Pardon me for being so late to
get this thing on. Luke chapter 4, did you find
it? All right. This is a background reading
passage. Our text actually comes from
John chapter 15. But this will be one of the passages
that we make reference to in regard to working on that subject
that is our text for this morning. Our Lord Jesus said these words,
they hated me without a cause. For no reason at all, they hated
me. Let's find out what it is that
causes people to hate the Lord Jesus. Why do I hate Him? And why perhaps you can say,
if you're born again, why did I hate Him? But you cannot say,
I never hated him. I can get a hundred statements
out of this Bible in short order to declare that to be false.
And the most glaring illustration of all in the whole of the Scriptures
is this passage in Luke chapter 4. Our Lord has just begun His
public ministry. That takes That takes care of
the first 13 verses of Luke chapter 4, his treatment of the temptation
of Christ in the wilderness. And chapter 4 of Luke and verse
14 and 15 cover a reasonable amount
of time, more so than you might imagine, in which the Lord Jesus
went to the various synagogues in the region of Galilee, which
was a despised part of the overall body of land that the Jews inhabited
at this time. And so verse 14 is chosen by
God the Holy Spirit of all of the places that He visited during
this period of time. Here's the one that God has purposed
to put in front of us in our Bibles. Everywhere he went and
everything he did and all that he said did not make it in this
book. This nowhere claims to be an
exhaustive treatment of what the Lord Jesus did while he was
on this earth for 33 years. But here's what happened in the
synagogue at Nazareth where our Lord Jesus was not born but was
raised. Almost 30 years of his life spent
in this little tiny village called Nazareth. So verse 16 reads, I should point out in verse 15,
it tells you that in all those other synagogues, it says, he taught in their synagogues
being glorified of all. Now watch what happens at Nazareth.
Verse 16, And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up.
And as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath
day and stood up to read. And there was delivered unto
him the book of the prophet Isaiah. It's actually a scroll. And when
he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,
quote, coming straight out of Isaiah, the Spirit of the Lord
is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the
poor. He sent me to heal the brokenhearted. to preach deliverance to the
captives and the recovering of sight to the blind and to set
at liberty them that are bruised. And all of those things are describing
a person's spiritual state. Now, there are people who are
poor literally. But the emphasis of our Bible
is not on the bodies of men, it is on the souls of men. And
all of these things together form a complete statement of
what our Lord Jesus came here to do in regard to our poor souls. So he begins to read in verse
18, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, Because he's anointed
me to preach the gospel to the poor. Now first and foremost,
the poor in spirit. Because in Matthew chapter 5
in the Beatitudes, blessed are the poor in spirit. So this is
a state that only God can put us in. Poverty of spirit is not
something we run around talking about when we're talking about
ourselves. Sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives, the recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised. All of
these to be taken, first of all, in a spiritual sense. Nobody
is trying to debate the fact that Christ literally He gave
people physical sight. It's in our Bibles for a purpose.
It's a type of what He does to the souls of men in His grace.
