Striving to be saved; Luke 13:22-30

I like the old Welsh hymn, Here Is Love that we sung today.  It is a good hymn, teaching sound doctrine, and one that I find refreshing in a time when so much Christian music is favored not because of what it says, but because of the way the music sounds.  But though the origin of this hymn preceded the Welsh Revival by about 20 years, it found a certain measure of fame from it’s use in what became known as the Welsh Revival of 1904, 1905.

There were a number of revivals or spiritual awakenings that happened both in this country and abroad in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.   But I want to quote from Wikipedia about the distinction of some aspects of the Welsh Revival as opposed to previous revivals.  “Unlike earlier religious revivals based on powerful preaching, the revival of 1904-05 relied primarily on music and on alleged paranormal phenomena as exemplified by the visions of Evan Roberts.”

I am not qualified to speak authoritatively on the veracity of  the revival that happened in Wales during that year.  Undoubtedly, some people were saved.  There are many reports of lives being transformed, bars being closed, policemen not having anyone to arrest because entire towns were being transformed.  There seems to be ample evidence of true repentance in many cases, resulting in real conversion.

But at one point Evan Roberts claimed to have a vision in which he saw that he would be the means by which a 100,000 people would come to Christ.  And such was the effect of the revival throughout the countryside that many claimed that there were indeed 100,000 souls saved in a six month period.  However, this number was arrived at by arbitrary means, for there was no real way to confirm that number.  But the report of this number of conversions was in and of itself a sort of confirmation to many that this was a great new work of the Holy Spirit.

But at the same time, there was obviously a counterfeit work that was going on concurrently with the revival.  Several of the histories that I read emphasized that much of the paranormal phenomena was centered particularly upon young teenage girls who became a driving force in the revival.  As a consequence of the emphasis on the paranormal, much  of what was initially attributed to the work of the Holy Spirit was in fact eventually deemed to be not of God at all.  Evan Roberts himself had a nervous breakdown after the first year of the revival.  He began to suffer from serious depression.  He was taken in by a well known patron of the movement, a woman named Jessie Penn-Lewis, who was a prominent religious author.  As a result of this and other events, the revival declined as quickly as it had begun.

Together, Roberts and Penn-Lewis would author a book a few years later renouncing much of what went on during the revival.  The book was called “War on the Saints” and detailed the way in which Satan and his demons counterfeit the work of the Holy Spirit, made especially deceitful when naïve people readily accept all spiritual phenomena as being of God, without discernment of the fact that there are many deceitful spirits gone out in the world.

The main point that I wish to make from this illustration though is that great numbers are not necessarily an indication of true revival in the hearts of believers.  Undoubtedly, many people were saved.  But just as certainly, many more were simply swept along in the emotion and frenzy of the moment and when that had passed, they were no longer as zealous for the things of God as they once were.

Today we see much of the same thing happening in our culture.  Joel Olsteen’s church is held in an football stadium and they have supposedly 60,000 people in attendance on Sundays.  Tens of thousands of people regularly show up in stadiums around the country to hear him speak.

But this fascination with large crowds and great numbers isn’t just limited to Joel Olsteen.  Many evangelists such as Joseph Prince conduct services around the world to packed out audiences numbering in the tens of thousands.  On a national level, mega churches boast several thousands of members at multiple services and some even have multiple satellite church campuses around their cities.  As Americans, we tend to think that bigger is always better.  We think there is no greater testimony to a pastor’s success than the size of his congregation.  And I’m afraid there is no greater assurance to his congregation than the self confirming  knowledge that they are part of a huge congregation.

But great numbers or large churches have never been the credentials of a godly prophet or pastor or a work of God.  Though Jesus Himself had thousands of people following Him, only 500 were in attendance at His ascension, and only 120 in the upper room on the day of Pentecost.

I think there is going to be a great upset at heaven’s Bema seat judgment one day, when some of the preachers and evangelists that received the most accolades here on earth will be last, and those unknown faithful missionaries in foreign lands and pastors of tiny churches in the boondocks will be first.  Jesus says that very thing in vs. 30; “And behold, some are last who will be first and some are first who will be last.”

I think this seemingly contradictory element of ministry was the basis for the scenario that we see identified in this passage.  Jesus has this great crowd numbering in the thousands that is following Him around and waiting for Him to do a miracle or some great thing.  But yet there weren’t many that were actually getting saved.  And someone in the crowd recognizes this and questions Jesus by saying, “Lord, are there just a few who are being saved?”

It’s obvious that this  question was prompted by the two parables Jesus had just finished giving to that effect in vs. 18-21.  In both of them He showed that the kingdom of God was something that would have an unhealthy, unnatural, even monstrous element to it.  In the first parable Jesus relates the kingdom of God, which by the way is simply a way of speaking of the church, that the church becomes a large tree where the birds of the air nest in it’s branches.  As we said last week, mustard seeds produce mustard bushes, not trees.  And so this picture is of a monstrosity, a seed that produced a tree that instead of producing fruit, had birds of the air nesting in it’s branches.  And I showed you last week that in Jesus prior parable about the soils, that He identifies the birds of the air as being the devil and his angels.  So the devil and his angels (demons) nests in the branches of the church.

And the other parable is basically indicating the same thing.  In this case it’s leaven, always a picture of sin in the Bible, that is hidden in the three pecks of flour until it’s all leavened.  And we told you last week that the three pecks of flour, which are likened to the kingdom of God, the church, comes from the Old Testament idea of the grain offering which was offered to the Lord in worship.  And so the picture is of sin being in the worship of the church, and the entire church being corrupted by it.

Now that is the scenario then when someone from the crowd asks Jesus the question, “Lord, are there just a few who are being saved?”  Whoever it was, and I think it may have been the disciples, was kind of confused.  There were all these people following Jesus around, seeing His miracles and listening to Him preach.  There was all kinds of enthusiasm, and emotion, and expectations that surrounded His ministry.  And yet it was apparent from His teaching that the majority of those listening were not entering into the kingdom. And furthermore, Jesus is making it clear in His messages that not all that thought that they were of the kingdom were really in it.

And so Jesus gives an answer to this person that is instructive for us today as well as we consider the great tree that has become the church, and as we recognize that doctrines of demons have found residence in the church, and that sin has corrupted the church and it’s worship.  And many of us are left wondering at how the crowds rush to embrace the next new church trend, while those of us that try to be faithful to God’s original blueprint of the church are left feeling and looking like an archaic, out of touch relic of the Reformation.

It’s a question that gives rise to speculation that perhaps if we just adapted to what other churches were doing, perhaps if we just loosened up on some of the doctrines of the church, if we just followed some of the strategies that seem to be working so well for others, then perhaps we could enjoy some of the same success.  We might become more popular.  This thinking progresses along the lines of “it’s got to be our fault. We need to update.  Maybe we need different music, or a younger, hipper pastor.”  After all, whatever brings more people into the church can’t be a bad thing.

But notice that Jesus doesn’t really even answer those questions.  He doesn’t even directly answer the question that was posed to Him.  But what He does say is to present a version of salvation that is totally at odds with most evangelical’s approach to salvation.  Jesus presents salvation without a formula, without a sinner’s prayer, or even using the Roman’s Road.  He doesn’t give a method for invitations, or a method for church growth.  He doesn’t give the number of how many will be saved.  But what He does is present yet another picture of salvation, of entering in the kingdom that is at odds with most people’s understanding.

Note that first of all, Jesus says in vs. 24, “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.”  Strive is an interesting word.  It comes from the Greek word “agōnizomai”.    It means to contend, to fight, to struggle to endeavor.  It was used to depict the struggles of a sport or a fight.

