No honor in hometown; Luke 4: 14-30

This morning we have come in our ongoing study of the Gospel of Luke, to the first sermon that Luke records of the preaching of Jesus Christ.  And yet we should understand that this wasn’t the first message Christ had preached, but simply the first that Luke records.  Actually, Jesus had been preaching the gospel of repentance, the same message that John the Baptist had preached, for about a year already.  So the question arises why did Luke pluck this particular event out of the timeline of Christ’s life to begin his record of Christ’s ministry?  And the answer is that Luke suspends His chronology for the sake of theology.

Luke has been establishing in the preceding passages the credentials of Christ as the Messiah, the Holy One of God that had been prophesied in the Law and the Prophets.  He has given testimony from John the Baptist, from Zacharias, from Simeon, from Anna, from Elizabeth, from Mary and the angel Gabriel that Jesus was the promised Messiah.  Luke also included the baptism of Christ where the voice of God confirmed that Jesus was His Beloved Son, and the confirmation of the Holy Spirit had descended upon Christ in bodily form.  Now, Luke presents this one particular event in the ministry of Christ to give yet another testimony to being the Messiah, and that is of Christ Himself.  Jesus Himself will plainly state that He is the Messiah, sent from God in fulfillment of scriptural prophecy.

So now we understand the purpose of this break in chronology, and if you want to fill in the blanks as to what happened in that year since Satan’s temptation of Christ as Jesus began his ministry to Judea and Galilee, you can find that record in the book of John, chapters 1-4.  For our purposes, Luke has condensed it down to just two verses, that of 14 and 15.

But what I want to focus on today is this event that happened when Jesus had returned to His hometown, and for the first time begins to preach to the very people that He had grown up with.  We see Him returning to Galilee first, and then making His way through all the small villages in Galilee to eventually coming to his hometown, which was Nazareth.  We sang a song today about Jesus the Nazarene.  He spent the first 30 years of his life there, and though He would make his home later in Capernaum, He would forever be associated with Nazareth. In John 1:46 Nathanael said to Philip, "Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?" It was almost a derogatory association that Christ carried for the rest of His life.

Let’s start with verse 16 which sets the stage for this important message that Christ gives in his hometown.  “And He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read.”  Nazareth was a relatively large town, not just a village.  Some historians believe that it contained as many as 20,000 residents at this time.  And this synagogue would probably not be the only one in the area.

Let me say a word about synagogues.  They are not to be confused with the temple.  The law allowed only one temple and that had to be in Jerusalem.  The temple was the only place that the regular sacrifices could be performed.  It was where the priests served and the priestly rituals and festivals were performed according to the law.  But especially during the time of the Jewish exile, and during the time when the temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians, there arose a need for there to be a local gathering place where Jews could come together to learn the scriptures and be taught the law of God.  So there became a tradition in Israel that stated that if you had a minimum of 10 men, you could start a synagogue.  They often were associated with certain rabbis.  It was a place to come to be taught the scriptures.

The scriptures were contained in hand written scrolls, and they would have been very valuable and were stored in the synagogues.  The average person did not have the scriptures available to them.  So they came on the Sabbath usually, but also throughout the week at various appointed times, to hear the scriptures read aloud so that they might learn them, and also to hear a sermon taught by one of the rabbis there.  They sometimes had an elementary school associated with it.  In a large city such as Jerusalem, there could be as many as a couple of hundred synagogues.  There was virtually one on every corner, much like our churches today.  They would be located within a Sabbath Day’s journey in every neighborhood.  So in many ways, the synagogue was a place which was very similar to our modern day churches.

And notice that the verse says that Jesus went to the synagogue on the Sabbath as was His custom.  In other words, it was habitual, He was accustomed to go to the synagogue every Sabbath.   I mean, if anyone had a good reason not to go to church, Jesus had a reason.  He was the Word, He was the head of the church.  He didn’t need to be taught anything.  But He went there faithfully.  And notice that when He went there in faithfulness, God opened up an opportunity for Him to present His gospel.

So many times we miss out on divine opportunities because we are not faithful in the little things.  We miss out on spiritual growth because we are not faithful in the custom of coming together with other believers in the church to be taught the Word.  Christ is our example that being found faithful, God gives greater opportunity.  More and more I am convinced of the need for progressive discipleship; that is, a steady progress in our faith, of being faithful to hear, then faithful to obey and apply, then faithful to hear again, then faithful to obey and apply which continues in an ongoing  pattern of perseverance which results in being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.  Though postionally our salvation was accomplished at our new birth, practically our salvation must be worked out day after day.  Phil. 2:12:  “work out your salvation with fear and trembling.”

Now there was a custom in the synagogue that when a visiting rabbi was present, he would be given an opportunity to read scripture and speak it’s exegesis.  And word had obviously gotten back home that Jesus had become a preacher and a teacher, and so when the appropriate time in the service came He was handed a scroll to read and explain for the people in attendance.  And I’m sure that the place was packed to overflowing.  Jesus had already become quite famous, so more than likely there were many more visitors than usual who overflowed the building.

Jesus took the scroll of the book of Isaiah and found the passage which was in chapter 61.  Traditionally, the rabbi would stand up to read the scripture and sit down to teach.  So Jesus stands up and reads this scripture which was well known to be a prophecy concerning the Messiah, and then when He finished He rolled up the scroll and sat down to teach.

And I’m sure that what Luke gives us here is a synopsis of Christ’s message and the scripture, there was undoubtedly much more said.  But this is what he records Christ reading.  "THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED,TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD." And He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him.  And He began to say to them, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."

Now before we can understand fully the significance of this event, we must first understand the significance of this particular passage.  First of all, Christ says the Spirit of the Lord is upon Him.  Luke repeatedly emphasizes the Holy Spirit in his gospel, more so than any of the other gospels.  In Luke’s account of Christ’s birth we see Jesus conceived of the Holy Spirit, in His baptism we see the Holy Spirit descending, in His temptation we see Him filled with the Holy Spirit, then led by the Holy Spirit, then return to Galilee in the power of the Holy Spirit, and now He says the Holy Spirit is upon Him.

I am reminded that Jesus said in John 4:24 that "God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and truth."  The truth is God’s word, but there is an added dimension which is enabled through the power of the Holy Spirit to bring conviction in men’s hearts.  Paul said in 1Thess. 1:5  “for our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.”

It’s important in this day and age when so many strange things are attributed to the work of the Holy Spirit, to see that the Word which was Christ was working conjointly with the power of the Holy Spirit in all that He did.  Neither Christ, nor the Holy Spirit are out there acting on their own, independently.  But they are One, One with one another, and One with the Father.  So today, when we evaluate whether a work is of the Holy Spirit, then all we need to do is ask ourselves if Christ did it.  And if not, then we need to be skeptical of that spirit, because as it says in 1John 4:1, we should  “not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”

The Spirit bears witness to Jesus, and John says that Jesus is the Word. 1John 5:7 “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.”

The point being, we need to preach the word of God, and we need the Holy Spirit working through the word of God to convict men’s hearts and bring them to salvation.  Ephesians 6 tells us that we are to take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.  They go together, and they work together, not independently of one another.  This is also the reason that if you haven’t been born of the Spirit, then you cannot really understand the Word of God.  You may read the Bible, but it’s true meaning is veiled to the unsaved person.

