In Luke chapter two we have the
story that I'm sure everyone here has heard one time or another
of how that Mary and Joseph took their young son Jesus and they
went to Jerusalem to celebrate the feast of the Passover as
they did every year. And it says that as they journeyed
back from Jerusalem that they discovered it along the way that
their son, the Lord Jesus, was not with them. And so it says they went back
to Jerusalem to look for him. It says there it took them three
days to find him. Can you imagine the state that
they were in? Now their 12 year old boy was
the Son of God. And He knows all things. He knew
that they were looking for Him. He knew that they were anxious
and no doubt worried and horrified and looking everywhere for Him. But
rather than go to them and relieve their anxiety, he continued to
do what he was doing. What he was doing when they found
him. And he did that so that we could be taught something
very important this morning. And I pray that the Lord will
teach us this plain, single, simple lesson. What Christ must
do. what he must do we pick up the narration in Luke
2 46 it came to pass that after three days they found him and they found him in the temple
they found him in the place of worship such as it was in those
days it had many problems many much error had crept in the traditions
of men were were observed and honored rather than the one whom
those traditions had been given to begin with in order to honor
the Lord himself. But they found him in the place
of worship sitting in the midst of the doctors, the ones who
were students of scripture and accomplished supposedly learned
men in the scriptures. And it says he was hearing them
and asking them questions But we also know that they heard
him and asked him questions because in the next verses all that heard
him were astonished at his understanding and answers. They listened to him and they
had some questions for him and his answers astonished them.
Now you think about this. I wonder, here we are this morning,
we've been studying the Bible together many of us for a lot
of years. And everyone in here, to some
extent, is a student of the word of God. I wonder if the Lord
came in here this morning, himself, and taught us if we would be
astonished. I mean, utterly astonished at
what he said. Or would we just say, that's
what we've been hearing? I wonder about that, don't you? Would he confirm? What we know
or would we be astonished? Maybe both. Maybe to hear it
so clearly from him and with such power. See, I can't say
it like he can. No man ever spake like him before
or since. But they were astonished at his
answers, his understanding. He's 12 years old. And when they
saw him, when his mother and father saw him, they were amazed. And his mother said to him, son,
why? Why? And the answer is the title
of our message this morning. Christ must. That's what he said. That was his answer to her. Didn't
you know that I must? We understand that there are
things that are just done in normal society. Children don't
just deliberately go off from their parents and make them work.
That's just not done. There are things that are done,
and there are things that are not done in this world. But then
there's that which must happen. That's what I want us to see
this morning. There's that which must happen. She said, Behold,
thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing. And he knew that. He knew that. And our Lord doesn't
cause unnecessary sorrow. Our Lord doesn't dishonor his
father and mother. The scripture teaching is clear
and abundant about that, how he honored his earthly mother
and father. But he said unto them, how is
it that you sought me? Wished ye not that I must? I must be about my father's business. And they understood not the saying
which he spake unto them. Our Lord taught us this same
lesson in Luke 9, 59. Let me read this to you. He said
unto someone, to a man one day, follow me. But that man said,
Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. And the understanding is, I believe
is correct here, that his father wasn't already dead and that
he needed to go handle the funeral arrangements. What he was saying
is, my father's old and I need to take care of him until such
time as he's buried. That's a common way to say that. But the Lord Jesus said unto
him, let the dead bury their dead. There's that which is just
done and not done in society. You don't not take care of your
old parents, but there's that which must happen
also. You see what I'm saying? And
again now, he's not teaching that we shouldn't take care of
our parents when they need us to. They took care of us, and
when they need us, we're to take care of them. And that's just
right and good. In fact, if that wasn't the case,
then there wouldn't be any power behind the must here the must
has meaning because of the other you see what I'm saying he's
arguing from the lesser to the greater here in a sense that
that there is that which is important and it is important but then
there's that which must happen we see that same lesson here And another said, I will follow
thee, but first let me go bid them farewell, which are at home
at my house. And Jesus said, no man having
put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom
of heaven, the kingdom of God. Follow me. There's what he must
do, and there's what we must do. And then there's everything
else, important things. Martha said, Lord, make my sister
help me. That would be good, wouldn't
it? That'd be a good thing to help. After all, the Lord Jesus
is at their house. There's things to be done. There'd
be some things to be done at our house if the Lord was coming.