These crazy preachers in our generation that claim they're
healing all these people, if they are, it ain't God's power,
it must be the devil's. Because that's as false as a
three dollar bill. No legitimacy whatsoever. nor
need there be." Verse 19, "...to preach the acceptable year of
the Lord." Our Savior closed the book, gave it again to the
deacon, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that
were in the synagogue were fastened on Him. They've heard all about
His trips to these all these surrounding villages and cities
and places. They've heard what He did in
those places. And they have said to themselves,
oh, He'll have to do more than that here. We have claims on
Him that nobody else has. Began to say unto them, this
day is this scripture fulfilled and all bear Him witness. and
wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth. And they said, Is not this Joseph's
son? He said unto them, You will surely
say unto me this proverb, Position, heal yourself, that is, prove
yourself to us who you are. whatsoever we've heard done in
Capernaum, do also here in your country." And he said, verily,
I say unto you, no prophet is accepted in his own country,
but I tell you of a truth. Many widows were in Israel in
the days of Elijah when the heavens were shut up three years and
six months. Isaiah proclaimed a drought of
three and one-half years, and it didn't end until God told
him to go stand on top of Mount Carmel after that took place between him and all
the prophets of Baal. You announce that the drought
is ending. This little tiny cloud coming
off the Mediterranean Sea. People read their Bibles and
say, I don't believe that. They're stupider than I thought. And so am I. If I don't, the
Lord Jesus did. Now that makes it serious, doesn't
it? If He believed it and I don't, somebody's wrong. Not hard to
figure out who. It's me. Verse 24. Our Lord said
to that crowd at Nazareth on that Sabbath, Verily I say unto
you, no prophet is accepted in his own country. They're surprised
at what he did not do. But I tell you a truth. Many
widows were in Israel in the time of Elijah the prophet. The
heaven was shut up three years and six months when great famine
was throughout all the land. We talk about droughts, and they
are not even in the same book with this one. This is unheard
of. But unto none of them, not a
single widow in Israel was Elijah sent to. but unto Sarepta, a
Gentile city, to a Gentile woman, a city of Sidon, unto a woman
that was a widow. And many lepers were in Israel
in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed
except Naaman the Syrian. And all they in the synagogue,
when they heard these things, were filled with wrath, They
rose up, physically, bodily thrust Him out of the city. Had our
Lord not been willing to go, they couldn't have moved one
single fraction of an inch. But He accompanies them. They
think they're carrying Him out there to the edge of this mountain
so they can throw Him off and kill Him on the rocks below.
They rose up, thrust Him out of the city. led him unto the
brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might
cast him down headlong." You know, churches claiming to be
Christians are filled with people who will say to what we've just
read, gentlemen, I would not do that. And I say to you, yes,
we would, only God preventing Yes, we will be passing through
the middle of them undeterred. I don't think even disappointed
because the very next statement in our Bibles is came down. I mean, if I'm reading this right,
there is not even the end of a sentence between verse 30 and
31. He went back to Capernaum. He
began to do the very same things that he had been doing before
he came. Our text is found in what chapter did I say? John
chapter 15 maybe? Yes. It's three verses long. One of our greatest problems
when it comes to reading our Bibles comes from looking at almost all the passages in Scripture
as though it were referring to someone other than ourselves. And that is not the case. Let's try reading now, beginning
at verse... Let's pray together. You save us by Your grace. Help
us to read our Bibles, deferring things to ourselves. Cause us
to flee to Christ as our only hope. The only ground and means
of our acceptance in Your sight is none other than Christ and
Him crucified. Lord, on this particular day,
the first Sunday of a new year, our understanding to receive and embrace what we
read. We cannot do this on our own. It is a spiritual exercise. Therefore, it cannot be accomplished
apart from Your grace. Lord, please come in our midst. We don't ask for anything, as
far as the eye of man is concerned, anything unusual. We just believe
that if you don't bless your work and honor and glory to your
son. John 15, 22, if I had not come
and spoken unto them, referring to a previous example, if I had
not come and spoken unto them, literally the King James says
they had not had sin, that is, I take to mean they would not
have had sin. He that hates me hates my father
also. If I had not done among them
the works which none other man did, there it is again, they
had not had sin. Would not have sin. But now have
they both seen and hated both me and my father. But this comes
to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that is written
in their law." One time in Psalm 35 and a second time in Psalm
69, verse 4, I think it is, they hated me without a cause for no reason at all,
God and His Son. Every one of us would rather
be saved on the merit system if we were left to human reasoning,
because we think we can do some things other people simply can't
or will not do. But I'm telling you when it comes
to spiritual things, to your utmost, your very best, and beyond
your best, and it doesn't count. For God has purposed that His
mercy and His grace is to be given to undeserving, hell-deserving
sinners, so that all the glory may go to His Son, our blessed
Lord Jesus Christ. Now that's where things really
are, right there. All right, let's get down to
business. Let's go back to Luke. Did I tell you to hold your place?
I probably didn't. You got me flustered when you
all got quiet so early, you know, and didn't get everything done. Now, did you understand what
I meant when I said this statement, they hated me without a cause?
