And the name of the message is
A Certain Man. A Certain Man. Today we'll continue our series,
Encounters with Christ. Looking at this portion of scripture
in the Gospel of Luke. Luke chapter 14, and we'll read
the first six verses of this wonderful portion of scripture.
Luke chapter 14, verses one to six. And it came to pass, as
he went into the house of one of the chief Pharisees to eat
bread on the Sabbath day, that they watched him. And behold, there was a certain
man before him which had dropsy. And Jesus answering, spake unto
the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath
day? Note they didn't say a word. Scripture says they just watched
them. And note our Lord poses a question
to them. And they held their peace. And
he took him and healed him and let him go and answered them,
As far as we see in the text, they still haven't said a word
to him. And he answers them, saying,
which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit and
will not straightaway pull him out on the Sabbath day? And they
could not answer him again to these things. Now turn, if you
would, to Isaiah chapter 58. But keep your finger there in
Luke chapter 14, because we will be going back there. That's where
our main text is, and we won't be leaving there very much. But
Isaiah 58, verses 13 to 14, I want us to look at this in the Old
Testament and what it says here. In our text today, the Lord Jesus
Christ has a divine encounter on the Sabbath day with a man
who had dropsy. Look at this in Isaiah 58, verses
13 to 14. If thou turn away thy foot from
the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the
Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord honorable, and shall
honor him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure,
nor speaking thine own words, then shall thou delight thyself
in the Lord. And I will cause thee to ride
upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage
of Jacob, thy father, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken
it. So there's a little bit on the Sabbath there for us to keep
in context of this healing occurs on the Sabbath day. Now, one
may ask, what is dropsy? Well, today it's called edemina. It was called dropsy long ago.
It's a swelling caused by fluid retention. I didn't know that. The people that have this, they
swell up because there's fluids in them. And the major underlying cause
of dropsy are congestive heart failure, liver failure, kidney
failure, and malnutrition. And the text before us will bring
forth that Christ is our Sabbath. He's our rest. He's our rest. And we should honor him every
day. not just one day a week, but we should honor him every
day. Every day, he's our Sabbath, isn't he? He's not just our Sabbath
on Sunday when we come to church. He's our Sabbath every day. He's
our rest. Sabbath means rest. He's our rest. Every day, he's
our rest as believers. We don't worship a day. We worship
the Lord, right? There's people called Sabbatarians
that say, And they stick to the Old Testament rules. They say,
if you don't worship on Saturday, then you have the mark of the
beast. I had somebody tell me that one time. Seventh-day Adventist. Told me, oh, you don't worship
on Saturday, you have the mark of the beast. I looked at him
and said, why? Why are you saying that? He says,
well, because that's the Sabbath. I said, well, Christ is my Sabbath.
I don't worship a day. I said, I meet on Sundays, because
that's what the Lord instituted. But I worship the Lord every
day. Do you? Every day we do, don't
we? Not just on Sundays. We worship him all the time.
All the time. Our glorious Savior, he made
the Sabbath a delight for many while he was upon the earth.
And he continues to make the gospel Sabbath, which is himself,
a joyous time. But all these old legal Sabbatarians,
they take delight in condemning others. Well, what's the scripture
say? Who shall lay in charge to God's
elect? It's God that justifies. Rail
on all you want, it's just noise. It's just noise. Remember that.
Here's something to think about. I was thinking about that this
week. Satan wants to destroy us. He wants to destroy the church.
That's what he desires. That's what he desires. So he
can raise people up, and he can have things go on in the world,
but all under the sovereign control All this stuff going on in the
world, it's just noise. What does noise do for we who
are humans? What does noise do for we who
are humans? Noise distracts us, doesn't it? Noise distracts us. We hear something. What was that? Our enemy is a noisemaker. And we come here to hear the
sweet words of Christ, don't we? We come here to have that
noise all stopped. And what happens when we get
our eyes focused on Christ? We've talked about it. We've
talked about it as individuals. What happens when we get our
eyes focused on Christ? All that noise just disappears,
doesn't it? It does. And what comfort we have in our
hearts, what peace we have in our hearts, So Christ is our
Sabbath. And for the believer in Christ,
we find delight in Him. We find delight in Him. When
sinners turn from our ways, when we as sinners are turned from
our sin, we still sin, but when we're turned from it, and from
the pleasure of our depraved heart when we're born again to
the Holy Spirit of God, when we're turned from this world,
we find rest in Christ, don't we? We find mercy in Christ.