So Christ is anointed by the Holy Spirit to preach the gospel.  I’m amazed at the simplicity of that, especially in light of the modern church entertainment based format today.  Here is the Creator of the Universe, able to bring 10,000 angels to bear at His command, able to cause the sun to stand still, or cause fire to fall from the sky, or do any thing He wants, and yet does something so simplistic as preach the gospel.  To just read from the Bible.  Talk about Power Point displays! Jesus could have done a Power Point display in the sky that would have convinced everyone of His divinity.  Yet He preaches the gospel from the word of God.

I happened upon a video the other day of a mega church in Texas.  And it was filmed from a live Sunday morning service.  They had like 5 satellite churches that were also watching the live feed on big screens.  And the lights come up on stage and this instrumental heavy metal type of music comes on and lights are flashing and there is this big megatron screen shot of a RPM dial like you have in a hot rod revving up center stage in time with the music, and then on the corner of the stage here comes this Rolls Royce being driven on stage by the pastor.  And he’s got another video cam inside the car showing him driving it.  The fans, I mean the congregation is clapping and going crazy, and he finally gets out of the car and introduces his message.  It’s a series on relationships like dating.  I guess relationships are like cars.  I never quite figured out what the association with cars was, but I don’t think it really mattered.  It was an event.  It would keep the people talking for a week and keep them coming back next week to see what would happen next.  The next week the pastor drove out in a Ferrari.  I guess he knows something that Jesus didn’t.

So I guess Jesus is really out of touch.  Not only is He preaching the gospel, but He preaches a message about sin.  You can’t get any more seeker unfriendly than to preach about sin.  Jesus presents through this passage four characteristics of sin.  Number one, Jesus says I am anointed (set apart, consecrated) to preach the gospel to the poor.  Sin makes us spiritually bankrupt.  As the Messiah, He was sent to bring salvation  to the poor. And the Greek word for poor is really speaking of being a beggar.  It’s not talking about the homeless.  Jesus isn’t presenting a social gospel, the passage is talking about spiritual bankruptcy.  Being so spiritually bankrupt and destitute that the only option is to beg for mercy.  That’s the idea.  Jesus would repeat this theme in the Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew, when He would say, “blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.”  The gospel means good news, and so it’s saying that for those that recognize their spiritual poverty, there is the good news that salvation has come.  God in His mercy has provided salvation by grace, that is, you cannot earn it.

Secondly, Jesus is saying through the scripture that the Messiah has come to proclaim liberty to the captives.  Sin makes people captive and enslaves them, and the Messiah has come to set them free. These are captives, or literally prisoners. It can mean prisoners of war, those who have been taken captive by some powerful force, brought into prison for crimes that they have committed and are waiting their own execution. Paul writes about this condition in 2Tim. 2:25 “with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.”  Make no mistake folks, sin enslaves.  You can’t play around with sin.  You can’t keep it at arm’s length.  Sooner or later, sin enslaves you.

Thirdly,  the passage says Christ has come to preach recovery of sight to the blind: Sin blinds us, and the Messiah has come to heal our spiritual and moral blindness. The sinner is not only made bankrupt, he is not only made a slave of sin, but he is also blinded to the truth. 2Corinthians 4:3 " And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”  And as I said earlier, because they are spiritually dead, without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, their blindness is even increased, because they don’t have the Spirit helping them understand the Word.

Then fourthly, the Messiah has come to set at liberty those who are oppressed: Sin oppresses its victims, and the Messiah comes to bring liberty to the oppressed. The oppression here is the idea of someone overwhelmed by the pain of life, overwhelmed by relationships that are abusive, overwhelmed by illness, overwhelmed by whatever kind of troubles life can bring to bear, overwhelmed in their souls. This is the person who is so overwhelmed by life that they have lost all joy. This is a person to whom Jesus spoke when He said, " Matt. 11:28 "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

This is the gospel, the good news, that Christ came to save sinners.  The sinner that trusts in Him for mercy will find rest for his soul.  And when Christ finished reading this passage, He sat down and said, “Today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” : In this statement, Jesus answers two questions. "Who did Isaiah write of?" Jesus answered that question, "Isaiah wrote of Me." "When will this come to pass?" And Jesus answered that question, "Isaiah was writing of right now."

Well, this statement was shocking, to say the least.  These were His own townspeople.  Many of them grew up with Jesus or watched Him grow up from a child.  Jesus, this guy from the neighborhood, if you will, was declaring himself to be the Savior of the world, the promised Messiah, the Chosen One of God.  And right about now they were scratching their heads, or laughing behind their hands, but totally unbelieving.

Jesus knows their hearts, He knows their thoughts.  And so He rightly declares, “"No doubt you will quote this proverb to Me, 'Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we heard was done at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.'"  See, they thought that He had done well reading the scripture and perhaps explaining the scripture, but this was going to far.  I see that so often in ministry.  They admire the fact that you preach the gospel and that you know the scripture.  They even commend you for being a great Bible teacher, but to follow you?  To become a disciple of your teaching and get in rank and get under the authority of the church?  No, that’s taking it a bit too far.  So many professing Christians know just enough of the gospel to be condemned, but not enough to be converted.  They don’t want this man or any man to rule over them.  They don’t want any authority in their life.  They want to stay in charge of their destiny.  They want to be a free agent, if you will.  But such independence is in contradiction to the gospel.

And so it was in Nazareth.  They were willing to give Jesus his due as a good teacher, but not his due as Messiah, as Lord of Lords, King of Kings.  They weren’t about to bow their will to this carpenter’s son.

So Jesus response is this: "Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown. But I say to you in truth, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was shut up for three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land;  and yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.  And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian."  The message is very simple.  If you’re not willing to confess that you are a sinner, poor, destitute, enslaved to sin, blind to the truth, and oppressed in your souls in need of deliverance, then just like in the days of Elijah and Elisha when your forefathers were unbelieving and rebellious, so it will be in these days.  The gospel will be taken to those who are ready to receive it, who are aware of their need for a Savior, and the good news will be preached to them.

And at that point, the anger that had started to flare up when they were told they were sinners, now came to the boiling point when they were told that the kingdom would be given to another people, and the townspeople of Nazareth “were filled with rage as they heard these things;  and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff.  But passing through their midst, He went His way.”

There is one last point in Jesus message which I skipped over.  At the end of the scripture Jesus read in Isaiah is the statement; “To proclaim the favorable year of the LORD.”  This is a reference to the year of Jubilee found in Leviticus 25.  It was a time set apart by God to bring rest to the land, the land would return to it’s original owners, and all the prisoners would be set free.  It happened at the end of 7 periods of 7 years, after 49 years, the next year would be the year of Jubilee.  It was a time of rest, a time of redemption, and a time of reconciliation.  It was symbolic of the rest that Jesus brings, the rest that He offered to all that are weary, all that are poor, all that are blind, all that are oppressed. This eternal rest is made possible because Christ has paid the price for our sin.  And because God counted our sins against Christ, and put Christ’s righteousness upon those who trusted in Him, we can be made righteous forever.  And because we are made righteous, God sends us His Spirit to live in us.  So that we become the temple of God, the Holy of holies as God’s Spirit dwells in us.