That it's talking about you and me, and we're either in that
state now or we used to be. I think, I hope, I pray. I'm not in that state now, but
I could be, and you not know it. And you could be, and I not
know it. So let's take this up just for
a minute or two. If you know anything about your
Bible at all, you know that there are many passages in the Old
Testament that describe the treatment that will be afforded the Messiah
when He comes. Isaiah is one of those prophets,
and the 53rd of Isaiah is nothing but 1 through 12 verses describing
this awful, awful treatment of the Lord Jesus Christ at our
hands. We despised and rejected Him,
did not want Him, would not have Him. The 22nd Psalm, from beginning
to end, is altogether a statement of the treatment given to the
Lord Jesus on Calvary's tree. Some people even believe, and
they may even be right, that the little statements that we
have, I forget how many there were, when Christ was hanging
on the tree, is it seven or eight? I don't remember. Maybe seven.
Like, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? that Psalm 22
is a full description of all the words that he spoke hanging
on that cross. The only ones that are given
to us in the four Gospels amount to about seven, and they're really
short and brief. But the point is that prophets
and other writers in the Old Testament Scriptures wrote that
the Redeemer would be despised and rejected and hated by men. When did this hatred begin to
manifest itself? No sooner than the Lord Jesus
was born in human flesh. No sooner than that. There was
a king there by the name of Herod, and he's the one that the wise
men on their way to Bethlehem stopped and had some conversation
with this king because he was certain that this king would
ruin his rule, perhaps take his throne. And so he urges these
wise men, after they have found the Christ and worshiped him,
to come back and tell him where he could find him. He, of course,
didn't divulge all of that to them. As far as he's concerned,
they think he wants to go worship him. So an angel appears to them
and tells them to go back where they came from a different way.
And Herod finds out that they're not coming back. What does he
do? He takes not only Nazareth but
a big swath of land all around it and decrees that every male
child under two years of age be put to death. And the angel
appeared to Joseph who was instructed to take our Lord to Egypt. until
Herod's threat was no longer there. The Lord directed him
to return at Herod's death, come back, and they made their home
in Nazareth. This hatred, when did it begin? At his birth. When did it end? At the cross. No relief, none
whatsoever. One of the things that just gripes
me about funerals in our day, you'll notice it doesn't fit
anything else. We'll say about somebody, the preacher will say,
this man never got angry. Nobody ever said anything bad
about this person. My Lord, what'd you do? Keep
him in cold storage. Some people ain't worth their
salt. And there are some things worth getting mad about. The
gospel is one of them. The rest of them ain't nothing
to them compared to the gospel. But a man ought to defend the
honor of his family, of his friends, of his spouse. But what about
the Lord Jesus? They hated me without a cause. I probably don't have time to
prove this, so I'm just going to make a statement. I think
I'll prove it as we go through some scriptures here to look
at. But several times in our Bibles,
it comes to light that the people who are most upset at the Lord
Jesus, their hatred is not rooted in what he did. It's rooted in
what he said. Let me show you that now real
quickly if we can. Let's see, first of all, John
chapter 10. And we'll keep all of our references,
I think I can anyway, in the four Gospels and most of them
in John's Gospel. John chapter 10. Now I can't go back very far
from where I need to be in this chapter because you know how
you are. I won't ever get there. John chapter 10, our Lord has
just said about His sheep that He will not lose a single one
of those souls that God gave to Him in old eternity in the
covenant of grace. And here he's talking about those
sheep. You remember these famous words
back down in verse 26 in John chapter 10, speaking to the Jews
that are always dogging his steps and trying to find some ground
to arrest him on and all this kind of stuff. He said to them,
but you believe not. Why? Because You are not of My
sheep." Oh, wait a minute, preacher. You're preaching election. I
ain't preaching nothing. That's Christ doing that. I'm
just reading. My sheep hear My voice, verse
27, and I know them and they follow Me. I mean, He makes a
blanket statement. It says every last one of His
sheep follow Him. any experience at all, you know
that our following, it ain't always a straight path, is it?