And I dare say that it is a principle that I have never heard a preacher use in relation to salvation.  Salvation is presented as accepting a gift, of receiving a blessing, of being given something for nothing.  But Jesus is presenting it as something that you have to battle for.

Now what on earth does He mean?  I’ll tell you what He means.  He means that you have to battle with yourself, fight against your sin nature, your selfish nature, your desire for self rule, for self gratification, for self fulfillment.  Salvation means nothing less than being willing to give up your will for His will, your desires for His desires.  And the flesh doesn’t want that.  Satan doesn’t want that. The world doesn’t want that.  So there is a great conflict in coming to Christ.  Because most of us come to Christ wanting something, wanting deliverance from a crisis, or deliverance from hell, but unwilling to sacrifice anything to get it.  And yet salvation does not come without a cost.

Jesus said we must count the cost of following Him.  You say, “But Roy, I thought Jesus paid it all, and grace is free.”  You don’t understand grace.  Grace is Jesus paying a price you could never, ever pay.  But there is a cost for  you as well.  Jesus said in chapter 12 that it is the cost of division between mother and daughter, between father and son.  It is the cost of not having a place to lay your head.  It is the cost of giving up your possessions.  It is the cost of taking up your cross and following Him in the fellowship of His sufferings.  It is the cost of rejection by the world, it is the cost of losing business, it is the cost of being an outcast in society.  There is a cost to following Jesus which involves a battle between your natural inclinations and God’s will, your natural instincts and God’s commandments, your common sense and God’s wisdom.  It’s a struggle, and it’s an epic struggle.

Now look at the rest of the statement, “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.”  Note second of all that it is a narrow door.  It’s not necessarily easy to find, nor is it easy to go through.  It’s not a door that allows you to carry a bunch of baggage in with you.  You can’t enter into the kingdom of heaven with the world on your back.  You have to leave the world on the other side.  And it’s a door that you have to go through individually.  It’s not entered as part of a crowd, or a congregation, or by a race or nationality.

Jesus said in Matt.7:13, “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.”

Listen, there are many who seek to enter into the kingdom of heaven.  There are many that think that they are already in the kingdom of heaven, but if what Jesus says is true then most of them are not in the kingdom of heaven after all.  Many statistics have come out in recent years that show that about 80% of Americans consider themselves to be Christians.   And yet the percentage that believe in the inspiration of the Bible as God’s word is just a tiny fraction of that.  The percentage that believe in a literal hell is just a tiny fraction.  There is a great difference between those that think that they are on the road to heaven, and those that will find it.

Everyone wants to go to heaven.  Only a fool is an agnostic.  Only a fool is an atheist.  But merely believing to some extent in God does not bring about salvation.  Even just believing that Jesus existed and lived on the earth does not constitute salvation, otherwise Jesus would have just shown that everyone who was looking at Him in the flesh on that day would have been saved.  That He was alive was irrefutable.  And all Jews believed in the existence of God.  But yet He says that few there are that are saved. Obviously just believing in His existence did not save them.

I’m afraid that many people in churches today are not saved.  I fear that over zealous evangelists and preachers have used gimmickry to get people to make an emotional response to the gospel.  As I have studied some of these revivals and the men that led them, it’s apparent that many of them used theatrics, music, emotional appeals and every thing imaginable to get people to come forward in an invitation and say a prayer and then counted as having made a decision for Christ.  But even a cursory look at some of those results a year or two later and you will find very few of them living a Christian life.  But I’m afraid that vast numbers of people like that fill our pews on Sunday mornings, under the illusion that they are good with God.

This is a tragedy, that people are being deceived into thinking that they are in the kingdom of God, and yet one day they will find out that they are not.  Jesus presents an illustration of this point.  He says, “Once the head of the house gets up and shuts the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock on the door, saying, ‘Lord, open up to us!’ then He will answer and say to you, ‘I do not know where you are from.’

It’s possible to be caught up in the enthusiasm, to be a part of the congregation, to think that you have been accepted in the kingdom of God, and one day the door is closed and you find yourself on the outside.  What a horrible thought.

Vs. 26, “Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets’;”.  These are people that think that they are in the kingdom.  They went to church.  They took communion.  They listened to sermons, participated in the worship. They were members on the rolls.  They may have even taught Sunday School.   They thought they were in.  But they are not.

Vs. 27, “and He will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you are from; DEPART FROM ME, ALL YOU EVILDOERS.’”   Here is the distinction folks, don’t miss it.  There is a distinction between those that claim to be in the kingdom and are not, and those that are in the kingdom.  And the distinction is their fruit.  Now please understand something;  fruit is not the means of salvation, but it is the evidence of salvation.  Look once again to Matthew 7:16, “You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they?  So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.  A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit.  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.”  Twice Jesus says that you will know true believers by their fruits.

Now what are fruits?  The text makes it clear that fruit is simply doing the will of God, obeying the word of God.  The contrast is in the next verse; to not do the will of God is to practice lawlessness.  Vs. 21, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.  Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’”  

So salvation is not dependent upon saying “Lord, Lord.” Salvation isn’t dependent upon what comes out of the mouth, but what comes out of the heart.  But salvation is dependent upon doing the will of God.  This throws much of our contemporary theology right out of their stained glass windows, doesn’t it?  But they will say, “Lord, did we not prophesy in your name? Didn’t we cast out demons? Didn’t we do miracles in your name?”

Hey, these guys had all the spiritual gifts going, didn’t they?  One of the problems of many charismatic churches is that the proof of their salvation is that they speak in tongues, they prophesy.  One of the proofs of their salvation is that they think that they are empowered by the Holy Spirit in all sorts of paranormal phenomena.  And naïve congregations clap and hoot and holler at the histrionics of their leaders, not knowing what spirit they are of.

Listen, I’m not hear to tell you today who is saved and who isn’t.  I don’t know.  I might make an educated guess by examining the fruit of someone that claims to be saved.  But I can’t know for sure.  But God knows.  He knows the hearts.  He knows the deeds that we do in secret.  He knows whether or not we have ever really repented of our sins and have in fact turned away from sin and the world.  Whether or not we have forsaken sin.

Listen, the only way to have fruit in your life is to first of all be a fruit tree.  In our natural state, we are not fruit trees. In our natural state we are unable to produce righteousness. But by repentance from sin and faith in Jesus Christ we are grafted into the body of Christ.  That is the first step.  It’s coming to Christ in desperation and poverty and bankruptcy, begging God for forgiveness and mercy. Begging God to be transformed and changed from a sinner to a child of God.  And God promises that whoever comes to Him like that will not be cast out, but will be adopted into the family of God.  And when we are grafted into this body, then we will bring forth fruit.  We will be in Christ and Christ will be in us.  We will be new creatures, living a new life in and through Christ who lives in and through us.  And then it is going to be evident to everyone that we are bearing fruit. We live righteously because we have been made righteous.

That invitation to be grafted into the body of Christ is universal.  The Jews thought that it was a physical thing, that their salvation depended on being sons of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.  They thought they could get in based on heredity.  Based on nationality.  Based on religion.  But in vs. 29 Jesus says that those that are going to be in the kingdom “will come from east and west and from north and south, and will recline at the table in the kingdom of God. And behold, some are last who will be first and some are first who will be last.”

There is an invitation that is inherent in Christ’s message.  There is good news and that is that Jesus has paid the price you could never pay.  And for those that are willing to forsake sin and the world to follow Him there is salvation from the judgment to come.  But please understand what it means to follow Christ, to forsake the world.  It’s a battle of the will to let go of everything for this pearl of great price.  But it is a battle that has eternal reward.