This coming of Christ was the institution of the favorable year of the Lord.  It still is the favorable year of the Lord. Hebrews 4:9  “So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.”  Today that rest is still available, the favorable year of the Lord, to whoever calls upon the Lord for mercy and forgiveness. 2Cor. 6:2  “for He says, "AT THE ACCEPTABLE TIME I LISTENED TO YOU, AND ON THE DAY OF SALVATION I HELPED YOU." Behold, now is "THE ACCEPTABLE TIME," behold, now is "THE DAY OF SALVATION."

Listen, those hometown folks in the synagogue rejected Jesus as their Savior.  That was a tragedy for them, but it’s an opportunity for you.  Please don’t reject his offer today.  “"Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

This is our seventh year of ministry here at the Beach Fellowship as a church on the beach.  And we’ve been praying every night this week as we walked around town in the Jericho March praying in the spirit that this would be the favorable year of the Lord.  We believe it is.  Today is the acceptable day, the day of salvation.  Come to Jesus today and find rest for your souls.

Overcoming temptation: Luke 4:1-13

The other day I came across an old VCR tape in a thrift store of the movie called Highlander, which spawned a popular TV series by the same name back in the mid eighties.  I remember watching the TV show a few times.  And I was thinking that this particular movie might have given birth to a whole genre of good versus evil movies, where the hero is seeking some sort of immortality by doing battle with these evil forces.  For some reason they love to use swords.  I guess it’s more dramatic to see these titans in some epic sword play that goes on and on, whereas in a more modern context, they would just pull out a gun and shoot one another.  But there seems to be some fascination with sword fights in these epic films.

Today, in our study of Luke, we come upon the greatest, most epic battle between good and evil in the history of the universe.  It’s presented here in chapter four without any undue fanfare or drama, but believe me, it was a battle with  universal consequences, more so than any conflict that the human mind can imagine.  But this battle wasn’t fought with swords, at least not the kind you can see.  This battle was fought with words.  The Word of God doing battle with the word of Satan.

In a spiritual battle, spiritual weapons must be used.  In Isaiah 46 the prophecy concerning the Messiah states: “He has made My mouth like a sharp sword.”  And in Revelation 2:16 Jesus says, “I will make war with them with the sword of my mouth.”  So there is a sword being used here, but it is a spiritual sword for a spiritual battle.  In Ephesians 6, the Christian is told to equip himself in spiritual armor for a spiritual battle, “not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

We are told then to put on the helmet of salvation and take up the shield of faith, having our feet shod with the preparation of the gospel, but what I want to draw your attention to is the weapon we are given;  “the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God.”

So what I want us to see as we look at this epic conflict between Christ and Satan, is that not only was it important for Jesus to be victorious in this battle so that He might be able to be the spotless Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the earth, but that he also might be our example, so that when we are tempted, we might know how we are to respond.  As Peter said in 1Pet. 2:21 “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH.”

And so I call this message today, “Overcoming temptation,” because not only did Christ overcome temptation by the devil, but He also presented an example of how we too can overcome temptation.

First of all though, I think it’s important that we understand why this happened.  What was the purpose of Christ being led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness, the Judean desert, to be tempted by Satan.  Because that is what the text tells us, isn’t it?  It wasn’t an accident that Jesus found himself there in the desert, famished and weak after 40 days of fasting, to be attacked by the forces of evil.  But the text tells us in verse 1 that Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, was led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

Now for starters, that goes against a whole bunch of people’s theology right there.  They have been taught by snake oil salesmen masquerading as religious figures on television and in many pulpits that if you are really of the faith, and you have enough faith, then nothing but good things are going to be in store for you.  God wants you to have the best of everything, and will withhold nothing pleasurable from you, because He just wants you to have all the desires of your heart.  So it’s incongruous to a lot of people in churches today to think that God would allow hardship and suffering to enter into our lives.

But Luke tells us specifically that when Jesus came up out of the Jordan River having been baptized by John, having had the witness of the Holy Spirit come upon Him in the bodily form of a dove, and having had the voice of the Father speak audibly from heaven saying “this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” right after this mountaintop experience, the Holy Spirit leads Jesus out into the middle of nowhere, in the midst of no man’s land, a craggy, rocky, desolate place in the middle of the desert, and He fasts for 40 days being tempted by the devil the whole time.

I can assure you that this passage is a good example of a common theme in scripture; that often our highest moments are followed by our deepest trials.  The mountaintop experience is quickly forgotten in the lowest valleys.  And I’ll tell you why.  Because God is able to teach us more in suffering than He can through  blessings  like abundance and prosperity and good health and happy marriages and so forth.  Once again, Jesus is our example.  As it says in Hebrews 5:8 “Although He was a Son, [Jesus] learned obedience from the things which He suffered.”  But God never tempts us to sin, rather God tests us so that our faith might be proven, that we might be refined like gold. Proof tested.

Now there was another reason that the Holy Spirit led Jesus out to the wilderness to be tempted.  And that is because just as Luke is presenting the credentials of Christ in the first 3 chapters, this too is another credential of Christ.  The Messiah had to be able to overcome sin and temptation, to defeat the devil, if He was really deity.  God is demonstrating the deity of Jesus by overcoming temptation and sin and defeating every trick of the devil.

If Jesus would triumph in the wilderness, then He would triumph at Calvary and He would triumph in the garden. He would triumph at the cross and triumph at the tomb. And if Jesus could conquer Satan, then we can be assured of that triumph and that He is able to redeem His people from their sins. And we know that He did triumph in the wilderness and later He triumphed at the cross where He bruised Satan's head with a fatal wound, where He destroyed sin, where He provided escape from hell for all who believe. And then we know He conquered death, rising the third day, now ascended to heaven He continues to conquer all sin and all accusation laid against His people because He ever lives to make intercession for us. So that in His securing love, in His conquering grace we are more than conquerors for whom nothing can ever separate us from the love of God.

It’s interesting that in the last chapter we see the human lineage of Christ go back all the way to Adam.  And we know that Adam is the father of the sin nature, which was passed on to all men, and all men have sinned as a result of this inherent sin nature.  But we know that Jesus was not born with that inherited sin nature, because He was born of a virgin, and the sin nature is passed from the males to the next generation.  But even so, Christ could still be tempted.  Hebrews 4 says that Christ was “tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.”

But lest we think that Jesus temptation is less severe than ours because He was deity in man, let’s contrast the first Adam and the second Adam, Jesus Christ. Adam was in the best of circumstances; he lived in Paradise which was perfect, he was full, fed, everything made for him perfectly.  Jesus had nothing, poor, hungry, alone, in the desert, physically beyond weak.  Yet Adam fell, and Jesus did not.  You may blame your circumstances on your sin, if I only had this or that I wouldn’t sin.  But Adam had everything in abundance, and yet he sinned. Where the first Adam failed, the second Adam succeeded. In the first Adam we all died, in the second Adam we all live.

So Christ demonstrates his power over sin and over temptation.  He demonstrates to the devil and his demons that He is the Messiah, God in the flesh.  And we will see that in coming studies, the demons recognize Him, they shudder, they call Him the Son of God and they are under His authority.  But at this moment, in this desolate place in the wilderness, far away from everyone, Christ stands alone at His weakest moment, to contend against Satan himself.

