't really hear anything else

15:16 about it in the gospels.

15:19 But what history tells us is something interesting.

15:22 Archaeologists have discovered that the area Jesus was in

15:26 has some major finds for our understanding

15:28 of early church history.

15:30 Of course, there's the standard kind of Greek columns, and there's some archways made for

15:35 famous kings and queens and various other artifacts.

15:38 But the most significant find, at least in my opinion, they have found over a dozen churches.

15:44 As a matter of fact, archaeologists estimate that this was one of the most heavily populated

15:51 Christian areas in all of the Middle East in the first century.

16:00 bondage. He told one person and another and another, and pretty soon Jesus had taken this

16:10 trapped, oppressed, sick land and made them into a free, joyous new creation. And by God's

16:20 grace, He brings healing and freedom to us, and will use us to do the same thing to

16:30 [Music]

16:44 Most of Jesus' miracles involve illness, infirmity, or spiritual oppression.

16:50 And Eric talked about some of those miracles, but a few of them, far less, but some of them

16:54 involve nature and substance.

17:00 about them and what Jesus means by doing them. When I was a teenager, the first

17:09 X-Men movie came out and I thought that storm was probably the most

17:14 unstoppable of all superheroes. It seems that controlling the weather is a

17:21 superpower unlike any other. I know that Superman is supposed to be the most

17:30 And anything to do with nature,

17:32 it just seems that you have a distinct advantage.

17:33 It seems like an unstoppable thing.

17:37 Unless of course you run into Jesus.

17:42 One of the miracles I want to focus on

17:44 is a miracle where he shows that he is Lord of nature.

17:49 This is in Luke 8, verses 22 through 25.

17:54 It reads like this,

17:56 \"One day he got into a boat with his disciples

18:00 Let us go across to the other side of the lake.

18:03 So they set out.

18:04 And as they sailed, he fell asleep.

18:06 And a windstorm came down on the lake,

18:08 and they were filling with water, and they were in danger.

18:12 And they woke, and they said to him,

18:14 \"Master, master, we are perishing.\"

18:16 And he awoke and rebuked the wind,

18:18 and the raging waves, and they ceased, and there was a calm.

18:22 He said to them, \"Where is your faith?\"

18:24 And they were afraid, and they marveled,

18:26 saying to one another, \"Who is this that?\"

18:30 He commands the winds and the waves and they obey him.

18:34 Who is this?

18:34 Is that a good question?

18:35 What is this miracle tell us about who Jesus is?

18:40 What is it about him that makes him able to do these sorts of things?

18:45 And why does he do this sort of thing?

18:48 Is it simply to save the disciples?

18:50 Well, that's one of them.

18:51 The first thing you see is that Jesus responds to the disciples as they say they are perishing.

19:00 sort of God that acts when someone is perishing,

19:05 that when people are in need,

19:08 that he goes and moves to help them.

19:12 We also see that he is one with the power over creation.

19:18 Now this is important because what it does

19:21 that ties him to the very creation of things.

19:24 He is in fact the creator.

19:30 creation, he is in fact the word that spoke these things into existence. This is the same

19:37 God who made the things and now controls the things. This connects him to the acts of God

19:46 in the Old Testament, the flood. You see in the flood that God sends water as judgment

20:00 Red Sea for the Israelites to cross through.

20:03 You see, even in the very creation of the world

20:06 that it is without form and void,

20:07 and the spirit of God is hovering over the waters

20:10 and that the earth is born out of water.

20:12 By Jesus doing things with water, controlling nature,

20:18 you see that he is the one who is Lord over it.

20:23 Like everything else, creation is not as it should be.

20:30 In a lot of ways, there's nothing more that we're more afraid of than the nature.

20:35 You can watch series on the History Channel as you wait for California to slide off into

20:41 the ocean with an earthquake or the Yellowstone volcano go off and the entire earth will die

20:47 or asteroids going and falling out of the sky into the ocean and creating tidal waves.

20:54 This is all a result of the world being spun into chaos by sin.

21:00 It's not the way that God intended it to be.

21:02 And as Jesus shows up on the scene

21:04 and does miracles involving nature,

21:07 he shows that he is indeed the Lord of all things,

21:14 including the world and the created order itself.

