Well, those songs were good.
I have so many thoughts from between the songs and the scripture
reading. That was really good, Art. We do enter into rest, don't
we, in Christ. I was thinking about that, about... I do trust Him, and He's my only... He's my only rest, He's my only
hope. I've tried to be faithful to
Him, and I've tried to be faithful to you, to preach the gospel
to you faithfully, and to try to honor the Lord, but I can't
put any trust in that. I can't find any rest in anything
I've ever done. I've sinned, I've failed, but I trust Him. If I'm going
to perish, I'm going to perish trusting Him. I don't have any
other rest but Him. And I trust Him to keep me looking
to Him and keep me hedged about protect me, and defend me, and
feed me, and carry me. I just don't have any other hope
but Christ. Is that so with you? He is our rest. There is no other. I don't know what the Lord's doing.
I have no idea. I know what He's shown me about me,
about my awful sin and failure. But I don't know what the Lord's
doing. I can't do anything but just trust Him. That's all I
can do. Ask Him to deliver me in His
righteousness. That's all a believer can do.
He makes you see it more true sometimes than at other times. But just trust Him and wait on
Him and He's all our salvation. Every day, every hour, as well
as eternally, everything is from Him. Sometimes He has to powerfully
break our hearts and show us. We've been too full
of pride. We've... We hadn't trusted Him as we ought.
Been too self-justifying. And that's so good that He won't
leave you, that He will correct His child and teach His child. Sometimes, you know, we go through
this life and we get some confidence, I think, from our brethren and
what they think of us. Confidence in the faith, confidence
that we're the Lord. But that's a false confidence.
And the Lord will take that confidence from you too. And not only will the devil himself
whisper to you, you're not a child of God. He'll make others treat you that
way. You're not a child of God. And you start questioning yourself,
am I a child of God? Why does He bring you to that
place? If you're really a child of God, why would He bring you
to that place? To make you find confidence in
one place. If I'm not a child of God, then I did wrong in casting all
my care into His hand. If that's wrong, then I'm not
a child of God. If I'm going to perish trusting
Him, Never a child of God ever did
so. But He's going to make Him to be our only confidence. That's all I know. I just have
to trust Him. But I do believe the Lord's Word.
I do believe the Lord's going to keep His people. And I do
believe the Lord is going to bring good out of things that
we can't in any way see as good. Look at the cross. Look at the
cross. Those poor, dejected believers
on the road to Emmaus said, we thought this was the Christ.
You see what that did to them? They saw Him crucified and they
saw that and they didn't see how any good could come out of
that. And that was the very glory and salvation of His people. He'll bring good out of it. He's
ruling everything. He's going to bring good to His
people. Alright, let's go now to Luke
10 and verse 25. We see here, Behold, a certain
lawyer stood up and tempted the Lord, saying, Master, what shall
I do to inherit eternal life? This man was a lawyer. He studied
the law, the law given at Sinai, and he was one who tried to come
to God by his obedience, by his law keeping. And that's what
he was interested in. What, Master, what shall I do
to inherit eternal life? What can I do? What works can
I do to earn it, eternal life? And so the Lord asked him, the
Lord said, well, what does the law say? And I like how he said
this. He said, what's written in the
law, but then he said, how readest thou? What's written there, but
then he said, but how do you read it? What's your understanding
of it? And he answering said, thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor
as thyself. And he said unto him, thou hast
answered right. This do. Anybody here done this? This do, the Lord
said, and you shall live. This do and you shall live. Nobody,
no child of Adam has ever done this. Because if we did the law and
live, we would do it without Christ. We wouldn't need Christ.
He's the only one. He's the only one that did it.