And I don’t think that Satan comes to Christ in this moment slinking around like a little red horned toad with a spiked tail. He doesn’t come looking like a zombie wearing a black hoodie.  I believe Satan comes in all his glory and power, in all his brilliance and all his splendor in sharp contrast to the humility and weakness of God in this emaciated human flesh.

Who is this devil?  I don’t have time to go into too much detail about him today, but I can tell you that Satan is not the way he has been presented in our popular media.  In Ezekiel 28:11 to 15, Isaiah 14:12 to 14, you read about him. Before the fall he was the anointed cherub which many commentators think means he was the praise and worship leader of heaven. He was heaven's chief musician. He was the one who led all the angelic praise.  He was the most beautiful of all the angels, and perhaps the most powerful.  He was the covering cherub, above the throne of God Himself. And because of his surpassing beauty, he rebelled in pride against God saying “I will be like the Most High.”  When He was cast down from heaven, the Bible says he took 1/3 of the stars of heaven, (speaking of the angels of heaven) with him.  He has millions of fallen angels, demons as they are now known, under his authority.

We should learn from this the way Satan works.  As he comes to Christ full in his glory, full of his power and in his pride, so Satan comes to us not looking like some caricature of a comic book demon, but like a friend, a companion, a trusted ally.  Someone who has it all together.  Someone that we can admire, someone powerful, having or seemingly able to provide all the things that we desire.

And so Satan comes to Christ in his extreme physical weakness.  After 40 days, it says he was hungry.  I think Luke is prone to understatement.  I read recently of someone who attempted to fast for 40 days and it killed him.  At 40 days, Jesus was probably physically so gaunt, that His clothes were falling off of him.  He was practically unable to move, to take care of himself.  He was weak to the point of being unable to stand.  And here comes Satan, full of beauty, clothed in splendor, reeking of majesty and power, usurping all that rightfully belonged to Jesus as he laid there on the hot, dusty desert floor, his body so weak He could hardly move.

Now the scripture says that Satan had tempted him for 40 days.  So in addition to the physical limitations of his body, he had been under spiritual attack for 40 days.  But now Satan culminates his temptation with three distinct temptations.  And though there are three temptations, there are really just two major areas in which he was tempting Jesus, and you can reduce that even further to just one common theme, attacking the word of God.

So the first temptation of Christ was an attack against His identity.  Look at verse 3, “"If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.”  His attack is on who Jesus was.  Remember, that this event directly follows the baptism of Christ in which the Holy Spirit comes down like a dove and lights on Him, and the voice of the Father speaks from heaven saying, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”  And so Satan is sneering at Jesus lying there 40 days later, seemingly abandoned by God, starving to death, as weak as He could be.

In the third temptation, the same sneering insinuation is made; “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down from here.”  The devil is challenging the voice of God with the voice of hell.  God said Jesus was the Son of God.  Satan insinuates that if He were really the Son of God then He wouldn’t have allowed Him to suffer in this way.

And doesn’t Satan come to us in this same way in our temptation?  Doesn’t he tempt us to doubt the love of God when bad things happen in the world?  Don’t we oftentimes find ourselves doubting the goodness of God, the love of God, the providence of God when the wheels start coming off and things start going bad?  The devil, Diablos, comes to insinuate, to question, to accuse, as he has from the beginning when he came to Eve in the garden to question, “did God really say?” Did God really mean that?  Isn’t God just withholding something good from you for no good reason?  He comes challenging our identity found in the Word of God.

And that is what is so beautiful about Christ’s response.  Christ responds with the written Word of God, quoting from Deuteronomy 8:3, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word which proceeds out of the mouth of God.”  Not only is Jesus attesting to the goodness and provision of God, that real life is not found in food but in God who gives life, but He is also attesting to His own deity.  As John would write in chapter one of his gospel, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”  He is saying that He has life in himself.  That’s how Jesus could say in John 14:6 "I am the way, and the truth, AND THE LIFE; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”  Jesus is not only the Word of God made flesh, but He is the life, the source of all life, by Him all things were made that were made.

So when Satan comes attacking our human identity, our identity in Christ Jesus, our identity as children of God, attacking the love of God for us his children, then our response is to be like Jesus, and rely upon the Word of God.  We need to hide the word of God in our hearts, that we might not sin against Him.  We need to make every effort to study and store the word of God so that in the moment of temptation we have a ready resource, a ready answer from the promises of God to counter every attack of Satan.

And the second thing Satan attacks is an assault on Christ’s ministry.  When God spoke audibly at Jesus’ baptism, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased” what He said was a direct echo of two scriptures.  The first one is found in Psalm 2:7; “'You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.”  And the second one is found in
Isaiah 42:1 "Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights.”

Satan knew those scriptures as well.  Satan was well acquainted with the prophecy of Isaiah that talked of God being pleased to crush His Servant, putting Him to death.  He was well aware that the plan of God called for suffering as the road to glory for the Messiah.  He understood the symbolism of the sacrificial lamb that was slain on the day of Atonement.  Satan knows the scriptures much better than most theologians.

This is proven in his temptations.  Satan quotes scripture back to Jesus, to try to use the Word of God to tempt the Word of God.  I’ve said it before, you can prove almost anything you want to prove by taking one verse of scripture out of context.  But remember this, scripture will never contradict scripture.  The full counsel of God’s word must be considered to know how to rightly divide the Word of truth.  Satan is a master of half truths.  But a half truth is just a whole lie.

Jesus also knew that the plan of God that He had submitted to before the world began would be a path of suffering and death.  But Satan offered Christ an alternative, a shortcut.  Oh, he claimed to be after the same goal, that of Christ’s glory, but it was only a deception.  Remember when Satan tempted Eve?  He tempted her by saying that if she ate of the tree, then she would be like God.  Isn’t that a good thing?  Aren’t we supposed to want to be like God, to be godly?  And yet his shortcut required that she disobey the word of God.  And so his promise was really a lie that resulted in her being disavowed by God.  She obeyed the voice of the creature rather than the Creator.

Satan is trying the same old trick on Christ.  Offering Him a shortcut to glory.  “If you throw yourself off this temple, then the Bible says that the angels of God will catch you so you don’t kill yourself, and then all the people will know you are the Son of God, and worship You.  Isn’t that the goal?  To have the people worship Jesus?

I fear our modern day “worship” of God has fallen for this trick of Satan.  The end justifies the means.  People think they are worshipping God, but they do so devoid of truth, because they don’t know the truth.  The Word of God has been eliminated from our worship, and the substitution of music and skits and drama and videos and good works have taken center stage.  Doesn’t it get a lot of people to come to the services?  Aren’t things a lot more exciting?  Isn’t the entertainment getting them introduced to the church?  Isn’t that the goal, to get more people in the door?

The devil loves to make a confusion of means and ends.  His message is that the end justifies the means.  He offers shortcuts and compromises while telling us that the goal is good.  He does the same in other areas of our life, for example, in business, or in sexual purity before marriage.  He offers shortcuts to what may be a good goal but a wrong means.  