21:19 This is also comforting because he says

21:22 he is the Lord of the new creation.

21:24 As he promises to make things new,

21:26 a new heavens and new earth.

21:28 We know that he has the power to do this,

21:30 to calm and still and recreate. Now he is also the Lord of substance and we see

21:38 this as well. There's not just nature such as wind and waves and and the earth

21:45 itself. He's also Lord over the simple things versus 12 through 17. We have what

21:51 is probably one of the most famous miracles that Jesus ever performed.

22:00 They began to wear away, and the twelve came to him and said, \"Send the crowds away to

22:06 go into the surrounding villages and the countryside to find lodging and go and get

22:10 provisions for we are here in a desolate place.\"

22:13 But he said to them, \"You go give them something to eat.\"

22:16 They said, \"We have no more than five loaves and two fishes unless we are prepared to

22:20 go and buy food for all these people.\"

22:23 Now there were about 5,000 men, and he said to his disciples, \"Have them sit down in

22:30 And so he had them all sit down and taking the five loaves and two fashions looked up to heaven and said a blessing over them

22:36 Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd

22:40 And they all ate and were satisfied and what was left over was picked up 12 backs baskets of broken pieces

22:49 What you see in this miracle first of all is that Jesus does not send the crowd away to be provided for

23:00 who are sitting there listening to him, for those who are following him, he is going to provide for them.

23:06 Secondly, you see that Jesus would not make bread from stones for himself in his temptation to wilderness,

23:12 but he does do, he does multiply bread for others.

23:17 Jesus has not then come to serve himself in his needs, but he is willing to serve the needs of others.

23:25 Another thing that this does is tie him to the Old Testament.

23:30 and performing miracles involving nature ties into the Old Testament.

23:34 So does doing miracles using food.

23:37 Simple things like bread.

23:39 There's a couple of examples for this.

23:41 One is the time when the prophet Elijah went and met with a widow in a famine.

23:48 This story is found in 1 Kings 17.

23:51 There's a famine going on.

23:53 She has no food.

23:54 She has a little bit of flour and a little bit of oil.

24:00 Take for her and her son and then she says she will eat it and they will die the prophet Elijah comes and says make one for me first

24:08 She said there won't be enough don't be enough if I make that

24:12 He says do it the Lord will provide and sure enough this flower and oil last and last and last

24:20 Now this is this a miracle by God in the Old Testament involving bread

24:30 spread last until the time comes where there is rain.

24:35 Now this is not the first time God has miraculously fed

24:37 an enormous group of people in a desolate place either.

24:41 This is an act by the same God that fed Israel

24:43 manna in the wilderness.

24:45 So again, we see miracles uniting him to the acts

24:49 of God in the Old Testament.

24:51 Just as God cared for his people in the desolate place

24:54 of the wilderness by providing the manna so comes Jesus

25:00 place. Water and bread are also sacramental elements. Jesus' power over these things

25:09 are important for his institutions of baptism in the Lord's Supper. This is to say that

25:14 Jesus does what he wants with water and that Jesus can do what he wants with bread.

25:22 The Lord's Supper is coming a little bit later and when you get there you might ask,

25:30 Well, it seems by these miracles that he can do whatever he wants with bread.

25:37 So there you have it.

25:51 We've just talked to you a little bit about some of the miracles of Jesus in today's session.

26:00 tying them back into the Old Testament.

26:03 I think it's so important, like,

26:04 when we look at the gospels,

26:06 when we look at the story of Jesus,

26:07 we have to realize that Jesus is fulfilling

26:10 like more than just predictions about His coming.

26:13 Jesus literally is, as you mentioned before,

26:15 Israel reduced to one, and I think you brought that out

26:18 quite a bit in today's talk about miracles.

26:21 - Yeah, it shows that the God of the Old Testament

26:24 and the God of the New Testament

26:24 are in fact the same God.

26:26 If Jesus is the Messiah,

26:30 the God of the Old Testament, just an Old Testament promise. And a lot of the miracles,

26:34 which we don't think about being things that tie him to the Old Testament, do in fact do that.

26:41 One of the things that you brought up is that exorcisms, which I think we think about that,

26:47 is just demonic oppression, and it's a nice thing for Jesus to do to free someone, which of course is

26:51 true. But that also, it frees people to do the work of proclaiming the gospel.

