synagogue, and I guess it's all
right to say it had become their synagogue, when men in the name
of God pretend to worship God in what they call the house of
God, refuse to bow to his word, their church is indeed their
church, not his. Their temple is their temple,
not his. Their synagogue, not his. Their game, not his worship. When the Jews at Nazareth through
the master out of their synagogue and tried to murder him because
he preached the gospel to them. Our Lord came down to Capernaum,
another Galilean city. I want us tonight to follow him
through Capernaum in one day. We will begin reading at Luke
chapter 4 and verse 31. Luke chapter 4 and verse 31. We're told here, and the Lord
Jesus came down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and taught
them on the Sabbath days. And they were astonished at his
doctrine. Underscore that. The scriptures
often talk about the Lord Jesus and his doctrine. You can't preach
and not preach doctrine. I'll talk about that a little
more. clearly taught his doctrine. For his word, the message he
preached, his word was with power. And in the synagogue there was
a man which had a spirit of an unclean devil, a demon, and cried
out with a loud voice, saying, Let us alone. The devil speaking
through him said, 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." What a confession
for a devil. And Jesus rebuked him, saying,
Hold your peace. Same word our Lord used when
he was in the ship on the troubled water and he came out and said,
Peace, be still. Same word. As he commanded the seas to be
calm and the wind to cease, so he speaks to the demons of hell
and says, Hush. Hold your peace. Come out of
him. And when the devil had thrown
him in the midst, he came out of him and heard him not. And
they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, What
word is this? For with authority and power
he commandeth the unclean spirits, and they come out. They do exactly
what he tells them to do. 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. And I never read that without
stopping to say so much for papacy. Simon's wife's mother, that one
whom the papist claimed to be the head of the Roman church,
had a mother-in-law. That means he had a wife. That
means he wasn't celibate. That means the whole thing's
a sham. 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." Now look at it immediately. Now this wasn't a headache. This
was a plague. The word fever here implies much
more than just a high temperature. It's not a bad case of the flu.
This is a plague that's normally fatal, and when one has had a
fever for a long time, rarely, rarely do they get up and go
about the house doing their daily chores. Rarely. The fever leaves
you in terrible weakness. Even when you begin to mean terribly
weak, but not when the master comes and heals as he did here.
Immediately, she arose and ministered to them. And when the sun was
setting, now remember, this is all began in the morning, and
the Master is still at it. When the sun was setting, all
they that had any sick with divers' diseases, everybody who had anybody
who needed anything from him who is everything, they brought
them to him. Somehow, I just believe if we
were really convinced we had sick, dying folks under our roof,
sick, dying folks living next door to us, sick, dying folks
under our influence, under the wrath of God Almighty, and we
really believe The Master would meet them right here. I wonder what stone we'd leave
unturned to bring them to Him. The problem is, we're not like
these folks. We become too complacent. We
become too contemptible. toward the things of our God.
Too familiar. Too familiar. But these folks,
James, had people in their house who were dying. Who were sick. Who were perishing. Who were
possessed of devils. And the Master was here. He might
not be here tomorrow. Before the sun set. Let's get
them to Him. Maybe. Don't know, but maybe.
Oh, maybe. Maybe. Maybe! He'll lay his hand
on them. And he did. And he did. Do you remember how those four
men carried their friend to the master? And they tore off the
tiles from the roof and let him down in the crowd because they
couldn't get through the crowd. They let him down through the
roof. And before all this crowd, the scripture says that he, seeing
their faith, said to the man, your sins are forgiven you. How
come? Because somebody believed he
would indeed be gracious, and he was. Read it now. When the
sun was setting, verse 40, everybody who had anybody sick, all they
that had any sick with divers diseases, brought them to the
Savior, and he laid his hands on every one of them, and healed
them. And 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." Again, notice his total dominion, 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. They
found out where he was, and they came to him. And they stayed
him. They stayed him. They got hold
of his coattails. They'll stay here. They got hold of his head
and said, Don't leave. They stayed him. That he should
not depart from them. And he said to 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. Now let's learn some lessons.
