Whom Shall I Fear? Luke 12:4-7 - September 24, 2023

 Luke 12:4-7 Whom Shall I Fear?

Good morning! Turn with me in your Bibles to Luke 12:3-7, page 871 in the pew Bibles.

I would like to thank you all for your prayers and outpouring of love on me last Sunday. For those of you who are unaware, I suffered a stroke a number of years ago and have had struggles with my speech ever since, and as you saw last week sometimes I have bad days. But I am very grateful for your love and support.

I am also grateful that our text for this morning is a wonderful encouragement from our Savior.

Let’s get right to it.

4 “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. 5 But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. 7 Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.

Let’s pray.

Again, I’ll remind you that Luke tended to organize his gospel more thematically than chronologically. So coming out of the warnings against hypocrisy, the leaven of the Pharisees, it makes sense that warnings against the fear of man would be in this section.

Proverbs 29:25 says, “The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.”

The fear of man was really at the heart of the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. They pretended to be spiritual in front of people, they appeared holy on the outside, but inside, in reality, were full of greed and wickedness.

So why not just embrace the greed and wickedness and shamefully appear that way on the outside? Because of what people would think, because of what people would say.

Why is it that we are not open and honest about our own weaknesses and failures? Same reason.

But when Jesus tells the disciples, His friends, “Do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do,” He knew what was in store for them.

Peter would be crucified in Rome upside down. James would be killed with a sword in Rome. John would be beaten, boiled in oil, and exiled on the island of Patmos. Andrew would be crucified in Greece. Philip would be scourged and crucified in Turkey. Bartholomew would be beaten with rods, scourged, then beheaded in Turkey. Matthew would stabbed to death with a halberd in Ethiopia. Thomas would be pierced with spears in India. James son of Alpheus would be stoned then clubbed to death. Thaddeus would be crucified in Mesopotamia. Simon the Zealot would be crucified in Persia for not worshipping the Sun god.

Jesus knew what was coming for each of them and still He said, “Do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do.”

Why not fear them? Because all they can do is punish this body, they cannot affect the destiny of the soul.

When Jesus says in John 3:16 that God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever would believe in Him would not die but would have everlasting life, He didn’t mean that our body would not die but that our souls would not die.

Lots of people who believe in Jesus have died, their bodies have died, but that is not the end for those who have faith in Jesus. That’s exactly what He is reminding His disciples. 

All they can do is kill you, if you trust in Jesus you know that this life is not the end, there is a glorious place being prepared for you in His eternal kingdom.

The sword of men is not nearly so dangerous as the fear of men, especially when our fear of people and their opinions makes us turn from the Lord.

John Calvin wrote, “If the fear of God is extinguished by the dread of men, is it not evident that we pay grater deference to them than to God?”

4 “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. 5 But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him!”

Psalm 111:10 says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all those who practice it have a good understanding.”

Psalm 19:9 says, “The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”

Proverbs 1:7 says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.”

Ecclesiastes 12:13 says, “The end of the matter, all has been heard. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.”

Are you starting to get it? I could go on!

The fear of God recognizes the reality of His holiness and majesty and our sinfulness.

When I think about the fear of the Lord and what that might look like I always think on Isaiah chapter 6.

In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” 

4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 

6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” 

8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.”

RC Sproul said, “The fear that we are to have of God is a fear of offending Him, a fear born of awe, reverence, and humility before His majesty.”

God alone has the authority to both to kill the body and cast the soul into hell, Gehenna, eternal destruction, the second death. And he does so rightly because of His holiness and justice and because it is what we deserve because of our sin.

Thanks be to God that because of His great love for us He has made a way for us to be forgiven through faith in His Son!

Jesus goes on to say, 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. 7 Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.

They must have been running a sale at the pet store that day, buy four sparrows get one free!

When was the last time you gave any thought to sparrows? How about when one dies?

It seems pretty insignificant to us and that’s exactly Jesus’ point. If something so small and insignificant is not forgotten before God, how could we possibly think that He doesn’t care about us? 

