Message was delivered on Sunday
morning, November 27, 1994, at the Trinity Baptist Church in
Montville, New Jersey. I will you turn with me, please,
in your own Bibles to the Gospel according to Luke, the Gospel
according to Luke and the 22nd chapter, and follow as I read
verses 31 through 34. Luke chapter 22 and verse 31. Our Lord Jesus in the presence
of his disciples on the eve of his crucifixion says in the context
of great intimacy with his own, Simon, Simon, behold Satan asked
to have you that he might sift you as wheat, that I made supplication
for thee, that thy faith fail not. And do thou, when once thou
hast turned again, establish thy brethren.' And he said unto
him, Lord, with thee I am ready to go both to prison and to death."
And he said, I tell thee, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this
day until thou shalt three times deny thou know'st me. a servant of God ministering
to his own people several generations ago, said to them in the midst
of a sermon that he preached dealing with the theme that we
will be considering this morning, every believer has need of everything
that Christ has to give. every believer has need of everything
that Christ has to give. Now why have I introduced our
meditation with this quotation, and the servant of God of the
bygone generation? Well, for this reason. After an intense season of self-examination
as to the reality of our professed experience of the grace of God,
I have been seeking to draw your attention to texts of scripture
that ought to be a means of encouragement, of strength, and of stabilization
to the hearts of all who, having come through this season of self-examination,
have been able to say, yes, by the grace of God, I am for real. And in the course of setting
out such text of scripture, we came several Lord's days ago
to Hebrews 7 and verse 25. A text which declares that our
Lord Jesus is able to save to the uttermost all who come unto
God by Him, seeing He ever lives to make intercession for them. And in the opening up of that
text, we noted the assuring affirmation, he is able to save to the uttermost,
that is, to the consummation of all that God has purposed
in his redemptive grace, and then the satisfying explanation,
seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them. and the
response of many of you to that, look at our Lord Jesus as our
ever-living High Priest, by His intercession securing our complete
salvation, your response was such as to impress my own heart
that this theme that I had not focused upon for a number of
years warranted several further meditations in the Word of God. And so the last Lord's Day that
I was with you, two Lord's Days ago, we considered two fundamental
concerns relative to the intercession of Christ, that very intercession
which secures our final salvation. We noted first the place from
which he intercedes. And according to Romans chapter
8 and verse 34, we noted that his intercession is carried on
at the right hand of God. That is the place of supreme
power and authority. And also, according to Hebrews
9 and verse 24, he carries on his intercession before the very
face of God, the place of acceptance and of favor. And then we contemplated
not only the place of his intercession, but the ground or the foundation
of his intercession. And we had occasion to note again
from Romans 8.34 and from the context of Hebrews 7.25 and Hebrews
9.24 that the ground of the intercessory work of Christ which secures
the ultimate salvation of all of his people is his once for
all sacrifice made upon the cross. In His office as the great High
Priest of His people, our Lord Jesus not only offers a once-for-all
sacrifice unto God, but by His ever-living intercession, grounded
upon that once-for-all sacrifice, That intercession secures that
everything he died to procure for his people will actually
become the possession of his people. Hence, old Robert Traill
said, every believer has need of everything that Christ has
to give. And as surely as there is no
salvation apart from our participation in the virtue of the once for
all sacrifice of Christ, We can say with equal certainty there
would be no salvation apart from the ever-living intercession
of Christ, an intercession based upon that sacrifice. Now today, both this morning
and this evening, God willing, I want us to consider together
some of the specific concerns, or the content, of the intercession
of Christ. As we believingly embrace the
facts of Hebrews 7.25, namely, that He ever lives to make intercession
for us, and that that intercession secures our salvation to the
uttermost, as we believingly embrace the reality that He is
in a position of exaltation and power, of favor and acceptance,
and He intercedes on the grounds of His once-for-all sacrifice
that everything He died to purchase will be ours, Do the Scriptures
give us any materials to put some concrete understanding into
our grasp of what He actually pays for and intercedes for at
the right hand of the Father? Now, some have suggested that
it is just the presence of Christ that is, in itself, the intercession. The Father looking upon the Son,
and seeing treasured up in the Son all the virtue of His saving
work upon earth, culminating in His crucifixion and resurrection,
that His presence itself is all the intercession that is needed. Some go further, and taking such
passages as Revelation 5, where John sees the Lamb in the midst
of the throne, but a Lamb standing as though it had been slain,
They go so far as to say there is some representation before
the presence of the Godhead of the very sacrifice of Christ
Himself. And these concepts, as I've tried
to wrestle with them and I've read extensively in the various
commentaries and theologians, I frankly find I cannot grasp
them sufficiently to preach them. And as I have been searching
the Scriptures and asking God, Lord, have you given us any clues
whatsoever in Scripture, at least things that point to something
of the nature and the content of the intercession of our Lord
