Would you turn back to Luke 4?
Tonight, after the service, we're going to recognize our graduating
seniors. So everybody is invited to that. He healed them that had need
of healing. I hope and pray that might describe
every one of us this morning. He healed them that had need
of healing. The Lord had just been baptized
and the voice came from heaven. This is my beloved son, in whom
I am well pleased." There was somebody there at that time and
his name was Satan. He heard that voice from heaven. And we read in chapter four,
beginning in verse one, and Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost
returned from Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
being 40 days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did
eat nothing, and when they were ended, he afterward hungered,
and the devil said unto him, if thou be the Son of God, He
heard the father speak from heaven. This is my beloved son in whom
I'm well pleased. If you are, if thou be the son
of God, prove it. Command this stone that it may
be made bread. And Jesus answered him saying,
it is written. And don't miss the importance
of that. How does the Lord answer the devil? He could have just
destroyed him, but he answers him with an, it is written. That man should not live by bread
alone, but by every word of God. And the devil, taking him up
into a high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of
the world in a moment of time. And the devil said unto him,
all this power will I give thee in the glory of them, for that
is delivered unto me. Who delivered unto him? God did.
He gave him this power. And to whomsoever I will, I give
it. If thou therefore will worship
me, all shall be thine. And Jesus answered and said unto
him, get thee behind me, Satan, for it's written. There we have
it again. For it's written, thou shalt worship the Lord thy God
and him only shalt thou serve. And he brought him to Jerusalem
and set him on a pinnacle of the temple and said unto him,
If thou be the Son of God, prove it. Cast thyself down from hence,
for it is written. Now the devil uses the scriptures. It's written. He shall give his
angels charge over thee to keep thee. And in their hands they
shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against
the stone. And Jesus answering said unto him, it is said, it
is written, thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. And when the
devil had ended all the temptations, he departed from him for a season. He was utterly unable. There wasn't anything for him
to work with, with the Lord. He said in another place, Satan
has come and he's found nothing in me. Nothing he could get hold
of. And Jesus returned, verse 14, in the power of the Spirit
into Galilee. And there went out a fame of
him throughout all the region round about. And he taught in
their synagogues, being glorified of all. And he came to Nazareth,
where he'd been brought up. They were excited. I'm sure there
was a buzz going on. This hometown boy who has done
all these great things and performed these mighty miracles we've heard
of. There was a buzz. He's coming home. He returns
to Nazareth. And as his custom was, he went
into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for to read. And there was delivered unto
him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And he read a passage of scripture
that we would find in Isaiah chapter 61, the first three verses. And when he opened the book,
he found the place where it was written. The spirit of the Lord
is upon me because he hath anointed me. to preach the gospel to the
poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. And he closed the book and gave
it to the minister and sat down and the eyes of all them that
were in the synagogue were fastened on him. Now at this time, they
knew what he was saying. The spirit of the Lord is upon
me. He hath anointed me. He has sent
me. They knew exactly what he was
talking about and they were astonished. Their eyes were fastened on him.
I bet you could have heard a pin drop at this time. As he says,
the spirit of the Lord is upon me. He hath anointed me to preach
the gospel to the poor. He hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted. Now, before we move on, I want
us to consider these grace words that he used. Remember, they
all wondered at the grace words that proceeded out of his mouth. Now, they'll only be grace words
to a certain type of person, because as we go on reading in
this passage of scripture, these grace words made some people,
most of the people, so mad. I guess all the people so mad.
They took him up to the brow where the city was built to throw
him off of a cliff. And from what I have read, when
you did that, then you proceeded to stone somebody. They were
going to put him to death over these grace words. But let's
consider these grace words. He said, he sent me to preach
the gospel to the poor, to the broken hearted, to captives, prisoners in a cell
who cannot get out, to the blind, to the crushed, and do the slaves. He sent me to preach the gospel
to the poor. Those who have nothing. Those who have nothing to recommend
them to God. If it only takes a dollar's worth
of merit for me to come up with, I can't do it. Somebody that's
poor. has absolutely nothing. You can't claim any sin conquered. You can't claim any change in
your life as to why God would do something for you. You have
nothing. Broken hearted. Now this is not
talking about somebody's heart being broken in the romantic
sense. Everybody's experienced that. It's not talking about
your heart being broken over your children. What it's talking
about is a broken heart. A heart that doesn't work. A
heart that is no good. That's the broken hearted person
he's talking about. It's desperately wicked according
to the scriptures, deceitful. above all things. And God looked
and God saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth and
that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only
evil continually. He came to preach deliverance
to the captives. Captives. You're locked up and
can't get out. You're a prisoner and there's
nothing you can do to make it any different. When you hear
somebody say something about free will, you know it's foolishness.