27:00 for me to hear about the history of the Decapolis

27:03 in the first century and how it became

27:05 this heavily populated Christian center.

27:07 And it's just, it's sort of an inspiring thing

27:10 to think of what God can do through those He has deemed

27:14 new creations.

27:16 This guy is the last person anybody would have seen

27:19 as being a great ambassador for the kingdom of God.

27:22 And yet that is exactly what He becomes.

27:25 We don't know how far He goes.

27:26 We don't know how many people He talks to about the gospel.

27:30 all we have that he was the first guy to start proclaiming the excellencies of what Jesus had done

27:36 and from there was birthed a large sort of church center in the first century. And so I think

27:42 with all the miracles, I mean really what it comes down to is again Jesus is doing these things

27:49 to show everybody around him. He has the authority to forgive sins. He has the authority to do the

28:00 this session. Next week we will be talking about the teachings of Jesus and his

28:04 ethical teachings, his theological teachings and getting into some parables.

We're over halfway through The Life of Christ According to Luke! How are you enjoying it? We always love feedback, so please let us know at instructor@1517.org. 

In this fourth session, we will focus on the teachings of Christ. Specifically, we'll look at:

1. The ethical teachings of Jesus
2. The parables of Jesus

- Dan and Eric

00:00 (upbeat music)

00:15 - Welcome back to the life of Christ,

00:16 according to Luke's gospel, session four.

00:19 Last time if you were with us for session three,

00:21 you know that Dan and I talked about the miracles

00:23 of Jesus and the various ways

00:25 that those miracles played themselves out.

00:30 for Jesus' ministry to prove the claims

00:33 that he's made about himself.

00:35 Today we're gonna be looking at

00:36 some of the things Jesus taught.

00:39 Now of course in the time we have

00:41 we're not going to be able to get to everything Jesus taught.

00:44 There's an awful lot of content there in Luke's gospel.

00:49 And so we figured we'd sort of do a broad overview

00:51 of the things Jesus taught.

00:54 First of all, for me I'll be taking on Jesus'

00:57 ethical teaching mainly found in the sermon on the plane.

01:00 and then talking a little bit about what he has to say about his second coming.

01:05 Meanwhile, Dan, what are you going to be talking about today?

01:08 Well, one of the things Jesus has known for is parables.

01:11 He tells a lot of stories.

01:12 Every gospel has loads and loads of parables.

01:15 We actually wrote a book on parables.

01:16 There's so many of them.

01:17 We covered not nearly all of them.

01:20 So when we cover in that, Jesus has stories that are both comforting to sinners and also

01:30 particularly the self-righteous.

01:32 Yeah, Luke also has the most parables of any of the gospels.

01:37 And again, we're not going to be able to get to all of them,

01:40 but we're trying to get to the real hub of Jesus' teaching

01:44 and get to the real kernel that all the other teaching flows out of.

01:49 So we hope you enjoy session four with us today.

02:00 (upbeat music)

02:06 So today in our fourth session,

02:07 we're gonna be looking at some of the teachings of Jesus.

02:10 Now, it's certainly not going to be exhaustive

02:13 because there's an awful lot of teaching,

02:15 but we are gonna look at his ethical side of teaching

02:18 today with my session.

02:20 And then when Dan comes in,

02:21 in the second part of our session today,

02:23 he'll be talking about some of Jesus's parables

02:26 to give sort of a well-rounded perspective

02:30 when he was here. To get a taste of his ethical teachings, probably the most obvious place to go

02:37 in Luke's gospel is found in chapter 6 in a place known as the Sermon on the Plane. That's

02:44 what it's called. Now, you might recognize that or it might sound very similar to what

02:49 you've heard of as the Sermon on the Mount that's found in Matthew's gospel. Well, it is similar,

03:00 Now, for the sake of time, I'm not going to read all of the sermon, but we are going

03:05 to do an overview of it so that you get a sense, get a taste of what Jesus' ethics

03:10 are and what they're supposed to be for his disciples.

03:16 So we'll pick it up Luke 6, verses 20 through 26.

03:21 \"And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples.\"

03:24 Very important.

03:25 \"Lifted up his eyes on his disciples.\"

03:27 He's speaking specifically to them.

