Well, welcome to our continuing
Bible study in Luke, and we're in the ninth chapter today, so
if you join me in Luke chapter nine this morning. Last week we were concerned with ending in verse 22, Previously Christ had been talking
with his disciples and he asked them some questions after he
healed a bunch of folks and they fed him with the loaves and fishes
and he asked the disciples, whom say the people that I am? And they all answered, oh, that's
easy, John the Baptist or some prophet or, something like that. And then
he said, well, whom say ye that I am? And Peter answered for
them and said, thou art the Christ of God. And so that brings us
up to where we are today. And we'll read there from verse
20 through verse 26. And he said unto them, but whom
say ye that I am? And Peter answering said, the
Christ of God. And he straightly charged them
and commanded them to tell no man that thing. It wasn't his
time yet, and he didn't want that, it was to take place before
their appointed time. and saying, the Son of Man must
suffer many things and be rejected of the elders and the chief priests
and must be slain and must be raised the third day. And that
was our lesson last week, those four musts of Christ. He must
do them. He must accomplish those things. Those must happen to Him. And
He said to them all in verse 23, if any man will come after me, let him deny
himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whosoever
will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever will lose his
life for my sake, the same shall save it. For what is a man advantage
if he gain the whole world and lose himself or be cast away?
For whosoever shall be ashamed of me, in my words, of him shall
the son of man be ashamed when he shall come into his own glory
and in his father's and of the holy angels. And then he mentions,
I tell you a truth, some of you will not taste of death until
they see the kingdom. And we'll save that for the next
session. But I just think it's so important
that we keep in context the overview of what's been going, teaching
the disciples, he's been instructing the disciples And he doesn't
ask them questions just because he's curious, or there's always
a deeper spiritual context in what he's trying to bring to
them. Whom say ye that I am? And when they said, you're the
Christ of God, then he says, okay, if any man will come after me,
if any man will follow me, let him deny himself. and take up
his cross daily and follow me. So I think it would be important
if we have a little background here on a couple things because
what he says is so important and it's been so misapplied through
time. we should be austere and give
up all everything and live this life of austerity and suffer
all the time and be dour. But it's not really what it's
talking about here. And we're going to use an example
from John here to kind of give an example of an application
where he brings this out. But in context, we must remember
those four musts of Christ. he must be rejected, he must
be slain, and he must be raised the third day. And so as we look
at the background here, we also have to keep in mind the
eternal perspective of things. And so often, because we live
in this, what we view as time, we get caught up in the here
and the now, and we don't, We don't think of the eternal aspect
of things, but Christ always sees things in that view, in
the I am view. And he's always bringing things
from that view. And so as we look at a couple
of things from the background here, what would have been the
likely outcome, the physical outcome of being a follower of
Christ at that time? He said, whom say you I am? And
they said, well, you're the Christ, the Christ of God. He says, well,
if you say that out loud, what's gonna happen? He says, I must
suffer many things and be rejected. And he tells them in other places,
well, they hated me before they hated you. And if they hate me,
they're gonna hate you. So you need to kind of be prepared
for that You need to have your, remember back to our total reliance
for all things. Don't take any script, don't
take any extra code, don't rely on me for everything. And we
apply that here as well. So the physical outcomes of being
a believer, of saying out loud that thou art the Christ of God,
the sent one, the one that came to accomplish those four must
because of sin and the fall, If you believe that and say it
out loud, you're going to be going directly against the religious
folks of the day. I remember when I was teaching
a Bible class up in Alaska and I found this really great book
called The Attributes of God, or The Sovereignty of God, I
guess it was Sovereignty of God by Arthur Pink. I showed it to this friend of
mine. He says, I love that book. That is a great book. He says,
but if you read that book and you believe one thing that's
in it, you're going to be going in exact contradiction to this
church. So be prepared. I'm not telling
you not to read it, he said, but be aware of the consequences
of reading anything in there and believing that God is actually
sovereign. And I said, okay, but I had already
read part of it, so it couldn't undo that. Hallelujah there. So what would
have been the physical outcome of being a follower of Christ
at that time and for that time, for that matter, any time? Let's turn over to John chapter
nine, And there's a narrative there that I'm sure you're all
familiar with. And the situation you find there
in John chapter nine is this man that was born blind from
birth. And there are just so many valuable
things in that block of scripture there. And they're applicable to what
