The Offense of the Gospel

We're gonna be back in John chapter 11 again this morning if you'd like to open your Bibles with me to John 11. Let's pray together. Our merciful heavenly father, we are reminded once again as we come to this place that a man can receive nothing except it be given to him from heaven.

Lord, you have given to us a place to meet, and for that we are thankful. You have given to us a desire to worship. Lord, we would never have that had it not come in the power of your spirit to our hearts. Lord, you have given to us thy dear son, our savior, the one of whom we just sang. Lord, we can never be thankful enough. We can never express our our gratitude as we ought.

Lord, we pray that you would cause us to be thankful, to be worshipful, and to be grateful this morning. Fill our hearts with the love of Christ. Enable us, Lord, to love thee in light of the love that you have for us. Lord, you send your spirit in power, Open the eyes of our understanding, open by word. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Excuse me. I have your Bibles open to John chapter 11. I don't know a text in scripture that shows more clearly man's unvarnished hatred for Christ than the verses that we're going to look at this morning. Verse 47 of John chapter 11, then gathered the chief priest and the Pharisees a council.

Lazarus had been miraculously raised from the dead. Some who witnessed his resurrection happened in Bethany, just on the other side of the Mount of Olives from the city of Jerusalem. And some that witnessed his resurrection ran back and reported to the Pharisees this undeniable miracle. This wasn't just any miracle. This was the miracle of miracles.

And the Pharisees knew that it had happened. And so they gathered together in their council, the Sanhedrin, those particular leaders of the Jews that were responsible for maintaining the religious commitments of the people. And they said, what do we? What are we going to do? For this man doeth many miracles. They knew what he had done. There was no question in their mind about about that. And then they said this in verse 48.

If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and our nation. I don't know if there's a story that depicts the depravity of man more than this one. We come into this world spiritually dead and spiritually blind, unable to see and unable to believe. We come into this world with a natural hatred for God. And we see it on full display among these Pharisees.

They knew the scriptures. They did not attempt to deny the miracle. And yet, they would not believe. They were unable to believe. That's what being a sinner means, that's what being depraved means. No amount of evidence would have convinced them otherwise.

Now, I hope that we're making application of this truth to ourselves because the only way that you and I would ever believe the gospel is the sovereign grace of God. It is the only thing that will melt the heart of stone. God's the only one. We would be as unbelieving and we would be as unwilling and as obstinate against all evidence if the Lord did not do a work of grace for us.

We cannot be too thankful, can we? Can we express our love and our gratitude too much? Who make it thee to differ? What do you have that you have not received? It came from God. As I said in our prayer together, A man can receive nothing except to be given to him from heaven. This is our natural condition. What are we going to do? We can't, we can't not believe on him. Otherwise the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.

Salvation is of the Lord. Paul said, I planted, He plants the seeds of the gospel. Apollos watered. Apollos came along behind me and through the preaching of the gospel, watered the seed. But only God can give the increase. Only God can make that seed come alive. Only God can cause it to be fruitful. God uses the foolishness of preaching to save them which believe and that's the means, isn't it? That's why we opened this book. That's why we seek to lift Christ up.

Reminded of that parable the Lord gave of the rich man and Lazarus. Some have suggested that maybe it wasn't a parable because in the parables, the rest of the parables in the Bible, names are not given. But in this parable, a name is given. His name was Lazarus. Interestingly, this is the same name of the man that was just raised from the dead, a different man, but the same name.

And the name Lazarus translated means the one whom God helps. The one whom God helps. If God doesn't help us, we will be without help and without hope in this world and in the world to come. So this Lazarus represents us. And the Lord told that story about the rich man and Lazarus. And so many have misinterpreted that story to think that rich people go to hell and poor people go to heaven. You remember what happened. The dogs licked the wounds of Lazarus. It doesn't have anything to do with material possessions. It has everything to do with the wealth of one's own righteousness.

That's what the Lord meant when he said, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter into heaven. The Lord, the disciples said, who then can be saved? With man, it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible.

We will hold on to our own righteousness, just like these Pharisees did. unless the Lord makes us poor. He has to. He has to make us to where we see that those things that we thought were gain, those things that we trusted in for our acceptance before God were actually to our loss. And we only by God's grace will ever count them as dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus.