You can't will yourself out of this. You're locked in a cell
and can't get out. Captive. Blind. You cannot see anything
about you that would bring God's favor. Crushed. Send at liberty them that are
bruised, that are crushed. Nothing works. And everybody
I've read says verse 19, and I think it is what it's talking
about, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, the year of
jubilee. You're sold into slavery. like Gomer on the auction block,
sold into slavery. And there's nothing you can do
to get out of this. Somebody says, well, I'm not
like that. I'm sorry. But that means there's
no mercy for you. That means there's no grace word
for you if you're not like that. The only people who will hear
these words as grace words are the people who fit this description. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me, the Lord says. God giveth not the Spirit by
measure unto him. He hath anointed me. This is
the words of Christ. And everybody knew exactly what
he is saying. He hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the
poor. Now, this is good news if you're
poor. If you have, I'm not talking
about the way you used to be, I'm talking about right now,
if you're poor. If you have absolutely nothing
to recommend you If you have something, it disqualifies
you. Let not conscience make you linger,
nor fitness fondly dream. The only fitness he requires
is to have a need of him. The whole need not a physician,
but they that are sick. Now, every aspect of the gospel
is free. Let me repeat that. Every aspect
of the gospel is free. It was great cost to Christ,
great cost to the father. but it's free to everybody he
saves because salvation is by grace. Now, what does that mean? Salvation is by grace. Everybody
would say, yeah, I believe that. I agree. Salvation is by grace.
I give my two cents to that. I'll put my stamp of approval
on that. But what does it really mean? Well, Ephesians 2, 8 and
9 says, for by grace are you saved through faith and that
not of yourselves, not of works, lest any man should boast. Now
that's what grace means, not of works. There is absolutely
nothing you do or pay to get this. God's grace refuses to be assisted
by your works. Aren't you glad? Grace is either absolutely free
of all influence by us or it's not grace at all. Now, who will receive this? Somebody
that has nothing. Somebody that is poor. A broken heart. You sent me to
heal the broken heart and a broken heart is a heart beyond Repair. It's broken. What do you do with
something that is broken and can't be fixed? You throw it
away. It's that useless. Broken hearted. You know, I hear
preachers say, ask Jesus into your heart. Where's that in the Bible? Ask
Jesus into your heart. You'd be far more wise to ask
him to give you a new heart. or to say with David, create
in me a clean heart, oh God. Mine's filthy and defiled and
beyond repair. Give me a new heart. If you're captive in a cell,
a prison cell, the door locked, you can't get out. The only hope
you have is for someone to set you free. Somebody's going to
have to do it all for you because you can't get out. Somebody's going to have to come
and rescue you if you're a captive, if the Son shall make you free. If the Son offers you freedom
and you take it, that still puts the, in your hand. No, if the
Son shall make you free. Rescue you from yourself. Save
you from yourself. Save you from your prison. Say,
Lord, save me. If the Son shall make you free,
you'll be free indeed. And you know, actually where
it says to preach deliverance to the captives, that word deliverance
is the word that's generally translated forgiveness. You know,
the only way you'll be freed is if all your sins are forgiven.
And do you know that Salvation begins with the forgiveness of
sins. It doesn't end. If you do this,
this and that, you'll have your sins forgiven. No, it begins
with the full, complete, frank, free forgiveness of sins. And he speaks of recovering of
sight. You're made to see. If you're
blind, the only way you can see is if he gives you sight. And
you know, when he gives you sight, you see. You see. Christ said, I am the way, the
truth, and the life. I see. I see. He is the way. He is the truth. He is the life. I see. By grace
are you saved. I see. Christ is all I see. A lot of folks never see that. If you're crushed, you're totally
depraved. And it's true. The only way that
you can be saved is to be set at liberty by his grace. And
I love this 19th verse to preach the acceptable year of the Lord,
the year of Jubilee. Now, this is so, this concept
in the Old Testament is so amazing. Can you imagine if this was going
on today? Every 50 years, a silver trumpet would blow that would
usher in the year of Jubilee. And on this year, all your debts
were canceled. You were no longer in debt. Everything
you lost was restored to you. If you were a slave, You were
set free. And the year was given, or the
land was given one full year of rest. You didn't have any
work to do. You had a year's vacation. Now
can you imagine how you would feel when this silver trumpet
sounded? The year of jubilee. Now what
I think is interesting is that we don't have any example in
the scripture of this year ever being observed. It was a commandment,
but we don't have any instance in the scripture where it was
ever observed. And I'll tell you why. There's
a lot of folks, how would you feel if all of a sudden all the
money somebody owed you was canceled and they were set free? You wouldn't
like that, would you? You wouldn't like it at all. You wouldn't
like it if what you had gained through their loss and you paid
for it, it was restored back to them and you lost by it. You
would not like it at all if your slaves were set free and now
you had to do everything. There were some people who absolutely
hated the thought of the year of Jubilee because of all they'd
lose by it. But there were some people who
loved the year of Jubilee. debtors, people who were slaves, people
who had lost everything. Oh, it was good news to them.