03:30 already his followers and said, \"Blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom

03:36 of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you

03:44 who weep now, for you shall laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you and when they

03:50 exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil on account of the Son of Man.

04:00 for behold your reward is great in heaven, for so their fathers did to the prophets.

04:08 But woe to you who are rich for you have received your consolation,

04:13 woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry, woe to you who laughs now for you shall

04:19 mourn and weep, woe to you when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to

04:30 few things here about these words of Jesus. First of all, very importantly, these initial

04:37 words are pronouncements of Jesus upon his disciples. They are not commands. And I note

04:45 that only because I believe oftentimes it is heard as command language. We've heard

04:52 these kinds of things before, and so we're tempted to think, \"Oh, this means I must

05:00 I must strive to be hungry.

05:02 But no, these are pronouncements.

05:04 You who are poor are blessed.

05:06 You who are hungry are blessed.

05:10 Now, of course, Jesus is not merely speaking

05:13 about physical attributes here.

05:15 He's not talking about mere physical hunger

05:18 or mere physical sadness or mere poverty.

05:22 What he is talking about here is basically

05:25 a pronouncement of blessing upon those who know

05:28 they are needy.

05:30 that they don't have enough in it of themselves to make it not only through this life, but

05:37 especially make it to the life to come.

05:42 Also note that the trajectory of the Christian life is precisely opposite of what the surrounding

05:47 world strives for.

05:49 Poverty, hunger, weeping, being hated, excluded, reviled, spurned, or all spoken of as blessings.

05:56 Why?

06:00 Because those things create a longing in a person for a truer and better world.

06:08 A new heaven and a new earth.

06:13 It's in light of this fact that Jesus goes on to give his list of ethical ideals and commands that the Christian is then called to live by.

06:23 He instructions disciples to do radical sounding things.

06:30 hearing them again right now, they may jar you a little bit.

06:35 Love your enemies.

06:39 Do good to those who hate you.

06:45 Bless those who curse you.

06:49 Pray for those who abuse you.

06:54 He's not done.

07:00 they're also. And from one who takes away your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either.

07:09 Give to everyone who begs from you, and from one who takes away your goods, do not demand them back.

07:18 And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.

07:30 None of us have ever lived up to.

07:34 Certainly not anywhere near perfectly.

07:38 And yet he's still not done.

07:40 His ethical teachings continue.

07:43 Judge not, and you will not be judged.

07:47 Condem not, and you will not be condemned.

07:52 Forgive, and you will be forgiven.

08:00 Now, immediately re-recognize upon hearing these ethical statements that the standard

08:09 is incredibly high.

08:13 And it makes us almost want to give up.

08:16 Well, there's a good side to that, because I think part of what Jesus is doing through

08:22 his ethical teachings is in fact bringing us to the realization that we have not lived

08:30 And thus, we have to remember as we hear this, as Martin Luther pronounced on his first of his 95 theses,

08:39 that all of the Christian life is one of repentance.

08:43 We have to continually acknowledge our need for grace and mercy.

08:49 If we would have any hope of being the kind of people that would seek to do the kinds of things Jesus lists here in His ethical teaching.

09:00 And yet, as hard as it is and as crazy as it sounds, every once in a while, we do come

09:08 across examples of these, these kinds of things.

09:11 I mean, first of all, obviously Jesus does all these things.

09:15 You could actually in some ways just read Jesus into all of them, that Jesus is literally

09:20 saying, \"Guys, this is who I am.

09:22 I love my enemies.

09:23 I do good to those who hate me.

09:26 I bless those who curse me.

09:30 Indeed, he does.

09:32 I'm the one when they struck me on the cheek, offered my other also, and when they took

09:39 away my cloak, I didn't withhold my tunic either.

09:44 I've given to everyone who's begged for me, and from one who took away my goods, I

09:49 did not demand them back.

09:53 Jesus is ultimately the fulfillment of His ethical ideals.

10:00 And yet the spirit has and does empower people sometimes, though imperfectly, to do the same

10:08 kind of thing.

10:09 And I'll tell you, when it happens in our world, it is a remarkable thing to see.

10:13 A little while back, I came across a news story depicting a wife who had just lost her

10:21 husband to a terrorist attack.