And so this man, he said, but he willing to justify himself
said unto Jesus, and who is my neighbor? Why did he say that? He's a Jew. This lawyer is a
Jew. And the Jews hated Samaritans. They hated Samaritans. They even
taught, they had a doctrine of men that they taught where they
said, it's okay to hate a Samaritan. They hated them. Absolutely hated
them. And as soon as he said this to
the Lord, I'm sure this man thought his conscience was pricked, because
he knew he hated Samaritan. He knew he had not loved God
with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his soul,
and he hadn't loved every neighbor that way either. And so he's
trying to justify himself and he says, okay, well then who's
my neighbor? And I'm sure he's hoping the Lord's going to say,
everybody's your neighbor here in Israel. But those rotten Samaritans,
they're not your brethren. They're not your neighbor. That
way the man would feel justified. Well, I've done it then. I've
loved everybody. But the Lord gives a parable,
that's how he answers him, he gives a parable. And notice this
now, the Lord puts the lawyer in the ditch. The lawyer's asking,
who's my neighbor so I can go fulfill the law and love him
with all my heart, mind, and soul, and earn a righteousness
and earn eternal life by loving my neighbor? Who's my neighbor? And the Lord gives this parable. You know the scripture. The Lord
said, the reason he gave parables is it's given to you to know.
You that have, that he's given ears to hear. It's given to you
to know what these things mean. But to the world, it's not given.
And the Lord answered him in this parable, but the Lord puts
the lawyer in the ditch. Look at this. Jesus answering
said, a certain man went down from Jerusalem. That's where
the Jews were. That's where this lawyer was.
So he's putting this lawyer in the ditch. He went down from
Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves which stripped
him of his raiment and wounded him and departed leaving him
half dead. The Lord is showing this lawyer
that he's the one in need of somebody else fulfilling the
law for him. He needs somebody else to love
him and fulfill the law for him. That's what the Lord's showing
him here. Verse 31, and by chance, I like how the Lord said that,
by chance. You know, if the Lord's got somebody
in the ditch of depravity, it's not going to be by chance. It's
going to be that he sends the gospel to them. He's going to
find them. He said, there came down a certain priest that way,
and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. And likewise
a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him
and passed by the other side. This priest and this Levite represent
the law. This lawyer was trying to
come to God in the law. What can I do? What laws must
I keep that I can have eternal life? And the Lord shows him
the law can't give you eternal life. The law can't help you
out of the ditch. Luke 10.33, but a certain Samaritan. Now look at this. This is one
that you hated. This is one this lawyer would
have hated. Hated this man. As he journeyed, he came where
he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion on him. And
he went to him and baled up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine,
and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn and
took care of him. And on the morrow, when he departed, he
took out two pets and gave them to the host and said unto him,
take care of him, and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come
again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three thinkest
thou was neighbor unto him that fell among the thieves? And he
said, he that showed mercy on him. And said Jesus unto him, go and
do thou likewise. The Lord made the lawyer to be
the one who needed another to save him. He made the lawyer
to be the one wounded and dead in the ditch that needed somebody
else to come to save him. and he made one that the lawyer
hated, a Samaritan, to be the one who was neighbor to him and
came and helped him and saved him. The good Samaritan is Christ. Christ is the good Samaritan.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the good Samaritan. That's the the
heading up here at the top that the writers put in, the Good
Samaritan. Remember, our Lord said, there's none good but God.
Christ is the Good Samaritan. And He's the one who we hated
by nature. We didn't want to come to God
by Him by nature. We wanted to come by the law,
by our doing. We wanted to do so that we could
obtain eternal life. But he's the one who loved God
and loved his people as himself. That's the fulfillment of the
law. He loved God and his people as himself. And how did he do
it? By coming to where we are and saving us out of the ditch
of depravity. That's the love of the law. That's
the righteousness of the law. That's what Christ did for us,
his people. So let's look at the Good Samaritan. First of all, this man who fell
fell in the ditch pictures every child of Adam dead in our sin. It says verse 30, Jesus said,
a certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell
among thieves which stripped him of his raiment and wounded
him and departed leaving him half dead. That's what we did. We went down. We went down. When Adam sinned against God
in the garden, he went down and we went down in him. We fell. We went down from being blessed
of God to being cursed of God. We went down from having peace
with God to being under the condemnation of God. We went down from communion
with God to separation from God. We went down from having a mind
that loved God to having a carnal mind of enmity that hated God. We went down. And we fell among
thieves. The devil entered the garden
and robbed all humanity when he robbed Adam. He robbed us,
he wounded us, and he departed leaving us half dead. Sin robbed
us of the image of God. Christ, the Lord, the triune
God in Christ made us in the image of God, made Adam in the
image of God. And the devil robbed us of that. Sin robbed us of that. Robbed
us of that image. So we come into this world, we
don't know God, we can't know God, we got a defiled imagination
of who God is. And the God that we think is
the end all, be all is us. That we're the one who has to
do and save. What must I do to have eternal
life? Sin left us naked in sin. It robbed us of all our garments
and left us naked in sin, just like this man was naked. It stripped us. We're guilty
before God. We have no covering before God. In Adam, we died spiritually
and trespasses and in sins. When we died, we died, the Lord
said, the day you eat of this tree and dying, you shall die. We ate of that tree. You did.