We find grace in Christ. We find salvation in Christ,
and we find rest in Christ. And the believer in Christ finds
that Christ in whom he delights, Christ in whom he rests, is a
true rest. And you know the Lord delights
in us. If you get down this week, which
we probably will, if something going on in the world bothers
you, Just think of this, God delights in you, in Christ. God looks upon you with love, with love, in unchanging love,
no matter the circumstances, no matter our state ourselves.
God looks upon his people with love in Christ. He loves us,
and not loves in eternal love, because he's eternal. And you know what? You can't
break that love. I can't break that love. Not
that we'd want to. There's nothing we can do that
will cause him to love us any less. That's amazing, isn't it? So
this love is eternal love set upon God's people. So we find true rest in Christ,
indeed, All who trust Christ delight in him. We have a triumph
over our foes. Let's read verse 1 here again.
And it came to pass, Luke chapter 14, verse 1. And it came to pass,
as he went into the house of one of the chief Pharisees to
eat bread on the Sabbath day, they watched him. Now our Lord
Jesus has fulfilled the law of God, and he did fulfill the law
of God when he was in this life perfectly. He established the
perfect righteousness for we who are his people. And true
believers find peace and rest only in Christ, only in his perfect
work of redemption. To attempt to find rest in anything
we do or anything in the law of Moses, including the Sabbath
day, is an abomination to God. He is our rest. To find comfort in the Sabbath
day is, well, I'm here. To vault it up like the Sabbatarians
do and say, If you don't come to church on Sunday, you're not
saved. Or if you don't come to church on Saturday, you're not
saved. That's another gospel. Our rest is in Christ. Now, do
we delight to come to church? Absolutely, we do, don't we?
God has taken rebels who did not want to go to church and
did not want to be with the people of God, and now we delight in
those things. That's a miracle of grace. I'll
tell you, that's a miracle of grace. Mine. So true believers only find peace
and rest in Christ and his perfect work of redemption, not in any
part of the law of Moses, including the Sabbath day. Those who foolishly think they
can find spiritual rest in the Sabbath day, you know what, they've
not ceased from their sinful works. They're still dead in
trespasses and sins. Bottom line, no matter what they
say, no matter what they say, My, the believer's true rest,
the believer's true salvation is in Christ and Him alone. Now
take note of what we see in verse one here. It was very common
for the Jews to have special feasts on the Sabbath day. They
did this often. And in our text, our Lord Jesus
Christ, he'd been invited to a feast at one of the chief Pharisees'
house. Now this is somebody who's something
in the Pharisees. One of the chief Pharisees, not
just Not just a normal Pharisee, he's one of the chiefs. One of
the chiefs. And we can see then from that,
from the text, that this man was probably a very prominent
Jew. He was a member of the Sanhedrin. We've been taught from our Lord,
Lord's encounters with the Pharisees, that they were very self-righteous
and very legalistic, weren't they? They were religious but
lost. And these men hated the Lord
Jesus Christ femininely, just as all people in religion do.
They hate the true gospel. They hate the preaching of a
complete, finished, synatonic work done by Christ and him alone. But that's what the scriptures
present. But religious folks, they don't
like that. They want something to do. They want something to
make them stand out a little bit more from the other people,
where they can go, oh yeah. My. And these prominent Jews, the
prominent Jews, they hated the Lord. They hadn't invited him
to this feast to have him as one of their honored guests.