I hope no one here has been deceived into thinking that somehow they have entered into the kingdom without the struggle of repentance and forsaking sin.  I hope no one thinks that they are in because of an association, or membership, or their relationship to someone who is in.  I hope that on that day when God shuts the door, you won’t find yourself on the outside wondering what happened.  There is going to be a terrible day of judgment that day is coming soon when the door will be closed.

I’m afraid that the point Jesus is making in this message is that most people lack true repentance. They lack the true contrition, true brokenness. They have never come  in desperation. They don't have a true relationship to Jesus Christ. They just hang around the church and think that is enough. They don’t know what it means to bow to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.  They want a gospel that doesn't ask for repentance. They want a gospel that has no threat of condemnation or judgment. They want a gospel that allows them to have some superficial attachment to Jesus, but not a bowing to His absolute sovereignty at any cost. They want a gospel that fixes them in this world to make them more comfortable. But that's not the gospel that Jesus is preaching. And that's not what Jesus offers.

Listen, the word revival is not even in the Bible.  Don’t be deceived great movements, great signs and wonders. Jesus says that the church will be characterized by an unnatural growth, it will be the roost for doctrines of demons, it will be puffed up by the corruption of sin, but not all that think that they are part of the kingdom are actually known by God.  They thought that the way was easy, the road was broad, but in fact the road was narrow, and the gate was small.  It is with difficulty that people are saved.  It is by striving, by contending, and by struggling with sin and false doctrine.  The church of God is not going to be characterized in these last days by great revivals where thousands and tens of thousands are swept into the kingdom in a wave of emotion and ecstasy. But true revival is an individual process of repentance, and then bringing forth the fruit in keeping with repentance.

The hypocrisy of the church, Luke 13: 10-21

One thing that I have grown to love and appreciate about Luke’s gospel, is that he doesn’t ever seem to just add random biographical selections from the life of Christ.  But Luke strategically weaves together historical events into a theological commentary that endeavors to teach us important doctrines in a systematic way.  And so the key to understanding Luke is to find this thread that ties these incidents and passages together. 

I heard Alistair Begg refer to this idea as finding the melody line in a music score.  And perhaps that is a good analogy.  We need to always remember to keep in mind the underlying melody line as we consider the individual notes in order to understand the intended message of the Holy Spirit.

Today’s passage is no exception.  At first glance, it may seem that this is just another miracle of Jesus and a couple of little parables which have no relation either to each other or to the surrounding content.  But I would like to encourage you to look closer today to discover what I think is an important message to the church.

But before we go into the story here we should understand the correlation between the modern 21^st century church and the synagogue that Jesus visited in this passage on the Sabbath day.  I’m afraid that the significance of the synagogue is lost on most modern Christians.  The synagogue was a place of assembly.  It was something that had evolved in Judaism as a result of the Babylonian exile when the Jews were displaced from their homeland and the first destruction of the temple.  The Jews living in Babylon did not have a temple, they had none of their religious and national edifices in the land in which they were exiled, and so the synagogue was a means of bringing the Jewish people together in an assembly where they could worship God.  And they did this through prayer and in reading and being taught the word of God, or the Torah.

But I think it’s important to understand that the synagogue was never an organization that was designed by God.  This was the Jew’s attempt to bring their community together for social, religious, educational and political purposes and to preserve their traditions.  Furthermore, the leaders of the synagogue were not necessarily of the Levitical priesthood as it was in the temple.  But where the leadership really got their authority can be traced all the way back to the book of Numbers 11 when Moses established 70 men to be judges over Israel during the exodus.  These 70 officials that he established became the foundation for what would be called eventually the Sanhedrin.  They were the religious rulers  or judges of Israel.  They were made up of two opposing political/religious groups known as the Pharisees and the Sadducees.  And in the evolutionary process that Judaism went through after the Babylonian exile up until the time of Christ, these religious leaders developed teachings called the Mishna which was a collection of rabbinical instructions which interpreted the scriptures and particularly the law.  So by the time of Christ’s and the Apostle’s ministry, the synagogue, the Sanhedrin and the Mishna had basically taken the place of authority in Judaism.  The priesthood had become corrupt due to the fact that the High Priest was a politically appointed office that was purchased by bribing the Roman government.  This was the status of Judaism in the time of Christ.  It had strayed far away from the original intent of God and plan of God given at Mount Sinai.  It had a lot of shared characteristics with God’s plan, but it had been subverted and changed to the point of outright apostasy. It’s leadership was not appointed by God but appointed by man.  They had their own self interests at heart.  God’s primary way of speaking to the people had always been through prophets who were called by God.  And the prophets, whether Moses or Jeremiah or Hosea, had always been vilified and rejected by not only the national leadership but most of the people as well. 

Now I cannot help but point out the parallels between the synagogue and the Judaism of Jesus day and the modern church and Christianity today.  The church was supposed to be the new covenant’s answer to the failures of Judaism.  We were supposed to be the stewards of the new covenant, just as  Judaism was the steward of the old covenant.  But just like our counterparts in the synagogue, the modern church I’m afraid has deviated far from the original plan of God.  That doesn’t mean that God doesn’t have a few people in His church that haven’t bowed their knee to Baal so to speak, but for the most part I’m afraid that the organization known as the church is like rotten fruit, that is swollen in it’s corruption and is ready to burst.  We have added so much disinformation to the scriptures that we have basically emasculated the gospel. We have added so many traditions to the church that it has almost completely obscured the gospel message.  We have leadership and teachers today in the church which God neither ordained nor did He call them to be His ministers.  We see corruption of both a political nature and in every other way, especially morally, in it’s clergy.  And we have produced a false gospel that rivals that of the Mishna which teaches a gospel of self fulfillment and false righteousness and robs people of their chance of salvation.

This is the same type of corruption that Jesus faced in His day, and we find history repeating itself in the 21^st century.  Jesus has been preaching against this hypocrisy ever since chapter 12 vs. 1.  Jesus is preaching against the hypocrisy of the synagogue, the hypocrisy of Judaism, and particularly the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.  He says in His opening sentence of His message in ch.12; “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”  In other words, beware of the corruption of the Pharisees, the leaders and teachers of the synagogue.  We can say the same thing today, “Beware of the corruption of the leaders of the church.”  I believe this is Christ’s message today for the church as we know it.  Beware of the hypocrisy that is in the church. 

The apostle Paul says the same thing to the church in 1 Cor. 5:6, “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

The problem in Jesus day was that they had taken the law of God which was given by God to produce repentance, and they had twisted it to produce self righteousness by works.   So God made Jesus the scapegoat to take on Himself the penalty of the law that we might be given the gift of righteousness in the new covenant.  But the problem with the church today is that we have taken the grace  which was supposed to produce repentance, and we have twisted it to produce self righteousness without works. Eph. 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”

 In spite of the fact that grace has paid the penalty of the law, we still have hypocrisy paramount in the church.  Instead of grace producing godliness, we have grace producing licentiousness; lawlessness.  We have hypocrisy today running rampant in the church under the name of freedom, but there is no sense of repentance, there is no conviction over sin, there is no abhorrence of evil, and there is very little godly works as the result of grace.  What was supposed to be the result of this magnificent gift of grace has been turned once again into an opportunity to indulge the lusts of the flesh.  And we have done just like our forefathers the Jews have done, we have had every privilege,  and yet have not born fruit in keeping with repentance.

Jesus had just given a parable concerning this situation in vs. 6-9, in which He says the owner of the vineyard came year after year to see if the fig tree had born any fruit and yet it had not.  And so the caretaker was going to fertilize and dig around the tree, perhaps prune the tree for one more year to see if it brought forth fruit.  But if at that time it still had not brought forth fruit, it would be cut down. 