I did. We were in that garden. We were
in Adam. We ate of that tree. And when we did, we died. We
became guilty before God, cut off under the curse and condemnation
of the law. Everybody in Adam did. The whole world. And not only
that, we're born defiled and depraved, bound to our sin nature. so that nobody can be saved by
their will. Their will is in bondage to their
sin nature. We will not bow to God's word by nature. We will
not look at this word and say, yes, Lord, I'm a sinner, depraved,
helpless, can do nothing to save myself. We won't say that by
nature. We won't confess that by nature.
We'll argue against God. And if he leaves us to ourselves,
the Lord Jesus said, in the day of judgment, men will still try
to argue with God, didn't we do many wonderful works? And
God will say, depart from me, I never knew you. That's the will that's in a man
by nature, a will to reject God's way, a will to reject God's salvation,
a will to reject Christ, because we want to do to be saved. Now make no mistake, the doctrine
of man's free will is a lie. That's a lie. Do you trust your
will? You're trusting the weakest thing
a man's got. We can't be saved by our will
or our works. We're wounded like this man.
From the sole of the foot to the head, there's no soundness
in it, but bruises and wounds and bruises and putrefying sores
has not been closed up, bound up, or mollified with ointment.
We're the man in the ditch. It's not only those who And the
reason half-dead pictures us is because we're physically alive
while we're spiritually dead in trespassing and sin. But here's
the thing, as long as a man's physically alive, there's hope
that Christ might come to him and save him out of the ditch.
That's what I pray he does for some of our family and friends. The lawyer asked who his neighbor
was because he's wanting to fulfill the law by loving them. That's
what he's wanting to do. And so the Lord puts this self-righteous
lawyer in a ditch. This lawyer heard this. He knows
he's the one that's, he's there at Jerusalem. He knows he's a
Jew. He's the one pictured in this. There he is in the ditch,
robbed, wounded, naked, left for dead. Why? Why did the Lord
put him there? Because before a man's gonna
need a savior, he's got to be made to know he is absolutely,
totally, thoroughly ruined in the ditch of depravity and he
can't save himself. Do you know that about yourself?
You can't save yourself before we're gonna love THE good Samaritan. We got to be brought to see that
it was God who first loved us. We didn't love him. We can't
boast that we love God and our love's the righteous fulfillment
of the law so God ought to receive us because we gave him our heart
and we gave him our will and we love God. We didn't love God. That means we're guilty before
the law. God sent His love and affection
on a chosen people and sent His Son. That's how He manifests
His love. He sent the Good Samaritan to
save His people. We have nothing to offer God.
We're robbed. We're robbed. We're naked. We're left half dead. We have
nothing to offer God. Now, until we're brought there,
we're not even a candidate for mercy. We got to be brought to
that place to see it and confess it and own it. I don't. You know
why we get upset with people? I'm going to tell you why we
get upset with people. Because we're so self-righteous, we think
we deserve to be treated better. That's the end of it right there.
I deserve better. No, we don't deserve anything.
We don't. We were naked, dead, robbed,
wounded, dying. just in the ditch of depravity,
and we'd have stayed there if God hadn't saved us. Now here
secondly, the Lord declares that the law cannot save us, it won't
even lend us a hand. Verse 31, By chance there came
down a certain priest that way, and when he saw him, he passed
by on the other side. Man, the priest didn't have a
heart, did he? He sees a man dying in a ditch
and goes around the other way? Likewise, the Levite, when he
was at the place, came and looked on him, passed by the other side.