This story tells us about man's depravity, but let's go back to Lazarus and the rich man. The rich man cries out and sees Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham and the rich man asked for Lazarus to come and put a drop of water on his tongue to relieve him of the torment of that place.

And Abraham tells him, the great gulf is fixed between us. There's no way that that gulf can be crossed now. And so the rich man says, well, Send Lazarus to warn my brothers of this place. I have five brothers. And what did Abraham say? This is the point that I wanted to make. What did Abraham say?

They have Moses and the prophets. If they will not hear them, neither will they be persuaded though one raised from the dead. These Pharisees were not persuaded though they knew that the Lord Jesus had raised a man from the dead. No amount of outward evidences, no amount of miracles, no amount of persuasion, no amount of trying to convince a person will be adequate to open the eyes of our understanding. This is something that God has to do. Do we employ the means that the Lord has given us? His word, prayer, preaching, witnessing, fellowship of the saints? Yes, yes.

But in all of those things, we plant and we water knowing that God must give the increase. And if he doesn't give the increase, there will be no life. That's our spiritual condition. These Pharisees, just like the rich man and just like his brothers who would not be persuaded if they don't believe Moses and the prophets, if they don't believe God's word. And we know that faith is a gift of God. And so the only way that we're gonna believe what God has revealed is if the spirit of God opens the eyes of our understanding and gives us faith to believe God. to believe God. This story shows us, yes, the depravity of man, it shows us our own depravity. It reminds us of how merciful and how gracious the Lord has been to cause us to differ and to do for us. Lord, why? Why would you not allow me to remain in this state, protecting my own place, protecting my own nation, rather than bowing to thee?

No man can come to me. No man can come to me, except the Father which sent me draw them, draw them. And when the prophet understood that truth, what did he say? Turn me, O Lord, and I shall be turned. Lord, draw me. Draw, cause me to come. There's nothing in me that would come if you don't make me to come. Make me to hear thy voice. Make me to see thy face. Make me to believe thy word. Can you think of an example of the depravity of man more clearly illustrated than this one?

I mean, these men knew the Bible. They knew what had been said all throughout scriptures about the Messiah. And here was the Messiah in their midst performing the most glorious miracles. It's not like these men were used to seeing miracles. Let's not think, well, These were Bible times and miracles were common. No, they weren't. Miracles were no more common then than they are now. And to have the undeniable evidence that this man who gave all the clear evidence that he was the promised Messiah, raise a man from the dead who'd been dead four days, And they got their council together and said, what are we gonna do?

What are we gonna do? If we allow this man to remain, we're going to lose our place and we're gonna lose our nation. And that cannot be. That cannot be. We will sacrifice everything to protect our place and our nation. And that's what we would do. No question about it.

In addition to the depravity of man, we see the sovereignty of God in this. The scripture says that the wrath of man shall praise thee. Never have we seen the wrath of man more exemplified than when God gave man the ability to crucify the Son of God. And the greatest crime that man ever committed in the hand of God turns into the greatest blessing that man could ever hope for. And so it is with our God. We know that he works all things together for good for them that love him and those that are called according to his purpose.

And if he did this with the wrath of man in the crucifixion of Christ, can he not take our sins and bring to us spiritual blessings so that we come to understand more and more where sin abounds, grace does much more abound? That we see the grace of God overpowering our sin? And let us not forget the conclusion that Paul comes to after that. Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Oh, God forbid. God forbid. Well, we're not saying that we continue in sin, that we may know more grace, that we purposely, if it were possible, we would never sin again.

But here's our hope, that just as God takes this great evil, the greatest evil ever perpetrated by man, and brings about the greatest blessing, so the Lord uses the firstborn, Isaac, I'm sorry, Esau, our flesh, our sinful flesh. And the Lord said, the older, that's our firstborn, that's our natural man, that's how we come into this world, shall serve the younger, that's Jacob. That's the new man created in Christ Jesus. Here's our hope that our great God, our God who has nothing but good for us, will take even the constant reminder of our sinful nature manifested in our bodies, in our flesh every day, and turn us again and again to Christ.

Notice in verse 49, Caiaphas, who was the high priest that same year, said unto them, you know nothing. In verse 50, nor consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people and that the whole nation perish not. And this spake he not of himself, but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation and not for that nation only, but that also he should gather together in one the children of God that are scattered abroad.