But what about when the Lord says this day is this scripture,
jubilee fulfilled in your ears. Verse 21, As their eyes were fastened on
him after he made this glorious statement, and he began to say
unto them, this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. I am
the fulfillment. And all bear him witness and
wondered at the gracious words, the grace words, which proceeded
out of his mouth. And they said, is not this Joseph's
son? They heard these words of grace
in answer to the ancient prophecy in Psalm 45, grace is poured
from his lips. But their response was, is not
this the son of Joseph? We've known him all of our life.
We saw him go to school. He played with our kids. Is not
this Joseph? Now these people believed in
Christ, but they didn't believe he was the one. They did not
believe that he was the one. It couldn't be him. It couldn't
be him. Look how our Lord answered them. And he said unto them, you will
surely say unto me this proverb, physician, heal thyself whatsoever
we've heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.
Prove it to us too. And he said, verily I say unto
you, no prophet is accepted in his own country. Turn with me
for a moment to Matthew chapter 13. He said this on another occasion,
Matthew chapter 13. beginning in verse 53. And it
came to pass that when Jesus had finished these parables,
he departed thence. And when he's come to his own
country. He taught them in their synagogue insomuch that they
were astonished and said, whence hath this man this wisdom and
these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son?
Is not his mother called Mary and his brethren James and Joseph
and Simon and Judas? And his sisters, are they not
all with us? Whence then hath this man all
these things? And they were offended in him. But Jesus said unto them,
a prophet is not without honor. save in his own country and in
his own house. And he did not many mighty works
there because of their unbelief. They could not see the Lord in
this light. Now, if a man is truly called
by God to preach the gospel and you can't see it, who's the loser in that equation? That's a solemn thing, isn't
it? They heard the prophet and said, this could not be him. Now look how he answered this.
Back to our text in Luke 4. This is how he dealt with this
attitude. And let me also say this, in
the New Testament, now it doesn't mean there's not one example
of anybody from Nazareth being saved. And maybe there was, but
we don't have an example of anybody. Where he was raised up, there's
not one example of anyone in Nazareth being saved by the grace
of God. Not one. They looked at him and
said, is not this the carpenter's son? And look at the way the
Lord dealt with this. Verse 25. I tell you of a truth. Many widows were in Israel, In
the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years
and six months, when great famine was throughout all the land,
but unto none of them was Elijah sent, save unto Sarepta, the
city of Sidon, a Gentile, unto a woman that was a widow. And
many lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet.
None of them were cleansed, save Naaman the Syrian." Now, there
are two words I want us to zero in on those verses. Sent and
cleansed. Sent and cleansed. He was not sent to any widow
in Israel, only a Gentile. But he wasn't sent to those Israelite
widows. If Christ was not sent by God
to save me, there is no hope of me being saved. Now the fact
of the matter is, according to the scripture, Christ was not
sent for everybody. He said, I'm not sent but to
the lost sheep of the house of Israel, God's elect, God's people. If he's not sent for me, I will
not be saved. And I need to be cleansed. I
can't cleanse myself any more than I can create the universe.
I need to be cleansed. And we read that none of those
lepers were cleansed. except for a Gentile leper that
God cleansed. I understand exactly what the
leper meant when he said, Lord, if you will You can make me clean. This is what I'm sure of. I can't
make myself clean. I have to be cleansed. Oh, Lord,
cleanse me. Now, the Israelite lepers were
all passed by. And what he's doing, he's addressing
their unbelief at this time. Is not this the carpenter's son? How can we believe what he says?
And I thought of John chapter six, verse 36, where he said, You see me and do not believe. You see me and you do not believe. You know what he said next? All
that the father giveth me shall come to me. You may not believe,
but all that the father giveth me will. Every one of them will
come to me. and him that cometh to me, I
will in no wise for no reason cast out. Verse 28. And all they in the synagogues,
synagogue, when they had heard these things were filled with
joy. wrath. They became furious. You
see, when you take salvation out of men's hands and show them
they're in God's hands, and their salvation is completely up to
Him, they have no control in this. Well, people get angry.