Jesus at the right hand of the Father, reminding ourselves that
anything that was unique to the days of this humiliation has
forever been stripped away from that intercession, I do believe,
and it is not a unique conviction with me, that there are at least
three passages of Scripture which at least point us in the direction
of having some concrete examples of how Christ carries on that
work of intercession. We shall consider one of them
this morning and, God willing, the other two this evening. Now, the one we're going to consider
this morning is the passage that I read in your hearing. Luke
chapter 22 and beginning with verse 31. And what I want to
do is first of all give a brief exposition of the passage and
then secondly highlight and bring into focus the abiding principles
of the passage as they relate to the intercession of our Lord
Jesus Christ for us, His people. First of all, then, a brief exposition
of the passage. Note with me the setting, the
substance, and the sequel to this paragraph. The setting of
this paragraph is, as I've already hinted prior to reading it, the
evening before the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus. Our Lord has
eaten the Passover with his disciples. In the upper room, verse 15 of
this chapter, he said unto them, With desire I have desired to
eat this Passover with you before I suffer. And then, according
to verse 20, he has instituted that new supper of remembrance,
and the cup in like manner after supper, saying, This cup is the
new covenant in my blood, even that which is poured out for
you. And in that very setting there
is then a period of contention in which there is among the disciples
a controversy over who will be the biggest big shot in the consummation
of the kingdom of Messiah. Verse 24, there arose also a
contention among them which of them was accounted to be the
greatest. And in that situation, the Lord
Jesus corrects their wrong thinking, and in spite of the grief it
must have caused him, here he has just distributed the symbols
of his own sacrificial death. The Lord of Glory is about to
pour out His life's blood as a common malefactor upon an instrument
of Roman execution, and they're talking about who's going to
be the biggest big shot in the kingdom. Yet nonetheless, in
His infinite patience and grace, He underscores their virtue in
verse 28, but you are they that have continued with me in my
temptations, and I appoint unto you a kingdom, even as my Father
appointed me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom,
and you shall sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of
Israel. So here they are contending about
who's going to be the greatest. He does not so much rebuke them
for this outburst of wretched carnality, He simply corrects
their misconceptions and then speaks of what He will confer
upon them by His grace as the reward of grace for their loyalty
and fidelity to Him. You are they that have continued
with me in my temptations, and I appoint unto you a kingdom."
And then, speaking particularly to the apostles, he underscores
that they will have a unique place in the administration of
the new Israel of God. Now according to Matthew 26,
31, having said those words, he knows that these are the very
ones who shortly thereafter will all forsake him and flee. For we read in Matthew 26 and
verse 31, without attempting to put this into a precise chronological
arrangement, in this very setting, Then said Jesus unto them, All
of you shall be offended in me this night, for it is written,
I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall
be scattered abroad. And though he speaks these words
after they leave the upper room and go out and down from the
Mount of Olives, he is already cognizant that the ones to whom
he spoke, saying, You have continued with me, and I appoint you a
kingdom, are the ones who in a few hours are going to be scattered
and are going to turn away from him. Now that's the setting of
the passage. Now in that setting, consider
with me the substance of what our Lord says. First of all,
he addresses Peter particularly, but not by his newly given name,
but by his old name, Simon. Peter is the name, you'll remember,
that our Lord gave to him, a rock. But at this point, our Lord reverts
to His previous name and says not merely Simon, but Simon,
Simon. And in the several instances
where we have that repetition of the name, there is an indication
of deep, inward, emotional disruption, attachment, agitation, Martha,
Martha. You are troubled about many things. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how
oft would I have gathered you. You remember David when mourning
for Absalom. Oh, Absalom, my son, Absalom. In this repetition of Simon,
it's clear that our Lord's heart is deeply engaged and His own
emotions stirred in the light of the things He is about to
say. And so addressing Simon in particular,
He says, Simon, Simon, behold! Stop! Think! Consider! Gather
and marshal all of your faculties and concentrate them upon what
I'm about to say." And obviously he had not taken Simon aside
and whispered these things in his ear, but is addressing him
as the usual spokesman of the Twelve, for in the original it
is not Simon, Simon, behold Satan asks to have you, second person
singular, But it is second-person plural. And this is where the
old Elizabethan English is helpful, because if you have the 1901,
you will notice the change from you to thee in verse 32. So though he says, Simon, Simon,
behold, Satan asks to have all of you, He is speaking particularly
to Simon, but not exclusively, in terms of Satan's request to
have all of the disciples. Simon, Simon. No longer the Rock, but just
Simon. I have a concern for you and
all of your fellow disciples because Satan has desired or
asked to have you in order that he might sift you as wheat. And the basic concept of the
imagery that our Lord uses is this. The sifting of wheat, to
separate the wheat from the chaff, was a concentrated, almost violent
agitation so that the wheat could be separated from the chaff.