we find here in Luke. This man was blind from birth,
and Jesus restored his sight, just as he said he would do in
Luke chapter 4, where he said he read that scroll of Isaiah. He said, I've come to give sight
to the blind, hearing to the deaf, to heal the lame, to preach
the gospel to the poor, and all those things that he'd mentioned
there that he read in Luke chapter 4, verse 18. He said, He has
sent me. And that's what the Christ is,
the sent one, the anointed one. He has sent me to do things. So as we look over in John chapter
9, as Jesus passed by in verse 1 there, He saw a man which was
blind from his birth. And here is the natural man kicks
in. that we always apply this kind
of thinking to stuff. Something bad happens to somebody
while they're being punished from God because of whatever
they did. And his disciples asked him,
saying, Master, who did sin? This man or his parents said
he was born blind. They must have done something
really awful. And Jesus answered, neither hath
this man sin, nor his parents. Not that they weren't sinners,
but they hadn't There was no particular sin for which they
were being judged that resulted in his being born blind. That
was just a function of the fall. Neither this man of sin nor his
parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in
him. He had been determined from all
eternity to this one point where he would intersect with Christ
and this situation would develop where he would receive his sight,
and then the aftermath that we're gonna read about. In verse four,
I must work the works of him that sent me, while in his day
the night cometh, when no man can work, long as I'm in the
world, I am the light of the world. And when he had thus spoken,
he spat on the grave, and he anointed the eyes of the blind
man with the clay, and said unto him, go wash in the pool of Siloam,
which is by interpretation sent. And he went his way therefore
and washed and came seeing. So the Lord had applied this
to him and gave him instruction and he did that and his sight
was restored. The neighbors therefore, and
they which therefore had seen him that was blind, said, is
not this he that sat and begged? Some said, well, this is he.
And others said, well, he's like him. But he said, I am he. I am that blind guy that just
sat at the gate and begged because I couldn't see and I couldn't
do anything. And he answered, or therefore they said unto him,
how are thine eyes open? How are thine eyes open? Boy,
we think back to Luke 4.18. He is sent to open blind eyes. He answered and said, a man that
is called Jesus made clay and he anointed my eyes and said
unto me, go to the pool of Siloam and wash. And I went and washed
and I received sight. Just kind of remind you of that,
the name in the leper. Go dip yourselves seven times
in the Jordan. Then said they unto him, Where is he? Where's Jesus, this
one that gave you the sight? And he said, I know not. They
brought to the Pharisees him aforetime that was blind. So they took him to be examined
by the religious folks because the miracle had been worked in
him. And this is where we start to see the part where we have
application in Luke chapter nine here and in our own lives. They
took him to the Pharisees and it was the Sabbath day when Jesus
made the clay and opened his eyes. So another crime there. Then again, the Pharisees also
asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them,
he put clay upon my eyes and I washed and do see. Therefore
said some of the Pharisees, this man is not of God because he
keepeth not the Sabbath day. Others said, how can a man that
is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division amongst
them. And they say unto the blind man
again, what sayest thou of him that he hath opened thine eyes? And he said, he is a prophet.
But the Jews did not believe concerning him that he had been
blind and received his sight until they called the parents
of him that had received his sight. They are going for the
dirt. They care not that a miracle
was worked in this guy, and that a great miracle was done, and
he was blind. Now he can see. They're trying
to uncover some element of ne'er-do-wellism. It's just awful. So they called
the parents of him that had received his sight, and they asked him,
saying, is this your son? Well, they knew he was their
son already because they went and got his parents. It's kind
of the department of redundancy department. Who, is this your
son who you say was born blind? How then doth he now see? And his parents answered them
and said, we know that this is our son and he was born blind,
but by what means he now seeth, we know not. Or who hath opened
his eyes, we know not. He's of age, ask him. He shall
speak for himself. They were... They did not want
to get involved in this because it was going to have a bad outcome
for them. These words spake his parents
because they feared the Jews. They feared the religious. They
didn't want to be ostracized. They didn't want to, boy, you
know, if you believe sovereign grace, you're a kook. You're
a nut. And, you know, mainstream religion does not go for that.
So we have that aspect of it. They feared the Jews, for the
Jews had agreed already that if any man did confess that he
was the Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. Whom
say ye that I am? Thou art the Christ of God. Get
ready for a consequence. Mainstream religion is not going
to appreciate that. Therefore, said his parents,
he's of age, ask him. Therefore, then again they called
the man that was blind and said unto him, give God the praise.