They get furious. These people became furious.
Look what they did. And all they in the synagogue,
when they heard these things, were filled with wrath and rose
up and thrust Him out of the city. These were the temple people.
All of a sudden, it becomes a lynch mob. They rose up and thrust
him out of the city and led him into the brow of the hill whereon
their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong,
kill him. Can you see them carrying him
up? But his time was not yet. His hour had not yet come. So
he passing through the midst of them, went his way 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." Now, mercy. Sovereign mercy. That's what our Lord is declaring
at this time. Sovereign mercy. He has mercy on whom he will
have mercy. Mercy. This is a true story. And I think
it'll give us some understanding of this thing of mercy. This
is a true story. The King of France gave a member
of his cabinet whom he favored the authority to go into a ship,
the galley slaves in there, you know, that all they did was do
the oars constantly. And he gave this member of his
cabinet the authority to go in and to give mercy, to have mercy
on anyone he wanted to have mercy on. Can you imagine having an
opportunity like that to free somebody from being a slave? You can have mercy on anyone
you want to have mercy on. So he came to one man who'd been
sentenced to 10 years, and he said, why are you here? He said,
I've been treated unfairly. My crime did not warrant this
punishment. And he said, this man doesn't
need mercy, he needs justice. And he came to another man, and
this man admitted to what he had done, but his circumstances
were such that who could blame him? Anybody in that position
would have committed that crime. And he concluded regarding this
man, he doesn't need mercy. He needs justice. So he came
to another man and said, why are you here? He said, I've been
falsely accused. I didn't do what I've been accused
of doing, and I shouldn't be here. We said, he sure doesn't
need mercy. He needs justice. And he came to another man and
asked him about his guilt. He admitted to the guilt, I'm
guilty. But there's people who've done worse things than I have,
and they haven't been punished as severely. Once again, here's
a man who needs justice, not mercy. And then he came to another
man and said, what are you doing here? He said, I'm getting exactly
what I deserve and worse. Or it should be worse. If I was
executed because of my sinfulness, because of what I've done, if
I was executed, it would be utterly just. Here is a man who needs
mercy. Here is the man I'm going to
give mercy to. You find me somebody who is poor,
broken hearted, a captive in prison, blind, crushed, a slave,
someone who comes with a rope around his neck, suing for mercy. One last scripture, Luke 18. Verse nine, and these are the two representative
men. This describes, you're gonna
hear your description in this passage of scripture. These are
the two representative men. And he spake this parable unto
certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and
despised others. Two men went up into the temple
to pray. The one, a Pharisee, and the other, a publican, a despised Roman tax collector,
a Jew employed by the Roman government to exhort taxes from the Jews. The Pharisee stood and prayed
thus with himself. God didn't hear him. He was praying
to himself. But notice what he says. God,
I thank thee that I'm not as other men are. I give you the credit. I give
you the credit. I'm thanking you for this. I
believe in grace. I thank you that I am not as
other men are. I want to say this carefully.
I've said this before. When we say, there go I, but for the
grace of God, I'm not so sure we're speaking accurately. There I am. When I say, there go I, but for
the grace of God, I'm really saying I'm a little bit better
than him. By grace, by grace, I'd be doing the same thing,
but I'm just not so sure we ought to be saying things like that. That's what this guy said. He
looked at that publican, there go I, but for the grace of God.
Well, let's go on reading. I thank thee that I'm not as
other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as
this publican. I fast twice in the week. I give
tithes of all that I possess. He talked about what he didn't
do and what he did do. And the publican, standing afar
off, would not lift up so much as
his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God
be merciful to me, the sinner. I know it says A, but the definite
article is used in the original. God be merciful to me, thee,
sinner. I tell you, this man went down
to his house justified. Justified, not merely forgiven. cleared of all guilt a perfect
man without sin justified. Rather than the other, for everyone
that exalts himself shall be abased. Just take that across the board.
You exalt yourself, you will be abased. Lord knows how to
abase them at walkin' pride. And that man who humbles himself
shall be exalted. Grace words. Let's pray. Lord, how we thank you for grace
words. Lord, we confess our poverty,
our brokenness, our being captive, our blindness, our being crushed, our being
slaves. Lord, we ask that you would deliver
us by your grace, enable us to take the place of the publican.
God be merciful to me, the sinner. Bless your word for Christ's
sake, in his name we pray, amen.