How many times you heard someone say, well, everybody's a child of God. No, that's not true. That's not true. God is all man's creator. God is the one with whom all men must do. But he's only the father of those whom he has adopted as his children in Christ. in Christ. And here's the promise.

Caiaphas, he didn't even know what he was saying. It's kind of like when Pilate brought forth the Lord Jesus after scourging him and said, behold the man, behold the man. It's kind of like when later on in John chapter 18, the Pharisees are going to get together Pilate's going to be reasoning with him, trying to figure out. Pilate's looking for a way out.

He doesn't want to crucify Christ. The Pharisees continue to insist. And the Pharisees make this statement. You're no friend of Caesar if you don't crucify this man. For he called himself a king. And then they made this statement. We have no king but Caesar. We have no king but Caesar.

Now, Jacob, many, many years before, at the end of the book of Genesis, when he's blessing his 12 children, said to Judah, of whom the Lord Jesus came at the line of, he's the lion of the tribe of Judah, Jacob said to Judah that the scepter shall not depart from the tribe of Judah until Shiloh come. Now, what is the scepter? The scepter is the reigning king.

It's the symbol of authority. It's the symbol of Judah's submission to God. And when they said that, they were pronouncing their own judgment. They were fulfilling prophecy. They were fulfilling prophecy. For in that moment, when they said, we have no king but Caesar, the scepter departed from Judah. Shallow had come. And a new king, well, the new revelation of the king, I should say, he's always the king, has been made. What am I saying?

That God uses not only our sins and not only the events of our lives, but he uses the words and the actions of unbelievers to accomplish his own end. Our God works all things together for good. Even for those who unwittingly say things that are true or say things like Caiaphas said, one man must die for the people that we not all perish. And he spake this, not of his own accord, but being high priest that year, he spoke the words that God gave him to speak.

Turn with me to Acts chapter 4. Acts chapter 4. We see in this story the absolute unwillingness and inability of sinners protecting their own place and protecting their own nation to believe on Christ. Their hatred, our hatred for God left ourselves, left ourselves.

And we see the sovereignty of our God. Is this not the offense of the gospel? Is this not what men are offended by to be told that they cannot come? And that he will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy? Look at Acts chapter four and we'll begin reading in verse 26.

The kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ for of a truth against thy holy child Jesus whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done." Bear full responsibility for our actions. All men do. What a glorious God we have. His purpose is always fulfilled. His work is always accomplished.

I think about Joseph's brothers selling him into slavery. And once he revealed himself to them, They thought, he's gonna get revenge against us for this. And he told them, he said, don't be afraid. You meant it for evil. You meant it for evil. God meant it for good to save much people alive. Caiaphas, the high priest and these Pharisees meant it for evil. And for that evil, they, like all who are still in their sins, will stand before God. God meant it for good. He meant it for good.

Turn with me to Psalm 2, Psalm 2. Verse 1, why do the heathen rage? The psalmist is standing in amazement of how a man could think that he could stand against God. How foolish, how dumb, how blind, how spiritually dead we must be to think that we can stand against God. And yet that's what we are. Why did the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing?

Why would we raise our fists to heaven? Why would we say, I'll not have that man reign over me? Why would we imagine vain things that somehow we can merit favor with God. And why would we set ourselves up on the throne of God? Why would we think that we can atone for our own sins?

But we do. The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed saying, let us break their bands asunder and let us cast away their cords from us. What are we going to do? And they plotted from that day forward how they would have him delivered up unto death. If we allow him to remain, we're gonna lose our place. We're gonna lose our nation.

In verse four, He that sitteth in the heavens, is he threatened? Is he at all concerned? No, to the contrary. To the contrary, he tells us that he laughs at men. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath and vex them in his sore displeasure.

Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree the Lord has set unto me. Thou art my son. This day I begotten thee. Ask of me. and I shall give you the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron and thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel."

That's what we need. We need to be broken. A broken and contrite heart he will not despise. David said in Psalm 51 that sacrifices and offerings thou wouldest not. I can't bring anything, a broken heart, a broken and contrite spirit. That's what God, why would he receive that? Because he gives it. He gives it.

These men would not be broken. We would not be broken. We would do all that we could do to protect our place and our nation. Lest the Lord, lest the Lord break us. Lest he break us. Go back with me to our text and let me just see if I can make a couple of quick points before we close.

