Much better. Join me again in
Luke chapter 7. One thing that we've been trying
to point out is And we keep mentioning this I am view of things, how
God views things, and much of what we read in the scripture
depends on what our view of the Lord is. And the section that
we're going to look at today is no different. Today we're
going to begin in verse 16 and where we left off, where he had
entered the town of Nain and he came, by coincidence, not,
up to a funeral procession. He raised a young man from the
dead. We find out that this This very thing comes into play later
on here in the scripture, in this very book of Luke, in this
very chapter 7 that we're looking at. It was no accident. And we pointed that out in our
previous lesson there. And so today in verse 16, and
we're going to read down quite a bit through there to get the
context of this block of scripture here. In verse 16, after this
young man sat up and began to speak, there came a fear on all. I would imagine that was quite
a shock for people to be carrying a dead man one minute and the
next minute he sits up and starts speaking. We discussed a little
bit about what he perhaps might have said last time. There came a fear on all, and
they glorified God, saying, A great prophet is risen up among us,
and that God hath visited his people. And this rumor of him
went forth throughout all Judea and throughout all the region
round about." So it was a pretty notable happening and pretty
notable miracle had taken place, in addition to the other miracles
that he'd done up near the Sea of Galilee. He fed the 5,000
with the two loaves, or the five loaves and two fishes, and all
those things he did up there. Cast out demons, and healed the
lepers, and sick, and all that. So he was pretty famous. And
the disciples of John, The disciples of John were witness to some
of this, and they went to John and told him about these things. The disciples of John showed
him of all these things, and John, calling unto him two of
his disciples, sent them to Jesus, saying, Art thou he that should
come, or look we for another? When the men were come unto him,
they said, John Baptist hath sent us unto thee, saying, Art
thou he that should come, or look we for another? And that
same hour he cured many of their infirmities and plagues and evil
spirits and said unto many that were blind, and to many that
were blind he gave sight. And then Jesus answering said
unto them, Go your way and tell John what things you have seen
and heard, how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers
are cleansed, the deaf hear, The dead are raised, and to the
poor the gospel is preached. Blessed is he whosoever shall
not be offended in me. Remember when we studied previously
about that word offended, the technical word for that is the
tripping stick that engages a snare. And it's used in the context
of being entrapped. Remember he told the disciples
that you will all be offended at me. And they all, later on,
under what they thought was the threat of death, they said, oh,
we don't even know him. And so that's what the context
of that word offended. It didn't mean not only just
embarrassed or unhappy with. It's a word that
means to trap into apostasy. That's what the meaning of it
is. And when the messengers of John
were departed, he began to speak unto the people concerning John.
And he said, what went you out in the wilderness for to see,
a reed shaken with the wind? But what went you out for to
see, a man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, they which are gorgeously
appareled and live delicately are in kings' courts. But what
went ye out for? Is he a prophet? Yea, and I say
unto you, much more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written.
Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare
thy way before thee. For I say unto you, among those
that are born of women, there is not a greater prophet than
John the Baptist. But he that is least in the kingdom
of God is greater than he and all the people that heard him. And the publicans, they justified
God being baptized with the baptism of John, but the Pharisees and
lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves being
not baptized of him. And that's our section that we're,
I don't know, we'll get all the way through that today, but there's
a lot of interesting things in there, a lot of things that are
pertinent to the church, those that heard him. That's just so
true of the gospel. Those that heard, some heard,
they all heard the words, but some heard the gospel and others
just heard words. Some heard, some just heard it
thunder. So, some things that I'd like
us to consider in this block of scripture that John was in
prison at the time of this activity, and you can go over to Matthew
chapter 11 verse 2. It says, John being in prison
heard about all these miracles that
Christ did, and he sent unto him two disciples. So we can
reasonably say that he was locked up at this time. He was in prison. And it's just so interesting,
he says, he sent two of his disciples, and he says, when you get there,
say, are you he that we look for, who is to come? He didn't
say, get me out. If you're he, get me out. And
somewhere between chapter 3 of Luke verse 20 when we have the
recording of John being locked up in prison, and chapter 9 he's
beheaded by Herod. And we'll get into that in a
little bit here later. So he's in jail and he's never
getting out. And he doesn't say, get me out. He was just interested in the
Gospel. He was just interested in the Lord. And so, John's disciples
told John of all the things done by Christ in the region. And
the most recent, we just read about it just a minute ago, was
this raising of the dead of this young man from Nain. And Jesus
sends a reply back to John with the disciples while he was still
there performing. It says, while they were there,
He did a lot more miracles. He healed a lot more people.