And God did cut down the fig tree that was Israel in 70 AD.  The temple was destroyed again.  The synagogues were shut down or destroyed.  The rulers and religious leaders were put to death.  Tens of thousands of Jews were massacred and the remnant scattered to the four corners of the world.  And then God took this magnificent gospel, this great gift to mankind, and He gave it to every tribe and every nation of the world that it might go and bear fruit.  But 2000 years later I have to ask, if Christ should return today, would He find fruit in the church?  Would God be pleased with the stewardship that we have given to the gospel purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ?  Would God be pleased with the stewardship of His Word, the Bible?  Would God find the church employed in the business of the kingdom of God or would He find a church that has deviated from the gospel of salvation to teaching a gospel of self gratification and self righteousness devoid of fruit?

My opinion is that there is scant difference between the hypocrisy of the synagogue and the hypocrisy of the church.  Notice our text again and let’s see what it says in this regard.  I think Jesus deliberately picks a fight in this synagogue.  I know that is at odds with some people’s theology, but I think that Jesus knows that He has less than a year left to His ministry, and they aren’t getting the message.  And so He takes the gloves off so to speak from this point on.  He is deliberately confrontational.  But the fact is that He doesn’t have to work very hard at it.  The gospel is by itself confrontational.  All you have to do is speak the truth of the gospel and people will take offense.  But Jesus isn’t dodging the issues to avoid confrontation, He is actually spurring it on.  He has already said in chapter 12 vs. 49, “I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!” 

So Jesus comes into the synagogue and begins to teach on the Sabbath.  This is sort of like walking into enemy territory.  He knows that this is hostile territory.  But He also knows that this is an opportunity to present the gospel. And by the way, this may have been the last time that He came into a synagogue.  But He came because this would have been where the Jews would congregate on the Sabbath.  There is thought to have been almost 500 synagogues in Jerusalem. Jerusalem’s population swelled to as many as 600,000 people during festivals according to some estimates.  So each synagogue might have served a thousand people or so. Jesus and the apostles after Him saw these assemblies as an opportunity to reach the Jews with the gospel. 

Now the details of the story are important, but remember that the healing of this woman is not the central objective of Luke recounting this story.  The purpose is to reveal the hypocrisy of Judaism.  But nevertheless, let’s look at the particulars.  Notice that Jesus summons the woman to Him.  Jesus sees this woman bent double and supernaturally recognizes that she is suffering from a demonic spirit.  And so He calls her over to Himself and says in vs. 12, ““Woman, you are freed from your sickness.” And He laid His hands on her; and immediately she was made erect again and began glorifying God.

Now my purpose today is not to teach a message about healing.  But as a point of interest, please note that the woman did not have to have any faith to be healed.  She didn’t even ask to be healed.  Jesus initiated the whole thing.  Listen, the point that needs to be clear is that this woman was seriously deformed.  She was bent over double for 18 years.  And Jesus healed her instantly. Blind and mute people were healed instantly. Paralyzed people were healed instantly.  Dead people were raised instantly.  It is criminal the way these fake healers like Oral Roberts or Pat Robertson or Benny Hinn get away with this charlatan hocus pocus in these healing services where no one who has any real visible signs of illness are ever healed, and the poor disfigured, deformed people are turned away and led to believe that they did not have enough faith.  If you want to know what that feels like to be one of the seriously handicapped people in wheelchairs that get ushered out the side door after their services, then see me afterwards and I will give you a link to Joni Eareckson Tada’s testimony of her experience with faith healers after becoming paralyzed from her neck down. I don’t deny the possibility that Jesus still may heal someone today, but I want to assure you that Jesus never healed like those guys purport to heal. 

But the main point that Luke wants to make in this account is the response of the synagogue official.  He says the synagogue official was indignant.  Indignant is the typical response of a hypocrite.  Here is a woman that comes into the synagogue, probably had been coming there for years bent over double, in pain and suffering, and in a moment she is made well and glorifying God.  But the indignant, self righteous official says, “There are six days in which work should be done; so come during them and get healed, and not on the Sabbath day.”

Jesus responds to that ridiculous statement by calling the guy a hypocrite.  Look at vs. 15, “But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites, does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the stall and lead him away to water him? And this woman, a daughter of Abraham as she is, whom Satan has bound for eighteen long years, should she not have been released from this bond on the Sabbath day?”

See, even their own Mishna had provided for the relief of suffering animals on the Sabbath day, and the law of God provided for relief of suffering on the Sabbath, so Jesus says, why shouldn’t this woman be released from suffering on the Sabbath?

Jesus said in Mark 2:27, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”  The Sabbath is a picture of God’s provision of rest. Hebrews 4:9 says, “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.”

So here is the hypocrisy of this synagogue official.  The Sabbath is a picture of the rest we can find in the salvation of God, and yet he is denying the rest that Christ provided for this woman by healing her from this oppression by Satan. This woman then is a picture of the sovereign work of the Lord in salvation, a picture of the enslaved, oppressed sinner under the burden and bondage of Satan, helpless and hopeless, robbed of dignity, bent over under the burden of sin. And she is met by the Lord and He out of His compassion delivers her, straightens her up and brings glory to God. This is the picture of the work of God in salvation.

But it is the hypocrisy of the synagogue official that I think is the main point of this story.  He is indignant.  He is self righteous.  He is trusting in his form of religion.  But he shows no true compassion because he has never been repentant. He has never seen himself revealed in the light of the law as depraved, utterly sinful and in need of salvation.  He saw himself in the light of the law that he manipulated and believed that he was good enough.  And not only is he still in bondage, dead in his sins, but he wants to keep his people dead in bondage as well.  He doesn’t want them healed. 

I think that a majority of the church today is still in the bondage of sin.  Because what is lacking most in the church today is preaching on the utter depravity of man; man’s utter sinfulness, hopelessly lost condition.  That we are totally without merit.  And concurrently what is missing is teaching of God’s absolute holiness.  Absolute pure righteousness.  And what the message of the gospel must be first and foremost is that sinful man is an abomination to God’s holiness.  The church today doesn’t speak of sin and doesn’t teach what holiness means, but just wants to tell people that they can have a relationship with God.  But God cannot have any sort of relationship to man because He is holy and we are so sinful.  We do not have a real understanding of our total depravity and God’s total holiness and how far apart those two realities are.  That’s why the primary message of the gospel has to be that of repentance.  Repentance, absolute remorse over your sinful condition, recognition of your absolute bankruptcy before God, and your need for forgiveness. Repentance is the prerequisite for forgiveness.  And the fruit of repentance is a desire to turn away, to forsake our sin and follow after righteousness.  To hunger and thirst after righteousness.

Immediately following this healing of the woman, Jesus gives two short parables that illustrate the hypocrisy of the synagogue and the danger of false teaching.  But I’m afraid that the true significance of these two parables has been lost in much modern teaching. I’ve often read and heard these two parables interpreted as if they stood alone and that leads to a wrong interpretation.  But the first word of vs. 18 should tie these parables to the preceding passage.  It is  “oun” in the original Greek, and it should be translated, “then, therefore, accordingly, consequently, these things being so.”  So vs. 18 should read “So therefore He was saying, “What is the kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like a mustard seed, which a man took and threw into his own garden; and it grew and became a tree, and THE BIRDS OF THE AIR NESTED IN ITS BRANCHES.”

