I'm going to ask you to turn
in your Bibles to Luke 4. Turn with me to Luke 4. Luke
4. I'd like to look at verses 14 to 19. I've entitled this message,
Lessons from the Lord's Preaching. The Lord Jesus Christ was led,
and this is in verses 1 and 2, blue for, into the wilderness
to be tempted of the devil. And after being tempted, the
scripture says that he, in verses 14 and 15, Jesus returned in
the power of the Spirit into Galilee and there went out a
fame of him through all the region round about and he taught in
their synagogues being glorified of all. All men spoke well. He healed those folks that were there.
And Scripture says in the next few verses, we're going to learn
through the words and the actions of our Lord that the Spirit of
God has been pleased to teach us some things concerning vital
issues, some vital issues that we need to learn. The Scripture
says, and here's where I'm going to look, really 16 to 19 will
be the heart of it. The Scripture says that he came
to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and as his custom
was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day. I'll stop
right there, I won't read the next words or two, but it says, as his custom was. He came to where he'd been brought
up, and as his custom was. He went into the synagogue on
the Sabbath day. Now, here is the federal head
of God's elect. Here's the one that is representing
his people. And as his custom was, as his
manner was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day.
What does that mean? As his custom was, as his manner
was, he was faithful concerning public worship. That's what he
said. He was faithful for the glory
of God. Now listen, here is the servant
of Jehovah. The servant who humbled himself. The Word made flesh. God Almighty, man. Totally God, totally man. And
here He was for the profit of His people, for the glory of
His Father, for the glory of the Word that was concerning
Him. As his custom was, he forsook
not the assembling of himself together with his people. At the appointed times of worship,
he was found in the house of God. That was his custom. That's what he did. At that appointed
time, He was there, and listen to this. He still does. He still does. Matthew 18-20, for where two
or three are gathered together in my name, I am in the midst
of them. There is nothing more important. There's nothing more important for a believer. There's nothing
more important for a believer than to be gathered together
with God's people at that appointed time to meet together and hear
the gospel of God's grace. Nothing more important. Nothing.
Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. We find by his actions, what
did he do? That was his custom. His custom
was to be in the synagogue where the word of God was read. Here's
my next point right here. Listen to this. I told you I'd
wait to read that letter. He came to Nazareth, verse 16,
where he had been brought up and as his custom was, he went
into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for to read. Now here we find the Spirit of
God instructing us through the actions of the Lord Jesus Christ
the importance of reading the Scripture. Reading the Scripture. He stood up to read. Assembling
themselves together, the reading of the Scriptures is a God-ordained
part, aspect. of public worship, public worship. There's some things that we do.
And when we come together, we read the scriptures. This is
what he did. He got up and he read the scriptures.
We, as I said at the beginning of this service, we need to hear
what God has to say. This is inspired of God. We need to hear what God has
to say about himself. And the scripture says that in
verse 17, when the Lord was ready to read, verse 17 says, and there
was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when
he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written. They brought him a scroll, and
the reason I know it was a scroll is because when it says that
he opened the book, I looked the word up, it means unroll.
So it was a scroll. It was a scroll, that's how they
did it. It was written on parchment or on vellum, which was skins
of animals, and it had two rollers and they unrolled it. There he
unrolled the book and he opened the book. But now, before I go
any farther, I couldn't pass when he had opened the book.
When he'd opened the book, I'll just hold your place right there.
There's a precious passage of scripture I've been looking at,
Lord, and I'll preach on it here soon. I keep reading it and going
back to it and reading it and going back to it. Luke 24, I'll
read this for you. If you wanna turn, you can. Luke
24, verses 44, 45. He's meeting with his apostles
here before he's ascended into heaven. And he said unto them,
44, These are the words which I spake unto you while I was
yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were
written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the
Psalms concerning me. Then opened he their understanding,
that they might understand the Scriptures." Isn't that a precious
passage, Scripture? He opened unto them their understanding. You know, I can, and I do, I
try so hard. I try so hard, I want to, I ask
the Lord, help me to, Be plain. I want to be plain. I want to
be plain in what I'm saying. But as plainly as I can speak,
I cannot open your understanding. I cannot open your heart. I can't
open your understanding to understand scriptures. Only the Lord can
do that. So the scripture says, He did,
He opened the book. He did unroll it, but He's the
one that opens the book. to the understanding of his people. So the blessing of the Lord opening
our understanding, just like what I just preached a minute
ago. I know that to the world, that's not a popular message.