He did a lot of things right in front of them that they would
be witness to. And gave sight to blind people. So he gives
an answer to him. He says, here's the message that
I want you to take back to John. And not that John didn't know
that. John very well knew. But these
disciples needed to be brought up a notch from where they were
when John sent them. They needed to gain a little
insight into grace. And so he gives him his reply
from two scriptures from the Old Testament. And those are
found in Isaiah 35, verse 5 and 6, and Isaiah 61. It's kind of a combination of
those two scriptures, and John would have known those. He said, go your way and tell
John the things you have seen and heard. The blind see, the
lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised,
and to the poor the gospel is preached. And those are pretty
much quotes from those scriptures in Isaiah that I mentioned in
Isaiah 35, five, and six, and Isaiah 61. And I was thinking, it's kind of
like code talkers. Tell John this. I fulfilled these
scriptures that were from the Old Testament. I fulfilled them. In Isaiah, I'd like just to read
this block of scripture from Isaiah. 35 verse 1 says, the wilderness
in the solitary place shall be glad for them, and this desert
shall rejoice and blossom as a rose. The wilderness, John
the Baptist came preaching the gospel in the wilderness. It shall blossom abundantly and
rejoice even with joy and singing in the glory of Lebanon shall
be given unto it. The excellency of Carmel and
Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord and the excellency
of our God. Those that are redeemed by the Lord. They're just going
to be overwhelmed with the glory of being saved from their sins
and giving the glory to God. He says, strengthen ye the weak
hands and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of
a fearful heart, be strong, fear not. Behold, your God will come
with vengeance, even God with a recompense. He will come and
save you. Those are just good words for even today. There's
just so many people that are so worried about what's going
on and all the things. God says to His people, fear
not. He will come and save you. The
eyes of the blind shall be opened, He says. The ears of the deaf
shall be unstopped, and then shall the lame man leap his heart,
and the tongue of the dumb shall sing. For in the wilderness,
this wilderness of this world that we're in right now, waters
shall break out and streams in the desert." Isn't that just
so poetic a description of the grace at work in the wilderness,
in the saving of the Lord's people. In Isaiah 61, the spirit of the
Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach
good tidings to the meek. To the poor the gospel is preached. There must have been quite a
discussion. There's a pretty good multitude
around the Lord trying to see all these miracles and things. So there must have been quite
a discussion about those disciples of John coming over and asking
Him, are You He whom we seek, or who art to come, or do we
look for another? And the answer of the Lord to
them. And there in verse 24, It doesn't record much of the
action of the people, but we know that they were around. Verse
29 tells us kind of the makeup of that crowd. There were the
people that heard him, the general people, the people of the land,
and the publicans, the tax collectors. justified God being baptized
with the baptism of John. But the end there in verse 30
says there were Pharisees there. and lawyers who rejected the
gospel against themselves. We have all this different mix
of people as we always find wherever the gospel is preached there. Jesus calls attention to the
common perception of religion by those in attendance. And in
the world at large, in verse 24 through 29, he says, concerning
John, what did you go out? Because he was up in the Jordan
area baptizing and preaching the gospel. So he appeared out
in the wilderness at the prescribed time when the Holy Spirit said,
now's the time to announce. You're the herald of the Lord,
now's the time to announce that. And we're going to back up and
look at a little bit of his history here in just a second. But Jesus is You're all talking about
John. What did you go out to see? What
did you think he would be? So a little background on John
this morning. As we noted in our first section
of our lesson today. Again, he was in prison as we
learned from Luke chapter 3 verse 20 and in Matthew 11-2. John being in prison heard the
works of Christ and sent two of his disciples to see what
was going on there. And then in Matthew chapter 4
verse 12 it says, Now Jesus had heard that John was in prison.