Sometimes to the right, sometimes to the left, and sometimes we
go backwards. But our Savior is still in command. Verse 28, And I give unto them
eternal life. Don't try to make that hard.
Eternal? What does it mean? It means eternal. I give unto them eternal life. They didn't deserve it. We didn't
merit it. He gives it freely because it's
by His grace. I give unto them eternal life
and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of My hand." Now watch this carefully. Here's one of the
answers to our question why we hate Him so much. My Father which
gave them to Me, just how does this work? God gives to God. God the Father gives to God the
Son, a people to live on this earth generation by generation. until all his sheep are in the
fold. My Father which gave them me
is greater than all, and no man can pluck them out of my Father's
hand." And then this simple, short, brief, wonderful statement,
verse 30, And the word my is italicized. I'm told that there should be
the word the, T-H-E, in front of the father. But if you disagree,
I'm not interested in debating it. I and the father are one. One God, three persons. And all of a sudden, the conversation
stops. And verse 31 says, then the Jews
take up stones to stone him. That is the very
thing that they do not long from now to the martyr Stephen in
Acts chapter 7. All right? Here's one answer. Why did they hate him? with so
much hatred. Why do I hate Him with so much
hatred? Because He's God. He's not ashamed to say it. He
tells us plainly. He told them just as matter-of-factly
as you could say it. As far as the way it appears
in our Bibles, it's isolated to one verse and it's just a
phrase. But oh, what a phrase! I and
the Father are one." If we have any sense, we say, glory hallelujah,
because if He ain't God, He can't redeem us. It's God's blood flowing
in those veins. There is a fountain filled with
blood drawn from where? Emmanuel's veins. And sinners
plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains. And
that's the only place they can lose it. Put off a single sin
by trying to pay for it with something you do. That's called
penance. Let me have one more little look
at that for you. We're right here in John, so
it's not far. Chapter 18. You've seen this
before, I'm sure, but let me show you this. Shoot, I know some of you forgot
it, but some of you might never have heard it, so I'll act like
none of you have heard it. John chapter 18. Now, what's
the subject? Why did we as well as they hate
Christ without a cause? Because He said He's God. All right. John chapter 18. I can't remember my verse. Just
a second. Now I've got it. Okay, verse 3. Judas has betrayed
our Savior. This is John 18, verse 3. And
Judas then, having received a band of men, that word band generally
means 500 men, a company of 500, as well as officers from the
chief priests and Pharisees They came there with lanterns and
torches and weapons. Now the Lord Jesus and His disciples
are in a remote area of this garden and our Lord comes forward. Jesus, therefore knowing all
things that should come upon Him, went forth, this is the
middle of the night, they went forth and said unto them, Whom
seek you? Who are you looking for? They
answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus said unto them, I am."
Now notice the word he is italicized. It truly does not belong in that
statement. Because this statement about I am is the very same God
at the burning bush that spoke to Moses when he was commissioning
him to go to Egypt. And Moses said, hey, wait just
a minute now. Who am I going to tell them has
sent me to deliver them from their Egyptian bondage? And what
was the answer? I am that I am. That's exactly
what is in front of us in this statement. As soon then as he
had said, I am, they went backward and fell to the ground. A couple
hundred people, ugly guys, rough people fall to the ground. I
hear that God can do that. You and I can't blow a leaf off
a tree just speaking a word. Verse 7, they get up off the
ground. This is the part that's hard
to believe. And they ask Him again. Whom seek you? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Verse 8, look at it real carefully.
Jesus answered, I told you that I am. If therefore you seek me,
let these go their way. Now if the power were in the
right words, then every time he spoke, I am, it would have
consequences that are visible to the human eye. So why in verse
8 is there no effect on those that came to arrest him? Where
back in verse 5, there's an obvious, obvious difference of what took
place. My take on that is this. I don't
know if this is right or wrong, It's the only thing I know to
say. I ain't no theologian. Wish I were more than I am, but
it's too late for that. You and I can read this book
privately or publicly, and we cannot cause or determine the
outcome. But God can take words that men
and women say and raise a soul to life. The point is this. In verse 5, the Lord Jesus breathes
His power into those words and they accomplish His purpose.
