So we're on Luke's Gospel, chapter
four, and I would like to read from verse 31. This is speaking about the Lord
Jesus. Verse 30 says that he passing through the midst of
them went his way. That was the crowd that gathered
to harm him at Nazareth. Verse 31 says, And came down
to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and taught them on the Sabbath
days. And they were astonished at his
doctrine, for his word was with power. And in the synagogue there
was a man which had a spirit of an unclean devil, and cried
out with a loud voice, saying, Let us alone. What have we to
do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us?
I know thee, who thou art, the Holy One of God.' And Jesus rebuked
him, saying, Hold thy peace, and come out of him. And when
the devil had thrown him in the midst, he came out of him, and
hurt him not. And they were all amazed, and
spake among themselves, saying, What a word is this! For with
authority and power he commandeth the unclean spirits, and they
come out. And the fame of him went out
into every place of the country round about. And he arose out
of the synagogue and entered into Simon's house. And Simon's
wife's mother was taken with a great fever, and they besought
him for her. And he stood over her and rebuked
the fever, and it left her. And immediately she arose and
ministered unto them. Now when the sun was setting,
all they that had any sick with divers diseases brought them
unto him, and he laid his hands on every one of them and healed
them. And the devils also came out
of many, crying out and saying, Thou art Christ, the Son of God.
And he rebuking them, suffered them not to speak, for they knew
that he was Christ. And when it was day, he departed
and went into a desert place. And the people sought him, and
came unto him, and stayed him, that he should not depart from
them. And he said unto them, I must
preach the kingdom of God to other cities also, for therefore
am I sent. And he preached in the synagogues
of Galilee. Amen. May the Lord bless. this reading to us. Having been rejected at Nazareth,
his hometown, the Lord returns now to Capernaum, which he made
his own city. That's how it's referred to. And from here, the Lord went
out preaching. and to here he returned, Capernaum
becoming the base of his ministry operations. He may even have
had premises, he may even have had a house here, or at least
he had access to one which seems to have belonged to Simon Peter. Mark, in the parallel passage,
tells us Christ having returned to Capernaum, he was in the house,
not in a house, in the house. So it does appear as if there
was even a house that was acknowledged as being the place from which
the Lord operated. And Capernaum is always called
a city. It's not mentioned in the Old
Testament, but in the New Testament, it seems to have had such a size
as to merit the title a city. So it must have been relatively
large. It had its own customs booth,
where Matthew worked as a collector, and it also had its own synagogue. And here again, we discover,
just as in Nazareth, that the Lord is active. We're told that
the Lord Jesus taught there on Sabbath days, it's multiple. So it does appear as if he made
it a habit to go, whenever he was in Capernaum, to the synagogue
where he was welcomed, it would appear, to contribute in the
service. We're told that the Lord taught
there on Sabbath days as in Nazareth. And it might seem odd that Jesus
had freedom and opportunity to teach the congregation at Capernaum. The structure of Jewish worship
services was rather rigid and prescribed. However, ritual notwithstanding,
it seems as if the attractiveness of the Lord's person, his wisdom
in ministering from the Old Testament scriptures, and the clarity of
his doctrine, his gospel doctrine, and just the power with which
he spoke, stirred up the appetite of the local people to hear him
whenever they could. So it does appear as if this
wasn't necessarily the religious structure that invited him to
preach, but simply that the people found his words so attractive
and powerful that they clamoured to hear him. They were, we're
told, astonished at his doctrine. for his word was with power. And furthermore, not only was
Christ's doctrine and preaching delivered with power, he augmented
his doctrine with practical evidence of his divine authority by healing
the sick and casting out demons. verses that we read today, we
have three specific examples quoted of the life-changing effect
of the Lord's ministry on the local community, on the men and
women and we might assume the children of Capernaum. So in
a sense there's little wonder that many wished to hear him
preach and were enthralled at his ministry. And yet for all the enthusiasm
and the evident power, we learn that the Lord was not willing
for his true identity to be widely known and especially that the
demons that he expelled from those who were possessed, the
demons that recognised him for who he really was, the son of
God, he did not want them, he was not willing that they should
declare that information to men and women generally. so that
rather than have his true identity known, he enforced silence upon
these demons and prohibited them from saying too much too soon
with respect to his person and his true identity. And we see
that in the instances that are given to us here by Luke in this
passage. The first example that we have
actually took place in the synagogue where Jesus was preaching. And
under his preaching, it appears that this was a reaction that
came from this demon, this devil, that had possessed this man.