But he knew that. And yet, he didn't say, well,
I've got to get my man out of prison. Everything was working
according to the purposes of God. Now, John had a mission.
And it's necessary for us to understand the mission and purpose
of God in John. And some thought he was the Christ. It tells us that in Luke chapter
3 verse 15. Some mused in their hearts and
said, maybe this is the Christ. And so it's necessary for us
also to understand the reason that he was cast into prison
according to the Lord's purpose. It's necessary to understand
as much as possible the relationship between John and Christ, and
how Christ viewed and reacted to John's circumstances. And understanding these things
help us to understand somewhat much of Christ, what he said
here in verse 24 through 28. What did you go out to see? So concerning John from an I
am viewpoint, from an eternity viewpoint, he was foreknown and
foreordained for this mission, for the purpose of God. Malachi
3, verse 1 says, Behold, I will send my messengers. That's a
possessive pronoun I think they call it. He belonged to the Lord. Thine they were, Thou gavest
them me, from John 17, that I will send my messenger, and he shall
prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom ye seek shall
suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant
whom ye delight in. Behold, he shall come, saith
the Lord of hosts. Remember from our previous lesson
in Luke, there was a man sent from God whose name was John. He was sent from God. He was
in God in the Lamb's Book of Life. He was in Christ from before
the foundation of the world. And I believe their relationship
is much more than we can know in this life. He says, behold,
I'll send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great
and dreadful day of the Lord. Remember that prophecy to Zechariah,
he shall come in the spirit of Elijah. and shall turn many unto
the Lord. The voice of him that crieth
in the wilderness, prepare you the way of the Lord, make straight
in the desert a highway for our God." In Isaiah chapter 40 verse
3, another prophecy concerning him. Every valley shall be exalted,
every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked
shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and the glory
of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it." I'm going to send
my messenger and he's going to announce the one that came to
save his people from their sins. There was a divine connection
between the Lord and John. We go back to Luke chapter 1
concerning his very conception and the details surrounding that. Luke chapter 1 verse 13, The
angel said unto him, unto Zacharias his father, Fear not, Zacharias,
for thy prayer is heard, and thy wife Elizabeth shall bear
thee a son. How all the things the Lord put
on his heart to pray to him about a specific thing. And he prayed
and the Lord answered that prayer and he did it in a way that accomplished
his purposes. And it was all foreordained from
before the foundation of the world because we just got through
reading about what he had said hundreds of years before. Elizabeth shall bear thee a son,
and you are going to call his name John, on purpose. And thou shall have joy and gladness,
and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great
in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor
strong drink. And he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even
from his mother's womb." Now, that's a concept that we just
cannot really get our arms around. He was filled with the Holy Ghost.
before he even exited the womb and was born. And it says, many
of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God,
again from the Old Testament, and he shall go before him in
the spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the fathers
to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to
make ready a people prepared for the Lord. So that little
block of scripture is so important yet so not understood. It's just hard for us to really
grasp that. Further on in Luke chapter 1,
in verse 39, when Mary went to visit her cousin Elizabeth, We
just kind of went through that season where we celebrate these
things and talk about them. Mary arose in those days and
went into the hill country with haste into a city of Judah and
entered the house of Zacharias and saluted Elizabeth. And remember
Zacharias was a priest and he was, at the time of that writing,
he was assigned the duty of taking care of the altar of incense.