Matthew Henry wrote, “Though they are of such small account that five of them are sold for two farthings, yet not one of them is forgotten of God, but is provided for, and notice is taken of its death. Now, you are of more value than many sparrows, and therefore you may be sure you are not forgotten, though imprisoned, though banished, though forgotten by your friends; much more precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints than the death of sparrows.”

I love the line from the old hymn, “His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me…”

John Calvin said, “Would He who is careful about the sparrows disregard the life of men?”

I think sometimes when we consider the love of God it stays kind of ethereal, just kind of out there somewhere and not very concrete. This idea can seem so far away and hard to grasp. But your Heavenly Father cares for you, and His care goes all the way down to the very smallest detail. Even the very hairs of your head are numbered.

You are not forgotten, you are worth more than many sparrows.

When we try to find our worth in the opinions of others we will fail. It may bring short term gratification but in the end will leave us disappointed.

When we put the opinions of others before the opinion of God we are in a very dangerous place. 

Whether we are seeking to please people or seeking to avoid their ire, if we do so because we fear them more than we fear and respect our Heavenly Father we are in a dangerous place.

The long and the short of it is that this should all drive us back to Jesus; to find our forgiveness in Him, to find our strength in Him, to find our confidence in Him, and to find our worth in Him. 

He loves you so much! Fear not; you are worth more than many sparrows.

Amen.

Leaven of Hypocrisy - Luke 12:1-3 - September 20, 2023

 Luke 12:1-3 Leaven of Hypocrisy

Good morning! Turn with me in your Bibles to Luke 12:1-3, page 871 in the pew Bibles.

This morning we are going to look at a one point sermon from Jesus. 

Now remember that Luke did not necessarily organize his Gospel in chronological order so this sermon from Jesus may not have taken place immediately after the preceding verses. 

Luke tends to group things more thematically so since the last passage was dealing with the problems of the Pharisees it makes sense that our text for this morning would follow it.

These statements of Jesus take place near the height of His popularity which would have been especially troublesome to the Pharisees and Scribes but was not delivered necessarily to the crowd at large. Instead it was a warning to His disciples against hypocrisy.

Let’s look at our text and jump in.

In the meantime, when so many thousands of the people had gathered together that they were trampling one another, he began to say to his disciples first, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. 2 Nothing is covered up that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. 3 Therefore whatever you have said in the dark shall be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops.

Let’s pray.

Before we get too far, let’s define our terms so we are all on the same page. I love doing key word studies to get a little more meat out of my studies. And as I look at this text there are two key words that jump out at me, leaven, and, hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy is something that we have talked about over the last few weeks.’

It’s a word that is borrowed directly from the Greek hypocrites, which means to play a part or pretend, to give an impression of having certain purposes or motivations while in reality having quite different ones.

“Hypocrites,” was the name of the man credited with inventing acting and plays. In Ancient Greece plays would be performed by only a few men who used special masks to represent each character and actually had cones hidden in the mask itself to amplify their voices when performing. (This is what I learned at University…)

Now there’s a certain irony to the idea that masks were used in the plays to pretend to be someone that you weren’t. It certainly seems like it helps us to further understand what being a hypocrite, or acting hypocritically really is: hiding the truth behind a mask.

I’m sure that most of you who have ever had occasion to talk with unbelievers about the church have heard someone say that the church is full of hypocrites.

In the past I have agreed to this idea, but is that really true, is the church full of hypocrites? 

Possibly but not necessarily.

Hypocrisy, pretending to be one thing when you are really something else, or pretending to have one motivation or purpose but really having a different one is definitely a sin and perhaps some of us here are guilty of it.

But in truth, we are only guilty of that sin if we claim that we do not sin.

To the world Christians represent righteousness and rejection of sin, but the reality is that we aren’t really all that righteous and don’t always do the best job at rejecting sin. When this is exposed, the world says, “AHA! What a bunch of hypocrites!”

But do you present yourself to others as free from sin, as perfect?

We all still sin, we are all still in need of God’s grace, none of us are perfect. It’s only when we pretend to be otherwise that we are guilty of hypocrisy.