And there were in this case. But Mary was just sitting at
his feet and listening to him talk. And Martha said, Lord, make her
help me. I got cooking to do and preparations to make. He
said, yeah, but there's something, though that's important, there's something necessary here. And I fear that we've got so
many important things to do that we neglect what's necessary.
But I wanna talk primarily this morning about what the Lord must
do. He must now. If all of us are
anxious and sorrowful as a result, it's got to be done. There's what this world considers
musts. And then there's that which Christ
declares necessary. His parents scolded him because
he deliberately now, you think about that, he deliberately separated
himself from them in Jerusalem. He's not a toddler that's just
wandering off without really knowing what he's doing. He's
a 12 year old boy that deliberately separated himself from them.
And they were mad about it when they found him. But he has something to do that's
more important than what's important to them. I think that's worth
looking into. When that man told the Lord that
his father was old and he needed to take care of his father until
he died, now that's something that normally should be done.
But then he said, I'll do your will after that. Don't let the necessities of
this world get in the way of what's really needful. Didn't
our Lord say it's the cares of this world that choke out the
seed in so many cases? The concerns of this world, the
business of this world, what's important in this world. And
don't, the application of this lesson, it can be misapplied, can't it?
We may neglect things that are important, that are important
in this world and use The Word of God has an excuse sometimes,
and that's wrong. The Lord's not teaching us to
abandon our elderly parents, all things being equal. And He's
not saying don't be a help when somebody needs your help. He's not saying needlessly grieve
your parents over anything. It's just a simple matter of
what's important to this world versus what's important to Christ.
And we must be careful about how we apply that now. It'd be
a very rare situation in which it would be right for a child,
especially a son, to not be there to take care of his mother or
father. And you notice that our Lord
did say in that passage that there would be somebody there
to take care of him, just not him. Did you notice that? And here's a lesson there. If
we do have to neglect things that otherwise are important
in this world, temporally important things, and there are such things
like that, if we do have to neglect them for his sake, he's not going
to let that go undone. You're never going to suffer
for honoring him. I'll tell you that. Not ever. Not in any way. And the important thing that
we have to learn here is that there are musts, and they don't
always correspond with what everybody thinks are musts. And I wanna
look at in the word of God this morning, especially what Christ
must do. And then we'll talk a little
bit maybe about what we must do. But Christ said in her text
that he must be about his father's business. And it's hard to ignore the fact
that doing the business of God the Father in this world, he
came to do his business, okay? Doing the business of God his
Father put him in direct opposition to organized religion. They were astonished. They were
troubled. at what he said. They were scared
to death of him and hated his guts at the same time. The so-called
church of this world claims to be doing the business of God.
Don't they? Isn't that what the church is
about? We're doing God's business. But when he came down, when God's
Son came down to do the actual business of God, the ones who
said they were doing God's business were exactly opposed. They were
diametrically opposed to him. Somebody's lying, aren't they?
Somebody's lying. But what was the father's business
that he gave his son to do? He said, I must be about my father's
business. What was that business? Our Lord
was never ambiguous about that. There was no mystery whatsoever
about that. Turn to John chapter six. Please, John six, 37. John 6 37 Now this is interesting passage
verses 37 through 40 the Lord is going to say what he came
to do and why And he's going to say what's going to be the
result of that but first in verse 37 he gives us the result and
then he tells us how that result comes about look at verse 37
all that the father giveth me shall come to me the father gave
his son a people before the foundation of the world we know that in
the covenant of grace he interceded for them in John 17 and not for
this world He has a people, a chosen, elect, loved, precious, unique,
peculiar people. And he said, all of those are
going to come to me. And when they do, I'm going to
receive them. No way am I going to cast any
of them out. He came down here to seek them out and to find
them. And they're going to come to him because he came to them.