And that's the basic concept. And to build a whole string of
ideas upon the imagery is exegetically unsound. What our Lord is conveying
is this, Simon, Simon, Satan has desired you and your companions. He has asked that he might bring
you into a situation of concentrated and unusual agitation and testing,
and the thought could be with the idea to prove that you are
nothing but chat, that your attachment to me is no more real than the
great multitudes who once followed me. And then I began to speak
of eating my flesh and drinking my blood. The many went back
and walked with me no more. Whatever this request of Satan
was, obviously there are overtones of the book of Job and chapter
1. where we find this interaction
between Satan and God Himself concerning the integrity of Job,
and how much of that our Lord was aware of, we do not know,
but He apprises this group, directing His words primarily, though not
exclusively, to Simon, Satan has asked to have you that he
might sift you as wheat. That's our Lord's description
of Satan's asking and his intention, but our Lord says, I have made
supplication for thee, and now he speaks directly to Peter. He speaks directly to Peter,
probably because Peter's involvement in the next hours would bring
forth the most aggravated expression of denial. The other disciples
all forsook him and fled and remained at some distance through
all of the events of going before the high priest and before Pilate
and Herod and back to Pilate. But you remember it was Peter
who out of his devotion to Christ wanted to be nearer And while
he is there warming his hands by the fire with the soldiers,
the little maid comes and identifies him, and this in turn leads to
his taking oaths and bringing down curses upon himself, swearing
with oaths that he does not know the man. So in the light of our
Lord's knowledge of Peter's unusual involvement in the sifting process
of the coming hours, he then directs his words more exclusively
to Peter, saying, I made supplication, and the word for supplication,
oh my, means to ask a specific thing. and to ask with earnestness,
to ask with serious, earnest supplication. And so he says,
while Satan has asked to have you that he might sift you as
wheat, I made supplication for you, Peter, and here was the
focal point of my supplication, that your faith fail not, that
your faith would not, and the sense of the Greek word here
is utterly fail, that your faith would not be totally eclipsed. that your faith would not prove
to be the faith of an apostate, which is temporary faith, a faith
that draws back unto perdition, in the language of Hebrews chapter
10, or in the language of Luke chapter 8, in the parable of
the sower, who for a while believed, Peter I've prayed for you, I
have made specific supplication for you that your faith fail
not." Then after speaking of Satan's request and his intention,
and the Lord's prayer and its focus, then our Lord gives a
prophecy and a directive to Peter. And do thou when once thou hast turned again, established
by brethren." Here our Lord says, by way of a prophetic utterance,
that Peter would turn back from whatever results of the sifting
were fuel for repentance. When once you are converted,
when once you turn again, Here is a prophecy that whatever the
sifting will do to Peter, resulting in his turning away from Christ,
turning away from the path of duty, turning away from the path
of fidelity to his professed loyalty to Christ, it would only
be a temporary turning away, but he would turn back again. And with that prophecy comes
a directive Do thou, when you have turned again, strengthen
your brethren. You will be better fitted, Peter,
to minister to your brethren, and having come through this
ordeal of sifting, and your restoration having been secured by my intercession,
sealed by my own word of prophecy, strengthen your brethren." Now,
basically, that's the substance of the passage. And what is the
sequel to this? Well, you know the sequel well,
most of you, if not all of you. Peter does deny the Lord, as
a dear preacher whom some of us have recently heard on tape
in a sermon called, The Autopsy of a Failure. exegetes why Peter
fell in this time of crisis. He said he was talking when he
should have been listening, he was sleeping when he should have
been praying, and he was warming himself by the sinner's fire.