The Pharisees were true hypocrites, they were frauds, they pretended to be holy when they were not, and that’s what Jesus was warning His disciples to avoid.

The second key word, which really came first in our passage is leaven.

Leaven is yeast, a substance that can be found everywhere. 

Yeast is very useful, it can be used in baking and making alcohol, but it can also be used to give your hair shine and refresh your skin, it can also be used to keep away slugs, which is great.

People often think that in Scripture leaven, or yeast, only ever represents sin, but in reality it doesn’t. Jesus used leaven as an illustration of the working and growth of the kingdom of God like yeast in a lump of bread dough in Matthew 13:33, and also later in Luke 13:21.

Leaven is used to represent sin in many other passages. But Jesus’ use of leaven in this passage where it does represent sin, and the others where it represents the kingdom of God, is really to represent something that may be small but is powerful and pervasive. It only takes a little bit of yeast to profoundly affect a whole lump of dough.

In this instance, where leaven represents sin, it does so powerfully because of the effect that yeast has on dough.

Consider two loaves of bread made from the same lump of dough. One of the loaves had yeast added to it but the other didn’t. They started out as one lump of dough and were divided equally and were equal in weight. 

The loaf with no yeast was baked immediately and the one with yeast was allowed to rise before baking.

The heat from the oven killed the yeast and it stopped rising because yeast is actually living organisms that digest sugar and give off carbon dioxide.

So despite the minute difference in weight added by the tiny bit of yeast, these two loaves still weigh the same because yeast only puffs up the bread but adds nothing solid.

John Calvin wrote, “We now perceive the reason why hypocrisy was viewed by Luke as equivalent to doctrines invented by men, and why he included under this name the leavens of men, which only puff up, and in the sight of God add nothing solid, and which draw aside the minds of men from the right study of piety to empty and insignificant ceremonies.”

Yeast only puffs up but in God’s sight adds nothing solid. This is Jesus’ warning to His disciples.

The leaven of the Pharisees was their hypocrisy, they were puffed up before the eyes of men but in God’s sight were just empty air pockets.

Verses 2-3 say,

 2 Nothing is covered up that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. 3 Therefore whatever you have said in the dark shall be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops.

RC Sproul wrote, “Ultimately, every mask of hypocrisy will be ripped off. At the judgment seat of God He will separate the real from the counterfeit, the genuine from the hypocritical.”

Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 4:4-5, It is the Lord who judges me. 5 Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God.

The day is coming when every man and woman who has ever lived will stand before the judgment seat of Christ and will have to answer for every evil thought, word, and deed.

The only escape from having all our sin laid bare for all to see, the only escape from the horror and shame of that is faith in Jesus Christ.

Because on Judgment Day when the righteous Father looks at us, by His grace through faith in Jesus Christ our sin will be hidden by Christ’s righteousness. When He looks at us he will only see Jesus.

We’re fooling ourselves if we think that it is enough to be seen as righteous in the eyes of men and not give a thought to having to deal with Almighty God.

Alistair Begg said, “If we do things, in religious terms, simply for the rewards of men, as the Pharisees were prone to do, then our motives will one day be disclosed.”

Jesus will bring to light what has been hidden in darkness, our motivations will be exposed, every word we whispered in the dark, in secret thinking no one would ever hear will be brought to light and shouted from the rooftops.

The leaven of hypocrisy is so pervasive, so tempting, so destructive to the church. We need to pursue just the opposite, honesty, integrity, simplicity, and love.

We need to pursue honesty, to be honest with ourselves and with the Father and with others about our sin.

We need to pursue integrity, to act in private like we would act in public. Act like the Father is present with us because He is.

We need to pursue simplicity. To reject all the scheming and hiding and covering up that hypocrisy necessitates.

We need to pursue love which encompasses all these things. Love for the Lord our God and love for our neighbor.

Amen.

Woe is Me - Luke 11:37-54 - September 10, 2023

 Luke 11:37-54 Woe is Me

Good morning! Turn with me in your bibles to Luke 11:37, that’s on page 870 in the pew Bibles. We are going to pick up where we left off last week in this great confrontation between Jesus and the Pharisees and teachers of the Law.