In verse 7, He just matter-of-factly repeats it without attaching
any converting or convicting power. that these people that
were the recipients of that first I Am, they're so intelligent
they'd get up and come back to do it a second time. That's us. That's me. All right? Let me
rely on your memory. Here's the second thing. In Luke
4, when we were reading about those two incidents, the one
with Elijah and the other with the prophet Elisha, What was
there about those two illustrations that brought such anger, I mean
passionate anger, against the Son of God, so much so that His
own relatives and friends were ready to throw Him off the side
of the mountain? What on earth? What was He saying
when He gave those two illustrations? It is simply this. God saves
whomever He pleases. The person that He saves has
nothing that God needs. It is sovereign grace and sovereign
mercy. This is taught in the Old Testament
as well as the New. That's the problem. The true
gospel proclaims a God who sovereignly saves his. We don't begin the
matter, God begins and we respond. It ain't the other way around.
Religion today is totally opposite of what is true. Obviously it
was that way at the synagogue in Nazareth when our Lord walked
this earth. All right, the third one, in
John chapter 8. Look at verse 59, that's the
last verse of John chapter 8. Before, I'm not reading it correct. Then took they up stones to cast
at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple going
through the middle of them. Now whether he made himself invisible
or simply blinded their eyes or whatever else may have taken
place, I don't know. The mechanics of it is not important. It's what he did because of what
he said. Everybody loves this sweet little
Jesus, boy, but everybody doesn't love the Christ of Calvary. Oh,
I follow his example. You're a liar. We don't. We wish we could. But we don't. Well, let me take you through
my verses. I've got them written here in a certain order. Look
back at verse 24. This is John 8, verse 24. I said
therefore unto you that you shall die in your sins. For if you
believe not, here it is again, that I am. What do you mean I
am? I am God. There's none else,
not anybody like me. If you believe not that I am,
you shall die in your sins. You mathematicians tell me right
quick how many generations since the beginning of time have lived
on this earth and every last single one of them without Christ,
you shall die in your sin. Now, if there's one thing We
don't want. It is to die in our sins. With our sins unforgiven. Not
under the blood of Christ. You can die without money. You
can die without health. You can die without about everything
else. But you don't want to die in your sins. Alright, look at
verse 44. I need to read this whole chapter
to bring you up to speed as we go through it. I won't make you
promise you're going to do it, but I wish you would read it
this very day. Verse 44, you are of your father the devil,
and the lust of your father you will do. He, the devil, was a
murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth, because
there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks
it of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it. In verse
45, and because I tell you the truth, you talk about a statement
turned around, but that one is the way it's worded in our Bibles.
It's unbelievable that we can be so blind, so wicked, hate
God so much. We believe Him not because Christ
tells us the truth. Look at verse 47. He that is
of God hears God's words. You therefore hear them not because
you're not of God. Look at verse 55. Yet you have
not known Him. This is the Lord Jesus still
speaking, starting in verse 54. Yet you have not known Him, but
I know Him. And if I should say I know Him
not, I shall be a liar like you. But I know Him and keep His sayings."
Alright, next in verse 58, Jesus said unto them, verily, verily,
those words literally mean amen, amen. I say unto you, before
Abraham was I am. Do you realize how many times
He said in our Bibles, I am? Then took they up stones to cast
at Him. But Jesus hid Himself and went
out of the temple, and going through the middle of them, and
so passed by. And to show you there's nothing
else between that statement, not a lapse of time between chapters
8 and chapter 9, it says he passed by the last two words of verse
59 and the fourth word in verse 9, chapter 1, and as Jesus passed
by, he meets this blind man. Is this the one that's at the
Pool of Bethesda? I think it is. No, this is a different one. This was the guy that was born
blind. The Lord Jesus tells the truth, a whole truth, and nothing
but the truth. It's a terrible thing to have
a hope only to discover on Judgment Day. It's a false hope. and Him crucified. Our last hymn comes out of the
chorus book.