So he was of the priestly lineage. And it came to pass that when
Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe, John, leaped
in her womb. He heard the voice of Mary, the
mother of Christ. And he says, here comes my friend,
hot dog. The babe leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost. And she spake
out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women,
and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me,
that the mother of my Lord?" And she understood that. She
had a grasp of that. He says, what? I don't understand
that the mother of my Lord is coming to me. There's a recurring
theme that we find in the scriptures. The centurion and all those that
we read about, I'm not worthy. I'm not worthy that thou should
come into my house. They have a view of their selves.
I'm a man of unclean lips in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. In Zechariah, I'm ashamed. And look what's going on around
me. And I'm part of that. So we find that continuing theme. What is this to me that the mother
of my Lord should come to me? For lo, as soon as the voice
of thy salutation sounded in my ears, the babe leaped in my
womb for joy. She says, wow, this is something.
She recognized something. There was something more. than
just natural circumstances there. And John, he was foreordained
for the specific mission God had elected him to accomplish,
to herald, announce the coming of the Lord Almighty in the flesh
to save his people from their sins. And one of the things he
was pretty good at was identifying sin. He said there's sin. And many people say, I'm not
much of a sinner. I haven't really done anything
wrong. They just don't have any spiritual understanding of the
nature of sin and the fall. The ones that have, in regeneration,
gained that perspective of sin in the fall, they say, I'm not
worthy for you to come into my house. There was a man. sent from God, whose name was
John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the light,
that all men through him might believe." John 1, verse 6 and
7. In similar fashion, John's face,
as we read about Christ, steadfastly making his way to Jerusalem to
save his people from their sins. John's face was in a similar
fashion set like a flint to successfully accomplish the task set before
him from eternity. And he had a clear understanding
of that. He was filled with the Holy Spirit from the womb. He
had a clear understanding of things and he was not deterred
from that. John chapter 1 verse 19 said,
this is the record of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites
from Jerusalem to ask him, who are you? And he confessed and
denied not, but confessed, I'm not the Christ. And they asked
him, well, what then? Are you Elias? And he said, I
am not. Art thou that prophet? And he
said, no. Then said they unto him, who
art thou that we may give an answer to them that said, they
didn't really care for themselves. They just were sent to get some
kind of a rational explanation to someone else who didn't believe.
We need to give an answer to them that sent us. And he said,
I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness. He had a clear
understanding of that. He knew why he was there. He knew from his mother's womb
why he was in the world. Make straight the way of the
Lord, as said the prophet Isaiah, that we read there earlier. John's mission involved baptism
of those who came to believe the gospel he preached in as
an acknowledgment of being cleansed being made free from sin. It
wasn't a, you need to do this in order to be. It was a recognition
that something had happened. And he always demanded evidence. He said, you want to be baptized?
Let's see some fruit, some fruit of the spirit. And you know what? Our theme through this block
of scripture we're in today is, there's no compromise. There was no compromise in John. And he was quite popular. And
he was considered a prophet as from old. Many came to his baptism just
to be trendy and to conform to things of the day. And you know
what? He rejected them. He says, nope. In our pastors' messages from
the Old Testament, it's clear that religion really had devolved
into a corrupt system. The little g-gods from other
nations were being incorporated into the religion. I think you'll
cover some of that today, perhaps. Zechariah said, our people are
getting hooked up with the people of these other nations. And the
relationship between them in marriage is not so much the issue
is that they're adopting their religious views and incorporating
it into what was meant to be the truth. And they're polluting
and corrupting the gospel by saying, well, their God is just
as valid as our God. Their religion is just as valid.