No, they had him there to trap him. So their whole intent of having
him come was to entrap our Lord. This man, along with other lawyers
and Pharisees, thought they had laid a trap so they could find
something which they could accuse the Lord Jesus Christ of. So
they watched him, the text says. Look at that, they watched him. He came to pass as he went into
the house one of the chief Pharisees to eat bread on the Sabbath day,
that they watched him. In my margin, it says, closely
watched. So they're studying him. They're
observing him. They're trying to catch him in something. So
their intent is not to feast with him and enjoy fellowship
with him. No, their intent is to entrap him, to find something
that they can go, there, look at that. Look at that. My, oh, my. Aren't you glad the
Lord doesn't do that to us? After he saves us, he doesn't
go, oh Wayne, oh man, you blew it so much. Oh, praise God he doesn't do
that. Praise God God looks upon us
and sees us in Christ. Doesn't see us in our sin. That's
a miracle, isn't it? Oh, it's wonderful. So these
men, they hated the Lord. But you know what? They were
trying to trap him in his words, but they had no idea. They had
no idea who they were trying to entrap. They had no idea who
they were dealing with. We say that often about some
folks after certain things. They had no idea who they were
dealing with. These people. And see, people have no idea
who they're dealing with when it comes to God. Unless the Lord
reveals himself to us, we don't have any idea. People speak so
flippantly of him. These men had no idea who they
were dealing with. They had no idea that they were having an
encounter with God incarnate in the flesh. They had no idea
that the very one who they were closely watching could read the
thoughts of their hearts, could read their own thoughts
in their head. They had no idea. They thought,
well, he's just another man. We're going to entrap this fellow.
He's got a following. He's taken away. He's taken away
from our following, taken away from our money. We're going to entrap this fellow. Look at verse 2. And behold,
there was a certain man before him which had the dropsy. And here's a description of dropsy.
This condition is accompanied by swelling, poor appetite, sluggishness
and incapacity. The swelling usually begins in
the feet and ankles and proceeds up the legs towards the stomach. It is fairly common among diabetics. In addition to the swelling,
the bladder functions poorly. A person loses their appetite.
They become very sluggish. Their swollen limbs become debilitating. And after a while, it becomes
obvious that they're terribly sick and will soon die if something's
not done to help them. This is what the condition that
this man was in. It said this also, when sulfuric
acid is generated in the body, it ignites with water that causes
the swelling. This produces heat, which expands
the blood vessels. This pressure forces the serum
through the walls of the blood vessels, producing inflammation
and dropsy. Now, the only logical expression
for this diseased man being in the house of the prominent Jew
for that feast is because they wanted to entrap our Lord. These
lawyers and Pharisees, they cooked up a scheme in their minds. They
bought this man into their home, foolishly thinking that they
could entrap the Almighty God. They thought he was just a man. Here's God in the flesh. And
if you read this again later on, I encourage you to read it
again later on, they didn't say a word through all this, which
again proves that our Lord knows the heart, knows the mind. They didn't speak a word. Little did they know. They were
having an encounter with God in the flesh. Little did they
know that they were just pawns in the Lord's hands. Just pawns. There's going to be a great miracle
performed here. And these men are just pawns. We're going to
see later on, too. Think of this, too. I'm going
to mention this now. I was going to mention it earlier,
but I want to mention it now. So they had all these schemes
and all these plans. But God had already overwritten
all those plans and all those schemes. And again, these people
were pawns. And you know what they were pawns in? Bringing
this man to Christ, bringing this man to the feet of Christ,
bringing this man to where Christ is. Do you see how God works? Man can scheme all these things,
all these wicked things, and God just says, nope. He just
overrules it all. Just overrules it all. For His
glory, for His honor, and for His praise. So here they are. They bought this man. They don't know that they're
having an account with the sovereign God in the flesh. They're but
pawns in His hands. Think of this again. They're
pawns in the hands of He who works all things according to
the counsel of His own will. Think of that in what we see,
too. All things, all things, are working for our good, for
the good of God's people, and for His glory. Think of that. Even what we're seeing today.
All things are working for our good and for God's glory. Somehow,
it's all working that way. Because that's what the scriptures
say. And we believe what the scriptures say. We believe what
the scriptures say. So they sought to entrap our
great God. They sought to entrap our Savior. But by God's will and purpose,
this man would be healed. And we, as God's people, would
learn a great lesson from this. Think of this. This happened
2,000 years ago. And here we are today looking at this. All
these encounters that we're going to be looking at all happened
2,000 years ago. We've already seen the deity
of Christ brought before us. We've already seen the power
and might of Christ brought before us. We've already seen how when he
heals, it's instantaneous. And it's a full, complete healing,
isn't it? We've already seen all these things. And we marvel,
don't we? We marvel. These men who sought to entrap
the Lord, they're nothing but religious hypocrites, beloved.
