March 18, 2012
Scripture:
Scripture:
Let’s turn back to Genesis 22. I have been thinking about what we were singing in regard to the load borne by the Lord. Here in Genesis, we have a father and son. Read v. 6. We have been reminded that the Father had the fire and the knife, and the Son had the wood. The load here for Isaac was wood; we know that wood is the New Testament type of humanity. This is the load Christ bore. When He was with God and was God, He had an invisible form. He had to take on a visible form when He bore our load, and yet He was without sin. Thus He was different from all of us. Yet this is the One we have been reminded of this morning. He was made to be what He wasn’t: He was made sin for us. He was made flesh, and given a body. What He wasn’t, He was made. It was so He could take our sins and the judgement for them. He took them so we could be like Him and have our sins removed. How precious!
Hymn 342 - Jesus came from Heaven
Prayer
Last time I spoke, we read about the Lord being tempted by Satan. At this point in His life, Jesus went from being obscure to being well-known in Israel; we’ll see that in today’s story.
Prophecy is a prediction of the future, usually given by God. The Bible holds a lot of prophecy: in fact, a whole third of it is prophecy. Six hundred years before the Lord Jesus was born, there was a prophet named Isaiah. Six hundred years is a long time: that long ago, there wouldn’t have been any cars. Read Isaiah 61:1-2. This prophecy isn’t about Isaiah: in fact, Isaiah didn’t even know who he was prophesying about. Then six hundred years after this prophecy was given, we have the gospels, and they all talk about someone arriving.
Luke 4:14-22
This story takes place in Nazareth, the home of Mary and Joseph, and the place where Jesus was brought up. On the Sabbath day, the Lord Jesus went to the synagogue. While at the synagogue, Jesus stood up. Where Jesus was brought up, He stood up: I hope that will happen here, that young brothers will stand up where they were brought up.
When Jesus stood up it, was an indication that he wanted to read. The book of Isaiah was brought to him and he started to read the verses we just read in Isaiah 61. Jesus read the passage and then sat down. Everybody started to stare at him, so Jesus started a sermon. He told the people that the scripture had been fulfilled that very day … six hundred years after Isaiah prophesied it. There were six things that Jesus was sent to do in the prophecy:
All the people in the Synagogue were amazed. They hadn’t heard anything like this before. These were words of grace and not of law, like they were used to hearing. Notice that Jesus stopped reading just before the part about vengeance. He was not sent to deal out vengeance, but to bring grace.
This is the first view into the Lord’s ministry that we’re given in the Bible, and in it we see how the people of Israel were starting to learn who the Lord really was.
Luke 10:30-42
We have a lawyer here who is asking our Lord, “Who is my neighbour?” He was trying to justify himself after asking and answering a couple of other questions. Jesus’ answer took the form of a parable.
We looked briefly at the certain man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves who stripped him and wounded him. We saw that this was like Satan, who stripped man of his innocence and left him a dying creature.
So this certain man was left lying on the side of the road and, by chance, a priest, and then a Levite, came along. They looked at the man, but passed by on the other side. The law was unable to give life to this dying man; it didn’t have anything to meet his need. If the priest or the Levite had touched him, they would have been left defiled. Nothing would meet this man’s need except an intervention from God. We think that the priest and the Levite were bad men, but what could they do? If they loved their neighbour as themselves, they might have given this man some bandages - that’s all the law ever was spiritually. However, Jesus was showing that this man’s case was hopeless in light of the law.
The next person to come along was a Samaritan. You might call Samaritans strangers; and this fits, because the Lord is actually telling this parable about Himself, and He walked down here as a stranger. Jesus is the perfect neighbour; He is the One that we need. He came down from glory to where we are, just as the Samaritan with this dying man “came where he was” (v.33). We are on a downward slope, and nothing we do can earn us salvation. Our only hope of salvation is through the Lord Jesus Christ, Who has gone lower than anyone else. As the poem says:
Wouldst thou be great, then lowly serve;
Wouldst thou go up, go down;
But go as low as e’er you will,
The Highest has gone lower still.
Jesus didn’t stop at being born in a manger. He went as low as dying on the cross for our sins.
The Samaritan “had compassion” on this man (v.33). Our Lord saw us in our sinful and awful condition, and He loved us. Who has loved their neighbour like Jesus? Like the Samaritan, He has taken the initiative and come to us. The priest and the Levite were careful not to become defiled, but the Samaritan came, saw, had compassion, went to him, bound up his wounds, set him on his beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. That’s quite a list of verbs! He knew how to bind up the wounds, but he went further than that. He set the man on his own beast - that speaks of us exchanging places with the Lord, He became poor that we might be rich; we’ve been accepted in the Beloved - and then brought him to an inn and took care of him. The inn is like the assembly, where new converts can be taken care of and are not alone.
As he left, the Samaritan gave the inn-keeper some money. There are people who have been given spiritual gifts in order to take care of others. Another interpretation of the two pence is that they are the word of God and prayer, as referenced at the end of this chapter (Mary was at Jesus’ feet hearing His word) and the beginning of the next (the disciples ask the Lord to teach them to pray). What would we do without the word of God and prayer? The Samaritan not only helped this man, but he also took care of his future.
A priest and a Levite had passed by, but the next person wasn’t a doctor; because then it would have been his duty to help the man. The Samaritan’s service had to come out of the liberty of his own love. When we go above and beyond the call of duty, God will certainly reward us. He is debtor to no man.
After finishing the story, Jesus asked the lawyer, “Which of these men was a neighbour to the man who fell among the thieves?” The lawyer answered, “The one that showed mercy to him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
Hymn 338 - I love my Saviour, my precious Saviour
Prayer