They believe in it just as hard as we believe in ours. But we know that they were false. But still, they adopted those
things, and they incorporated them into their religion, and
just little by little. Well, can't we just agree on
this one thing? I know you believe this, and
we believe that, but here's some middle ground here that we can
kind of compromise on. You know what John said? There's
no compromising grace. You cannot compromise grace by
one iota. You cannot compromise the finished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. You can't just say, well, I believe
this, and my God is just as good as your God, and we don't have
to do that. And we can worship You worship over here at Mount
so-and-so, and you worship over there at this mount. Why can't
we just meet in the middle and be happy? Why can't you just
see things my way?" And John says, The true sacrifices that they
were supposed to be doing to picture a type of the gospel,
the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world, a lamb
without spot, without wrinkle, that went by the wayside. Things that pictured the death,
the burial, the resurrection of the Lord for salvation were
corrupted. John said, nope, not happening. The religious leaders were more
concerned with pomp and power than in the truth of the gospel
they were supposed to be presenting. You know in Jerusalem they had
the temple there, and here it had a big palace made, and they were going
back and forth. hanging around the palace and
going back to the temple. And they were just in complicit with
what was going on. And they said, you know, as long
as we can do our priestly thing and collect our dues and exercise
our religious power over the people, we don't really care
what the rest of you do. We just were willing to compromise
on that. The religious leaders were malleable. They were influenced by whoever
was in political power at the time. As long as the powers that
be allowed them the freedom to do their deeds, they didn't really
care. Into this mix comes John the
Baptist. Now Herod, if you remember back
in your history, Herod was the Tetrarch of this area. The Romans
had divided this area into four, and that's what the tetra thing
is about. He was in charge of one area,
and his brother Philip was in charge of another area, and there
were two other tetrarchs in charge of that area. Now Herod had married,
for political purposes, he had married an Arabian princess. just like what Norm said in Zechariah,
you're marrying these people that you shouldn't be hooking
up with. Then Philip, he had a wife and
Herod looked at that and said, I kind of like her. And Philip's
wife says, I kind of like him. So they both divorced their spouses
and got together. And all of this was just against
God's purposes. So let's go back to Luke chapter
3. Now in the 15th year of the reign
of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate, being governor of Judea, and
Herod being Tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip, Tetrarch
of Ituria, and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias,
the Tetrarch of Abilene. Annas and Caiaphas being the
high priests, there was another violation, they had two high
priests when there should have just been one. The word of God
came unto John, the son of Zacharias in the wilderness. That wilderness
that we read about in Isaiah that said the gospel is going
to break out in the wilderness. And he came unto all the country
about Jordan preaching the baptism. And here is a word that has caused
much havoc in religion. the baptism of repentance for
the remission of sins, and what that word for really means is
because of, not in exchange for. He preached the baptism of repentance
because of the remission of sins. Come and get baptized because
you're acknowledging that there's been remission for your sins.
You've been cleansed. You've been saved. As it is written
in the book of the words of Isaias the prophet, saying, The voice
of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord,
make his path straight. Every valley shall be filled, every
mountain and hill shall be brought low, and the crooked shall be
made straight. The rough ways shall be made smooth, and all
flesh shall see the salvation of God. Then said he to the multitude
that came forth to be baptized of him, He said, O generation
of vipers, who has warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
He says, bring forth, therefore, fruit. Now you could just put
a period there. Bring forth some evidence of
fruit of the Spirit. Evidence that you've been saved
by grace. Don't just tell me, well, I've
never done anything really wrong and I just need to be baptized
so that I can check that box. Don't say to me that you're a
children of Abraham. Don't give me those reasons,
physical reasons, why you think you should participate in baptism. Give me some fruit. Bring therefore
fruits worthy of repentance, not so that you can earn them. It's odd how men twist that around
to make it a works-oriented process. And begin not to say within yourselves,
we have Abraham to our father. For I say unto you that God is
able these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. And he
said, The axe is laid unto the root of the trees. Every tree
that brings forth not good fruit, the tree of works, the tree of
the law, all those trees that bring forth not good fruit, they're
going to be hewn down. They're of no value. They're
not of any worth. And the people ask him, well,
what do we do? What are we going to do now?