And that's exactly what happened. And you'll remember the very
Peter who says, look Lord, I'm ready to go both to prison and
to death. The Lord says, Peter, I don't
question the sincere intention of your heart, but the reality
is, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times. And we know that our Lord's word
was true, and Peter did deny, and denied with increasing vehemence
in the midst of his fears of his own life being taken as he
saw the seriousness of the intention of the religious leaders and
the unprincipled Roman leadership to actually put his Savior to
death. But then you remember, our Lord
looked at Peter, and that look coupled with the crowing of the
rooster under the blessing of the Spirit of God brought Peter
to an immediate, deep, and thorough repentance, and the Scripture
says, he went out and he wept. He was turned again in a matter
of minutes from his denial or just a couple of hours from his
initial denial, unlike David who went on for almost a whole
year held in the grip of the sifting that he experienced when
he looked out from the rooftop and saw Bathsheba and followed
the horrible impulses of his baser nature Here Peter is turned
again in a relatively quick fashion. The Lord formally restores him
by the shore of Galilee in one of those post-resurrection appearances
when, having denied his Lord three times, three times our
Lord elicits from Peter the affirmation of his love. Peter, do you love
me? You know, Lord, I love you. Peter,
do you really love me? Yes, Lord, you know all things.
You know that I love you. And so the sequel to this is
indeed fulfilled in the gospel history in the life and ministry
of Peter and then when we turn to his letters, the first and
second letters of Peter, we find him in a unique way being the
strengthener of his brethren. He writes an epistle to a suffering
people to console them in the midst of their suffering. And
a second epistle, he writes primarily to protect them from the influence
of false teachers and their heretical teaching that would destroy their
souls. And the Lord's words are fulfilled. He did turn again, and he did
fulfill the directive of strengthening his brethren. Well, that's a
brief exposition of the passage. Now we come to the abiding principles
of the passage as they relate to the intercession of Christ
for his own the abiding principles of the
passage as they relate to the intercession of Christ for his
own. And the first principle that
we see in the passage is this. As our interceding high priest,
Jesus knows and controls Satan's efforts to turn us away from
Christ. As our interceding High Priest,
Jesus knows and controls Satan's efforts to turn us away from
Christ. Look at the language of the text.
Satan asked to have you that he might sift you as wheat. There must be few things more
galling to the prince of darkness than to half-truth knowledge,
he is at the end of the chain of the mighty Christ. That he
cannot touch any one of Christ's people without Christ's permission. You will remember, I trust, when
we were giving a parallel passage to underscore the significance
of Christ being seated at the right hand of God. We looked
at Ephesians 1, 19 and following, where that position is described
as one in which Jesus our Lord is exalted far above all principality
and power and might. and every name that is named
not only in this age but in that which is to come. And parallel
to Job chapter 1, here we find our Lord acknowledging that there
was some interaction in the spiritual realm, outside of the realm of
human sight and human sound, where this embodiment of all
evil against Christ and His people, the devil himself, Satan, the
adversary, Has one spoken of in Genesis 3.15, who knows that
his head is to be crushed by the seed of the woman? but who
is determined that in the process he will bruise the heel of the
one who crushes him. And in the book of the Revelation
that theme is picked up and we see that he makes war against
the woman and against her seed and against all who follow the
Lord Jesus. It should be a tremendous comfort
for us to know, as God's people, when we read Hebrews 7.25, wherefore
he is able to say to the uttermost, those that come unto God by Him,
seeing He ever lives to make intercession for them, that our
great Intercessor, our great High Priest, knows and controls
Satan's efforts to turn us away from Christ. If that were not
so, how could we draw comfort from 1 Corinthians 10 and 13,
There hath no temptation taken you but such as man can bear,
that God is faithful to you, will with the temptation make
a way of escape that you may be able to bear it. If he were not in control of
those temptations that come at the instigation of the Prince
of Darkness, that promise would be negated. Thank God that promise
is one that we can continue to rest upon and plead before God
because our great High Priest knows and controls Satan's efforts
to turn us away from Christ. And this is no novel opinion
of my own. I personally have come to the
conviction as I've wrestled with this issue that God has given
us the record of this incident only here in the Gospel of Luke,
that we who are time-bound and bound by the world of sense and
find it so difficult to form any workable conception to which
faith can lay hold of, Christ is interceding, yes, but precisely
what does He do as He intercedes? What a wonderful thing to know
that his Peters, who sometimes revert to becoming Simons, they
are no longer rocks. They are no longer worthy of
the name that Christ has given them. They will deny him. There will be lapses and periods
of declension, yet in spite of all of that, He says on the front
end, you are they that have continued with me in my temptation. You
are truly my own. You are not fair-weather disciples. You are attached to me in faith
and love. And when the multitudes disperse,
you are those who said, to whom else shall we go? Ah, it's the
words of eternal life. And yet in the moment of weakness,
in a time of divinely permitted sifting by Satan, the very one
who said, to whom can we go now as the words of eternal life
is saying, I swear by Jehovah God of heaven, I know not the
man. Can it be that sincere confession
to whom else shall we go can be found in the same person who
withholds a malediction, says I know not the man? Yes. That's the Peter of the Bible.