The last temptation of Christ is the same thing.  Offering Christ the kingdoms of the world if He would just worship Satan.  Sell himself to the devil so that He might win the nations.  But again Jesus answers him not with arguments or clever dialogue, but with the written word of God. “Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY.'" Every issue was settled in Christ’s mind by the Word of God.  There was no negotiation.  There was no compromise on the truth of the Word.  Christ was saturated in the Word of God.  That’s what it means by the way to be filled with the Holy Spirit and then to be led by the Holy Spirit.  It doesn’t mean you want to do something and then you see an opportunity to take a shortcut to glory and then you feel some exhilarating sensation that you attribute to a confirmation of the  Holy Spirit and so go off to the races, fulfilling your carnal desires.  No, being filled with the Holy Spirit and being led by the Holy Spirit means being filled with the Word of God and then being led by the Word of God.  The Holy Spirit will never contradict the Word of God.  God cannot deny Himself.  2Tim. 2:13

We live in a world today filled with many voices trying to drown out the Word of God.  We live in the information age, the age of Ipods, and I pads, TV’s and car stereos and computers and we’re being fed voices and messages from the world all day long, 7 days a week.  We have to deliberately counteract the destructive attack of these voices that are raised in opposition to what God has said in His Word.  And the only way to do that is to study the Word of God.  To get under the teaching of sound doctrine.  To be faithful to every opportunity to learn the Word of God.  And then to study privately the Bible as the Bereans did, to see if those things are so.  To have a private time with God every day.  Tally up your time spent with God this week.  And then tally up the rest of the time that you spent listening to the voice of the world.  It’s no wonder that we fall so easily when temptation comes.

The devil tells us to make our own laws, our own decisions, our own judgments on what is right and appropriate.  And so we become our own little gods, our own idols.  Satan will tempt you to doubt God’s word, then to take matters into your own hands to do what you think is right, what you think is appropriate.  We need to saturate our lives with the Word of God, that we might do what is right and live holy and righteous lives in the midst of an evil world.

God has sent Jesus to be tempted and suffer and die for us, that having been found righteous He might purchase with his blood our righteousness. Christ defeated every temptation of Satan that He might defeat death and hell, and having been raised from the dead, He sits at the Father’s right hand to be an intercessor for us, that we might have life in Him.  He died so that we might also be set free from the power of sin and death.

 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand firm therefore, HAVING GIRDED YOUR LOINS WITH TRUTH, and HAVING PUT ON THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, and having shod YOUR FEET WITH THE PREPARATION OF THE GOSPEL OF PEACE; in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take THE HELMET OF SALVATION, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel.”  (Eph. 6)  Amen.

Born of a woman, Luke 3: 23-38

Those of you that are regular attendees of the Beach Fellowship know that I preach in a style known as expositional, which means that we study the Word verse by verse, chapter by chapter.  And while I believe that the merits of this style of preaching usually far outweigh any negatives, today we come upon a passage which I would be tempted to skip over.  It’s been said that smart preachers should always avoid teaching on genealogies. 

So I guess I’m not very smart.  I wanted to skip over this passage, but it seemed that the Lord impressed on me that there are things here that are of great importance, and it would be to our benefit to study this section of scripture. 

Another thing that those of you who are regulars here will know, is that I do not normally use our time in the scriptures to pander to secular holidays.  So I had no intention of trying to preach a Mother’s Day message today.  Ironically, however, as I resolved to be faithful in preaching the next passage of scripture on the genealogy of Jesus  Christ, I found that there is a Mother’s Day message of sorts hidden in this text. 

Now you may find that hard to accept, looking at this long list of names.  There are 77 names in this list, and all of them are names of men.  So the logical question I’m sure you are asking is how can this be relevant to mothers if all the names are of men and no women are mentioned?

But before we answer that question, let’s answer another question.  Why does Luke include the genealogy of Jesus Christ here anyway?  Of what significance is this record?  And the answer is that Luke is presenting the credentials of the Messiah.  He has already given us the testimony of witnesses, like Mary, the shepherds, the angels, Simeon, Anna, and the prophecy of Zacharias and Elizabeth.  He gave us the witness of John the Baptist, and last week we looked at the testimony of the Holy Spirit and of God the Father at the baptism of Christ.  So Luke is presenting the credentials of the Messiah.  And the genealogy of the Messiah is yet another absolutely necessary credential. 

It was necessary because it was well known that the scriptures explicitly prophesied that the Messiah would come from the lineage of David. In 2 Samuel 7:16 the prophet Nathan speaks God’s words about David saying, "Your house and your kingdom shall endure before Me forever; your throne shall be established forever."'"  And this promise was reiterated over and over again throughout the OT. 

For example, in Isaiah 9:6 there is the familiar passage:            “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of [his] government and peace [there shall be] no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this.”  So it is necessary then to present the lineage of Jesus in order to establish that He was from the line of David, the royal line which gave Him the right to the throne of David, in fulfillment of prophecy. 

Now there are two genealogies given for Jesus, one here in Luke and another in Matthew chapter 1.  Matthew, if you will remember, was written primarily to the Jews, and comes at it from a Jewish perspective, starting from Abraham, the patriarch of the Jewish race, and then on to David, and from David to Solomon on down to Joseph, who was the legal father of Jesus, by adoption. 

Luke was a Gentile, and writes for a primarily Gentile audience, who starts at the other end, starting with Jesus and working backwards.  Luke wants to show how the Messiah links with all of humanity. He goes back through David, back through Abraham all the way to Adam and finally to God taking that universal approach connecting the Messiah to all humanity. But interestingly, Luke’s genealogy is different from Matthew’s in some names as well.  Luke’s genealogy from David to Joseph is completely different than that of Matthew’s.   And the reason comes from verse 23, “being, as was supposed, the son of Joseph…”  Literally, the original says, “as it was being thought.” 

So here is the nod to the mother’s today in Luke’s account See, in Luke, the genealogy is maternal, it follows his mother’s line.  Matthew’s genealogy is paternal, it follows his legal father’s line, even though Joseph was not his actual father, but his adoptive father.  And that is why Luke says, it was thought that Joseph was His father.  Jesus actual father was the Holy Spirit.  Mary was a virgin who conceived a child through the Holy Spirit.  So even though genealogical records of that day were traced through the males, Luke starts from Joseph, saying he was commonly thought to be the father of Jesus, and then skips over to Mary’s father, Eli, and then traces his line back to David.  When you read Matthew’s account, the line goes back to David through Solomon, David’s firstborn son.  But in Luke, the line goes back to David through Nathan, Solomon’s brother.  So we see that in both his mother and his legal father’s lineage, the line goes back to the throne of David, which is the main point that Luke is trying to make. 

However, I think it’s particularly interesting that Mary’s line doesn’t stop with David, or even Abraham as Matthew’s did, but goes all the way back to Adam, who it says was the son of God, literally of God.  Because Luke is not only interested in presenting Jesus as the rightful heir of David, but also as the Son of Man. That was our Lord's favorite title for himself, one he used more frequently than any other name. As you read the Gospel of Luke, the one you meet here is, of course, the same person you read about in Matthew and Mark. However, in Matthew the emphasis is upon his kingliness. Matthew presents Jesus as the King, and in Mark Jesus is presented as the suffering Servant. But in Luke, the emphasis is quite different. Here Jesus is presented as the Son of man---Jesus, the man. The perfect man.  His essential manhood is constantly being set forth throughout this Gospel.

It’s an important dynamic that needs to be understood, that Jesus had a heavenly Father, but He had an earthly mother.  And this is what Luke is pointing out.  To better understand this turn to Galatians 4:4 “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law,  so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.”