10:24 And she was being interviewed in the midst of this news story to ask her how she felt

10:28 about her attackers.

10:30 I'd like to just take a few minutes now for you to see what that was like.

11:00 (speaking in foreign language)

11:30 (speaking in foreign language)

12:00 (speaking in foreign language)

12:30 (speaking in foreign language)

12:56 - So we see that even though these ethical demands

13:00 incredibly difficult and incredibly painful what they bring us to constantly is a

13:06 Remembrance that we need Jesus all the time and they remind us that it is Jesus who might just empower us to do something

13:14 Impossible or seemingly impossible like forgive or worst enemies love our worst enemies give to those

13:21 Who don't deserve it and so on and so forth?

13:30 bit about Jesus' second coming, because he does spend a good amount of time teaching

13:35 about that. There's only a few things that you really need to know. I'm not going to

13:40 go over all the parables that he uses. I'm not going to go over all of the specifics,

13:45 but there's really four main aspects to Jesus' teaching about the last things. First

13:52 of all, in Luke 17 verses 20 through 37, we see that Jesus says he's going to come back

14:00 and bodily.

14:03 That is, has been held from the beginning of the church.

14:08 We accept that and we teach that.

14:11 The second thing he says is that before that day,

14:14 he warns that there will be many false messiahs

14:17 claiming to be him and instructs us and his church

14:22 to not follow after any one of them.

14:25 Unfortunately, we all know that it's happened far too many

14:30 following after these false messiahs, but Jesus warns about it.

14:34 So if anybody ever does say he's there here,

14:37 Jesus says, don't believe them.

14:39 I'm coming with the clouds of heaven.

14:43 The third thing he teaches about the end times is,

14:46 he says there will be signs before his coming

14:48 like wars and natural disasters and famines

14:51 and persecution of Christians.

14:55 But if you think about it in a sense,

14:57 that's really what the world's been seeing

15:00 He's ascended, and for that matter, it was going on before he came.

15:04 And so really what Jesus' point is when he says these things will be happening before

15:09 I come again is really what he says to his disciples all the time when it comes to how

15:14 we should live in light of his second coming, and that is this.

15:18 I could come at any time.

15:20 I'm going to be like a thief in the night.

15:23 And for you who are mine, it will be the greatest moment of your life.

15:30 that day because that will give you hope in the midst of a world where yes, we're called

15:35 to love our enemies, do good to those who hate us and even go so far as to walk the

15:40 extra mile for them.

16:00 And the Pharisees in the scribes grumbled, saying,

16:03 \"This man receives sinners and eats with them,

16:06 so he told them this parable.\"

16:09 Those are the first three verses of Luke chapter 15.

16:12 They end with it saying,

16:14 \"So he told them this parable.\"

16:17 The teaching that you find most from Jesus' parables

16:21 in Luke's gospel, Jesus both comforts sinners

16:24 and smacks around the self-righteous in stories.

16:30 stories that God is in fact a storyteller.

16:34 In fact, the entire Bible is a story.

16:37 It's God's story of redemption.

16:42 Jesus also knows that we love stories.

16:45 We love stories because we're living one.

16:47 You have a story, I have a story.

16:50 We love sharing stories.

16:51 We love it when people share their stories with us.

16:53 We go to movies because they're stories.

16:55 We read books because they're stories.

16:57 Jesus knows that stories are an effective way

17:00 communicate a truth. Jesus' stories are full of comfort, warnings, judgment and grace.

17:07 And ultimately, Jesus' stories are about the kingdom of God and what it looks like.

17:15 Let's hear the story that Jesus tells, the grumbling Pharisees, and the presence of all

17:20 these sinners gathered around him in Luke 15.

17:24 Here's the story.

17:30 one of them does not leave the 99 in the open country and go after the one that

17:35 is lost until he finds it. And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders

17:41 rejoicing and when he comes home he calls altogether his friends and his

17:45 neighbors saying to them, \"Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.\"

17:50 Just so I tell you, there will be more of a joy in heaven over one center who

18:00 no repentance. This is the story that Jesus tells, two scribes and Pharisees

18:07 who are grumbling over him being received by tax collectors and sinners,

18:12 by them simply drawing near to him and Jesus not rebuking them. Jesus comes to

18:18 seek the lost and all of heaven rejoices over found sinners. Again,

18:30 because he went and found you.