The priest and the Levite represent the whole law of God. The priest
and the Levite represent the whole law of God, the moral and
the ceremonial and the civil law. They represent all who teach
that salvation is some way dependent upon a sinner's work, or worth,
or will. Everybody teaches that is this
priest and this Levite. This priest and Levite represents
the law. It represents coming to God by
works is what it represents. They both saw the man in the
ditch. The law sees us in our ruined depraved condition. The
law of God looks upon us in our ruined, depraved condition, but
the law offers no help. The law will not help us out
of the dead. It won't heal our wounds. You
can't heal your wounds by your works. It won't help us. It just
won't help us. The moral law leaves us right
where it found us. We were guilty when God gave
the moral law. It leaves us right there. Unless
God works in us, we're guilty, we're dead, we're unable to save
ourselves. Romans 8, and look at Romans
8 and look at verse 3. I want you to see this. Now,
look at this. Romans 8 verse 3. What the law
could not do. See that? What the law could
not do. in that it was weak through the flesh. Don't get it wrong.
The law is not weak. The law is holy, just, and good.
There is nothing wrong with the law. The law is of God. The law
does just what it was sent to do. But the law, we are weak. We are the sinner. We are the
one wounded and ruined. We can't save ourselves by the
works of the law. That is what this lawyer wanted
to know. What can I do that I can save myself? And the Lord is
teaching him, the law can't help you. You're in the ditch, wounded
and dying and the law is going to pass you by. It can't offer
you any assistance because you're weak. You can't fulfill it. And
so God sent his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and
for sin, condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness
of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the
flesh but after the spirit, that is, who believe on Christ. He
established the law and through faith in Him what He did is made
ours. We establish the law through
faith in Him. He did it. That's what I'm saying.
He did it. The ceremonial law couldn't offer
us any help. The ceremonial law could show
us a shadow of who could help us out of the ditch, but the
ceremonial law couldn't help us out of the ditch. You can
offer all the sacrifices you want to offer. It's not going
to save us. The law has a shadow of good things to come. It pictures
the good thing to come. It pictures the good Samaritan.
But it's not the very image of the things that can never with
those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make
the comers thereunto perfect. The priest and the Levite not
only represent the law, they represent all who preach morality
and law keeping and works and giving the sinner some idea,
some imagination that he can do something or contribute something
to his work. That's who's represented here.
Most take this very parable And they use it to teach sinners
to love their neighbor. That's what they use it for.
That's what they use it for. And they never preach Christ
and declare Christ and declare the sinner ruined and show how
Christ is the good Samaritan. And so people get up and walk
out and determine for a little while, I'm gonna love my neighbor
like that. But thankfully, they never see
anybody wounded and laying in a ditch, so they don't really
have to do much. It's ironic that men take a parable
that's given to show us Christ, and they preach just the opposite
of what Christ is teaching in this. They preach that it's by
your loving and you doing that you're going to be saved. Well, the Lord said, do it and
you'll live. Do it and you'll live. But understand,
loving God with everything you are means you can't have one
slight thought that's not a perfect love to God. And you can't have
one slight thought that's not a perfect love to everybody you
come in contact with. Even the man that is spitting
in your face and railing on you and running down you and everybody
you know. We've got to love him perfectly. We can't do that, can we? Well,
let's see who can. In the Good Samaritan we behold
the Lord Jesus Christ who alone saves His people from our sin.
Verse 33, But a certain Samaritan as he journeyed came where he
was, and when he saw him, He had compassion on him. The Lord
Jesus Christ is the only one who loved God and his neighbor
with perfection. He loved God and his neighbor
with perfection. He is the love that fulfills
the righteousness of the law. He is the Lord, our righteousness. Christ's love for God and his
people's manifest in this. He journeyed to where we are.