Here was a man, we're told, of an unclean spirit. Not simply
an unclean heart, Many, no doubt, had unclean hearts, but this
man is particularly and peculiarly identified as being possessed
by the spirit of the devil. And he came under Christ's preaching. There in the synagogue, he came
under Christ's preaching and became so agitated that it caused,
this devil caused the man to shout out in the middle of the
service. And we read about what was shouted
in verse 34. Let us alone, what have we to
do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us?
I know thee, who thou art, the Holy One of God. And it really
is quite an extraordinary declaration. You must have been able to cut
the atmosphere with a knife in that moment when that confrontation
took place. And no doubt the men and women
who were there, many of them, as has been already said, relishing
the ministry of the Lord. realised that their little gathering
had been elevated to some extreme degree because the confrontation
now taking place was at a much higher level. It had entered
into a spiritual domain. And I think that such an extraordinary
declaration cannot be explained other than to think that these
devils thought that their time of judgment had come and that
God's condemnation was about to fall upon them. And Jesus' rebuke of the evil
spirit is twofold. He commands the devil to leave
the man, which, being subject to Christ's authority, this devil
was compelled to do, though not willingly, as it appears, because
he threw the man to the ground, although he was withheld from
hurting him anymore, and secondly, Christ commanded that the devil
be silent and speak no more of who he was. The incident amazed
the synagogue congregation who marvelled at what they had seen
and heard so that we are told the fame of him went out into
every place of the country round about. The next miracle that Luke speaks
about here, and it seems to have been immediately afterwards,
that the Lord went out from the synagogue and into the home of
Peter. And Peter's mother-in-law was
there. And all of a sudden, she took
seriously ill, dramatically ill, with a fever, and the Lord was
called to her help. And the help that he gave, this
he did by simply rebuking the fever, as he later would rebuke
the wind and the waves in the storm. And like the wind in the storm,
the fever at once lessened. And Simon's wife's mother was
restored, and she arose and ministered unto them. That's what we read. She being healed at once, sought
to serve the Lord at once, no doubt in love and gratitude. And it's interesting that no
lingering weakness seemed to trouble her. Often with serious
diseases, often with fevers, there might be a long tail to
such an illness where slow recovery was required with lots of rest. But immediately this woman was
up and about her business and about the serving and ministering
to those that had come into her home for hospitality. And as
I thought about that, I thought that's the best sort of ministry
and the best sort of response to have. Peter's wife's mother,
Peter's mother-in-law, exhibited the best kind of service. Those
who obey the Lord compelled by fear, or indeed by duty, like
these evil spirits, are no match for those who serve Him in love
and thanksgiving. The devils did what the Lord
said because they feared him. But the Lord's people whom he
has blessed, they relish the opportunity of serving out of
love and gratitude. And that is a much better motivation. for our dealings with the Lord
and our service towards him. I'm sure that Simon's wife's
mother served her saviour there that day with a smile on her
face and with joy in her heart." And that little section about
Peter's mother-in-law, it ends delightfully. It says there,
now, when the sun was setting, all they that had any sick with
divers diseases brought them unto him and he laid his hands
on them every one of them and healed them. And I don't know that Luke could
have expressed himself any more comprehensively if that had been
his only motivation. He says all they any who were
sick, whatever diseases, and every one of them was healed. I think that that's a lovely
encouragement to us all. It's a lovely, it's a wonderful
encouragement to come to the Lord with all our problems because
he's big enough to receive us all. He's big enough to deal
with any sickness, with whatever diseases, with whatever troubles
and trials and problems and issues that we have, and we're told
every one of them was healed. We can come to the Lord with
all our problems. And more than that, if we just
parse those phrases a little bit, it wasn't necessarily the
sick people who came to the Lord as the well people who brought
the sick to the Lord. And there is another dimension
to our dealings for one another and our dealings in representing
one another. We can bring one another to the
Lord with all the problems that those that we love and care for
might also have. We don't need to just be limited
to our own prayers for our own needs, but for the prayers of
others. Christ healed those who were
brought to him. So let us bring one another. Let us bring our daughters and
our sons. Let us bring our grandchildren. Let us bring our relatives. Let
us bring our friends and our neighbours. Those that the Lord
lays upon our hearts, those that the Lord enables us to have affection
and concern for with respect to their souls. Hebrews chapter
13 tells us, Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and
forever. He is the same Jesus who received
them all on that day in Capernaum, and he receives them still. He who healed once is able to
heal again, body and soul. And if he will, he will. If he doesn't, then it's his
sovereign prerogative. We're told there that this happened
as the sun was setting. And I'm just going to take a
little bit of a detour on that little point. But as the sun
sets on our day, as the sun sets in our lives, and many of us
are older, Most of us here will not live as long in this world
as we've already lived. The sun is setting in our lives, but I see here the reason to
act in prayer as those who have done before. acted by way of
their deeds. We can bring them to the Lord
and we can pray for those that the Lord lays upon our hearts.