I'm quite aware of that. I know that because it flies
in the face of everything that We usually have all been told. It's just contrary to it. It's not kind of close. It's
not even close. It's just opposed. But it's what God has to say.
But the Lord is going to have to open my understanding to understand
that and to love it. And to love it. They say, that's
what God has to say. I love that. He opened their
understanding. David said in Psalm 18.28, For
thou wilt light my candle, the Lord my God will enlighten my
darkness. The Lord, He gives light. He gives light to His people.
When He gives light, I'm telling you, they say what thus saith
the Lord. That's what God said. And I believe
that. Isaiah 29, 18, in that day shall
the deaf hear the words of the book and the eyes of the blind
shall see out of obscurity and out of darkness. Isn't that so?
Before I, what does every believer say? All I know is this, you
know, one time I was blind and now I see. I was blind to what
that book said, but now God's given me some understanding.
So, Almighty God opened, He opened the book. He was faithful to
the attending of worship. Faithful, faithful. He didn't
just, you know, divers and miscellaneous reasons, He was there. I understand
that. There's a lot of times where, you know, providentially
I understand that, but as much is not trying to make excuses
for anything, but he was faithful. Lord, may I be faithful. Be in
the services. Second, hear what God has to
say. Realize that he opens our understanding. And then it says he opened a
book. verse 17, and found the place where it is written. He found that place. He opened
a book. He found where it was written.
He found, he opened it and he found, he found a place. Well,
now without a doubt, I don't, this is no, you know, without,
the Lord turned to exactly. exactly what they needed to hear
that day. He found the place. He found
a place, the place that was ordained for the moment. This is the burden
of a pastor, to seek the Lord for the message of the hour.
I've told you, Brother Henry said this, God's people are not
listening for a message. I got a thing over there, a cabinet,
one of those old barrister cabinets. I've got messages that I've preached
over the last 40 plus years. I've got them back in the early
80s and stuff like that. I got a bunch of messages over
there, bunch of them, bunch of them. All the outlines are there,
all the outlines are there. But do you know what I'm looking
for? I'm not just looking for, you
know, I've kind of gone over them again. They're scripturally
sound, you know. If they're not, I'll throw them
away. But the thing is, I'm not looking for just a message. It
can be scripturally sound. I'm looking for the message right
now, this morning, right here. What does God have to say this
morning? There'll be times that I'm looking
for, I'm getting ready to preach. I know I'm going to have to preach
on Sunday morning, Wednesday night. I know, I know. And I'm
looking at scriptures and I'll read this and I'll look at this
and I may consider that. How do you know? It just ain't
there. It doesn't do anything in my heart. But I'll come across
something and I'll think, you know what? I need to stay right
there. I need to look right there. He
found the place. He found the place where it was
written. And the passage of the moment
right then was according to Isaiah 61 verses 1 and 2, which is quoted
in verses 18 and 19. It was providential. that the portion of scripture
that was to be read for that day which speaks plainly of the
Messiah of whom he is, that the hearers there would be left inexcusable
concerning who he was, the one that they were going to hear
of, that they'd been hearing of for Sabbaths and Sabbaths
and Sabbaths. He was standing before them.
And he turned to that passage of scripture and so he says,
here's what he read. Turn to that passage where it
was written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath
anointed me. I'll stop right there for the
second, just a second. The spirit of the Lord is upon me because
he's anointed me. Here's what we learn. A man must
be qualified, qualified for the work. All the gifts and graces of the
Lord were conferred upon Him, not by measure, but without measure. The Spirit of the Lord was upon
Him without measure. Now, all of us have the Spirit
of God, believers, by measure. We know in part, we prophesy
in part. No man born in Adam knows everything. And I've had people ask me, and
if I don't know it, and if I hadn't just looked at it, sometimes
I might know it and need to go back and read it again to remember
what I said. Or somebody will call me and
say, I listened to a message that you preached on this and
so and so. And I'm thinking, I preached that? Not him. Not him. He said that the Spirit
of the Lord is upon me. It's only by God's Spirit that
we perceive, that we understand, the anointing, that He who is
the Word. What an amazing passage of Scripture. The Word made flesh, who humbled
himself, made himself of no reputation, came in the likeness of sinful
men, of sinful flesh, and for sin, sin of the Father, was qualified
by the Father. He who humbled himself was qualified
by the Father, by the Father giving Him the Spirit without
measure. All I can say is, Lord, I believe
that. As you say it is. Somebody said, explain that.