He came to where we are. He came down to this hell hole
we live in from heaven's glory. And we won't even drive across
town. The Son of God came down from
glory to this sin, cursed, stinking earth. He took flesh like His
brethren. He was made under the law like
his brethren. He went about fulfilling everything
for us. You imagine if you had a brother
who's sick and you go and say, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'm
going to go to work for you tomorrow and I'm going to work at your
job for you. You'll get all the payment. I'm just going to go
do all the work for you because you're sick so you don't get
in trouble with your boss. And I'm going to come home and
I'm going to cook all your meals for you. And I'm going to clean
your house for you. And I'm going to tuck you in
and make sure you get a good night's rest. I'm going to stand
by the door and make sure nobody disturbs you. And tomorrow I'm
going to do the same thing again." We still wouldn't have done what
Christ did for us. Have we loved our neighbor? Can
we come to God boasting in some love in us that we've loved so
God ought to receive us? Christ is the only one. He saw
us ruined in the ditch, and He had compassion on His people.
He loved His people. He loved us ere we knew Him.
In the eternal covenant of grace, He loved us. Throughout the whole
time state of this world, He had His heart set on His people.
When we sinned in our rebellion, and we walked shaking our fist
at God, and hating God, and cussing God, and blaspheming God, and
taking everything He gave us and using it for ourselves, He
loved His people perfectly. And He manifests His love when
He comes to His child personally in the ditch. He comes to you
personally in the ditch of depravity in this state. And He comes to
you. And He binds up your wounds. He pours in oil and He pours
in wine. He comes to you in the season
of His love. This is true love. This is how
love manifests. He came down. He went about and
fulfilled everything for us. And He comes to us in love where
we are. And He pours in the gospel and
He gives us the Holy Spirit and He binds up our wounds in regeneration. He pours in the oil of the Spirit
and He cleanses us with the wine of His blood so He purges our
inward conscience so that we can actually hear Him declare
the good news to us. We can't even hear this word
and obey Him and bow and serve Him and believe on Him and serve
Him until He had come and cleaned our conscience to make us do
it. And He don't ever stop doing that. Because we're constantly
picking up defilement. We're constantly listening to
things we shouldn't be listening to and being turned where we
shouldn't be turned. And He has to constantly come
and get you out of the ditch. And when He does this, He takes
His garment of righteousness, He brings you to see Him, and
believe Him, and trust Him, and He takes His own garment of righteousness,
and He covers your nakedness in it. And look at verse 34,
And He set Him on His own beast, and He brought Him to an end,
and He took care of Him. In everlasting love, thy Lord
Jesus Christ has set us on the gospel. What do you do when you
set on a... This was a donkey or a horse
or whatever, but it was his own beast. When you sit on it, you
don't do anything. You rest. He set this wounded
man on his own beast and he leads this beast and he's carrying
this man to the end. He's given us the gospel where
we hear our rest constantly declared and this is how we're brought
back into rest, week in and week out, day in and day out, and
how he keeps us resting in him. and he brought him to the inn.
That's where he's brought us. We're at the inn right now. This
is the inn. This is the Lord's inn right
here where he brought us to hear this gospel preached and hear
him continually. The house of the Lord. And verse
35, and when he departed, he took out two pence and he gave
them to the host and he said to him, take care of him. Use
these two pence, take care of him. Whatsoever thou spendest
more when I come again, I'll repay thee. You know, do you
remember when we looked at the price of redemption in the law
and it said a half shekel of the sanctuary, the people had
to pay a half shekel of the sanctuary and then they took that silver
of the half shekel, perfect amount, they melted it down and they
made the floor of the tabernacle with that. You know what a half
shekel was? Two pence. You know what it is
that is taking care of us constantly? That picture, redemption accomplished. or to put us in mind of the one
message we hear that takes care of everything for us. Is this
not so? Is this not the balm of Gilead?
When you hear how that Christ paid the full price to redeem
you from the curse of the law so that you can never perish,
nobody can ever charge you again with sin, and they might, self-righteous
folks might, God won't. And as long as God don't, I'm
good. How about you? If God doesn't
charge me, I'm good with that. Let others say what they will.
My God doesn't charge me. And help me, Lord. Help me, Lord,
to not, you know, correct my brother, yes. Help my brethren,
yes. Make them know that that's not
right, yes. But don't charge them and condemn them, because
God don't. That's how we're taken care of.
That's how we're provided for. And he says, and whatever you
spend more, when I come again I'll repay it. He did this to
the host at the end. He's provided pastors who preached
this gospel of the redemption accomplished of Christ, and he
tells his messenger, whatever you have to spend, whatever it
costs you to take care of this one I've brought under your care,
whatever it costs you, you're not gonna be a debtor to me.