Because I had my list. I just gave to Goodwill last
week, and I donated food to the food bank, and I sent 20 bucks
so they could dig a well in Nigeria or somewhere. I support all the
missionary work in Alaska, and on and on it goes. All the things
I do, I give tithes of all I have. I'm glad I'm not like that other
guy that's a crook. Bring forth fruit, meet for repent. Give me some evidence. Some evidence of fruit of the
Spirit. Show me a change. And the people ask him, what
shall we do then? And he answered and saith unto him, and he doesn't
give them just a list of things to do. OK, when you go do all
these, then come back and I'll baptize you. He said, he's giving
them a list. Well, if you've really been saved,
then this is going to be some fruit of the Spirit. It's going
to be evidence. He said, if you have two coats, let him apart
to him that hath none. Love your brother as yourself.
He that hath meat, let him do likewise. Then came also the
publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall
we do? And he said, exact no more than that which is appointed
to you. Remember Zacchaeus? He said, oh, man. He said, if
I've robbed anybody, I'm restoring fourfold to them. And I'm not
going to tax people based on how many legs their donkey has,
or how many spokes there are in the wheel of their cart, or
all those things that I've had power to do. I've extorted them. A popular
thing was, well, you know, if you don't pay me a little extra,
I'm going to tell the soldiers that you are guilty of sedition
and they're going to come arrest you and the Romans just have
the habit of throwing you in the clink and they don't care
if you ever come out. They're not interested in justice.
They're just interested in nobody causing trouble. So, okay, since
there's no defense for a situation like that, I guess I'll have
to pay you. That's kind of the things they were up to. He says,
well, I don't want to do that anymore since I've been saved
by grace. And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, what
shall we do? And he said unto them, don't do violence to any
man. Don't walk down the street in
your little group and see some guy standing there and you threaten
him and club him in the head and say, how much you got on
you? Get handed over. Do violence to no man and neither
accuse any falsely and be content with your wages. And as the people were in expectation
and all men mused in their hearts saying of John whether he was
the Christ or not. This is not the advice that we
normally get from our religious leaders. John's dedication and
decrying of sin was uncompromising and without respect to persons
regardless of what class they were in or what status they had. Herod sent unto John, and I think
maybe he had something to do with those from all Judea that
came out to see what John was about, because it said John and
him apparently had some kind of a communication in Luke chapter
3. He reproved him for his relationship
with Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, and for many other evil
things that he had done. So John gave him the record and
Herod was the ruler. And he didn't make a compromise
because Herod was the man in charge. And as a result, Herod
didn't like it and had him cast into prison. no compromise. He wasn't willing to say, well,
I know this is the rule for general people, but since you're the
rule, the Tetrarch, we'll make an exception in your case, and
God will look the other way because you're like the king guy. So,
okay. I'll peace be with you. He said, this is wrong. This
is sin. This is sin. This is sin. No compromise. You know, John,
another example of what we said about our theme was, I'm not worthy. That's what John
said. I'm not worthy to untie his shoes. Herod the Tetrarch, being reproved
by him for Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, and for all the
evils which Herod had done, added this, yet above all, that he
had shut John up in prison. And John was in prison for approximately
two years, and then he was beheaded and killed. And yet we don't
find him sinning to the Lord's sin. Get me out. Don't let them
kill me. He said, you know what? I'm the
voice of one crying in the wilderness. I went and cried in the wilderness.
I'm no doubt preaching the gospels there in the prison where he
was. He sent his disciples to Christ and said, art thou he? And those disciples, he said,
follow. That's the Lamb of God. Follow
him. So he's likely here in prison
at this time, holding the truth in righteousness. And that we find here in Luke
seven, as he sends those disciples to inquire the Lord art thou
he that should come. So next time we had kind of tried
to get to this point here, he says, what did you go out to
see a reed shaking in the wind? One that's just blown about by
every wind of doctrine that's compromising to every single
thing? It's a rhetorical question. He
was as much as saying, John was like a rock. John was like a
great cedar tree unbending in his declaration of the gospel. So we'll stop there. Pick up
next time, Lord willing, So in the meantime, thank you for your
attention and be free as always.