And this, and then here's why. Now he's gonna tell us why that's
gonna happen. He's gonna tell us what he came to do and why.
And he just stated the result of it. That's gonna happen. All
of his sheep are gonna be saved. They're gonna come to him and
he's gonna receive them and they're gonna be saved. Him that cometh
to me shall have everlasting life. That's the result of it
now. Now here's why it's gonna happen.
Because I came down from heaven to do something. Not the will
of man, not even my own will as a man, but my Father's will.
God's will. The will of Him that sent me.
I came down here with some business to take care of. To do the will
of Him that sent me. And this is what it is. It's
pretty clear, isn't it? This is the Father's will, verse
39, which hath sent me, that of all which He hath given me,
I should lose nothing. but should raise it up again
at the last day. All that the father loved, he
said, I love Jacob and I hated Esau. Jacob, Christ said, is
gonna be mine. I'm not gonna let him go. I'm
gonna save him. I'm gonna do what it takes so
that he'll be with me and my father forever. That's what he
prayed in his high priestly prayer, that we all may be one, that
we might be together in one, that those that you've given
me might be with me where I am. Jacob's one of them All whom he loves And this is
the will of him that sent me that everyone would see at the
Sun This is our experience of it. We see him the Gospels preaching
we say I see Christ in the scriptures in his message in his gospel
and believeth on him if the word is mixed with faith in them that
hear it and by the one who gives it may have everlasting life. And
I will raise him up. I won't let him go. I'm not gonna
let him perish. I lay down my life for my sheep,
John 10, and they shall never perish. Neither shall any man
pluck them out of my hand. So you see what he came down
here to do and why. He came down here to save his
people and he did it because his father sent him to do it.
He did it because that was his father's will because he loved
him and made a covenant With himself to save him. He said
I will have mercy on whom I will And so Christ came down to save
him and that's why because God willed it And the certain result
of that is that they will come and I will receive them That's pretty clear that's the
business that must That's why the Lord was doing what he was
doing when Joseph and Mary found him. Because he must save his
people from their sin. He must do the will of the Father
in redeeming his people. And this is very important now. He must do his Father's business.
And his father's business has everything to do, all of the
business that he did now had to do with the salvation of a
people. But you might think, well, he's saving people now.
He's still saving people, isn't he? Though he's not here on this
earth physically, could he have stayed in heaven and done his
father's business from there? He's doing it that way now. From
the throne, he could have stayed on the throne. The Lord Jesus
could have never left heaven, perhaps, maybe, and done his
father's business from there. No, he can't do that. He can't. No, his father's business is
for him to do what is necessary to save all of God's elect. And
that must, that's a must now, they must be saved. Because God
willed it. God ordained it. They must be
saved. And that must necessitates other
musts. If that must is going to happen,
some other musts have got to happen. Now we understand this concept.
That's simple, isn't it? If I must go somewhere tomorrow,
there's somewhere tomorrow that I've got to be. And it's a long
way from here, and my car's broke down. If I'm gonna make that
must a reality, then I must get my car fixed. I've got some other
musts that have to happen in order for that one to happen.