The Romans, when they conquered a land, now, the Roman Empire was vast and powerful at this point. No one could compete with them, and no one could stand against them. They ruled the world with a rod of iron. were smart enough to know that the local tribes and the local cultures, in order to maintain peace in the empire, needed to be preserved. And so they would allow certain freedoms and certain liberties to the conquered nations to maintain their own traditions, and in many cases, their own religion, As long as it led to keeping the people at peace, as long as it thwarted any potential rebellion, we will allow you to maintain some control over your traditions, over your religion, and over your people. And yet those controls had limits.

And the word Roman here, the word Rome means power. It means strength. And if we let this man alone, If we allow others to believe on him, the ones of power, the ones who have the authority to take from us the place that they have given to us. These were the men who were given certain authority amongst the people of Israel to to exercise their power and their authority. And if we allow others to believe on him, the Romans will come and they'll take away both our place and our nation. To illustrate this, let me ask you, if you will, to turn over just a few pages to John chapter 18.

I'm so sorry, I've written the wrong text in my Bible, I mean in my notes, but I wanted to take you to that place in the scriptures where they wanted Pilate to crucify the Lord and Pilate said to them, this accusation that you're bringing against this man is of your concern. You settle it. You deal with him. You have the authority. We've given you authority to deal with these religious matters amongst yourself. You deal with them yourselves.

And the Jews said, but we can't have him put to death. And the next verse says, and these things they said to fulfill what the Lord Jesus had said about the manner in which he would be crucified, in which he would be put to death. Now that passage of scripture tells us the Jews had the authority to put people to death, but it had to be by stoning. but they couldn't crucify. The Lord Jesus was incomplete.

He's not a victim here. He's in complete control of everything that's going on and everything that's being said and everything that's being done. But Pilate wanted them to settle this problem amongst themselves. And they wanted him crucified. They weren't satisfied with having him stoned. But more importantly, it was God's ordained purpose to have him crucified, to have him nailed to a Roman cross.

And so, turn with me to Luke chapter 11. Verse 21. Now these same Pharisees are accusing our Lord of casting out devils in the name of the devil, Beelzebub. And here's what our Lord says in response to that, verse 21. And when a strong man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace. But when a stronger than he shall come upon him and overcome him, he taketh from him all his armor wherein he trusted, and he divideth his spoils." These Pharisees were under the authority of the Roman governor in empire. And yet the Lord is saying to them, or they are saying, the Romans, they fear the Romans removing them from their place.

And the Lord is telling us there in Luke chapter 11, that like these Pharisees, we are under the authority of a strong man. And unless one stronger comes and overthrows the strong man, we will trust in our armor. We will trust in what we have, just as these Pharisees trusted in what they have. What is the confession that we must make?

Lord, I'm bound by the Romans. I'm bound by a power stronger than me. I need a strong man to come and deliver me. I need to lose my place. By nature, we will try to protect our place. By nature, we will try to protect our nation, our possessions. And by possessions, I don't mean just material possessions. I mean our possession of time, our possession of authority, our possession of freedom. We will not bow. We will not submit.

Unless the Lord causes us, we'll be just like these Pharisees. unless the Lord causes us to see, Lord, I can't believe. Lord, I can't come. Lord, I'm under the rule of the Romans. But you see what these Pharisees are saying? If we believe on this man, and if others believe on him, those of whom we are under their authority will come and they will take a place, take away our place and they will take away our possessions. They will take away our nation. What does faith say? This is the opposite of what faith says. What does faith say?

Lord, I need you to take away my place. I need you to take away from me my weapons of warfare. I need for you to cause me to believe on Christ. Lord, I can't atone for my own sins. I can't come to faith in Christ. I can't obey you. I can't establish my own righteousness. I can't do anything. I'm under the strength of a strong man.

And though just like these Pharisees who had, let's call it puppet authority. They had the freedom under the authority of Rome to exercise their own power amongst their own people. That's the life of the unbeliever. He has authority, he has freedom in this world to exercise power.

But it's not until the Lord strips us of that power. It's not until he causes us to say, Lord, I don't wanna leave you alone, I don't want you to leave me alone. I've got to have Christ. I've got to have the power of my own sin and my own sinful nature broken. Let's take a break.

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