And yet God used them to bring this man to Christ. You see the big picture? There's
a big picture, isn't there? that we don't see. And it's God
working out all things to his will and purpose. Again, for
our good and for his glory. But what mercy's on display here?
What mercy? Sovereign mercy, what amazing
love. God was manifest in the healing of this man. God used
the evil intents of those Pharisees to bring about good, to bring
about a miracle of grace. This man would be healed of his
physical and spiritual diseases. How? By the power of Christ.
And this would happen right before the eyes of those that hated
the Lord Jesus Christ. See, our Lord did things in public,
didn't he? He didn't do nothing in secret. He didn't do things
in secret. He did things right out in the
open. He did. And man, because our
natural enmity towards God, towards Christ, is hatred, They hated
him without a cause. My, oh, my. And God the Father sent his son
to do his will. And this was purposed by our
great God in old eternity. God's not changed, beloved. His
sovereign will is still being accomplished even today. Even
today. He's on the throne of power right
now. Just as much as he was 2,000 years ago, just as much as he
was in eternity. He's on his throne. He's not
moved. He's not changed. He's bringing things to pass
as it pleases him to do so by an eternal plan, too. It's not
something that he's just doing, well, yeah, well, this guy did
this. Now I've got to go Plan B over here. No. God doesn't operate that way. I talked to an author friend
of mine when I was in Oregon, and I asked him, when you write
a book, do you sit down before you write that book and frame
the whole thing, frame a plot line, frame some characters?
He goes, absolutely. All that's all done. He says,
all before I even start typing the book up, I have a whole outline
of what I want to have coppice in that book. God didn't go to plan B when
Adam fell. I used to say that in religion.
He didn't go to plan B. I remember saying, well, when
the Israelites rejected Christ, then God went to plan B and gave
it to the Gentiles. That's a lie. Oh, I had to unlearn
all that stuff. He didn't go to plan B. It was
always his purpose to save the Gentiles, to save people of every
tribe, tongue, kindred, and nation. And that's us. Isn't that amazing? Think of
our different ethnical backgrounds, right? Think of where your grandparents
came from, your great-grandparents, your great-great-great-great-grandparents.
Think of how the Lord sovereignly moved them to places where you
would be born, right where you would hear the gospel. Isn't that incredible? Oh, my. If he can do all that, he can
take care of us, can't he? Oh yeah. He's still on this throne. He's still in control of the
whole universe and everything in it. It all belongs to him.
The one who saved us, everything belongs to him. Everything we
see visible and everything invisible belongs to him. And he can do
whatever he wills. So it's nothing for him to take
a lost sheep out of darkness. and bring him into the marvelous
light of God's kingdom by the regenerating power of God the
Holy Spirit. If he spoke galaxies into existence, then it's nothing
for him to do that, is it? But it's a miracle, I'll tell
you that. It's a miracle. Just as it's a miracle when God
created everything out of nothing. See, we need things to create,
don't we? He created something out of nothing because he's God. And so we see this man in Luke 14.3. Let's read that now. Our Lord speaks to these lawyers
and Pharisees asking them. And Jesus answering spake unto
the lawyers and Pharisees saying, is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath
day? Now again, we don't read where
these religious hypocrites said a word. In this text, they've
not said a word. We know from the text that they
watched him. They were closely, you know,
you ever see people watch people where they're like totally, what
are they going to do? That's how they were. He's going to fall into our trap. No, he's not. He's God. He already knows what they planned. He already knows why they invited
him there. He knows that there's the bleating
of one of his lost sheep occurring. One of those lost sheep that
were given to him by the Father from eternity. One of those lost
sheep whom he was soon to go to the cross and purchase their
eternal soul. Here is the cry of love from
one of his sheep. Oh my. And all this is happening according
to the eternal purpose of God. And this is God they're speaking
to, the word of God, the second person of the Trinity. He's the God man. He knows their thoughts. He knows
the intents of their hearts. So when he spoke to them, several
commentators believe he was answering what they were thinking. Isn't
that amazing? Because nowhere in a text does
it say they spoke anything. He was answering what they were
thinking. God knows what we think. He knows the intents of our hearts.