And you see that which made the difference was Jesus tells him
I'm aware of the activity of the adversary of Satan who desires
to sit and wants to show that his opinion is the right opinion
that you're all chapped and none of you has any real abiding attachment
to me. So as God gave the devil permission
to touch Job's family, and all of his possessions to demonstrate
that Job served God for God's sake, and not for what he could
get from God. So the Lord Jesus permits unusual
times of sifting, times of sifting that may even result in grievous
temporary lapses in the lives of his own people. We have an
interceding high priest who knows and controls Satan's efforts
to turn us away from Christ. Then there's a second principle
in the passage that I believe clearly relates to the intercessory
ministry of the Lord Jesus, and it is this. As our interceding
High Priest, Jesus prays for us that Satan's efforts will
not be successful. As our interceding High Priest,
Jesus prays, makes requests, makes requests for us that Satan's
efforts will not be successful. Notice three things about that
prayer in the text. The prayer is intensely personal. Satan has asked to have all of
you that he might sift you as wheat. And in the original there's
an extra word that we could render the text this way to reflect
that, the presence of that word. But I, even I myself, we have
the use of the ego for you Greek students. Instead of just the
simple use of the verb, which has the first person and his
action in it, I have made request, he says, I! It is I myself, Peter,
who have made request for you in particular, Peter. Though
Satan has desired all of you, to sift all of you as wheat,
Peter knowing that in a peculiar way, His activity will be focused
upon you as one who will have a unique place of leadership
in the church that will be built upon the foundation of my person
and work. I know that in a unique way,
Simon, you will be the object of this sifting effort of the
enemy. And my prayer for you, Peter,
is personal. I myself, Peter, pray for you
personally. And then, secondly, the prayer
is real request. I've already alluded to this.
The Greek word, Deomai, is the one that is used in Matthew 9,
38. Pray ye, therefore, the Lord
of the harvest. Make request of the Lord of the
harvest that he send forth laborers into his harvest. Most appropriate
that I should have that parallel text after the Sunday school
hour this morning. It's the word used in Acts 4.31
after that prayer meeting held in the upper room upon the opposition
to the servants of God. And they come and they spread
their case before God, and God shakes the building, fills them
with the Holy Spirit, and the word pray is found in Acts 4
and verse 31. And when they had prayed, well,
what had they been doing? They had been spreading out specific
requests before God. So that the interceding High
Priest, our Lord Jesus, praying for us that Satan's efforts will
not be successful, is engaged in a very intensely personal
redemptive activity. This person engaging our persons
in all the individuality of our needs. You say, well, how can
one person Know all of the individual needs of millions of his people
at one and the same time. It's because of who he is that
he's able to do what he does. He is God. This is why the doctrine of the
essential, true deity of our Lord is not some abstraction. Without a divine Savior, we could
not have a divine intercession in its scope and in its efficacy. And since the intercession is
essential to our salvation as we have seen, thank God there
is one who can do such a work because he is just such a person
who is the God-man. His prayer is personal. His prayer
is real request. The third thing note about his
prayer is the prayer focuses on the sustaining of the root
grace of faith. Look at the text. I made supplication
for thee, Peter, Simon, that thy faith fail not, that thy
faith be not utterly eclipsed, totally spent and abandoned."