And there's another sense in which the sun was setting. This
was the sunset at the end of the Sabbath day. These people
came to Christ for healing at the very first opportunity when
freed from the legal bondage of Jewish ritual and ceremony. They were not allowed to be out
and about the healing of even their loved ones while it was
the Sabbath. But when the sunset came, as
soon as they had the opportunity, they didn't wait until tomorrow.
They came at once to the Lord. It is surely not too much to
hope that for many of these souls, the sun was setting on their
old life and a new day of spiritual life and faith in Christ was
about to dawn. In these twilight hours, as the
sun was setting on that Old Testament age, perhaps in the consciousness
of the church, Christ the Son of Righteousness was rising with
healing in his wings. It was surely so. And yet again,
so that Christ's true identity be not revealed too widely, too
soon, the devils who cried out said, thou art Christ the Son
of God, They were rebuked and admonished not to speak, for
they knew that He was Christ the Messiah. Final couple of
verses that are here, 42 to 44, tell us that the people would
have Christ stay with them. They went out into the wilderness.
Early in the morning, the Lord got up. Probably he had been
involved in healing people for much of the night, but he got
up early in the morning and went out into the wilderness to pray,
as was his want. and the people followed him out
and they constrained him, they would have him stay with them. Now there's probably a lot that
we could make and say about this point, but I just want to mention
this because time is not on our side. I just want to mention
that there are times when the Lord says no. There are times
when the Lord says no. They wanted him to stay in Capernaum. They went to him and they said,
we would have you stay with us. And he says no. We may recall
the occasion of the Gadarene demoniac, who having been cleansed
from his sin, clothed into his right mind, asked to be allowed
to go with the Lord. who said, no, rather go home
to thy friends and tell them how great things the Lord hath
done for thee and hath had compassion on thee. Here's my point. Sometimes the Lord refuses what
we ask for. Sometimes he declines to allow
what we desire. So be it. for so it seemed good
in thy sight, Father. The Lord could not stay when
the people asked him. The Lord's business at that time,
unbeknown to them, was to fulfil his purpose and to preach the
gospel of saving grace for the forgiveness of sin in many other
places. And the little phrase that the
Lord uses here, therefore am I sent, reveals the voluntary
constraint that Christ was under as part of his covenant obligations
concerning which we are often speaking. We've been speaking
about it quite widely, quite fully on the Lord's Day in recent
weeks. This is the covenant under which
Christ came into the world. These were the obligations and
the duties that fell to him. He was, amongst other things,
sent by his heavenly father to preach the good news of the kingdom,
and this he had undertaken to do. And thank God he did. It would have been terrible if
the Lord had stayed in Capernaum when asked to do so by his people. Bigger designs were at play and
greater responsibilities awaited and that has to be taken into
consideration when we ask for things as well. There's bigger
things at play in our lives and in the lives of those that we
pray for sometimes than we can comprehend in the moment. The
Saviour must go to the cross. He couldn't stay in Capernaum. This message of free grace and
eternal glory had to be preached far and wide for the gathering
of the church and the saving of the elect. And the Lord tells
us that he says to the people that he had to go and that is
what he did. And he preached in the synagogues
throughout Galilee. May the Lord continue to bless
his word as it goes forth, even to this day and beyond. And may
the Lord continue to do his work, even when it is of a bigger scale
than we can immediately comprehend. Amen. Amen.