Now this is the mystery of godliness that Paul speaks of in 1Tim. 3:16            “By common confession, great is the mystery of godliness: He who was revealed in the flesh, Was vindicated in the Spirit, Seen by angels, Proclaimed among the nations, Believed on in the world, Taken up in glory.”  God becoming man is a great mystery, but a key to understanding it can be found by going back to the Garden of Eden when Eve, the mother of the human race was deceived by Satan and sinned against God. 

But though Eve sinned, and then tempted Adam to sin with her, the Bible doesn’t speak of sin being passed down from Eve, but it speaks of sin being passed down through Adam. Romans 5:12 says, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

The sin nature is passed from man to the next generation.  We have inherited it from our forefathers.  Adam’s sin was in a way even greater than Eve’s sin in that he chose to obey man, rather than God.  Eve at least was deceived.  Adam sinned with both eyes wide open. 

But even so, the end result was a catastrophe for the human race.  God had created man in his own image, male and female.  And I believe that as it says in Genesis 1:26, “our image” and then it says “our likeness” did not mean that man physically looked just like God, but that man was made like God as a triune being; spirit, soul and body.  When God warned that man would die if he ate of the tree, he was not only speaking of eventual physical death, but immediate spiritual death.  When man sinned, the spirit of man died. 

Man was created to have spiritual communion with God.  We were created to have an intimate knowledge of God, but when sin entered into man, that capacity was shattered.  So then ever since, man has been aware of some great spiritual need, but unable to fill it.  Unable to achieve peace with God, because he cannot know God in his sinful condition. 

But God gave a wonderful promise back in the Garden, after Eve had sinned.  God said to Satan  in Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel."  It was a promise of the Messiah, that one would come through the woman who would one day bruise Satan on the head.  Satan would bruise Jesus on the heel, so to speak, when he crucified Him, but Christ would bruise Satan on the head, a mortal wound, when He rose victorious from death and hell.

So then Luke presents his genealogy from Mary’s father all the way back to Adam, the son of God, because he wants to show that Jesus is the promised offspring of woman’s womb that would bring about defeat of death.

There is another passage of scripture that I think is tied to this, and it’s 1 Timothy 2:15, “But women shall be preserved through the bearing of children if they continue in faith and love and sanctity with self-restraint.”  In some versions, it may read saved through the bearing of children.  The Greek word is sozo, the common New Testament word for salvation. The word can also mean “to rescue,” “to preserve safe and unharmed,” “to heal,” “to set free,” or “to deliver from.”

This is not saying that a woman can go to heaven by virtue of the fact that she has given birth, but it means that the human race will be saved by the birth of the Messiah, coming through a woman. So a better way to approach this passage is based on the grammar in the original Greek language. In the original, it says she will be saved in the childbirth.  And it means that through a woman will come salvation for man.

Going back then to Galatians 4:4, Christ was born of a woman, born under the law. The law of God condemned man to eternal death.  We were powerless to do anything about it.  We could not reach up to heaven.  We could not bring God down to earth.  We could not attain to the righteous standard of God’s holiness.  Man was lost, condemned under the law.  The law wasn’t made to provide a stepladder to heaven, as if we could only climb up each rung and never make a mistake then reach heaven.  It is impossible, because of our sin nature inherited from Adam.  

Job realized this and said in Job 25:4, “"How then can a man be just with God? Or how can he be clean who is born of woman?”   And his cry was answered in the angel  Gabriel’s prophecy to Mary in Luke 1:37            "For nothing will be impossible with God."  Gabriel announced, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God.”

Man could not come up to God, but God could come down to man. And while history is filled with men who would be God, only one God would be man.  And He did so by becoming born of a virgin, conceived by the heavenly Father. Luke who was a doctor, confirms this great mystery of godliness, God becoming man, and tells us that One entered the human race who was born of a virgin; because Mary had never known a man. Yet she had a son, and his name was called Jesus. The wonder of that mystery is given in this simply told genealogy that Luke presents to us.  He presents the grandeur of God’s great plan from the beginning to redeem man from sin through Mary’s lineage, by going from Eve all the way to Mary, to show God’s fulfillment of His promise that from one born of a woman would come One to bruise Satan’s head and save the human race from death.

Jesus himself attests to that purpose in what is the key verse of the whole book of Luke, chapter 19 verse 10 when He calls himself by that special name, which we now know has special significance, the Son of Man, saying, "The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which is lost."  He is not only talking about coming to save lost people; he has come to save that which is lost. Not only is it men who are lost, but also it is man’s purpose of his humanity. We no longer know how to be what we were intended to be. The whole dilemma of life is that we still have, deep within us, a kind of subconscious memory of what we ought to be and what we want to be, but we do not know how to accomplish it.

Our soul is searching for that other place, the lost Holy of Holies, which is behind the veil, impenetrable. We cannot enter there. We know there is something more, something deeper, just beyond the edge of our soul.  This is the place where God intended to dwell, and which is the intended center of human life. It is the spirit of man. But because the spirit is dead in fallen man, men rise only to the level of intelligent animals, beholden to their baser instincts. Yet there is something mysterious, reserved, lying deep in an area which they cannot enter, pricking their subconscious.

But in Luke’s genealogy, he traces the coming of One who at last penetrates into the secret place, who enters the spirit of man, the place of mystery, and rends the veil, opening it up so that man might be reborn in his spirit, knowing the mystery of the purpose of his being, and thus find fulfillment through Christ Jesus.

Consider for a moment what it meant for Christ Jesus to come to earth as a man to secure our salvation. The King of heaven left His throne and took a stable for a nursery. The very Son of God was hunted by a tyrant king and became an infant exiled in Egypt. The source of all wisdom and knowledge was born into poverty and lived without earthly wealth and luxury. Holy and without sin, the Messiah was assaulted by every temptation Satan could thrust on Him, yet He resisted each one. The King of creation willingly subjected Himself to all that it means to be human--pain, hunger, thirst, sorrow, physical exhaustion, the full range of human emotions--yet did so without sin.

In an unfathomable act of selfless, sacrificial love, He left heaven's glory to die on our behalf. He offered mercy to a people who deserved only His wrath. He stooped to accomplish that which we not only could not do, but also would not do. In love, the God of the universe stepped from eternity to do what was impossible with man, to come to the world and save those wholly unable to save themselves.

Look in closing at verse 38. Christ’s lineage comes full circle, it is traced all the way back to God. He is the Son of God. He goes all the way back to God with whom He existed before the world began. Adam also was a son of God by creation. And when Adam was created he fully bore the image of God. He was a son of God, a real child of God like God designed men to be, able to know God. He bore the image of God body, soul and spirit uncorrupted until he fell into sin.  But when Adam sinned, the original image of God was shattered, it was broken and no one has ever entered into the world a true son of God like Adam was, except Jesus. Man’s spirit died, his nature became sinful, and everyone of Adam's descendants has been stained with the sin of Adam ever since. But Jesus came into the world without that sin nature which was passed on by Adam by the fact that He was born of a virgin.  And not only was any sin nature found in Him, but He lived fully pleasing God, as God said in verse 22, "This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." He was man the way Adam was designed to be, sinless, perfect man bearing absolutely perfectly the image of God. He was the true Son of God, the only true Son of God that had ever come into the world since Adam.