Could you imagine, I shudder at this, could you imagine if
the Lord opened our minds up, our thoughts to the whole world,
let's just say for one minute. Oh my, no Lord, please no. He knew exactly what they were
thinking. And see, God even knows the sin in our thoughts, We don't
have to do anything to sin. We sin in our thoughts. We sin
in our heart. Everything we do and say is plagued
with sin. Our best prayers, Spurgeon said,
are plagued with sin. But God accepts them in Christ,
doesn't he? And God accepts us in Christ. So as these commentators
said, he's answering what they were thinking. He asked this question, is it
lawful to heal on the Sabbath day? And these foolish, wicked
men, they were fools to think that they could succeed in their
sinful attempt. And this is what this was. This
was a sinful attempt to entrap the all-powerful, all-sovereign
God. They thought they were dealing
with a mere man. But they were dealing with the
God-man. They were dealing with God in the flesh. And these same ungodly religious
hypocrites have been in the world in every generation. And they're
even with us today. Our Lord warns us to beware of
the doctrine of the Pharisees. Beware of anyone who mixes grace
with works. Beware of them. Beware of anyone
who tells you you have to do this to be saved. Beware of them. There's only two religions in
this world. You can boil all the religions in this world,
and I'm talking even the pagan ones and even the so-called Christian
ones, you can boil them all down to grace or works. Salvation's either all the grace
or salvations by grace in something you do, or as the pagan religions believe,
just by something you do. And I say pagan religions because
that's what they are. Buddhism, all these other things,
they're pagan religions. They've been around for thousands
of years, just pagan religions. And the devils know they're not
real. Because we've even seen in our
studies that devils believe and tremble. They know who the Lord
is. They know that those are just false religions. They know
that. They know there's only one true God. They know that.
And they're afraid of him. They're afraid of him. So think
of this. Most religions usually have only
one little thing they want to convince you of in order to be
saved. Each one has different little things. Some might be
meet on Saturdays. Some might be, oh, you have to
be baptized to be saved. Some might be, you have to exercise
your free will. Others might say you have to
join their religious denomination. It goes on and on and on. You
know what it is? It's man manufacturing something
others are to do for them to be saved. And you know what it's
doing? It's taking them right to hell. Some people might say,
that's a little harsh, Wayne. Well, that's the truth, though.
If you mix a pinprick of works to grace, you're not saved. Salvation's
either all of the Lord or it's not. And we know the scripture
declares salvation's of the Lord, period, from beginning to end
and everything in between. It's all of him. And we say as
God's people, praise his mighty name. I can't mess that up. Hallelujah. This is a perfect
salvation. And it's not even anything I've
done. And we're just receivers of that mercy, aren't we? Given
to us by God's grace and by God's mercy. And we rejoice. We rejoice
over that truth, don't we? We rejoice that salvation has
nothing to do with us, other than we're just receivers. And
it says that, for by grace are you saved through faith, and
that not of yourselves. It's a gift of God, not of works, lest any
man should boast. We're his workmanship, created
in Christ Jesus unto good works, which he has ordained from before
the foundation of the world, beloved. It's wonderful. If you attempt
to add any works of any kind, I don't care if it's by thought
or by something you do, to the finished work of Christ, it destroys
grace, no matter how small it is. Therefore, works of any kind
you must do to be saved brings about actually a perverted gospel.
It's not good news. See, the good news of the gospel
is Christ done it all. If he cried, it is finished. When he cried that, the salvation
of my soul was accomplished. When he cried that, if you're
a believer, the salvation of your soul was accomplished. He
obtained eternal redemption for us. Now, we're born again by
the Holy Spirit of God in time, right? But he purchased us 2,000
years ago. The work of redemption was finished. That's something to shout about.
My, it's wonderful. Look at verse 4. What happens
when our Lord asks them those questions? Look at this. They
held their peace. And he took him, being the man
with dropsy, and healed him and let him go. Look at that. The Lord shut their mouths. He
muzzled them. Remember how he muzzled the demons in the other
encounters we've looked at just by a word? These men are muzzled
by his words. You know what? They're trapped
by their own trap. Aren't they? They're being entrapped in their
own trap. That's how the Lord works, beloved. Become trapped by their own trap.