Now if you’ve been here faithfully in the past then you know that I have said that the kingdom of God on earth is the church.  It is the visible manifestation of the invisible kingdom of God on earth, that is God reigning in the hearts and minds of His people.  The church is the body of Christ, and He is the head.  So Jesus is saying that the church is like a mustard seed which a man planted in his garden and it grew and became a tree and the birds of the air nested in it’s branches.  Now at first we may think that’s just an inscrutable riddle, but on the other hand think that it doesn’t sound too bad.  We all remember Jesus saying that we need to have faith like a mustard seed.  So the first reaction is that this is something good Jesus is saying about the church or the kingdom of God. 

But actually Jesus is saying the exact opposite.  Remember, this comes in context with His rebuke of the synagogue official’s hypocrisy.  First of all, it’s important to understand that mustard seeds produce bushes, not trees.  What Jesus is describing is an abnormal growth of the seed to become a tree that birds nested in it’s branches.  And there is an important element to understanding birds in Jesus parables.  If you remember in the parable of the soils in Matthew 13, Jesus said the birds that ate the seed were the devil and his angels.  And so the picture Jesus is presenting here is that the church grows abnormally large, and the devil and his angels find nesting places in the branches of the church.

Folks, this is such a clear picture of the Christian church today.  The church today has become a monstrosity that incorporates every strange foul doctrine that the demons of hell can devise. 1Tim. 4:1, “But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron.”  Listen, as I keep saying, don’t for a moment think that the devil is not in the church.  Don’t think that just because some wacky experience happened in church that it must be of God.  And don’t forget that the devil knows more scripture than you do.  He has had thousands of years to perfect his schemes and deceit. 

Paul told the church in Acts 20 to be on guard, because he said, “I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.”  Listen, the greatest enemy the church has today is not the forces of evil outside the church, but within the church itself.  And it’s always been that way.  This is what Jesus is preaching against. Remember the fig tree.  It is a flourishing tree that should bear fruit, but instead it is just become a roosting place for birds, for doctrines of demons, for false teachers.  And Jesus said if it doesn’t bear fruit then He will cut it down.

And so Jesus gives one more illustration of the corruption that is in the church.  Vs. 20, “And again He said, “To what shall I compare the kingdom of God?  It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”  Now once again, this parable is often interpreted incorrectly, as some sort of prophecy of the growth of the future church.  But if you remember the context of this message, that it started with Jesus saying “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy,” then that should give you a clue as to how you are to interpret it. 

Leaven is always presented in the Bible as a picture of sin.  And so this parable is warning that the church is able to be corrupted by sin.  The mention of three measures of meal was the standard grain offering that was given to God.  So the correlation is clear.  This is unconfessed sin in the church that is a corrupting influence. Essentially, Jesus is giving a picture of corrupt worship. Hiding sin within corrupted an offering to God.  And I’m afraid that once again this is a picture of the current condition of the church.  The call of the church today is to come as you are to worship God.  That as long as you offer to God the praise of your lips and maybe raise your hands or something then that is all that God requires of us.  And there is no mention whatsoever in the church today by and large about the need for repentance, for confession, for turning away from sin.  And I’m afraid that the church is as guilty as the self righteous Jews of the synagogue who refused to repent at the preaching of Jesus.  We’re guilty of coming with unconfessed sin to the worship of God in the church.

This is why today’s Christian church is more carnal than that found in Corinth.  You can be living with your boyfriend in immorality and be perfectly content in church today.  You can divorce your husband at will and be perfectly content in church.  You can smoke pot on the weekends and get drunk on Friday nights and be perfectly happy at a church.  Because we have no concept of the abhorrence that God has for sin, and furthermore, we have no abhorrence of it ourselves, and rather than just tolerate sin, we embrace it, even celebrate it in the church. 

But I put the blame squarely on the shoulders of the leaders of the church. That is why Jesus most scathing criticism is not of the prostitute or the person enslaved to sin, but of the synagogue officials, of the Pharisees and rabbis that were teaching a false doctrine that permitted sin to flourish without remedy.  And that is my primary concern today.  As a shepherd I am tasked with protecting the sheep from the ravaging wolves that rise up among ourselves, from within our own ranks.  My job is to expose it for what it is; hypocrisy, the doctrines of demons, designed by the architect of all false religions, Satan himself.  We need to cleanse ourselves from the old leaven. 1 Cor. 5:6, “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” 

In Revelation 2 and 3, Jesus gives one last message to seven churches.  And all but two of those churches had moved away from the truth and towards apostasy.  And Jesus gives a similar message to all of them.  I believe that the church today is in the last days, and the message Jesus gave to the last church was that of Laodicea, to which Jesus said, “‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot.  So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth.  Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked,  I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent.  Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”

The need for repentance, Luke 13: 1-9

A few years after I left college, I was working in the hotel business and on one occasion I had a long weekend break from work.  An old college buddy of mine named Ivan happened to call and we made plans to go to Charleston, SC for the weekend.   At the time, I had fallen away in my walk with God and was, to use an old fashioned term, in a backslidden condition.  Ivan wasn’t living for God either.  But both of us had been raised by Christian parents and attended Christian schools, and so we both were more or less aware that we were in rebellion against God. 

On the way home after a weekend of partying, Ivan began to talk about how depressed he was.  And as we talked, he admitted that he did not know whether or not  that he was saved.  Being backslidden myself, I found the conversation uncomfortable.  But I remember that I vaguely tried to reassure him as we drove the long drive back home in the dark. We were both young men in the prime of our lives. Ivan was beginning a new career in a couple of weeks as an airline pilot.  And I had recently gained a promotion in the hospitality management field.  We thought we had the future ahead of us, and a lifetime to make the most of every opportunity.

After we got home that night, we parted ways, making plans to reconnect in a few weeks and take another road trip.  But  I never got to speak to Ivan again.  On his maiden training flight with the cargo airline he started working for, his plane crashed with him and three other crew members aboard.  They think that something caused the plane to blow up in mid air.  Their bodies were scattered over a four block area.

When I got the phone call, I was very disturbed as I remembered the last conversation I had with Ivan.  I don’t know if he ever made peace with God.  Knowing Ivan, I doubt that he did.  As for me, it should have been a wakeup call.  However, I’m sad to say that it wasn’t. I continued to live in rebellion against God.  Yet I wondered why he was taken and I wasn’t.  After all, we were both more or less in the same boat.  And yet, God chose to let Ivan die while I continued to live in rebellion against God.  It was another 3 or 4 years before I finally got right with God.  However, even to this day I find myself wondering why Ivan was taken, while I was given another chance.

As Jesus is finishing up a long sermon to a large mixed crowd of disciples and curious onlookers, He found Himself confronted with a similar scenario.  Jesus had been preaching on the judgment to come and how that day can come upon you at a time when you are not expecting it.  And someone in the crowd, after listening to His message about judgment, asked Him about a current event that everyone in the crowd must have been familiar with.  They asked Him about a group of Galileans who had been killed by the Romans while offering sacrifices in the temple.  And there had been such a slaughter that their blood was mingled with the blood of the sacrifices.  It must have been a horrific event, and one that was particularly hard for Jews to come to grips with because it would have happened in the temple.  These Galileans were probably insurrectionists that had been found in the temple and massacred by the Roman soldiers as the temple sacrifices were going on.  So they obviously were connecting a calamity of this magnitude with the judgment of God.

 That’s an assumption that perhaps we have all made from time to time as we have processed some great catastrophe that we have heard about on the news.  It’s the sort of questions that were frequently raised after the calamity in this country following  9-11.  The question they asked Jesus was similar to questions that I’m sure we all have asked ourselves at times like that; “Were these people worse sinners than everyone else? Did the judgment of God fall upon them because they were such evil people?”