from this day in Capernaum. Number one. Our text begins and ends with
statements about our Lord preaching the gospel. And this is the lesson. Don't pass it by easily. Preaching, gospel preaching,
is God's ordained means of grace to the souls of men. Our Lord
Jesus declared I must preach the gospel, for therefore am
I sent." Preaching was his business. Our text opens with statements
concerning our Master and his doctrine, and the word of power
with which he preached. I stress this fact. Because we
live in a day in which preaching is belittled, set aside, considered
out of date in this refined world. It's, you know, a passé thing. It's not up to snuff. Now we
have contemporary religion and contemporary worship and dialogue
preaching. That means one fellow stands
over here and says, this is what I believe. Another fellow stands
over here and says, this is what I think I believe. Let's decide what's
right. Well, what's your opinion? What's your opinion? What's your
opinion? What do you think? Dialogue preaching. It's called
compromise and a denial of the authority of God's Word. Friday
afternoon I picked up the paper and noticed that they had a big
write-up about One of the campus groups, you know, two of the
campus groups got together and had a picture of them playing
the guitar, you know, and they had a great worship service.
No preaching. What was that? No preaching.
They just sang and clapped, you know, and had a good time. Wonderful
worship service. Anything that doesn't involve
pornography now, they call it worship as long as you put Jesus'
name in it. Anything. I guess even the pornography,
I don't know. Listen to me. speaks to men and
women by the mouth of saved sinners, declaring his word in the power
of his Spirit. Faith comes by hearing. It's
the only way it comes. It pleads God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. Ever beware of those
who make little of preaching. Ever beware of any tendency to
set aside the ministry of the word. The Church of God, more
than anything else, is a sounding board for the gospel. Our purpose
for existence is not the entertainment of men. Our purpose for existence
is not to make folks feel good on their way to hell. Our purpose
for existence is to preach the gospel in this generation as
widely, as far as God in his providence will make it possible.
The church is never stronger than her pulpit. The church is
strong when the pulpit is strong, and the church is irrelevant
when the pulpit is irrelevant. Which is, the gospel of God's
free grace is God's ordained means of grace to his people. It is that means by which God
saves, edifies, comforts, and directs his people in all things.
Turn to Ephesians chapter 4 for a second. Ephesians 4, where our Lord ascended up on
high as our almighty, all-prevailing, great High Priest, as our great
King, the King in Zion, sitting on his throne. He led captivity
captive and received and gave gifts unto men. In verse 11 we
are told what some of these gifts were. He gave some apostles and
some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers.
And this is the reason for the perfecting of the saints, for
the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Well, I believe that the saints
can be perfected without this. I believe that the saints can
be edified without this. I believe we can have a ministry
without this. Then you believe contrary to
this book. Preaching is not irrelevant. Now, most preaching is, but gospel
preaching is not irrelevant. Verse 13, He gave these gifts
till we all come, that is, till all God's elect come in the unity
of the faith, till we are all brought together as one in Christ,
and of the knowledge of the Son of God, and to a perfect man,
under the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, for
this purpose. that we henceforth be no more
children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every
wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness
whereby they lie in wait to deceive." Preaching is for this purpose.
This means that God saves sinners, gives faith to chosen, redeemed
sinners. It is by this means that God
edifies, gives strength, builds up his people, feeds his people. It is by this means that he comforts
and directs our lives. It is by this means that we are
established in the faith. It is by this means that we are
kept from all the wandering to and fro of heresy that arises
in our own minds and arises in the world around us. Now look
what Luke tells us about our Master's preaching. He tells
us in verses 31 and 32, And then in verses 43 and 44 of this fourth
chapter, that our Savior, as I said earlier, was a preacher
of doctrine. Now that ought to go without saying, if anybody
thought about what they're saying, is that I'd just like for folks
to preach Jesus. You can't preach him without
preaching his doctrine. Don't talk to us about doctrine. Well,
if you listen to anybody talk, they're talking about doctrine.
It may be confused doctrine, it may be insignificant doctrine,
it may be heretical doctrine, but they're telling you some
kind of doctrine. The word means teaching. Teaching. If you preach, you teach. And
our Master taught the doctrine of Holy Scripture, and all preachers
do. Dead, dry, empty doctrine is
useless, but gospel doctrine is profitable for your soul.
His doctrine was astonishing. It was astonishing. What does
that mean? Though he preached, now listen
carefully, though he preached from the same book as all their
rabbis preached from, turned to the same text as all their
doctors turned to, he taught from the same words that all
their teachers taught them. They never heard anything like
what he said in their lives. I can't tell you how many times
in the last 30 years I go somewhere and preach and somebody meet
me at the door or meet me in the parking lot. I never heard
anything like that in my life. I've been in church all my life.