His prayer focused on the sustaining of the root grace of faith. Now may I be bold enough to say
that had the Lord Jesus said to Peter, I have made supplication
for thee that thy courage fail not, He would not have shrunk
back before the question of the maid. But the Lord did not pray
that his courage fail not, for courage is one of the fruits
of faith. But he prays that the root of
all other graces, namely faith, would not utterly fail. For if his faith were to utterly
fail, He would fit the description of Hebrews 10, and here I ask
you to turn there for a moment, please. Hebrews 10, you know
the great theme of Hebrews is the greater things, the better
things of the New Covenant, that's the objective teaching, and the
great emphasis of the exhortations is, therefore, Continue in persevering
faith in the better things of the new covenant. Don't turn
back to types and shadows and cast off confidence in Christ. And here at the end of Hebrews
10 in verse 38 and 9, that my righteous one shall live by faith. And if he shrink back, my soul
hath no pleasure in him, but We are not of them that shrink
back unto perdition, but of them that have faith unto the saving
of the soul. You see, the shrinking back here
is not a temporary lapse. It is an utter eclipsing, an
abandoning of faith. And when that happens, that's
apostasy, and that results in perdition. Whereas the scripture
tells us we are kept by the power of God, how? Through faith unto
salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time, 1 Peter 1.5. But now the question is, what
is it that keeps that faith from utterly failing? Even when, for
a period of time, that faith is so eclipsed that had we known
nothing of the previous history of Peter and had our first introduction
to him there by that fire outside the courtyard, surely we would
have said, this is no lover and devotee of Christ. by oaths,
saying, If I know the man, let God ban me here upon the spot."
It says, with cursing and oaths, it wasn't that he was using four-letter
words, he was saying, I swear I will take an oath by the God
of heaven, if I know that man, let him destroy me on the spot. He would say, surely. Maybe some
of those soldiers warming their hands might be secret disciples,
but this man is no disciple. He's no believer. Ah, yes he
was. Jesus had said to him a short
time before, you are those who have continued with me in my
temptation. He calls his whole earthly existence
the period of his temptation. The period of his trial. And
he says, you have been with me, and I point you a kingdom, and
I will give you special responsibilities and privileges in that kingdom.
But here is a temporary lapse. But blessed be God, the prayer
of Jesus focused on the sustaining of the root grace of faith. So
he did not prove himself to be the stony ground hearer who believes
for a while that in times of persecution, falls away. No, Peter fell and fell grievously. But one look from the Son of
God, one conscious remembrance of the prophecy of this Savior,
before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times, and
the rooster crows, and through the ear gate of the crowing of
the rooster, and the look of the Son of God through the eye
gate, And the depths of his being were broken, and he went bitterly. And he repents, and he turns
from his wretched cowardice, and his temporary denial of Christ,
and the root of faith that had attached him to Christ. the root
of faith that had opened up the world of spiritual reality, so
that as Jesus said, flesh and blood has not revealed this to
thee, but my Father in heaven, you are the Christ, the Son of
the living God. That root of faith again produced
its fruits of repentance, of subsequent open, unashamed attachment
with Christ in the post-resurrection appearances. And then that same
Peter on the bed, Pentecost, looking straight into the eye
of some of the very ones whom he saw, apprehend his Lord, spit
upon him, and ultimately take him out and crucify him, he said
to those people, you, you and you and you and you and you,
by wicked hands, have crucified and slain him. You see, faith
now produced a courage born of the influence of the Holy Spirit
upon his heart, the prayer focused upon the sustaining of the root
grace of faith. So the interceding High Priest,
Jesus, prays for us that Satan's efforts will not be successful,
and that prayer for us is intensely personal. He prays And he prays
for us individually, all the individuality of our peculiar
vulnerability and the devil's accessibility to us by divine
permission. As our interceding high priest,
he prays that Satan's efforts will not be successful, praying
for the sustaining of the root race of faith. There is a third
and final principle that I see here in the passage, and it's
this. As our interceding High Priest, the prayers of Jesus