18:32 This is the repentance of the world

18:34 that Jesus is bringing about.

18:35 This is how the kingdom of God works.

18:38 But the Pharisees, they don't want any of them.

18:41 The religious elites don't want any of this.

18:43 And this is a stern rebuke to those who cannot rejoice

18:48 in the grace of God.

18:51 Jesus will do this over and over and over again,

18:55 rebuking those who cannot rejoice

18:57 that Jesus came for sinners.

19:00 In this story we see him say that heaven rejoices and throws a party over one sinner

19:06 repenting, more so than the 99 who don't need repentance, which of course is nobody.

19:17 This isn't the only place he does this.

19:18 He calls out the Pharisees here, but the Pharisees don't really get the point.

19:23 So in the same chapter, Luke 15, another one of maybe the most famous parables of Jesus,

19:30 It's Luke 15, 11 through 32.

19:32 No, read the whole thing.

19:34 But you probably know it.

19:36 It's a story of a young man who decides he wants to have his inheritance early.

19:41 He asks his father for it.

19:43 He goes and he takes it.

19:44 He goes into a far country, spoils it with riotous living until he has nothing left, finds himself

19:52 working with pigs, which are unclean animals, in the styes with them with nothing to eat.

20:00 to him that the servants in his father's house have more than he does.

20:04 And so he decides that he will go back to his father.

20:07 He will make a deal with him.

20:08 He will ask to be hired on as a servant, not to be treated as a son.

20:13 And he makes his way back.

20:14 But before he can get there, the father spots him coming.

20:17 And he busts out the door, and he goes and says he embraces him and kisses him.

20:22 And he tries to get the words out.

20:24 The son tries to give him his well-rehearsed plan for repentance.

20:30 Father will have none of it before he can even get out the negotiation.

20:34 He says, bring the coat, bring the ring, kill the fatted

20:38 calf.

20:38 Again, we are going to have a party for this one center who repents.

20:43 Now this, this, this son has an older brother and he's not so happy about his

20:48 brother returning.

20:49 He's upset.

20:50 He hears there's a party going on and he won't go in.

20:53 He's angry because his brother has made all kinds of mistakes.

21:00 and then going and wasting it.

21:02 And he's angry because there was no such party for him.

21:06 This is the parable that Jesus tells again

21:08 to the Pharisees in Luke 15,

21:10 to try to show them the fact that sinners

21:14 and tax collectors are coming to Jesus

21:17 is something worth celebrating.

21:19 It is in fact the reason he came.

21:21 He came for sinners, but they can't.

21:27 So you may think the Pharisees would get the point

21:30 story. They do not. Only three chapters later, in Luke 18, it says this, \"Jesus also told

21:40 this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others

21:45 with contempt.\" This is the conclusion of what Jesus is doing. The Pharisees might be

21:52 sort of getting the point that, oh, there's righteous people out there, huh? There's some

22:00 And maybe that older brother is like us, and we never had to go and repent.

22:04 Here Jesus directly talks about those who believe their righteous and treat others with contempt.

22:12 The story goes like this.

22:14 Two men went up into the temple to pray.

22:17 One, a Pharisee.

22:19 Jesus isn't mincing words now.

22:22 This story has them in it.

22:24 They're not hidden under sheep.

22:26 They're not hidden under older brothers.

22:30 a Pharisee, and the other, a tax collector.

22:34 We're not talking about younger brothers.

22:36 We're not talking about law sheep.

22:38 This is a story about a Pharisee and a tax collector.

22:42 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus,

22:47 \"God, I thank you that I am not like other men,

22:50 \"extortioners, unjust, adulterers,

22:54 \"or even like this tax collector.

22:56 \"I fast twice a week.

23:00 But the tax collector standing far off would not even lift his eyes to heaven, but beat

23:06 his breasts saying, \"God be merciful to me, a sinner.\"

23:10 I tell you this, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other.

23:17 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

23:24 Jesus has finally given it to them straight in this story.

23:30 told a story about a tax collector and a Pharisee.

23:35 Here's the trouble though.

23:37 While this is a critical blow to the self-righteousness

23:41 of the Pharisees, the Pharisees who

23:43 are upset with specifically tax collectors

23:48 and people who hang out with tax collectors

23:51 following Jesus around, it is a gut shot to them.