I've never heard anything like that in my life. What on earth
are you talking about? Well, right there. You mean all these fellas, they
didn't see that? Apparently not. Apparently not. They were astonished. Why, nobody
ever told us these things before. They were astonished. He preached
the kingdom of God. What does that mean? He preached
who God is. On his throne, a king. He preached
the kingdom of God. He preached how it is that men
are brought into the kingdom, not by being born as Abraham's
seed, but by being born as God's seed, the seed of Abraham truly,
spiritually God's seed. The scripture tells us here that
his word fell upon the hearts of men with power. His every
word was intentional, weighty, powerful. His gospel came in
demonstration of the Spirit and in power. All right, that's the
first lesson. Preaching is God's method, God's
means of grace to sinners. Secondly, Satan and hell and demons are
real. Now, I know in this age of Hollywood, movies and all the nonsense folks
have and the perversion of history. You know, folks talk about, you
kids go to school and you learn about the Salem witch hunts.
Oh, those barbaric Puritans, they talk about witches, witches.
There are such things. There are such things. Read this
book. Demonology is real. Now I urge
you, don't dabble with it. Don't play with it. Satan is
something you don't want to face on your own. But hell is not
a fairy tale. Satan is not a boogeyman. The
demons of hell are not a myth. They're not ghosts. The demons
of hell are fallen angels. Satan's a fallen angel, bent
upon the destruction of men's souls, evil in this world, and
dishonoring God in all things. So don't play with these things.
I don't mean to suggest that these things are now, ever have
been or ever can be out of control, not at all. For this purpose
the book says Christ was manifested, that he might destroy the works
of the devil. And here in this text our Lord
demonstrates his power over all hell. He demonstrates plainly
that he is in control. Now look what the text tells
us here about the devil and his cohorts. The devil is an unclean
spirit, perverse, wicked. When he says unclean, he's not
talking about unclean like a pig stall. He's talking about unclean,
decadent, vile, base, corrupt, without a brightness, unclean. The unclean spirit works evil
in the souls of men, just as he did in their bodies during
the days of our Lord's earthly ministry. And these things came
to pass as they did, that our Master might be proven and demonstrated
clearly by his miraculous power to be the Christ of God, not
only able to heal the power of Satan in men's bodies, but in
their souls as well. The devils. Those who are under Satan's strongest
influence are often found in the house of God with folks worshiping
God. These unclean spirits and these
possessed of them were in the church on the Sabbath day. That's
where they were. And they were fine. They were
fine. They got along with everybody.
They wouldn't have been there if they hadn't been. They didn't
foam with their mouth and roll them to the floor, they didn't
act crazy until the Master came and preached the kingdom of God,
and then all hell did break loose. It did break loose, and it always
does when the gospel of God's grace is preached amongst devils. The Lord Jesus Christ heard this statement from these
devils. In verse 34, you have nothing to do with us.
You have nothing to do with us. And I'll talk more about this
Tuesday, the Lord willing. But these devils understood what
few people seemed to grasp. The Lord Jesus Christ came here
on purpose. He laid hold of and came here
to save the seed of Abraham. And these devils understood,
you didn't come here to save us. You don't have anything to
do with us. This is what we're told in Hebrews 2.16. He took
not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of
Abraham. He passed by the fallen angels alone, left them in chains
of darkness, held them there in bondage until the destruction
of the last day. These devils, in other words,
recognized his total sovereignty. Now understand this. The Lord Jesus always has Satan
and all of hell under his total control. In verses 35 and 36,
he says to hell, I love this, hold your peace, hold your peace. When Faith was a little girl,
she'd start to interrupt or something, I'd say, shh. And it didn't take
a long dough that minute. And I didn't have to say it twice.
That's all. She just crammed up. Took care
of business. Our master says to Hale, that's the end of the matter.
That's the end of the matter. You mean, you mean to put you
at ease? He has such power? Such dominion, such authority,
that hell bows to his will? Always. Always. All right, here's the third lesson. I hope you won't miss this. Knowledge
is not salvation. There's no such thing as salvation
without it. But knowledge is not salvation.
Look in verse 34. The devil said, Let us alone.
What have we to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou
come to destroy us? In another place they said, Are
you come to destroy us before the time? But we know there's
a time coming. You've already told us when you're
going to destroy us. Have you come ahead of time?