You're not gonna be a debtor to me. What have you given for
Christ? You're not gonna be a debtor
to him. I can promise you that. Whatever we sacrifice to provide
for our brethren and make sure they have the gospel, I can assure
you this, the Lord is not, you're not going to be a debtor. He's
not going to owe you. He's going to make sure you're
paid in full. He's the one who's providing
everything you need to pay whatever cost necessary to take care of
those he's put under our care. Do you see Christ's perfect love
toward God and his people in the Samaritan? I realized the
Lord Jesus was not a Samaritan. He was a Jew. He was the son
of Abraham. But what did the self-righteous Pharisees call
him? Do you remember? You remember what the self-righteous
Pharisees called him? They answered, the Jews answered and said unto
him, say we not well thou art a Samaritan and have a devil?
That's what they said to Christ. You're a Samaritan. You got a
devil. They hated the Lord Jesus. They
hated the Lord Jesus. And that was you and that was
me before He came and saved us. The Lord makes this one in the
ditch a Jew to show us that our carnal mind, and that Samaritan
comes to save him to remind us that our carnal mind was enmity
against Him. You were sometime alienated at
enemies in your minds by wicked work, yet now has He reconciled
in the body of His flesh through death to present you holy, unblameable,
unreprovable in His sight. When we were without strength,
when we were in the ditch, in due time Christ died for the
ungodly. Much more than being now justified
by His blood, we'll be saved from wrath through Him. Brethren,
now, the Samaritan said he'd be back for this man. He
said, if I'm coming back for him, brethren, Christ told us. He said, if I go prepare a place
for you, I'll come again and I'll receive it to myself that
where I am, there you may be also. He's coming again. We're going to see him face to
face, Art. Can't you just, I just picture Brother Henry and Brother
Don seeing him face to face. It just makes me happy. We're
gonna see him face to face. Now let's hear the Lord's application,
verse 36. He said, which now of these three
thinkest thou was neighbor to him that fell among the thieves?
And he said, he that showed mercy on him. Who was neighbor to us
that had fallen? We fail, who's neighbor to us?
Was it the law that was a neighbor to you or was it the Lord Jesus
Christ? Was it you and your works and all that or was it the Lord
Jesus? Let's test it like this. We always
think of ourselves as what we've done. Do you know of anybody
that you've ever encountered in this world that you could
say, that person was such a neighbor to me? that He's perfectly righteous
and holy and God ought to receive Him. You ever met one? Never. And I had never been that neighbor
to anybody either. But Christ was that neighbor
to me. And Christ was that neighbor to you if you know Him. Now,
if you know this, if the Lord has found you and He's bound
up your wounds, And He's covered your nakedness and He put you
on His beast and brought you to His end, provided you with
the redemption price that you hear constantly preached. And
He's done this for you and saved you. Then our Lord says, just
like I've shown you mercy, just like I've shown you mercy, now
you go and you do likewise. That's different. He told that
lawyer, you do this law and you'll live. And then he said, now here's
what I do for my people. I come and make them live. I
come and do all this for them. And then from the heart of love
I've given them, making them see what great love I've loved
them with, I tell them now, now you have life. You're saved. I've saved you by mercy. Now
you go love the way I've loved you. You go have mercy on brethren,
your brethren. Not for life, because you do
have life. Not to mend your wounds, because
I mended your wounds. You get that? That's when we're
brought to the place where we start. We believe him. We don't look anywhere else but
him, and our motive now is if I could just show a little bit
of the mercy that he's shown to me, if I could just show a
little of the love that he's shown to me, I don't dare imagine
that I've loved anywhere near like he has. I trust him. He's
the one that loved perfectly. But by His constraint of my heart,
I want to love like He loved. I want to serve. I want to honor.
I want to be somebody that our Lord one day will say, well done,
my good and faithful servant. I know that's going to be in
Christ and because of Christ. But by that love, don't it make
you want to serve Him? Don't it make you want to love
your brethren and be merciful? I pray He'll bless that. Amen.