But He's not only Son of God, He is Son of Man. He is like us, tempted, troubled, suffering, persecuted, hated, reviled and killed. He is a Son of Man suffering the penalty of death completely for man all the way down to the pit of Hades, yet rising triumphant over death. He is fully man in every sense, yet fully  Son of God. God in His deity, Man in His humanity. He is Son of God, Son of Man, deity and humanity.

Then He is Son of Abraham as to His nationality. That is He is the promised seed. When God made a promise to Abraham it was to a seed, Galatians 3:16 says, and He is the promised seed who will bring all the blessings promised to Abraham. And He is also Son of David, royalty, the promised King who will usher in the glory of all the Kingdom of Heaven of which there will be no end, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. 

So that is my Mother’s Day message, a message buried in the genealogy of the most favored mother of all mankind, who brought forth a Savior as was promised even as judgment was being cast upon the sin of the mother of all mankind.  God is a God of justice and mercy.  And in the end, “mercy triumphs over judgment.” (James 2:13)

I trust that you know the mercy of God, by accepting the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ on your behalf, confessing your sins, repenting and calling upon God for mercy.  David said that a broken and contrite heart God will not despise.  For those that humble themselves and confess Jesus as Lord of their life, He promises to save them.  That’s what Jesus suffered and died for, to redeem us from the penalty of sin.  But for those that reject Him as Savior, there remains for them nothing but the judgment.  The choice is yours. 

identified with sinners: Luke 3:21,22

If you are a regular member of our services, then you will know that we study the Bible verse by verse here at the Beach Fellowship.  And we have been going through the book of Luke for a couple of months or so now.  Today we find ourselves at a very significant passage of scripture, which is the story of Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist at the Jordan River.

I’m sure most of you are very familiar with this story and perhaps have seen it acted out on film or seen pictures or paintings of this event which may have influenced your perception of it to some degree.  But today, I would like to take you a bit deeper than just the obvious storyline, and delve into the doctrinal implications of Jesus’ baptism.

As I began to study this passage, I found myself asking a similar question that John asked in the parallel  account of  Matthew chapter 3: 14, 15; “But John tried to prevent Him, saying, "I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?"
But Jesus answering said to him, "Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he  permitted Him.”

John was confused why Jesus would come to be baptized, after all, the baptism of John was a “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” it says in our text.  And so rightly John objects to baptizing Jesus, because he knows that Jesus is without sin, the Holy One of God.  And that prompts my question as well – why did Jesus become baptized?  He couldn’t have been a sinner.  The author of Hebrews said in chapter 4:15 “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.”  Peter also attested to his sinlessness in 1Peter 2:22 “WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH.”  So did the Apostle John in 1John 3:5 “You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin.”

So then if He wasn’t baptized in  repentance for the forgiveness of sins, then why was He baptized?  Jesus answered John’s question “permit it at this time, for in this way it is fitting to fulfill all righteousness.”  And I believe that we can take that verse two headings which will help us answer the question why.  Number one, it was fitting and number two, it fulfilled righteousness.

Let’s consider why it was fitting for Jesus to be baptized first of all.  If you think about all that has been presented by the author of Luke up to this point, you notice that there is one example after another of witnesses and testimony to the divinity of Jesus Christ.  Testimony that Jesus was the promised Messiah, the Son of God.  He states this in the very beginning of the book; chapter 1: “Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus; so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.”

See, what Luke has been doing is presenting eye witness accounts and testimony to the divinity of Jesus Christ.  He started with the old priest Zacharias and Elizabeth, and recounted all the wonderful events that transpired in their lives and their testimony about Jesus who was yet to be born.  He then presented the testimony of the angel Gabriel to Mary and Gabriel testifies that Jesus is the Holy Child, the Son of God.  Then there is the testimony of Elizabeth who called Jesus her Lord while He was yet in Mary’s womb.  Zacharias testimony is next that Jesus would be the Sunrise from on high, in fulfillment of the prophecy of Malachi that the Sun would rise with healing in his wings, speaking of the Messiah.  Then Luke records the testimony of the angels who appeared to the shepherds, announcing that Jesus would be the Savior, the Christ, or Messiah.  Then Luke presents the testimony of Simeon, an old man serving the temple in Jerusalem who had been promised by God that he would not die until he had seen the Lord, and when he saw the baby Jesus called out, “I am ready to die now Lord, for my eyes have seen the salvation of the Lord.”  And then Luke records the testimony of an elderly widow named Anna who had faithfully served the temple up to the age of 84, and her testimony of the Lord as her Redeemer.

So all of Luke’s testament up to now is one account after another of reliable witnesses to the fact that Jesus is the Son of God, the coming Messiah.  And so next he presents then the witness of John the Baptist, as John began his ministry preaching a gospel of repentance for the forgiveness of sins and crying out, “Make ready the way of the Lord, make your hearts right before the coming of the Messiah.”  He said, “I baptize you with water, but One is coming who will baptize you with the Spirit and with fire.

Now, the parallel account found in the Gospel of John, the Apostle John, records the fact that though John knew about Jesus, and was preaching about the Messiah,  he had not yet met Jesus.  And so it is fitting that Jesus comes to be baptized by John so that John can give testimony that this Jesus was in fact the Coming One, the Messiah that he had been sent to prepare the people’s hearts to receive.  John says in John 1:33, “"I did not recognize Him, but He who sent me to baptize in water said to me, 'He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.  I myself have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God."

So it was important that Luke records that John the Baptist testified that Jesus was the Son of God.  It is fitting in the long list of testimonies that Luke has given, that John’s testimony is also recorded, and it happened as a result of Jesus being baptized and fulfilling a heavenly directive that John would know He was the Messiah by the fact that the Spirit would descend and remain upon Him.  And Luke records that that happened just as God told John it would.  So we have then the full testimony of John the Baptist.

Secondly it was fitting that Jesus was baptized so that we might receive the testimony of the Holy Spirit.  It’s important to understand that Jesus was not devoid of the Holy Spirit prior to His baptism.  Go back to Gabriel’s testimony to Mary and you will find that he announced that Jesus was born of the Holy Spirit.  Gabriel said to Mary, “"The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God.”  Jesus was indwelled by the Spirit of God from before His birth.  What you have here at this baptism is nothing less than the divine inauguration of Jesus Christ to begin His ministry.  We have inaugurations in our culture today, don’t we?  We elect a president and when he is ready to begin his term he is inaugurated.  For a king, it’s called a coronation.  And we could call this event either of those things.  But the main point is that this is the testimony of the third person of the Godhead – the Holy Spirit.  This is a great illustration, by the way, of the trinity, one of the core doctrines of Christianity.  That God is one in three distinct persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 1John 5:7 says,  “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” And here in this place we see all three at one time, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the Father all distinctly working in one place, at one time, establishing the truth of the doctrine of the trinity.

So at the baptism of Jesus then we see the Holy Spirit come down from heaven in the form of a dove and lighting upon Jesus and remaining upon Him.  Another term that aptly defines this coronation is the word ordination.  This is the ordination of the Holy Spirit upon Jesus’ ministry here on earth. John says the Spirit remained upon Him.  Now the Bible does not explain why the Holy Spirit came in the form of a dove.  But we can speculate that there are at least two reasons.  One is that a dove was the approved sacrifice of the poor.  If you remember in chapter 2, Joseph and Mary could not afford the lamb for the required sacrifice for a first born son so because they were poor they were allowed to bring two doves.  So we have a picture there of a dove as a sacrifice.  And secondly, the dove was a picture of peace with God.  Noah, if you remember, sent out a dove three times from the ark to see if God’s wrath was finished upon the earth and the water had receded.  The dove symbolized man having peace with God.  And so we see that the dove indicated that God would come as our sacrifice in the form of a man, that man might have peace with God.