Art thou come to destroy us? I know thee, who you are. You're the Holy One of God. Now these demons, these devils,
they have faith. They have doctrinally accurate
faith. They believe that Jesus is the
Christ, the Son of God. They believe the doctrine of
the Trinity. James states it plainly. But
they don't have saving faith. And I fear for many women who
look upon unsanctified knowledge, unsanctified familiarity with
the things of God as being an evidence of salvation. You see,
spiritual knowledge, gospel knowledge, a saving knowledge of Christ,
is accompanied by faith. It inspires hope, and it produces
love. This unsanctified knowledge is
a dangerous snare by which many are taken to hell. It's a positive
curse. We must never be content. I don't know how to say this
like it needs to be said. We must never be content with
knowing facts and data and history and trivia about the Bible. When you ladies teach Sunday
school, I don't have to say this to Shelby, I know because she's
been around me a long time. When you sit in her class and
you teach your children, don't teach them trivia. Don't teach
them Bible games. Don't do that. That makes this book a game.
This is not a game. Play games with Sears and Roebuck
catalog. Play games with American history, not with this book.
Not with his book. Mere thoughts are not gospel
knowledge. Mere ability to quote and recite
scripture is not gospel knowledge. We must seek to know God himself. What did our Lord say? This is
life eternal, that they should know all about you, the living
God. But that's not what he said. That's not what he said. This
is life eternal, that they might know thee. Knowing about you
and knowing you is two different things. You understand that? I know about Stonewall Jackson.
He was a tremendous man, but I never met the fellow. I don't
know him. I know about Bill Clinton, but
I never met him. I don't know him. I don't really
know him. I've just seen his picture a time or two, heard
him talk a time or two, but I've never sat down and met with him.
I don't know him. I don't know him. And knowing about Christ
is not knowing Christ. Now you've got to know about
him to know him, but you can sure know everything on this
earth about him and never know him. Salvation, Lindsay, is knowing
him. It's knowing him. Here are some
questions worth considering. I understand the doctrine of total
depravity. I understand it. I can give you
the scripture proof. I can defend it. I can set it
forth so clearly that nobody with good sense can deny it from
the scriptures. But that's meaningless if my
knowledge of sin doesn't make me hate my sin. I understand the doctrine of
God's electing love and grace, I rejoice in it. But anybody
can figure that out. I heard a fellow say one time,
some men can't believe this and not be saved. The devils do. They said, what do you have to
do with us, what do we have to do with you? You didn't come
here to save us. They understood it. Anybody can
understand election. But my knowledge of election
is of no profit to my soul. if it doesn't compel me to love
him who loved me from eternity. Does my knowledge of Christ cause
me to trust him, love him, seek to honor him? Does my knowledge
of God's will cause me to seek in all things to do his will?
Does my knowledge of doctrine make me useful to others? Does my knowledge of God's grace
make me gracious. If not, my knowledge is useless
knowledge." There is one more thing. The Lord Jesus Christ is a mighty
Savior. In our text, verses 38-42, we
read earlier, we see demons and disease alike fleeing before
his word. By the touch of his hand the
fever is removed and the fainting body is made strong. These events
are recorded with divine intention to fix our hearts and our minds
upon the fact that our Lord Jesus Christ is the gracious, omnipotent
healer of all the evil sin has brought into the world. Christ
is the antidote for the serpent's poison. He's the remedy for our
ruin. Christ is the physician for our
sin-sick souls. He is life. He is health. He is liberty. The way the book
puts it is this. Christ is all and in all. Now, Paul Wendell, if he's able
to speak a word and cast out a devil, if he's able to lay
his hand on a perishing woman, remove her fever and make her
If he's able to say to hell and hell obey him, he's able
also to save to the uttermost every sinner who comes to God
by him. He's a mighty Savior, a mighty
Savior. And there never was one, never
was one who came to him who wasn't saved by him. Never. Never. I hear fellows preach
sometimes they act like they're scared to death. Some of the
non-elect are going to get saved. It'll be alright, just come on.
Just come on. There never was a sinner. There
never was a sinner who came to Christ and was turned away. Never. You won't be the first, I promise
you. If you come, it's because he before the world began chose
you. He's redeemed you by His blood. He's called you by His
grace. Oh, may God be pleased now to
bring you to Him. And may He be pleased to lay
His hand of grace on you and heal you. Amen. All right, let you listen.