And they dared not say anything that they might show any agreement
to the master and therefore have their fellow Pharisees accuse
them of believing that man. So they could not say yes without
consenting to what he was about to do. And they could not say
no without denying that works of mercies were permitted on
the Sabbath day. as he pointed out about their
own oxen. These religious hypocrites, they're
no match for our king. They're no match for him. They're
no match for the wisdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. They're no
match for wisdom incarnate, which is what he is. There are no mats
for him. Is anyone in this world who shakes
their fist at God any match for our king? No. No. Scripture says he laughs at them. He laughs at them. My. No match for our almighty
Savior. No match for God incarnated in
the flesh. They thought they were wise.
Oh, they thought, we're going to get him. We're going to entrap
him. We got him this time. There's
no match for him. No match for him at all. In Matthew
22, verse 42, our Lord asks several questions. Turn, if you would,
there, Matthew chapter 22, 42 and 46. Look at this. These folks are
no match for Christ. There are no match for him. Matthew
22, verses 42 to 46. Look at this. I'll read verse 41, too. While
the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying, What
think ye of Christ? Whose son is he? They send him
the son of David, because they knew his lineage. They knew that
Mary and Joseph were of the son of David. They don't know that Joseph's
not his father. But see, Mary's his mother, right?
And she's part of the lineage of David. We know that. He saith unto them, How then
doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying, The Lord said unto
my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies
thy footstool? If David then call him Lord,
how is he his son? And no man was able to answer
him a word, neither does any man from that day forth ask him
any more questions. He just silenced them. He silenced
these guys. They haven't even spoke a word.
He's reading their thoughts, and he's silenced them already. Oh, my. Let's go back to our
text there. In Luke chapter 14, we read verses
4 to 6. And they held their peace. And
he took him and healed him and let him go and answered him saying,
Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fall into a pit and
will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day? So then
there's that act of mercy on a Sabbath day. And they could
not answer him again to these things. Now, these unbelieving
Jews, they held their peace. And then we read in the same
verse, and he took him and healed him and let him go. So this man,
he had no, he had no idea that he was going to have a divine
encounter with God in the flesh. He probably didn't even know
he was a pawn in this situation. He probably thought, well, this
fellow invited me for dinner, I'm going to eat a nice dinner.
But he was probably in a lot of pain with inflammation as
we read that the effects of it, he is probably in severe pain. But we read here that our Lord
took him and healed him and then let him go. Marvel at this, beloved God.
Our Lord Jesus took this helpless and hopeless man, this sinful
man. He was dying of the dropsy. He took him, and he healed him,
and then he let him go. Is this not a picture of the
sovereign power of our Lord Jesus Christ as he performs the miracle
of the new birth in every chosen, blood-bought child of God? Is
this not a picture of that? And this healing is instantaneous,
isn't it? And this healing is complete. This man got up and walked away. It's a complete healing. There's
no time for recovery. Remember how we've been looking
at some of these things? And usually for us, if we get
a fever, like Peter's mother-in-law had, it's weeks before we recover
from that. But that was an instant healing,
wasn't it? She was up serving him. The Lord heals him, he's
out the door. And notice our Lord took him.
Our Lord took this man, he healed him. He took that certain man
by the hand, that's what he was, he's a certain man, and he let
him go. You know what he did? You know
what our Lord did? He led him away from those wicked men. What does God do to us when he
saves us? He leads us away from our wicked, the wicked folks
we used to rejoice with in our sinfulness. And he brings us
into the company of other sinners who've been saved by the grace
of God in Christ. You know the church, the hospital
for sinners? This is a hospital for sinners.
Really, it is. We're all sinners here. The hospital
for sinners. This is an oasis for saved sinners.
Mine. But our Lord took him. He led
him away. And he let him go. He didn't want him with those
men. He didn't want to leave him with those sinful men. So
he took him, and he let him go. Think upon this. This was one
of the Lord's sheep. This is one of the Lord's sheep
who the Father had given him for maternity. And our Lord took him into his
bosom, didn't he? He took him and brought him into
a living union with himself. Our Lord healed him. And I believe
the Lord not only healed him of his physical disease of the
dropsy, but I believe he healed him spiritually too. And once the master had shamed
these babblers into silence, he took the man with the dropsy
and healed him. And you know, If he can dry up the Red Sea, if he can calm the waves of an
ocean with his words, if he can bring water out of
a rock, and he had no difficulty drawing
a little water from this man's body, did he? By his word, that water just
dried up. By his almighty power. Because
that's what it is. It's a retention of fluids. Just
dried right up instantaneously. It doesn't say he even said it.