Let’s pray.

Last week we dealt with how Jesus pointed out that the inside should match our outside; that outward cleanness, that is appearing to be spiritually clean on the outside, is of no value without cleanness on the inside. The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law were only concerned with outward appearances and Jesus exposed their hypocrisy.

In the rest of the passage Jesus proclaims six woes to the Pharisees and the lawyers.

According to the “New Bible Dictionary, Third Edition,” When Jesus says ‘Woe unto you’, he is not so much pronouncing a final judgment as deploring the miserable condition in God’s sight of those he is addressing. Their wretchedness lies not least in the fact that they are living in a fool’s paradise, unaware of the misery that awaits them. The state of the materially-minded blinded by wealth to their spiritual needs, of the self-satisfied, of the impenitent and unsympathetic, and of those who are universally popular is declared by Jesus to be wretched (Lk. 6:24–26). Similarly, the woeful condition of the Pharisees and scribes (Lk. ‘lawyers’) lies, Jesus tells them, in the hypocritical zeal, the lack of proportion, the love of display and the self-complacency which disfigure their religion.

So let’s look at our text from Luke 11 together and see what we can glean from it.

37 While Jesus was speaking, a Pharisee asked him to dine with him, so he went in and reclined at table. 38 The Pharisee was astonished to see that he did not first wash before dinner. 39 And the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. 40 You fools! Did not he who made the outside make the inside also? 41 But give as alms those things that are within, and behold, everything is clean for you. 

42 “But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. 43 Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces. 44 Woe to you! For you are like unmarked graves, and people walk over them without knowing it.” 

45 One of the lawyers answered him, “Teacher, in saying these things you insult us also.” 46 And he said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers. 47 Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed. 48 So you are witnesses and you consent to the deeds of your fathers, for they killed them, and you build their tombs. 49 Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ 50 so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, 51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation. 52 Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.” 

53 As he went away from there, the scribes and the Pharisees began to press him hard and to provoke him to speak about many things, 54 lying in wait for him, to catch him in something he might say.

The Pharisees, as we talked about last week, were a sect of the Jewish people who were known for a strict adherence to the Law of Moses, so strict that they added all kinds of other rules and traditions on top of the Law of God but taught that those rules were just as important.

The lawyers, on the other hand, were those whose interpretations of the Law formed the basis of the whole Pharisaical system. So these two groups walked hand in hand as we saw in our text. If Jesus insulted one, He insulted the other.

The problem of both of these groups was the same, the outward exercise of religion versus the inward cleanness of faith. 

Jesus was pointing out the difference between reputation and character, reputation being what other people think you are and character being what God knows you are.

When you focus on the former and neglect the latter you become a hypocrite.

For these individuals this was a big problem, but the bigger problem was that these individuals were leaders and influencers of others and their influence was not positive.

So in Jesus’ exposure of their uncleanness and hypocrisy he pronounces six woes, three to each group.

The first is in verse 42.

42 “But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.

The word, “tithe,” means to give a tenth of one’s income. This principle was introduced in Leviticus 27:30-32.

30 “Every tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees, is the Lord’s; it is holy to the Lord… 32 And every tithe of herds and flocks, every tenth animal of all that pass under the herdsman’s staff, shall be holy to the Lord.

The Pharisees were careful to count out every tenth mint leaf but neglected justice and the love of God.

As Calvin defines it, “Judgment is taken for equity, or uprightness, the effect of which is, that we render to every man what belongs to him, and that no man deceives or injures others. Mercy proceeds farther, and leads a man to endeavor to assist his brethren with his property, to relieve the wretched by advice or by money, to protect those who are unjustly oppressed, and to employ liberally for the common good the means which God has put into his hands. Faith is nothing else than strict integrity; not to attempt anything by cunning, or malice, or deceit, but to cultivate towards all that mutual sincerity which every man wishes to be pursued towards himself. The sum of the Law, therefore, relates to love.”