And Jesus answered this question by saying, ““I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”  Then Jesus followed up that remark with another recent headline that would have been familiar to them all.  There had been another group of Jews, eighteen persons in all, that had been crushed to death when a tower in Siloam had fallen on them.  And Jesus asks a rhetorical question, “Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem?”  His answer is exactly the same as before; “I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

Now to properly understand this, we need to realize that the Jews had a theology that basically said they were the chosen people of God, the fortunate people.  They were the people of God’s blessing.  And so to their minds, the only way misfortune could happen to them was if the people involved were particularly evil people who were being punished by God.  Because they believed that the normal situation was that the Jews were favored by God.  Bad things could happen to pagans and deservedly so, but not to Jews.

By the way, that same theology is very common in modern evangelicalism isn’t it? Especially in American evangelicalism there is a predominate teaching and mindset that says that Christians are somehow exempt from all the troubles and trials of the world.  That if we claim to be Christians and just have some form of faith, we can be assured that we can avoid the calamities that befall the rest of the world.  Such false doctrine has given rise to the Joel Olsteens and the Kenneth Hagins of the modern church which teach a health, wealth and happiness philosophy that has been called the prosperity doctrine. Such false teaching has  given rise to the faith healers like Benny Hinn and Oral Roberts and others that teach that sickness and calamity are never ever going to happen to believers if they have enough faith. 

Unfortunately, Jesus Christ did not teach these doctrines. In fact, this very passage teaches that calamity comes on us all.   Jesus makes it very clear that the calamity that fell upon these two groups of people did not happen because they were greater sinners than others.  But what Jesus is teaching is that sin is the underlying reason for all death and calamity.  It is the nature of a fallen world. Romans 8:22 says that

“the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. In other words, as a result of sin, the world is under a curse.  Nature is under the curse.  And man is under the curse.  All of creation suffers under the effects of sin and is waiting for the day of  redemption.

The correct perspective of understanding such tragedies is that sin has caused death to come upon the world, and all of mankind is doomed to death.  That is what Jesus means when He says unless you repent you will all likewise perish.  There is a fate worse than death, and that is eternal death and destruction at the judgment of God.  Physical death is just the gateway to judgment and the judgment is  eternal death.  Hebrews chapter 9 says that it is appointed unto man once to die and after that the judgment.  But for the grace of God, we all are destined to die an eternal death.  What time we have on this earth is but a temporary reprieve, an opportunity to respond to the gospel in repentance and be saved from the destruction that we all deserve and are destined to receive.

Just because you or I have escaped some calamity up till now is no indication of a favored position with God.  It simply means that you have been given more time to repent, to turn to God for forgiveness. Romans 2:4 says, "Do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and forbearance and patience not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?"  But for the grace of God we all should suffer some calamity.  But God has given us time to repent, and whatever time we have in this world is due to the kindness of God that should cause us to repent.

But I’m afraid that most of us respond to the kindness of God much the same way as I did when I found out that my friend Ivan had died in a plane crash.  I thought it was a tragedy, but at the same time I thought that somehow I was exempt from such suffering, even though I was in the same sinful condition.  Most people go through life presuming upon the grace of God when they are able to continue in sin without calamity, and then blaming God when calamity strikes. 

Now I think it’s obvious that Jesus is using these two events to reinforce the need for repentance. The idea of perishing is not talking about just physical death which comes upon us all, but Jesus is speaking of eternally perishing without God and finding yourself at the judgment being cast into eternal hell.  So repentance is the means of escaping that calamity that is due to befall everyone.  That calamity is greater than any disaster that might happen to us on earth, to be ushered into the presence of God and found wanting.  And what Jesus is making clear here is that the only way to escape that calamity is by repentance. 

I’m afraid that in the salvation message today the need for repentance has been obscured by offering people a dumbed down version of the gospel that minimizes the need for repentance, and instead emphasizes the benefits of blessing.  It’s a false doctrine similar to what the Jews of Jesus day were believing in.  Today there is a great appeal to the world to come as you are, to have a relationship with Jesus and that He will solve all your problems and you will have an enriched, fuller, more successful life as a result. 

Consequently, I’m afraid that a lot of people claim Christianity that in actuality haven’t ever been saved.  Because Jesus makes it clear that repentances is the means of salvation.  There must be a complete realization of our sinful condition before God and the judgment that we completely deserve.  Repentance then is the recognition of our sinful condition, of being cut off from God and deserving of God’s judgment, and then calling out to God for forgiveness and in a desire to give my life to God if He will give me life.  It’s an exchange of my life for His life.  My sin for His righteousness.  My will for His will.  It’s an act of grace, whereby I am completely undeserving, but God in His mercy has provided a way of escape through the substitution of Jesus Christ.

That’s the process of salvation.  I’m afraid though that isn’t what a lot of people who claim Christianity have done.  They have added a certain measure of Christianity to their lives in hopes of enriching their lives here on earth, or in hopes that God will enable them to escape some bad habit, or undesirable consequence of their sin, but there has never been repentance; to hunger and thirst after righteousness.  To become sick of your sin, and to understand that repentance is a desire to turn away from sin and live for God.

That sort of repentance will produce something else in a person’s life which is lacking in modern Christianity.  That sort of repentance will produce forsaking the world and living for God, to become conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.  This part of salvation is what is called sanctification.  Hebrews 12:14 tells us that without this sanctification, no one will see the Lord.  Sanctification is the process of working out your salvation with fear and trembling, as we grow and mature in Christ and ultimately bring forth fruit.  True repentance produces three things in the life of the saved; saved from sin’s penalty, being saved from sin’s power, and one day saved from sin’s presence.  That is the three stages of Christianity, salvation, sanctification and one day glorification when sin is done away with forever.

The problem with modern Christianity is that we have a lot of people claiming salvation, but lacking sanctification.  And I’m here to warn you today that sanctification is the fruit of repentance; it’s the fruit of salvation.  I’m here to warn you that a life lived without a desire after the things of God, a life lived without being conformed to the image of God, a life lived without any visible signs of spiritual fruit needs to be examined in light of what God’s word really says. 

Jesus said in Matt. 7:16, “You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.”

Now looking back again at our text, Jesus teaches this very important principle by using a parable about a fig tree that was planted in a vineyard. Luke 13:6, “And He began telling this parable: “A man had a fig tree which had been planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and did not find any.  And he said to the vineyard-keeper, ‘Behold, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree without finding any. Cut it down! Why does it even use up the ground?  And he answered and said to him, ‘Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in fertilizer;  and if it bears fruit next year, fine; but if not, cut it down.’”

Now the illustration of the fig tree obviously refers to the nation of Israel in this parable.  And for three years Jesus  had been teaching and preaching the gospel of repentance.  John the Baptist had preached it prior to Christ.  And so Jesus is saying that because they were rejecting His message and not bearing fruit in keeping with repentance, God was ready to cut down the  tree.  John the Baptist had said that the axe was already laid  at the root of the tree.  And Jesus would be with them just a little while longer and then He would be taken away.  The time for the Jews to repent and start bearing fruit was now. 

But history shows that they did not.  And within the lifetime of many of those who heard the message that day, in AD 70 the Romans would come and destroy the temple.  The massacre of the Galileans who blood mingled with the sacrifices in the temple would pale in comparison to the calamity that would come upon them then as thousands upon thousands  would be slaughtered while taking refuge in the temple.  And the temple itself would be burned and not one stone left upon another. God’s judgment would fall upon the Jews because they rejected His Son.  They had received all the care and benefits of being in God’s vineyard and yet they had not brought forth fruit.