He just took them by the hand. Oh, our great savior, beloved.
This is the one who saved us. This is the one who keeps us.
I bet you this man went home rejoicing. I bet you he was jumping
for joy all the way home. Oh, my. And what would he do? He'd proclaim who healed him,
wouldn't he? He'd say, Jesus of Nazareth touched me. He healed
me. Oh, we would, wouldn't we? If
we were him, we'd be going, we'd be going telling everybody in
our family. And they'd probably look, they'd look up, my gosh,
look what, because they'd see the difference. Who made us to
differ? God. Who made this man to differ? Who healed this man? God. Oh, my. He's free from the pain
and misery of the dropsy. Oh, he's free from the bondage
of that disease, too, isn't he? And he's even free of these lawyers
and Pharisees, because the Lord took them and let them go. Because religion is nothing but
bondage. When God saves one of his sheep,
and if we're in religion, I was there, if we're in religion,
he takes us out of the bondage, and we are set free. And if the
Son will make you free, you're free indeed. I'll tell you that. We who are born-again blood-washed
believers, we've been set free in Christ. We've been set free
from the power of Satan. We've been set free from the
power of darkness. We've been set free from the power of sin.
We've been set free from the guilt of sin. We've been set
free from the wrath of God. And we've been set free from
the eternal fires of hell. And this certain man who was
brought to the feast by these wicked Pharisees to be used as
a pawn to entrap our Lord Jesus Christ had no idea of the blessings
that were waiting for him. He didn't have a clue. And every
blessing that we receive comes from our great God, beloved.
And this blessing came from our great God to this man. All through
who? All through Christ, right? Every
blessing was purposed by God and sent by God in Christ Jesus
our Lord. Now consider this too. This man
contributed nothing to these blessings that he received. He
contributed nothing to his healing, did he? We see that in the text. He didn't do nothing. The Lord
put his hand out, took his hand, and let him out. Healed him,
healed him and let him out. He didn't contribute nothing.
What rest the believer in Christ can find here? When one is free,
we can rest. When one is free, we can rest.
And when one is truly free in Christ, we can truly rest. We
have true rest now in Christ as believers. We have rest from
the labors of trying to earn our salvation by our doing. It's
all been done by Christ. He shed his blood to purchase
us. He did it all. He has risen again the third
day for our justification. We're born again to the Holy
Spirit. He sent the Comforter to us to teach us the things
about him, things that he wanted us to know. I can honestly tell
you that when I was in my 20s, I had no idea. of what I've learned,
and what I've learned is just a scratch on the surface. What
you've learned even is just, what we've learned about Christ
is just a scratch on the surface. We can't even boast in what we
learned. But think of this, what we've learned has been taught
to us by God the Holy Spirit. That's amazing. Because you look
back, I look back 20, 30 years ago. I didn't know nothing about him.
I had a god of my imagination cooked up in my mind, but I did
not know the true and living God. And I did not know that
I was going to have an encounter with him either. Praise his mighty
name. He saved my soul. Oh my. So our situation spiritually
seeking was just like this man. He was helpless. He was hopeless.
He couldn't do anything for himself. He couldn't heal himself. But
he was bought to Christ. Do you know the law is the schoolmaster
to what? Bring us to Christ. What a picture we have here.
Here's these lawyers, these Pharisees, these keepers of the law. They
bring this man to Christ. And they don't even know the
purpose of God is going to occur in this man's life. Neither did
the man. Oh, under the preaching of the
gospel, the Lord heals us, doesn't he? He heals us, and He applied
His healing virtue to us, His healing balm, making known to
us by the enlightening power of God the Spirit, that He by
His stripes healed us, that He by His blood washed us clean
from all our sins, that He by His perfect sin-atoning work
has obtained eternal redemption for us, that He, the Lord Jesus
Christ, by Himself purged our sins, and God remembers them
no more. No more in that Christ and Christ
alone reconciled us to God by his death. And we know now by
the teaching of the Holy Spirit that we live because of him. That we live and have our being
all according to his will and purpose. We didn't know that
before. And one big thing that we know
now, he set us free. He set us free, beloved. Set
us free from the bondage of religion, set us free from all our sins,
set us free from the judgment of God, set us free from the
law of God, saved us from the wrath of God. He did it all by
himself. Oh my. Free from the power of
sin, free from the the power of Satan, free from the power
of darkness, free from the power of sin again, free from the guilt
of sin, free from the wrath of God, free from the eternal fires
of hell. Oh, what a great God we have.