Though we are set free from the Law’s strict requirement to tithe, it is a great starting point for us when it comes to our cheerful worship in giving. Jesus told the Pharisees that they should do one without neglecting the other and the same holds true for us, justice, equity, uprightness, mercy, love for our neighbor, love for God as well as generosity in giving.

43 Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.

Again Jesus reminds them of their focus on outward appearances and pride. They sought to sit at the head table, to sit up front in the synagogue where the dignitaries and important people sat.

In Just a few chapters from now in Luke 14:8-11, Jesus instructed His followers,

8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, 9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. 10 But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. 11 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

This is exactly the opposite of the attitude of the Pharisees, they exalted themselves all the time, only now they were getting dressed down for their pride and presumption.

Next is the woe that bothers me the most.

44 Woe to you! For you are like unmarked graves, and people walk over them without knowing it.

This basis for this statement is found in Numbers 19:16, which says, 16 Whoever in the open field touches someone who was killed with a sword or who died naturally, or touches a human bone or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.

The trouble I have with this statement is that the people who followed the Pharisees, who admired their guidance, and who sat under their teaching, were actually being defiled instead of being made clean. The uncleanness of their legalism and pride was actually infecting those who followed them and they didn’t even know it.

As a teacher this troubles me greatly. I pray that I don’t add to anyone’s problems because of my own sins and failures.

So in the middle of Jesus’ proclamation of woes on the Pharisees, one of the experts in the Law stands up and says to Jesus, “When you insult the Pharisees, you’re insulting all us lawyers too!”

I wonder what kind of response this lawyer was looking for… “Sorry, my bad, you guys are cool!”

Yeah, nope.

46 And he said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.

The problem Jesus is pointing out is not the Law. The Law wasn’t the problem it was the lawyers.

Jesus is pointing out  the lawyers’ unscrupulous, hypocritical, shameless, inconsistent enforcement of the Law of God, loading people up with the burdens of religion without lifting a finger to help them. 

This is exactly the effect legalism has. You have to dress this way, you can only use this version of the Bible, you have to sing out of this book, you can play only these instruments, you can’t work, or shop, or walk around on Sundays… You get the picture.

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free, don’t submit again to a yoke of slavery to empty religion and powerless religious rituals. Religion buries the Word of God under mounds of traditions.

 47 Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed. 48 So you are witnesses and you consent to the deeds of your fathers, for they killed them, and you build their tombs. 49 Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ 50 so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, 51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation.

Abel, in Genesis 4:8, was the first martyr, murdered by his brother because of jealousy, because he offered a right sacrifice before God and God was pleased by it.

Zechariah was the last martyr in the Hebrew organization of the Old Testament, as recorded in 2 Chronicles 24:20-21, stoned to death in the Temple. 

Alistair Begg said, “The same hate that filled the hearts of their fathers towards the prophets is actually filling their hearts.”

In Acts 7:51-53 the words of Stephen, the first martyr of the New Testament: 51 “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. 52 Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, 53 you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.”

Proverbs 29:1 says, He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.

These men were held responsible for the blood of all the prophets because they did listen to them, they didn’t learn from them, they didn’t recognize that they were all pointing them to Jesus whom they were persecuting and plotting against.

And finally, 52 Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.” 

Jesus said in Matthew 23:13, For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.

Jesus is the key to the whole Bible, both Old and New Testaments. Instead of pointing people to Him as the fulfillment of the Old Testament and its prophecies they stood opposed to Him, rejected Him, and eventually had Him killed.

They refused to turn from their sin, from their empty religion, and turn to Jesus in faith and instruct others to do the same and so they would not enter the kingdom of heaven and hindered others who were entering.

I know this is long but we still have to ask, what is our take away, what can we learn from this confrontation?

Don’t be like that.

Don’t count on outward appearances, don’t count on empty religious practices and not on true faith in Jesus, don’t withhold justice and mercy and generosity, don’t neglect the love of God and your neighbor, humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and let Him left you up, honor the Lord by obeying His Word as it’s given, not adding to it nor taking away from it, enter the kingdom of God through simple faith in Jesus and invite others to join you. 

Amen.