23:55 This parable is also a trap.

24:00 Because we read this and I read this and we rejoice in the Pharisee finally getting what he deserves.

24:09 That Jesus doesn't use camouflage language anymore.

24:12 That the Pharisee gets put on blast in front of everyone and tore apart.

24:17 The Pharisee is finally shown to be the contemptible, self-righteous leader he really is.

24:30 not like that Pharisee. This is what always happens. Now the tables have been turned.

24:38 We read it and we put ourselves in the place of the sinner. That's me. I'm the one who

24:42 goes and confesses my sin and comes out righteous. I'm not like one of those people

24:47 who don't understand grace. I'm not like one of those people who don't understand the

24:51 gospel, who don't understand that Jesus came for sinners. I'm not like that Pharisee.

25:00 ourselves in the trap of Jesus where we must then repent again.

25:05 Come to Jesus again.

25:07 Live the life of ever repenting.

25:11 In the end, Jesus' stories show us that we're all sinners in need of saving.

25:16 It shows us that the kingdom of God is a kingdom built on people coming, confessing,

25:22 receiving grace, forgiveness, and mercy.

25:30 Now, this is the reason Jesus' stories are so like this.

25:36 These are the stories that we live,

25:39 and these are the stories that Jesus tells.

25:43 (upbeat music)

25:56 - So we've just completed session four

26:00 the gospel of Luke. And then you just got done talking about the parables of Jesus or at least

26:06 a few of them. And I really appreciated the sort of progression you showed in the parables

26:12 that Jesus told, you know, first in Luke 15, comparing the Pharisees to those who at least think

26:18 they're found, you know, the 99 sheep. But it was sort of hidden language, you know, metaphorical

26:23 and symbols and things. And then a little bit more specific, you know, they're compared to the

26:30 is to go in and fellowship with the younger brother

26:33 and the father.

26:34 But I loved how you showed that, look, by Luke 18,

26:37 he's no holds barred.

26:39 He's like literally, there's a Pharisee

26:41 and there's a tax collector.

26:42 - Yeah, I mean, the parables can definitely stand

26:45 on their own as individual stories,

26:48 but they really, really understand what Jesus is saying.

26:51 You do have to look at the context.

26:52 You have to look at the audience that he's talking to.

26:54 And they do in fact build in a lot of cases.

26:57 And a lot of times we think of the parables

26:58 and we think that they're just stories

27:00 deeper meeting, like sort of like ASOP's fables or something like that.

27:04 There's an intentionality that's present when you look at them in context.

27:07 You know, when you were talking about the ethical teachings of Jesus, something that

27:10 jumped out is that, you know, in contrast to people, or this idea that Jesus is sort

27:16 of this, always talking about grace, always talking about forgiveness, which is he's doing

27:20 a lot of them.

27:21 We've talked a lot about he's drawing sinners to himself.

27:23 He's, he's wanting the sinners to come to him.

27:27 But he does in fact preach the law and pretty harshly.

27:30 I mean, throughout all of the gospels, Jesus does not hold back.

27:34 As a matter of fact, it seems that he would make the law even more strict than anybody

27:39 really thought at the time.

27:40 I mean, so of course, if you go to Matthew's account and the Sermon on the Mount, you know,

27:44 he'll say, you know, you have heard that it was said adultery is wrong, but I'm telling

27:47 you, if you've lost it after somebody, you're guilty.

27:51 And he does this with a number of the commands showing that it's not merely a matter of what

27:54 we do outwardly, but also what comes from within.

28:00 mentioned briefly in my talk to remind us that yes, the ethical demands are high and yes,

28:07 it is what we ought to do, but we haven't done it and so we need to be constantly needy for grace

28:14 and mercy, repenting all the time of our inability to do it so that in fact Jesus would build in us

28:21 the kind of person that might one day do these things for the good of our neighbor.

28:30 the good of our neighbor.

28:32 What is going to be best for those around us?

28:35 And so that's what we got to talk about a little bit today.

28:38 Next time we're going to dig into the passion week of Jesus,

28:43 and there's an awful lot to go over there.

28:46 So look forward to you joining us for session five.

28:49 (upbeat music)