Well, this is the way it is in our salvation. If Christ must
do the Father's business, and the Father's business is that
all of his people be saved, then there's some other things that
are necessary. Our Lord must accomplish salvation in order
to do that He must do some other things Luke chapter 9 Luke chapter 9 verse 18 It came to pass verse 18 of Luke
9 As he was alone praying, his disciples were with him, and
he asked them, saying, Whom say the people that I am? They answering
said, John the Baptist. But some say Elias, and others
say that one of the old prophets is risen again. He said unto
them, But whom say ye that I am? Peter answering said, The Christ
of God. And He straightly charged them
and commanded them to tell no man that thing, saying, the Son
of Man must. Now He must be about His Father's
business. How is He going to accomplish that? What is the
Father's business? To save His people. God has an earth, He
has a universe because He has a people. Well how is He going to save
them? He must suffer. He must suffer many things and
be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes. And
he's got to die. He must be slain. He must be
crucified. And he must be raised. He must
rise again from the dead. He must be raised again the third
day. If the Lord Jesus Christ is not
going to lose any of his sheep, And the way he said that's not
going to happen is I lay down my life for them, and they shall
never perish. There's a reason why his sheep
are not going to be lost. They're not going to perish because
he laid down his life for them. He must establish for them, and
this is plain in John 6, he's not going to lose any of them. His will is that I not lose a
single one of my sheep. And if that's going to be the
case, then something's got to be done about our sin. Why would
he lose any of us? Why would any of us be lost?
What does it mean to be lost? We're sinners before God. We're
cast out of his presence and communion from the Garden of
Eden in the beginning and all of us, through Adam, dead spiritually
and Adam all died. And our sins have separated between
us and our God. And so he must establish for
his people a perfect righteousness. And he must pay for all of their
sins. He spoke there in John 6, where
we read, of raising us up from the dead in the last day. Well,
how can that happen? He said, I'm gonna raise them
up, they're gonna be with me. The only way he can do that is
if death has no more claim on us. What is death? It's the wages
of sin. It's the result of sin. It's
what we deserve for sin. How's he going to raise us up
from the dead then? He's going to put away our sin. Death will
have no claim on us just like it had none on him. Because our
sins are put away. He bore them, but they weren't
on him when he came out of the grave. Where are they? They're
gone. And they're gone from me too. He put them away as far
as the east is from the west. Our brother read just a minute
ago. They're gone. And in order for that to happen,
he must suffer, he must be slain, and he must rise. And that's how he makes us holy
and spotless, and that's got to be true if we're not gonna
be lost. He said, I'm not gonna lose a one. In order to accomplish
us being not only without sin, We've got to be without sin.
All of my sin. And we go astray from the womb
speaking lies, David said. We're born sinners now. We can't
do anything but sin. We cannot not sin. Everything
we do is full of sin. And that's got to be done away
with. I've got to be sinless. I've got to be without sin. All
my sins have got to be paid for. But more than that, I've got
to be positively holy. I can't just be without sin in
the negative sense. I've got to be holy and righteous.
I've got to love God in the positive sense. Got to love God. Got to
believe on Him. Got to trust Him. And so Christ Jesus, in order
to accomplish all of this, He must always do the will of the
Father as my representative. He said in John 9 4 I must work
the works of him that sent me while it is day. I must work
the works of him that sent me. He said in John 8 29 I do always
those things that please my father. He must. And that's him as my righteousness
and he must also pay for my sins. Which brings us back to what
he said in Luke 9. He must suffer many things, and he must be slain,
and he must rise. Paul preached, it says in the
book of Acts 17, in verse 3, it says that as his manner was,
he went in unto the synagogues, and he reasoned with them for
three days, it says there, from the scriptures. Opening and alleging
that Christ must He must needs have suffered He
must needs have risen again and That this Jesus whom I preach
unto you is that Christ? This Jesus is that Messiah He
must suffer and die for the sins of his people that's the business
that he was about all of his life and He was living to accomplish
that purpose, and did everything that he did to that end. He must
pay the wages of sin for his people, which is death, and not
just physical death, but the forsaking of his father, spiritual
death, hell. He suffered our hell. If he is to accomplish the will
of his father in saving us, then he must, needs have suffered,
Paul said. Now you might think that him
suffering and dying is not something that he did. That's not something
that you accomplish. That's something that happens
to you. Well, if it was you we were talking about, that'd be
true. But on the Mount of Transfiguration,
our Lord spoke with Elijah and Moses about the death that he
should accomplish. Death didn't just happen to him.