Though this parable speaks primarily to the nation of Israel, it also has individual applications as well.  I know in my own life, I mentioned earlier that I eventually returned to the Lord.  And yet I did not return with my whole heart.  Perhaps I thought I was ok at the time.  I eventually married my wife, had children and became more involved in my church.  I thought I was doing more than most Christians.  I taught Sunday School.  I participated in various church functions and regularly attended services.  I tithed. I read my Bible every morning.  When I compared myself to most other people in the church I thought I was doing better than most of them.  And yet I held on to certain things.  My priorities took precedence over God’s priorities.  I was still in charge of my life and I wasn’t really producing much fruit.

The funny thing is, I was an ardent believer in the prosperity doctrine.  I thought I was a living example of God’s blessing.  I had built a beautiful home.  I had a great career.  I had a beautiful family.  I drove nice cars.  And I thought that I could offer myself to the unbeliever as an example of someone who was blessed by God.  That my example would be an inducement for others to come to Christ, that they might be successful like I was.

But God had other ideas.  He began to prune away the branches that were not fruitful.  He began to dig around my roots so to speak, and work in fertilizer that I might bring forth more fruit.  It took about three years, but by the time God was done with me I was broken physically and spiritually, bankrupt and ready to get serious about the things of God. 

You all are familiar with my testimony, so I won’t belabor it.  But I will tell you that I learned that we are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.  That means we are to exercise our faith, live it out in our daily lives.   Christ didn’t suffer the indignities of human existence and rejection and the sufferings of the cross so that I might use Him as a talisman to ensure that I can enjoy all that life can offer and still get a free get out of hell card.  Christ suffered so that He might purchase salvation for us by the price of His blood, that we might be made righteous, and having been made righteous we might be transformed to live no longer for this world, but to live for Him.

I encourage you today to examine your life.  I believe that I was saved when I was a little kid.  And though there were times when you might have looked into my life and seen a period of spiritual stagnation, or even backslidden-ness, yet as I look over the timeline of my life I can see the hand of God working in me and bringing me into a closer walk with God.  I can see a progression of growth and fruitfulness.  Maybe not as much as I would like to see, but a steady progression in my life as God worked in me, and disciplined me, pruned and fertilized in order to bring about more growth and greater fruit for Him. 

And so I would ask you to examine yourself.  Some of you I know have fallen from time to time.  That’s ok.  Get back up, repent and ask God to help you not to fall again.  Confess your need for the Lord to help you walk in the Spirit and not according to the flesh.  God says if you sin 70 x 7 times, and repent, He will forgive you.  But when you say that you have no sin, you are deceiving yourself and the truth is not in you.  The sin that God hates is the sin of hypocrisy; the sin that says it isn’t sin.  The sinner that won’t repent.  That thinks that they are ok in their complacency, in their apathy.

Listen, the Bible says that if you are a true child of God then God will discipline those He loves.  But if you aren’t a true child but an illegitimate child, then there will be no discipline in your life and as a result there will be no fruit.  But there will be one day a certain terrifying certainty of judgment upon all that have not repented of their evil deeds.  I hope that you are a true son or daughter of God today.  If you examine yourself and find that something is lacking, then call upon God in repentance and faith today that you might be saved and that you might bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

The signs of the times, Luke 12:54-59

As most of you know, I was traveling last week to a pastor’s conference in California and while I was on the trip I came into contact  with a lot of people as a matter of course.  And from time to time as I traveled to various places and waited in line at airports or car rentals or wherever, people would out of a sense of friendliness would speak hello and say something about the weather.  And I found myself reflecting that perhaps the most common topic of conversation today is that of the weather.  It is a rather innocuous way of making small talk with someone that you may not know very well, or because you want to fill an awkward silence between someone you are next to and have nothing else in common to talk about. I think the reason we like talking about the weather is that it is a safe conversational topic.  We all know that proper social etiquette requires that we don’t speak of anything too serious in polite conversation.  We have been warned that we should avoid talking of politics or religion, for instance.

And that is understandable to a certain degree.  Sometimes there may be a place for banal conversation.  But I don’t quite understand people’s fascination with the weather.  Especially in a place like Los Angles.  I saw a monitor in the airport showing the weather forecast for the next five days in LA and it said 71 degrees every day for the next week.  But yet they still want to talk about it.  The weather seems to predominate the news nowadays.  They have an entire network on television that is all about the weather.  And even on our local television stations news programs more time is spent on the weather than almost all other considerations.  There could be wars going on all over the world, and every kind of scandal going on in Washington DC, and yet all of that can be eclipsed by whether or not they think  it may rain the next day.

It really should be disconcerting that people’s lives are filled with trivial things like talking about the weather, or entertainment or sports and yet we studiously avoid talking about what is really important.  There is nothing wrong with those things in and of themselves if they are kept in perspective.  But I’m afraid our fascination with these trivial subjects have taken precedence over focusing on what is really important.

Perhaps that is why Jesus uses an illustration of discerning the weather as a metaphor in His sermon about the judgment of God.  At first glance, it seems like suddenly Jesus throws a couple of unrelated illustrations in at the close of His message that don’t really seem to have much relevance to what He has been preaching so far.

If you look back in this chapter at the beginning of Christ’s sermon, we see Him using one illustration after another to build a case before the crowd that there is coming for every man a day of reckoning with God.  A day when the thoughts of man will be revealed.  When what was whispered in the back room will be shouted on the housetops.  There will be a day of judgment as He illustrated with His parable of the rich fool who laid up so much treasure here on earth that he needed to build more barns to hold it all, and yet  failed to plan for his death and the subsequent judgment of his soul.

The theme of Jesus sermon up to this point has been to present one scenario after another to show that man needs to be concerned first about the kingdom of heaven and emphasizing the fact that what a man has done in response to His knowledge of God will be required of him at the judgment.  Jesus goes on to allude to this coming judgment as a judgment of fire,  which will burn up those things that can be burned up, leaving only what is eternal.  He says that this judgment will divide between those that have accepted Him and those that rejected Him.

And then suddenly in the midst of this message Jesus starts talking about the weather.  In an agrarian community, the weather would have been a familiar topic.   And so Jesus says in vs. 54, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, ‘A shower is coming,’ and so it turns out.  And when you see a south wind blowing, you say, ‘It will be a hot day,’ and it turns out that way.”

Now that was sort of common knowledge.  You didn’t have to be a trained meteorologist to be able to know that in that country, as well as in ours, weather typically moves from west to east.  And even though they didn’t have the radar maps and computer models that we have today, still they would have taken note of the fact that when clouds appeared on the western horizon they usually brought rain and storms as they moved east.  And again, you didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to notice that when the wind blew out of the south the air got warmer, and when the wind blows out of the north the weather gets colder.  This would have been pretty elementary stuff for most people in that day who could not depend upon flipping on the TV at night to hear the weather forecast.

So what’s the point that Jesus is making?  Well, look at vs. 56, Jesus continues; “You hypocrites! You know how to analyze the appearance of the earth and the sky, but why do you not analyze this present time?”  In other words, you can deduce the upcoming weather from analyzing the characteristics of the sky and the wind, but you can’t discern the signs of the times, which are just as obvious.

And I think it’s interesting that Jesus calls them hypocrites.  At first, we might wonder what is hypocritical about lacking discernment.  After all, earlier in the chapter we saw hypocrites being defined as someone who hides their sin, while pretending to be righteous.  So why call these people hypocrites?  Well, the answer is that Jesus is saying that they are choosing to believe a lie so that they can continue living in sin.  This form of hypocrisy denies the truth and believes a lie.  Jesus is saying that they have had ample evidence that He was the promised Messiah and yet they had chosen to disregard it. They chose to believe a lie because they loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. John 3:19
“This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.”

Look at Rom 1:18 for a moment which says, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.”