Free, free, free, free. If the Son shall make you free,
you're free indeed. So rejoice, beloved of God. We've
been delivered. We were in bondage. We've been
delivered. Rejoice, beloved of God, as Jesus
Christ, our sovereign Lord, has set us free. And you know what? We're going to be eternally grateful
for that, aren't we? As a result of that, we're going to be eternally
grateful to Him. We'll give our wonderful Lord and Savior all
the praise and glory, just like the folks in heaven are doing
right now, the blood-bought saints are doing right now. We're going
to do that with them one day when we depart from this world.
My. Now let's read verses 5 and 6
of Luke chapter 14. It says, and answered them, saying,
which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit? and
will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day. And they
could not answer him again to these things. So we see here
in verses four or five and six that after our Lord had let the
man that he healed go, we read in these verses our Lord himself
speaking. And remember, we have no mention
in these verses of them saying a word, even up to this point. He answered
them, saying, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fall into
a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day?
And they could not answer him again to these things. So I point
out once again that we don't read where these unbelieving
Jews were speaking. Nope. No doubt they were filled
with evil thoughts, and the Lord knew their thoughts. They were thoughts, they were
filled with thoughts of contempt in witnessing what our Lord had
did on the Sabbath day, but they were powerless to say anything,
because he'd muzzled them up, hadn't he? He'd actually shut
them up, where if they agreed with him, then they're in trouble
with their other Pharisee friends. And if they disagree with him,
then they're going against the law. The Lord just turned the
tables on them, didn't he? He literally turned the tables
on them. Our Lord answered their thoughts
with words, and they had no answer. for his words. These proud, arrogant,
self-righteous Pharisees were not interested in the glory of
God, not at all, not at all. And they weren't even interested
in the eternal soul of the one they bought to Christ, or their
own souls. Their chief concern was their
own property. Their chief concern were their animals, their materialistic
gain, a following. And our Lord told them the truth.
about what they would do on the Sabbath day with their own animals.
They said, if your own animal was in a ditch, you'd go get
him. Because that's an act of mercy.
That's allowed on the Sabbath day. And they couldn't say a
word. They couldn't say anything to
him. Here's one of the Lord's sheep
in a ditch. Ditch is sin. Ditch of a disease you need to
be healed from. Lord just took him right out of there. And didn't
leave him with them, sent him on his way. You're not going
to be with those fellas. Isn't that amazing? Think of
how the Lord's brought us here to hear the gospel. There's a
lot of noise out there, isn't there? There's a lot of people
in pulpits preaching false things, lying about God. But God's brought
you here to hear the gospel, because that's the most important
thing. for the Lord's people, to hear the gospel preached and
proclaimed, to hear about our Savior. Our Lord told them again the
truth about what they would do on the Sabbath day with their
own animals, and they were incensed with Him. They were incensed
with Him. They were incensed over the good
that He would do to a human being whom He created. Remember, we're
His creation. Remember the reading that I read?
The reason I read that reading is to show us how much more valuable
we are than all of creation. God's people, in His eyes, He
loves us. He watches over us. We're much
more valuable to Him than anything else in this world. Because we're in Christ, and
He's the head and we're the body. And when they heard these words
of truth, they had no answers for the truth that came out of
our master's lips. They could not answer him. They
just could not answer him at all. So may we who are the people
of God, may we rejoice in what we've read today, what we've
looked at, and may we rejoice that we're one of his. That he's
put a hand upon us, he took us by the hand. Nothing we did,
he took us by the hand, right? He led us out from amongst amongst
those who we used to delight in sin with, and he set us on
our way, and now he's brought us in fellowship with other believers,
and we rejoice. We give him all the glory and
honor and praise for the great things that he has done. Hallelujah,
Lord Jesus. Praise your mighty name.