He said, I laid down my life. I give my life a ransom for many
I don't accomplish death, but he did. And he did so in order
to accomplish his father's business in saving me. All that Christ must do becomes
a must. Why is it a must? It becomes
a must when God says, I will have mercy. If God's going to have mercy,
then Christ must. He said that, God said that to
Moses when Moses asked to see God's glory. And you know what God showed
him? I'm not sure exactly how it appeared to Moses, but I know
this. God showed him Christ. He said,
I'm gonna make all my goodness pass before you. And I'm gonna show you this,
I'll be merciful to whom I'll be merciful. And I know that
all of his mercy, he said, I'll be gracious to whom I'll be gracious.
Where's the grace of God? Where's the glory of God? Paul
said it's in the face of Jesus Christ. So I'm pretty sure Moses
couldn't see God's glory unless he peered into the face of Jesus
Christ. The will of the Father that Christ
came to do. If God's gonna have mercy now,
then Christ must. He came on a business trip, didn't
he? I must be about my Father's business. He came down here on
a business trip. How many times did our Lord say,
or does the Bible say, that our Lord did something because the
scriptures must be fulfilled? They must be fulfilled. The scriptures
must be fulfilled. And this is a book of redemption.
This is a book of salvation. He said, I didn't come down here
to condemn this world. That was already true. I came
down here that the world might be saved. That's what this book
is about. God didn't send his son to be
an example for us. That's not why he sent him. He's
an example to us as a natural consequence of who he is. But
that's not his purpose in coming. God didn't send his son to give
sinners a chance to be saved. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners. That's why he came, to save sinners. And in order, if that's a must, Then the cross is a must. The
precious blood is a must. He came to save those that the
Father gave him. And I know who some of them are.
I know who some of them are. I
know Jacob was one of them. Because he said, I love Jacob.
And the love of God is salvation. I know that Lazarus was one of
them. And I know that his sisters, it says that, doesn't it? In
John chapter 11, he loved them. It says in John 4, that our Lord
must, needs go through Samaria. I know you've read that before
in John chapter four. And in that chapter, in that
same chapter, we find out why he must. Because one of his sheep
was there. One of his lost sheep is at a
well drawn water in one of the cities of Samaria. And so he
must, needs, go through Samaria. God is the only free will that
there is, but his will is free now. He can do as he pleases,
he can go where he pleases. But because God said, I'm going
to have mercy on sinners, he must. He must go through Samaria. Now think about this, this lost
sheep is at a well there in one of the cities of Samaria. And
I'll tell you this, he said also to Zacchaeus, I must come about
at your house today. Got to do it. Same reason he
must go through Samaria. And there's an important lesson
here. For Christ to save you, we've established that he must
do the will of his father. Because that is the will of his
father to save his people that he should not lose any of his
people the covenant people of God. Got to do that as our representative
and we know in order to do that and he must suffer and die in
our place under the wrath of God for our sin and we know because
he said so that he must rise again from the dead being the
first fruits of them that slept if we're going to rise he must
be the first fruit he must rise first. And if he did all of these
musts for that woman at the well, if she's one of his sheep, if
he must need to go through Samaria in order to save her, and he
did all of these things, if he did the will of the Father, coming
to this earth, dying in her place, which he would do after that,
but salvation's eternal now, if he knew that he was going
to, if he came to die and to rise again for her, and accomplish
the will of God for her, then why does he need to go through
Samaria? Doesn't Christ save sinners now without coming where
they are physically? Well, not really. No. He doesn't ever save a sinner
without coming where that sinner is. This is important, because
we've seen all the other musts now. He must come down here. He said, I came to do the will
of him that sent me, to do my father's business. He got to
come down here where we are. In order to be a faithful and
merciful high priest, he's got to be made like unto his brethren,
Paul said in Hebrews. And he's got to, he got to die
for us. He got to suffer, he got to die,
he got to rise. But I'll tell you what else he
must do. He must need to go through Samaria if that's where you are.