I can't explain that. I can tell you that He possessed
the Spirit of God. He who is God humbled Himself
without measure. But I want you to notice that
the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He has anointed me
to preach. Preach what? The Gospel. To preach the Gospel. The Gospel. I'm going to tell
you again what it is in just a second. The Gospel which is
the power of God unto salvation. Romans 1 16. The Gospel by which
all God's elect are called. 2 Thessalonians 2.14. Does God call any sinner out
of the darkness of sin and unbelief any other way except by the gospel? No. No. No. I didn't know you had to hear
the gospel in order to be converted. God said you do. Thanks be unto
God that He would even put me under it and teach me anything
of it. The gospel which is concerning
Romans 1-3, God's Son, Jesus Christ, which was made of the
seed of David according to the flesh. Now I'm going to begin
to wrap this up, and I'm going to tell you what the gospel is,
and then I'll finish this 18-19. This is the gospel. The gospel
is a message. The gospel is a message. It is
a message of the good news, the good tidings from the throne
of heaven. It's a message that's sent to
man. God has a gospel and he sent some preachers to preach
it. Here's what it is. Now, it's the message of the
good tidings from the throne of heaven of pardon, of mercy,
of peace with God for a people that God Almighty has everlastingly
loved in Christ. Here, I got a message for you.
Here's what it is. God has everlastingly loved the
people. He knows them. I don't. I got
an idea of some of them now, but I don't know. I don't know.
I don't see their hearts. God knows. But God's got a message. And God Almighty, according to
Ephesians 1, chose those elect in Christ before the foundation
of the world. We've looked at that. And this
is the reason that they should be holy and without blame before
Him in love. And the Father, here's the good
news. All of us had sinned, all of us fell in Adam, all of us
had broken God's law. God's law was given to show us
what we are and what we're not able to do. God's law shows us
the demand of God for holiness. God shows us we can't do it.
That's the way it is, you can't do it. You can't do it. But,
here's the good tidings. God has entrusted all that he's
everlastingly loved to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
God's gonna deal with them in one man. He's gonna deal with
all of his elect in one man. And whatever that man does, whatever
that man does, God's gonna charge his obedience to his people. Whatever he does. Boy, you're
talking about a precious passage of scripture. This is my beloved
son, whom I'm well pleased. I'm well pleased with him. You
hear him. You hear him. I'm thinking, Lord,
thank you. Thank you. If God's well pleased
with you and I'm in you, Lord, then I've got hope. I've got
hope. Here's the good news. He went to the cross that I just
dealt with. He bore the guilt of his people,
made it his own. This is mine, I'll make it my
own. Buried it in his own body. And
God dealt with him, God's just. God's gonna deal with you being
just. And he put away their sin. He paid, Christ paid the debt.
Wages of sin is death. Did he die? He did, he died. Buried by God Almighty. who accepted what he did, raised
him from the dead. And when he came out of the grave,
let me tell you what the good tidings are. We came out with
him and we're gonna be with him. Father, I will that all that
you've given me be with me. The spirit of the Lord is upon
me because he's anointed me to preach the gospel. Preach it
to who? To the poor, poor. Those poor in spirit made sensible
of their sins and their poverty, the poor. You know a miracle
of God's grace is God would tell a man or woman they can't do
anything. That's a miracle of God's grace. I didn't know I
couldn't do anything, but I do now. I know it. I know something
of it. Matthew 5, 3, He has sent me,
the scripture says, Not only to preach the gospel to the poor,
but to preach, sent me to heal the broken hearted. Broken hearted,
those shattered. Shattered by the fall. Crushed. Oh, how merciful. That God Almighty
would tell this. He said, I got a message for
you. I'm gonna heal the broken hearted. I'm gonna heal the broken hearted.
How you gonna do that? I'm gonna give you a new heart. I'm going to give you a new heart.
I'm going to remove that heart of stone. I'm going to give you
a new heart. I'm going to give you a new spirit.