By the way, verse 23 says that Jesus was 30 years old when He began his ministry following his baptism.  A priest could not begin his service in the temple until he was 30 years old.  And there was an ordination service for the priests, just as we have ordination services for pastors today.  There is a confirmation, a laying on of hands as other preachers attest to the call of God upon the young pastor’s life, and they publicly confirm him to the call to ministry.  And I believe that is the significance of the Holy Spirit coming in bodily form and lighting upon Jesus. The Holy Spirit laid hands upon Him, if you will.  This is the only time in the Bible that the Holy Spirit comes in bodily form as a the third member of the trinity.  And that was simply so that John might recognize Him.   Because you can’t see a spirit.

The third reason it was fitting for Jesus to be baptized was so that we might receive the confirmation and testimony of God the Father.  Vs. 22; “a voice came out of heaven, "You are My beloved Son, in You I am well-pleased."  This is the last great testimony to the divinity of Jesus Christ.  God the Father himself opens heaven and speaks in an audible voice confirming that Jesus is His Son, that He is sinless, and that He is pleased with Him.  There can be no greater testimony than that.  God audibly speaks again at the transfiguration to Peter and John, but this is significant because it is the ordination of Christ’s ministry.

Furthermore, it was a direct fulfillment of scriptural prophecy found in Isaiah 42:1 where God says, "Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations.”

So the baptism of Jesus was fitting because it was the coronation of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and the ordination of our Great High Priest and the beginning of his ministry here on earth.  It was fitting so that a complete record of eyewitness testimonies might be made complete for us here today, from Zacharias all the way to the Holy Spirit and God the Father.

And the second phrase from Jesus answer to John was that it was necessary for Him to be baptized by John to fulfill all righteousness.  Now what does that mean?  Well, it means that Christ had to be made in all points as we are yet without sin, as it says in Hebrews 4:15.  Christ came to identify with sinners, that He suffer all that we have to suffer, yet without sin, fulfilling all the requirements of righteousness.  As I said a couple of weeks ago, another reason Christ did not begin his ministry until the age of 30 was He had to live a full righteous life to exchange for our sinful lives.  He had to live a full life, going through all that we have to go through, and yet do so without sin.  That was why God’s testimony “I am well pleased” was so significant.  He had lived through 30 years without even the smallest sin, and would continue in that sinlessness for another 3 years until He was crucified.

But I want to illustrate John’s baptism so that you can relate to it perhaps a little better, and understand what Jesus was doing that day. John the Baptist came preaching that the world was populated by sinners and that as sinners we needed to repent that we were sinners, that we might receive forgiveness of our sins in order to be accepted by God in preparation to receive the Messiah.

It’s as if John came out here on the beach this morning and drew a line in the sand and called out, ok, I want all the good people – the God fearing, patriotic American church going, upper middle class people over on this side of the line, and I want all the sorry, good for nothing low lifes to get on this side of the line.  Ok, let’s go.  And there is a mad rush for the good side by all the good upstanding citizens of Sussex County.  They all go over to the good side, elbowing their way, to make sure that they have a predominate spot on the good side.  After all, that’s one of the benefits of being good, is that people get to see you being good and therefore it increases your public standing, in fact, it’s even good for business.

But on the bad side of the line is left this sorry, no good group of low lifes with their heads hanging down, kicking the sand, trying not to stand out too  much.  They are ashamed to be there on the bad side, but they know that they belong there, and they are pretty sure that everyone that knows them realizes that they belong on that side.

So there ends up being a large crowd on the good side, and a few sorry individuals standing rather sheepishly on the bad side feeling like they want to go run and jump in the ocean.  And suddenly, here comes Jesus Christ, walking across the beach, as John would the next day proclaim, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.”  As God himself proclaimed when Jesus came up from his baptism, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  God in human form comes walking across the sand of the beach, and wonder of wonders, Jesus walked over to the bad side of the line and stood with them.  This sinless man, God in the flesh, identified with sinners, because these were the people that He came to save.  So He got in line with the sinners who needed to be baptized in repentance for the forgiveness of sins, because God was going to place our sins upon Him and His righteousness upon us.

Jesus said in Luke 19:10 "For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost."  Jesus didn’t come to save those that think they are righteous. John called that group a brood of vipers, they were of their father the devil.  Outwardly they looked religious, but they didn’t have a converted heart which brought the fruit of righteousness.  They never confessed their sinfulness, so they were still dead in their sins.  But Jesus came to save those that know that they are sinners, who knew they were cut off from God.  The problem is that those that think they are righteous aren’t saved by the righteousness of Jesus, they are attempting to be righteous by their own works.  And their own works will never be enough.  Romans 3:23 says that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  It’s like trying to jump the Grand Canyon.  If everyone here had to jump the Grand Canyon or be put to death, then everyone would line up and get a good running start and jump as hard as they could.  Some would jump just a few feet and fall and some might jump many feet, but still fall short.

Romans 3:20 says “by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” And “So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.” Romans 9:16

So Jesus came to be the bridge between God and man, that man might receive the forgiveness of sins, because He became our substitute.  That we might be made righteous, because He has become our sacrifice.  2Cor. 5:21: “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”

See, baptism is a picture.  It is a picture of repentance first of all.  A recognition that I am sinful and lost and without hope, unable to attain to the standard of God.  And then we are buried in the water with Jesus, as Jesus died for sins, so we too die to our sins, acknowledging that the wages of sin is death, and that I need to die to my sinful desires, crucifying my flesh, and then we are raised into newness of life even as Jesus was raised from the dead in triumph over sin and death, so in our new life we have triumph over sin and over death.

Jesus identified with us that we might identify with him. He consecrated himself so that we might be consecrated to him.  And He received attestation from the Father and the Spirit that we might receive attestation as children of God.

Galatians 4 explains it this way, vs.3, “So also we, while we were children, were held in bondage under the elemental things of the world.”  Christ found us under the condemnation of the Law, unable to achieve it, and unable to escape it’s condemnation because of our sin nature which was bound to the elemental things of the world. Bound by our lusts and desires of our sinful nature.

Gal. 4:4 “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.”  Christ voluntarily submitted himself to the Law and kept it perfectly, that He might be the spotless lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. For those that repent and accept Him as Lord of their lives they are credited with His righteousness in exchange for their sins that they might be adopted as children of God.

Then Gal. 4:6 “Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.”

See, because Jesus identified with sinners, because He offered himself as our substitute and became our sacrifice, we too are given the Holy Spirit in our bodily form, that we might have new life through Him.  Through the indwelling of the Spirit, He gives us new desires, a new hunger for the Word as He leads us in the Word, and the strength to live the life He has called us to live.  And because the Holy Spirit has given us new life, we too can be called the sons and daughters of God, “in whom He is well pleased.”  Because we have the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 53:6 “All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. Isaiah 53:5 “But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed.”