are always, are always effectual. As our interceding High Priest,
the prayers of Jesus are always effectual. Look at the text again
in Luke chapter 22. He does not say, Satan has asked
to have all of you that he might sift you as wheat. But I made
supplication for thee, Simon, that thy faith fail not. And if you will cooperate with
my prayers and turn again, you will then be able to establish
your brethren. I could not believe my eyes when
I read one of the commentators who, seeing the force of the
absolute certainty and efficacy of the prayers of Jesus, wrote
a whole paragraph to try to bleed this text with its obvious significance. He said, now, though it may appear
that the issue was already certain, if Peter did not this and if
Peter did not that, because he's someone who refuses to believe
that once God has placed a man through the narrow gate and on
the restricted way, he's going to bring him home to glory. And
when he comes to a passage like this, He sees his doctrine that
you can lose salvation shattered, so rather than bend to the text,
you should see what he did with the text. I wouldn't insult you
by even reading the paragraph in your hearing. No. The Lord
lets Peter know, think of this now. Think of this. He says,
Satan's asked to have you that he might fit you sweet. He clearly
lets Peter know that he will have some very Powerful influence
in turning Peter away temporarily, because he says, when you are
turned again. Now you say, surely if anything
will minister to license, it's to tell a man, you're going to
fall, but you're going to be recovered. Won't that make people
turn to grace of God and philosophy, isn't it? It sure didn't with
Peter, it caused him to go out and weep bitterly. And for a
child of God to know that though I may fall, and fall miserably,
so that at any given point what I may do and say, anyone viewing
that in isolation would say, no Christian can do or say that,
to know that my Lord Jesus Christ is committed to save me to the
uttermost does not make me bold to sin. It makes me fear to sin,
lest I should abuse such amazing grace. And when I have sinned,
And I think that He has pledged an everlasting kingdom to me,
full well knowing in His perfect foreknowledge that that sin would
have been committed along my pilgrimage to the celestial city,
that He still promised me entrance to that city. That doesn't make
me bold to sin. It breaks my heart that a Savior,
knowing I would fail Him so miserably, committed himself to all the
agonies of the cross, and to the selfless, ever-living intercession
at the right hand of the Father, to bring me safely home to heaven.
You can't help but love a Savior like that. In loving Him, you
want to obey Him, and you want to jealously guard your heart
for our interceding High Priest, The Lord Jesus, his prayers are
always effectual. Listen to old Bishop Ryle commenting
on this passage. Reading now from Ryle's expository
thoughts on Luke, we learn in these verses one great secret
of a believer's perseverance in the faith. We read that our
Lord said to Peter, I prayed for thee that thy faith fail
not. It was owing to Christ's intercession
that Peter did not entirely fall away. The continued existence
of grace in a believer's heart is a great standing miracle. Do you hear that? Do you believe
that? The continued existence of grace
in a believer's heart It's a great standing miracle! His enemies
are so mighty, and his strength is so small. The world is so
full of snares, and his heart is so weak. It seems at first
sight impossible for him to reach heaven by the narrow road that
leads there. The passage before us explains
his safety. He has a mighty friend at the
right hand of God, whoever lives, to make intercession for him.
There is a watchful advocate who is daily pleading for him,
seeing all his daily necessities, and obtaining daily supplies
of mercy and grace for his soul. His grace never altogether dies,
because Christ always lives to intercede. If we are true Christians
we shall find it essential to our comfort in religion to have
clear views of Christ's priestly office and intercession. Christ
lives and therefore our faith shall not fail. Let us beware
of regarding Jesus only as the one who died for us. Let us never
forget that he is alive forevermore. And then he quotes Romans 8.34
The work that he does for his people is not yet over. He is
still appearing in the presence of God for them and doing for
their souls exactly what he did for Peter. His present life for
them is just as important as his death on the cross. When
R. Ryle wrote, he said, 1800 years
ago, we say 1900 years ago, Christ lives. and therefore true Christians
shall live also." Banyan understood this, didn't he? Remember the
House of Interpreter, kids? Remember that strange scene?