What that passage is saying is that God’s wrath is coming upon all men because they have rejected truth and loved sin.  Listen, Paul isn’t just talking hypothetically about a few reprobates out there that have turned away from the truth and indulged themselves in gross sin.  But he is talking about the nature of all mankind.  As he said in Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”  This is the curse of the fall, that all men by nature reject the truth of God because they love their sin.  It’s the characteristic of all of us, that at one time we rejected salvation. We liked being our own master and lord, to be the captain of our destiny, so to speak.  And it comes naturally to all of us.

But ever since the beginning, Paul says, God made it clear to men that their was a God by virtue of the creation, of the stars, the heavens, the earth and it’s produce and all the wonders of creation, all of that order, all of that precision, all of that creativity, all of the wonder of creation illustrated that there was a God.  And furthermore, Paul says, creation alone was enough to reveal to men the invisible attributes of God, His eternal power and divine nature.  And yet Paul goes on to say that men rejected that revealed truth about God and substituted instead something out of their own imagination.  They exchanged the truth of God for a lie because their deeds were evil.  That is the hypocrisy.  That truth was available and yet they said it wasn’t and so therefore they claimed immunity and the freedom to do as they wanted.

Jesus says that is why they were hypocrites.  They had not only the benefit of all men by the wonders of creation, but they had the additional benefit of witnessing the life and words and miracles of Jesus Christ and yet they still rejected Him.  In spite of all that He was, in spite of His teaching of which they said, “Never a man spoke like this man spoke,”  in spite of His miracles which numbered in the hundreds and were indisputable proof of His deity, yet they called for more signs as the reason that they still did not believe.  But it wasn’t for a lack of signs.  Many people had believed and had less signs than they did, but Jesus said it was because they wanted to continue in their form of religion without the fruit of it.  They wanted to claim citizenship in the kingdom of heaven, but they were not willing to renounce the kingdom of darkness.

And so they are by their rejection of Jesus bringing upon themselves the judgment that they rightly deserve.  Jesus speaks of this coming judgment again by means of another illustration starting  in vs.57, “And why do you not even on your own initiative judge what is right? For while you are going with your opponent to appear before the magistrate, on your way there make an effort to settle with him, so that he may not drag you before the judge, and the judge turn you over to the officer, and the officer throw you into prison.  I say to you, you will not get out of there until you have paid the very last cent.”

What Jesus is illustrating here is someone who has done wrong against someone in his community, and so they send the magistrate to arrest him and bring him before a judge who will announce his sentence and his punishment.  And Jesus says, why wouldn’t you try to settle with the one who you defrauded before you go to court?  Why wouldn’t you try to make things right with him on your own?  You know you sinned against the man.  You know you’re going to have to make retribution for that sin.  So why not do what is right and reconcile with him on your own.  Why wait for the court to come after you?  You’re just going to make it worse on yourself.

The parallel here should have been clear from the context of His message.  The parallel is this.  We  have all sinned against God.  We have defrauded Him who made us for His glory by denying Him and serving ourselves.  We had the truth revealed in creation, we had the truth revealed in Jesus Christ, and yet we rejected the truth because we loved our sin.  Jesus says, you have time right now to go to your Heavenly Father and ask for forgiveness.  You have time now to reconcile with God.  But there is a day coming, and coming soon, when your reprieve will be up.  And when that day comes, it will be too late then to try to work out a deal.  God will judge you by what you have done in response to His Truth.  When that day comes, every man will give an account for himself before God.  Every man, every woman, every teenager will stand before God and give an account for what he or she did with God’s truth.  And on that day, God will test every man’s work by fire, and what is of earthly wood, hay and stubble will be burned up.  But that which is eternal will endure. Those that are found wanting will be cast into the Lake of Fire and their punishment will be eternal torment.

How are we then to apply this message?  What should our response be?  I know what my response is.  On that day, when I stand before God I don’t want to be ashamed.  I don’t want to be found lacking, having determined my own version of what I think life is all about.  Having lived a life according to what the world said was important and finding myself wanting in the day of judgment.  The Bible says that there is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof is the way of death.  I don’t want that to be my judgment.  I don’t want to be ashamed when I stand before God.

The good news is that Romans 1:16 tells me how that is possible.  It says “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.”  That’s the good news, that is what the word gospel means.  That there is salvation available to every one that believes in Jesus Christ.  That means that if we believe in Jesus Christ, and accept by faith the righteousness of Christ which is offered to us, we will be saved from that wrath which is to come.  The wrath we so rightly deserved.

Because the gospel tells us in 2 Cor. 5:21, that “God made Jesus, who knew no sin, to become sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”  This righteousness which we receive by faith is the only way we might stand before God unashamed.  And this gospel of Jesus Christ is powerful in that it is able to accomplish that transaction for everyone who confesses their sinfulness and their need for a Savior.

God has provided reconciliation through Jesus Christ. God wants you to settle out of court and the way you settle is to make peace with Him through His Son, through faith in Christ, whom God made sin for us that we might be made the righteous of God in Him. God punished Him, the just for the unjust, that we might be brought to God. Grace is available. Forgiveness is available. Freedom from sin is available. Freedom from punishment, the hope of eternal life, escape from judgment. You can settle with God out of court. If you don't, you'll get to court and you will pay in full down to the last cent.

I would close by asking you this simple question.  Have you personally accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior?  Have you called out in faith and repentance to God and asked Jesus to take your life and make it clean?  Sometimes I think that some people come to an intellectual acknowledgement of the gospel, they more or less see the truth in it, and they more or less see the value in it, but they have yet to call upon God and ask Him to come into their life and change it.  To forgive them from sin and give them the righteousness that has been procured by Jesus Christ.   I hope you will honestly examine yourself and see if you have actually called on God to save you.

Today, this is your chance.  2 Corinthians 6 says  that “Today is the acceptable time of salvation.”  And Isaiah 55 says, "Seek the Lord while He may be found. Call on Him while He is near."  Don’t wait until it’s too late.  The Jews had no idea when Jesus warned them that the judgment would come upon the nation of Israel within their lifetimes.  In just 30 years the Romans would destroy the temple and kill thousands upon thousands of Jews, scattering them into the far corners of the world, displaced from their homeland and everything that they held dear.

God’s judgment is coming on the entire world.  The signs of the times point to His imminent return.  It could be any day.  I hope you will call upon Him today and make peace with God.  I hope you will know the peace that comes from forgiveness and reconciliation with God.

While I was away this last week, for some reason I found myself thinking a lot about my own mortality.  And while that may sound depressing, it really wasn’t.  It actually was a time of confirmation, that I was doing what God wanted me to do.  And as I think about my mortality, I know that I want to use the time that I have left in the service of the King.  I decided I would rather die for something, than to live for nothing. And what nobler cause to give my life for than in service to Jesus Christ.

One thing that might have contributed to this sense of mortality was some conversations that the key note speakers had during a question and answer period during one of the sessions.  These were some of the highest profile religious leaders and thinkers of the conservative evangelical movement.  And what came out of those talks was that they were seriously concerned about the future of the church in America as we know it.  There are precedents in the courts already established that if applied to our situation, and there is mounting pressure from our enemies for them to do so, that can effectively shut down  churches all across America.  They may never shut down the preaching of the  gospel completely, but what we have taken for granted in terms of the church in America may be  but a memory in just a few short years.  And as Christians we may find ourselves in the midst of a persecution that rivals that which happened to the Jews in AD 70.

Folks, we need to make the most of the time, because the days are evil.  We need to discern the signs of the times and make the most of the opportunities that we have today to do the work of the kingdom. Romans 13:11 says, “Do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.  Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy.  But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.”