You don't have to come where you are. Salvation is Christ
and what he accomplished for us, yes. But he also must come
where you are. He must speak the very words
of life to you like he did that woman at the well. They said
we can't go, we got nowhere to go because you have the words
of eternal life. And that woman heard those words.
And if God's gonna have mercy on you, so will you. He must
come to your town. You see that? He must give you life personally. He must quicken you. The one
we talked about this morning, who quickens whom he will. He's
got to come and do that by the power of that blood. What Christ
did for you is necessary, but Christ in you is the hope of
glory. When he does for you what he
did for sinners, That's salvation, absolutely. But when he does
that, then he's going to come do a work in you, too. That's
necessary, too. He must. And I'll tell you this finally
today, there's so much more to say about this, but never, never,
never think of events, no matter how necessary, as salvation. say things like I have a sure
hope because I got saved on such and such a day. That's not a
sure hope. That's a false hope is what that
is. And no better is it to trust in a glorious event like the
resurrection. Martha did in John 11 now. We
won't turn there this morning. You know that story there. Lazarus had died and Martha said
to the Lord Jesus Christ if you had been here, he wouldn't have
died Well We're not we're not going to
talk bad about Martha because we all ignorant aren't we we
all need to be taught of the Lord But that's ignorant The
Lord was there For one thing he's omniscient he's omnipresent
and omniscient and omnipotent He was there, he knew what was
going on, and there was nothing to stop him from doing something
about it. But she said, if you had been here, it wouldn't have
happened the way it did. Well, the Lord, it doesn't matter
where he is physically, if it's his will, it ain't gonna happen,
or it will happen, whichever be the case. But then she said
this, the Lord said, your brother will rise again. And Martha said,
I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last
day. She believed in the doctrine of the resurrection. And I'll
tell you this, that set her apart from most. Our Lord was mocked
and ridiculed and opposed concerning the resurrection of the dead
by the religious authorities, much less everybody else. But
she had good sound doctrine. I believe that in the resurrection,
your people are going to rise. the dead. That's true. That's
good sound doctrine. I believe that too. But the Lord
said, I am the resurrection. We need to understand that too.
We need to know something beyond just knowing some doctrine. We
need to know a person. We need to know who is the resurrection
now, not just that there is one and what will happen when it
comes. You see what he's talking about there? Never trust just
events. No matter how wonderful they
are, things must happen. And they did. And I'm glad they
did. And I couldn't have been saved
if they hadn't happened. But salvation is a person. He is the resurrection. He is
our hope. He is our life. I don't trust
in the crucifixion. I pray. What I want to do is
trust Christ crucified. Can you see the difference there?
There is a difference. Many say the scriptures are my
hope. The Lord said to the Jews, you trust them in the scriptures. You search the scriptures for
in them you think you have life. But they are they which testify
of me. And you're not gonna have life till you come to me and
you won't come to me. You see the difference now? As precious and wonderful as
the word of God is, and he's not gonna save you apart from
his word. Faith cometh by hearing, and
hearing by the word of God. But don't trust the scriptures. Trust the one that the scriptures
teach. Don't trust in your baptism. Trust in the one who is pictured
by baptism. I hope that's clear. May the Lord Jesus Christ give
us faith in himself. People say that the gospel is
that Jesus died on a cross. was buried and rose again. I've
heard that actual answer given. What's the gospel? The death,
burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. That's not true. It's
just not true. The death, the burial, the resurrection
are not salvation. That's not the good news. In order for the good news to
be good news to you, you need to know who it is that died.
Who it is that went into that grave and came out. Who it is
that said, I have power. I have authority to lay my life
down and take it up again. And he said, by that authority,
I lay down my life as I please. By sovereign authority, I lay
it down. And I choose to lay it down for
my sheep. And because I do, they're not
ever going to perish. So talking about the musts, let's
remember this, who must? Christ must. And the reason he must is because
God loves me. He said I'm gonna have mercy
on old Chris. And so it became necessary for my savior to come
where I was and live for me, die for me, and live for me. Thank God. Let's pray together.