We know that this man is a sinner. And he answered, they were talking
about Jesus, because he did this on the Sabbath day. You should
give God the praise, not this Jesus guy that we don't like.
And he answered and said, whether he be a sinner or no, I don't
know. I know not. But one thing I know,
that whereas I was blind, now I see. He couldn't unknow that. A work of grace had been worked
in him. And like anyone that has a work of grace in them and
understands it as grace, they can't unknow that. They can't
go back. And they said unto him again,
what did he to thee? How opened he thine eyes? They
wanted some physical kind of application there that they could
identify with. And he answered them, says, I
told you already. And you didn't hear. That's the
same thing Jesus always says. Tell us plainly if thou be in
Christ. He says, I told you already, and you don't believe. You can't
believe. It's just impossible. I told
you already and you did not hear. Wherefore would you hear it again?
I'm just gonna tell you the same thing again. Will you also be
his disciples? Well, they got mad about that. This blind beggar guy giving
them a lecture. They reviled him and said, thou
art his disciple, but we are Moses' disciple. We know that God spake unto Moses,
as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is. And the man
answered and said unto them, Why, herein is a marvelous thing, a marvelous thing, that you know
not from whence he is, and yet he hath opened my eyes. You don't
know that he is the Lord God Almighty? You don't know from
whence he is? You have no clue? Now we know that God heareth
not sinners, but if any man be a worshipper
of God and doeth his will, him he hereth. Since the world began,
was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was
born blind? If this man were not of God,
he could do nothing. And they answered and said unto him, Thou
was altogether born in sins." They said the same thing the
disciples said. If you were born blind, you must have done something
really awful. Thou was altogether born in sins,
and you're going to teach us? And they cast him out. And remember
from our lessons in Peter, casting out of the synagogue was more
than just a casting out of... You can't come to church anymore.
You were cast out of the synagogue. You were cast out from society.
You were cast out from commerce. No one would have anything to
do with you. And he was already kind of in the unskilled labor
pool. He was a beggar. How much further down could he
go? So it was just going to be bad.
They cast him out. And of course, Jesus talks to
him then, and says, does thou believe on the Son of God? And
he says, well, who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him?
And he says, thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh
with you. And then he said, Lord. Calls
him Lord. I believe. And he worshiped him.
So, when we look at this application of Really, it's just religious
extortion. If you believe that Christ, He's
the Christ of God, you're out. You're out of religion, you're
out of commerce, you're out of favor, you're out of society.
If any man follow me, and truly follows Him, if you
truly believe in sovereign grace, you're not going to be popular.
It's not the popular thing. So the disciples were kind of
faced with certain ostracism if they followed Christ and confessed
Him as Lord and Christ. And we know that they ran into
that later on because the night that He was taken, they all abandoned,
they all threw Him under the bus and said, hey, we don't even
know Him. the flesh part of us. Thank God He looks at the spiritual
part, the new man, that he is reborn. And He says, I'm not
going to hold this against you guys, but every one of you is
going to turn on Me before the night is over. So, He tells them here back in
Luke chapter 9, If you agree that I'm the Christ,
if you believe with all your heart that I'm the Christ of
God, then if you come after me, you need
to do like that blind guy did. He said, well, how were you made
whole? He says, well, I didn't do it.
I don't know how it happened. I know not why God's wondrous
grace to me he hath made known, but I know one thing. I know
whom I have believed. He denied himself, I had nothing
to do with it. I did not do, I was a blind figure. Could not see. So, banned from society, rejected
by his parents for fear of the Jews. Even your family is kind
of against you sometimes when you believe in in sovereign grace. Being cast out, maybe being killed. Remember Paul was on his way
to Damascus to arrest people that believed that he was the
Christ. You know what? He couldn't deny
what had taken place. In having experienced free grace,
He couldn't unbelieve it. Once you've had grace revealed
to you, you can't unknow it. And everything makes sense to
you then that maybe perhaps didn't really make sense before. And
people have so much problems with their lives because they're
up and down. One minute they think they're
saved, and the next minute they think they're not. And it's all
hinged upon what they themselves have done. And like this man
that was blind, he said, I couldn't do anything to get my sight back.