There was a wall, and there was a fire at the bottom of the wall,
and on one side of the wall there was a man throwing water on the
fire. But instead of the fire going
out, it kept burning brighter and brighter. And Christian scratched
his head and said, I don't understand this. Whenever I see a fire and
I throw water on it, the fire is extinguished. So interpreter
takes him behind the wall and he says, there stood a man who
was continually pouring oil upon the fire. And Bunyan makes the
perceptive comment that often the Christian is a marvel to
himself. All he sees is the efforts of
the devil to sift him, to use Bunyan's imagery, the devil in
the world, in his own flesh, seeking to pour water upon any
fire of devotion to Christ and attachment to Christ, secretly,
out of sight. There is the constant work of
our Lord Jesus, sending supplies of His Spirit into our hearts,
there nurturing, quickening, reviving the graces that he himself
has implanted. And so I say these three great
principles are here in the passage. With respect to Christ's intercessory
work for us, surely whatever there may be that is different
in a world to which we find it difficult to relate, Does Christ
have to communicate by words to his Father? Well, surely if
the sighs of my heart, unexpressed, are heard by God, the Lord would
not have to express it in words. But thank God that he's accommodated
himself to us. And here we see the great High
Priest, while he's still among us, performing his priestly function
and giving us at least pointers in the direction of how he carries
it on in the heavens with all of our limitations and all of
the recognition that we are treading on holy ground. Surely we are
warranted to say from this passage, as our interceding high priest
Jesus knows and controls Satan's efforts to turn us away from
Christ, if not why did he teach us to pray? Our Father, who art
in the heavens, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will
be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our
daily bread. Forgive us our trespasses, as
we forgive those who trespass against us. Lead us not into
temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. If he doesn't control me, How
can we pray to be delivered from it? Second great principle is our
interceding High Priest. He prays that Satan's efforts
will not be successful and those prayers are personal. They are
in the form of real requests and they focus on the sustaining
of the root grace of faith. And thirdly, as our interceding
High Priest, the prayers of Jesus are always effectual. What is
my closing word of exhortation to you, children of God? Surely
it is this. Do you not see that behind the
scenes of your life the ancient conflict of Genesis 3.15 is still
going on? The serpent and his seed, the
woman and her seed. And Matthew 1.21 says, Thou shalt
call his name Jesus. for he shall save his people
from their sin. How does he do the saving? Well,
there is the element of his perfect life, yes. There is the element
of his substitutionary death, yes. But there is the element
of his perpetual intercession. He is able to save. See, he ever lives to make intercession. Do you not now see Why temptations
which have taken others away and let them clean out of the
Christian faith have crippled you so that at the time there
seemed to be no difference between your sin and theirs, but here
you sit this morning, not as a formalist, not as an irritated
kid who says, why in the world do I have to have parents bring
me in a place like this? But you sit here with a heart
that runs out in love to Christ and to His Word and to His praise. Why is it you are still in the
way of faith? Because you have one who prayed
when the sifting time came that your faith would not be utterly
swept away. You are a monument of the efficacy
of the intercession of the Lord Jesus. When I mentioned that
incident Wednesday night of the man who heard me preach 42 years
ago, when I was only 17 or 18 years old, one of the things
that so moved me was to look back and think of all of the
fruit of the intercessory work of my Savior. All of the places in my life
where I felt indeed that I was in the sifting rack. And there
was the agitation and the shaking, and I felt the winds of temptation,
and almost like tales of satanic oppression that I thought for
sure would blow me away as a child. But God graciously brought me
through, and I stand today united to Christ, because I have a faithful
heart. O Christian, O Christian, give
thanks for his perpetual intercession which secures your perpetual
walk in the way of faith. And my unbelieving friend, my
closing word to you is this. Far from Satan having to ask
to sit with you, he doesn't need to ask permission, you're already
his. Jesus said to religious people
of his day, you are of your father, the devil and the lust of your
father. It is your will to do. And when
Paul was commissioned by the risen Christ, recorded in Acts
26, he said, I'm sending you forth to open their eyes, to
turn them from darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto
God. My unconverted friend, young
or old, you are under the power of this adversary who hates God. and vents his hatred by trying
to drag as many of God's and his bearers as he can into hell
with him. My friend, this Jesus, who intercedes
and by his intercession secures the salvation of all of his own,
he not only lives to make intercession for those who are his own, he
lives to receive every sinner who will come and say, Lord Jesus,
I want to be within the orbit of that saving mercy and grace. Lord Jesus, will you look in
pity and mercy upon a slave, a semen of the devil such as
I? And will you not magnify your
grace by liberating me and bringing me within the orbit of your intercessory
work by which I will be kept unto eternal salvation? I end where I began. Robert Trail
was right when he said every believer has need of everything
that Christ has to give. Let us pray. Our Father, we confess to you
that When our poor, shriveled human minds seek to grasp the
wonders of your grace and saving mercy in the Lord Jesus, we feel
intimidated by their grandeur. We feel like little children
standing before massive, mighty mountains and being asked to
jump over them. Have mercy upon us. increase
our capacity to grasp by faith the glorious realities upon which
we've meditated today, until the day comes when we'll no longer
see through a glass darkly, but face to face we'll see Him who
ever lived to make intercession for us and by that intercession
brought us safely home to glory. Have mercy upon those who are
not within the orbit of such gracious activity. O Lord, have
mercy upon them even this day, that they may run to Christ and
find refuge in him. Sealed on your word we pray,
and bless us on this your day, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.