David, listen to the words of a regenerate. Psalm 41.4, I said,
Lord, be merciful unto me. Heal my soul. For I've sinned
against thee. Heal my soul. Heal my soul. If I get sick, I'm going to go
to the doctor. I want to get healed. I really do. I want to
get well. Just the thought of being sick doesn't appeal to
me. It just really doesn't. But Lord, heal my soul. My soul. My soul. Heal my soul. You know,
the only one that lasts that is a believer that God's already
had mercy toward and has healed his soul. He's already healed
it. And a believer says, heal me. Lord, save me. The only one to say that is one
saved. Psalm 34, 18, the Lord is nigh unto them that are of
a broken heart, and save as such as be of a contrite, crushed
spirit. They're like that public, God
be merciful to me, a sinner. I've come to preach the gospel
to the poor, heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the
captives, those that have been, that are captive by nature, captive
to sin, captive to Satan, captive to their old sinful nature, the
law. I have come to preach deliverance
to the captive. How did he deliver them? He died
for them, paid their debt, put away their sins. And he said,
I've come to preach recovery of the sight to the blind. Oh,
he would mercifully heal blind folks. Asked old Barnabas, what
do you want me to do for you? He said, Lord, that I might receive
my sight. But you know what? That was just a picture and a
type that the Lord gives eyes to see, spiritually, eyes to
see. Man is born blind, blind to his
condition, blind to God's demand for righteousness before him,
blind to the way that God saves sinners. Man can't see by nature,
he can't see spiritually. The here and there, the see and
I, the Lord hath made even both of them. And those that one thing
they know, one thing they know, I see. I see him by faith. Then he says also, to set at
liberty them that are bruised, to declare the freedom that has
been purchased. And this is what I'm doing right
now. This is what I'm preaching. The spirit of the Lord is upon
him. He has sent preachers, to preach
that there's the gospel to the poor, poor in spirit, can't help
themselves. To heal the brokenhearted, to
preach deliverance to the captive, to recover the sight to the blind,
set at liberty them that are bruised. And then he says in
verse 19, I'll close right here, to preach the acceptable year
of the Lord. You know, many writers said,
and I don't have any problem with this, I really don't. They
really refer to that verse as being the year of Jubilee. And
I don't have any problem with that. Year of Jubilee, year 50,
it was a great setting forth of the captives and their slaves
and everything. But John Calvin made an interesting
point on here and I'm going to share what Mr. Calvin had to
say. It's worthy of consideration. He states, when the Lord said
to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, he said that what
the Lord was saying is concerning the assurance from God that all
those who had wondered concerning the apparent delay of the promised
Messiah. Now they'd been listening. Now
you have to understand, 1,500 years. They've been offering sacrifices
and you know how people are. Where's the promise of His coming? Things are going on just like
they have right now, just like they did back in the 60's and
50's and 1800's and 1700's. Everything going on, it's on
and on and on. He said, I'm here to preach the
acceptable year of the Lord, the time of redemption. This
is me. This is what he was saying. That
time of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ was according to
the purpose and good pleasure of God. The Apostle Paul said
this in Galatians 4, 4 and 5 in confirmation of this. He said,
when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son,
made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were
under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. So here, in closing, the Lord
teaches us that don't give yourself over to curiosity, wonder. Rather, let us learn. Learn from
what he's saying right here. To bow to the timing and good
pleasure of God. The Lord has, the Old Testament
said there's a Messiah coming. New Testament says He came. When
the Lord was here, He says, I'm here. I'm here to preach the
acceptable year of the Lord. Let's learn that His word is
sure. It's sure. It's going to happen.
And let us strive after To realize and ask the Lord for guidance
and direction to admit, say, and believe this. Whatever He
has counseled, whatever He has purposed, whatever He's willed,
it's going to come to pass. It's going to come to pass. Almighty
God has been pleased to teach us something today of Himself. And I pray that what He's taught
us through His words, through His actions, let us learn that,
the assembling of ourselves together, the importance of reading the
Scripture, the importance of hearing the Gospel, and knowing
what the Gospel is, and hearing what the Gospel proclaims. And
know this, that soon, very soon, He's coming back to receive us
unto Himself, that where He is, there we may be also, to His
glory and our eternal good. Okay, Gary.