I wished a lot. I wished I could see. It didn't happen until the Lord
came to him. And he said he had nothing to
do with it, but whereas once I was blind, now I see. If you look down here below,
you'll find those words etched on that famous hymn by John Newton. I once was lost, but now I'm
found. Somebody found me. I was blind,
but now I see. And boy, when the Lord lets you
see, things open up. You see things. He said, well,
here's a marvelous thing. I see a lot of stuff now, not
just physically with my eyes, but I see a lot of things now.
And you have had sight all your life, and you don't see it. The second thing I wanted to
look at here real quickly is this cross. You should deny yourself and
take up your cross and follow me. And you know there's been
tons of religious stuff that's orders of religious folks that
cloister themselves off and live a life of austerity and self-punishment. trying to, they
try to add, they try to pay for their own righteousness by self-denial
and by suffering, creating a situation where they suffer. I need to
suffer. And religion kind of tries to
get you to do that because they say, well, first thing that has
to happen is you hear the gospel, then you need to suffer. When you've suffered enough,
and then you get on your hands and knees and grovel and beg
enough, then the Lord will come and have mercy on you. The way
that it really is, is those things occur because the Lord has already
taken care of it. And He's opened your eyes, and
you just see what condition you were in. And then you find out,
He says, you're saved because He saved you. Go and have some
faith, total reliance on him. So the next thing he says, take
up your cross. Take up your cross. Well, what
does that mean? Well, the cross wasn't really
a new thing then. The cross had been around for
centuries and centuries. And I copied a thing from the
History and Pathology of Crucifixion by PubMed, which is a, medical
site on the internet and it says the cross probably originated
with the Assyrians and the Babylonians and it was used systematically
by the Persians in the 6th century BC and Alexander the Great brought
it from there to the eastern Mediterranean countries around
the 4th century BC and then the Phoenicians introduced it to
Rome about 300 BC. So I've been around a long time
so Many people just say cross Christ and they don't really
think of it in terms of being a method of execution for hundreds
and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years in a particularly
miserable form of execution. It wasn't quick, it wasn't swift
like if they chopped off your head or hanged you or something
like that. It took hours and sometimes days
for that to kill you. So first off, it's important
that we remember that the cross is an instrument of execution. It's a terrible means of killing
somebody who is condemned to death. I was telling Norm this
morning, if you wear a cross on your neck or on your arm or
wherever, it should say on the front of it, there's no condemnation
to them that are in Christ. That ought to be the meaning
that we attach to that, that He took care of that for us. It was the means by which God
before determined to effect the punishment carried out upon His
Son in the place of the guilty who deserved condemnation, but
instead they received mercy because of eternal love and sovereign
grace. So if you have a cross that That
ought to be what you think about when you, not just a, it's just
a, I'm a Christian, I have a cross. And that's supposed to identify
you, but it only identifies you if you think about it in the
right context. Otherwise, it's just another
hunk of jewelry. In Isaiah the 53rd chapter it
says, Surely he hath borne our griefs, he hath carried our sorrows,
yet we did esteem him stricken. He was smitten of God and afflicted. I added this he's in there just
to emphasize that it was the Lord that was inflicted on. He was wounded for our transgression. He was bruised for our iniquities
and the chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes
we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray
and we've turned everyone to his own way and the Lord hath
laid on him the iniquity of us all. So what does it mean? for the church, for those who
by grace follow Christ to deny their selves and take up our
cross. Of course, many through time have taken this to mean
that we should abandon all ties to the world and enter into this
austere existence that we talked about and somehow contribute
to righteousness, which God demands by efforts at this self-denial
and self-imposed suffering. And we've already seen the example
in John chapter nine that denying oneself simply means we believe
we're saved by grace through faith and that, not of ourselves.
It's a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. And
secondarily, there's the context of those in whom the Spirit of
God is working to beware of this extortion by the world, by religion. You say he's the Christ, if you
believe sovereign grace, then you're gonna be cast out. just
as this blind man and his family were threatened with being cast
out, banned from society, banned from commerce. The spirit of
grace working in God's elect overcomes this, and they are
made to know that. And here we're talking about
this eternal perspective now, that Jesus is always looking
at things in the I am way, the eternal perspective. And we're
thinking, oh man, what's gonna happen? They're made to know that whatever
befalls us here in this world has no eternal consequence. And
we have to always remember that because we get caught up in the
here and now too much. We're strangers and pilgrims
in this world. Hebrews 11, 13 gives us that view of things. These all died in the faith,
not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off
and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed
that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they
that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they
came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
But now they desire a better country, that is a heavenly. Wherefore, God is not ashamed
to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city.
So as we have that view, we have that perspective, taking up our
cross, and it's a constant reminder that our substitute, the Lord
Jesus Christ, came down with us, became obedient to death,
even the death of the cross, for those whom he loved eternally,
and for those whom the Father gave him in the covenant of grace. You can read about that in John
17. Taking up our cross then is a
constant reminder that we have no power of self to overcome
sin. And as it was brought out in
a message here not too long ago, as Moses lifted up that serpent
in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up on that
cross. and that cross that represented
by that brazen serpent that was lifted up by Moses. We also must
constantly look up to our Savior lifted up in our stead. And so
if we take up our cross, deny ourselves, deny our own righteousness,
deny our own ability to do anything on behalf of ourselves in salvation,
take up our cross, take up our recognition that Christ did that
for us. We have a few verses here in
our last few minutes that we have for our class today in conclusion
that Paul wrote about by the Holy Spirit's inspiration about
this. He was kind of the poster child
for not denying himself, I was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. I was this, and I was that, and
I profited, and I was zealous for God, and he did all these,
he checked all those religious boxes, and then he says, that
was all done. Turns out. What should we say then? Romans
chapter six, verse one. Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? God forbid, how shall we that
are dead to sin live any longer therein? Know ye not that so
many of us as were baptized unto Jesus were baptized unto his
death? Therefore, we are buried with
him by baptism unto death. It's a picture of what he did
for us. that like as Christ was raised
up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also
should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together
in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness
of his resurrection, knowing that our old man is crucified
with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth
we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed
from sin. Now, if we be dead with Christ,
we believe that we shall also live with him. Knowing that Christ,
being raised from the dead, dieth no more, death hath no more dominion
over him. For in that he died, he died
unto sin once, but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise,
reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but
alive unto God. through Christ our Lord. So taking
up your cross just means that we've been crucified with Him.
Our sins have been paid for by His death on the cross. And as
He died and was raised again, and we picture that in baptism.
We're getting raised in newness of life, the inner man, that
new man that He writes about. Not that we're physically free
from sin in this world, but spiritually, sin hath no
more dominion over us. I'm crucified with Christ. He
says, but nevertheless, I still live. You know what he always
said? You know, he says, to will is
present with me. He had this problem. To will is present with me. And
he said, that just frustrates me. Because he saw the spiritual
side of things, and then he saw that his flesh was always trying
to take him in this other physical direction. And he said that the
flesh and the spirit, they're always warring one against the
other. I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless
I live. Yet not I, but Christ liveth
in me. And the life which I now live
in the flesh, and this is something that people
get mixed up a lot too because they take one of these words
and misapply it here. He says, the life that I live
now in the flesh, I live by the faith of the son of God. The faith of him who loved me. the faith of him who gave himself
for me, not because I can do it all myself. That's the denying
yourself part. I live by the faith of Christ
who is faithful, who became obedient, humbled himself, came down, was
obedient under the death of the cross, that instrument of execution. I live by his faith. Because
if it was up to me, even now, every day I would fail. Every
day His mercies are new because we need them. Galatians
5, 22, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. Against
such there is no law. You know, I wish I could just
do those all day with no problems. I probably don't make five minutes
before I violate all of these. He says in verse 24, and they
that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections
and lusts, lest any man should boast. It's a gift of God. And we live in the spirit. If
we live in the spirit, let us also walk in the spirit. Let
us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another and envying
one another. And then our last verse will
be in Galatians chapter six, verse 14. God forbid that I should
glory. Because that's what the antithesis
of all this is. If we could do all that ourselves,
we would be boasting, we would be glorying, we would be pretty
proud of ourselves. We wouldn't need him. God forbid
that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
by whom the world is crucified, the world is executed unto me
and I unto the world. Spiritually, He said in John 17, they are
not of the world, as I am not of the world. So take up our
cross and follow Christ, denying ourselves and remembering him
who died for us in our place. Take up your cross. Next up,
we'll be talking about the transfiguration. Something pretty miraculous there. So until then, everyone be free.