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seated and we'll dismiss the
young ones to go to the creche and the rest of us please can
open up our Bibles to Luke chapter 4. By the way, that hymn that
we just have sung, it's written by John Moore who pastored in
Glasgow and then pastored on the Royal Mile at Crutgers and
I think he's probably at this time passed away. When we bought
the piano, the first piano we bought from the church, we went
in to buy it on the Royal Mile and And the man said, I know
John Moore, you know, the author of Burns' Olympic Calcum. It's
a well-known hymn all around the world. And I said, is that
right? He said, yes, and I've got his
phone number. Let's call him. So he actually dialed him up
and he called Canada. And he didn't answer, so I didn't
get a chance to meet him on the phone. But he was all excited
to tell me that. It's pretty neat, the Christian
history that we've got here in Scotland. We've got a new tract
that I don't know if you've seen it on the back. They're in groups
of 10 on the back, and I encourage you to take some of them and
be willing to hand them out. Some of the churches are aware
that I do street preaching almost a weekly basis. I try to get
down every week. Don't always get down every week. When we
came to Scotland, I was praying. I had on our board, our display
board, as we went to churches and raised support, it said street
preaching. But it was there and it's just
something that got in front of my heart. And then I got here
and I just, it just wasn't me. And so I did a lot of evangelism,
a lot of personal evangelism down the street, but I prayed
about it for 13 years. And within your 15 years coming
up on the 24th, we arrived, we left on the 23rd of March. But praying about it, Down on the Princess Street,
it was a festival and there was a man that was down there street
preaching with some other men were with him and God just gave
me that urge, I wanted to street preach and it's right where I
just saw William down there, I was street preaching down there
this past week or two weeks ago and I saw William but right in
that spot he's declaring the Word of God right in front of
the mound and I just had an urge to take Uh and then after that, uh I
went home and I prayed and I said, lord, if you want me to street
preach and this is a call cuz I prayed to god and said, lord,
if you're gonna want me to street preach, you gotta call me. Uh
I said, give me scripture and god gave me uh in uh in Exodus,
I think it is god speaking Moses and said, uh to Moses sent the
bronze serpent up up on a pole and you know, in John chapter
three, uh Jesus says, the serpent has lifted up. Even someone's
son, Andy lifted up. that scripture and then every
time as I start to witness to somebody, I just had an urge.
It was the spirit of god in my heart. Uh just to declare it
on the street so much so that TK Max down at um Cameron Toll. Uh I was witnessing to an employee
and uh I said to him, I said, I'm burdened to get this message
down in the street and he said, you should. He said, uh festival's
on right now. There's a lot of people there
and I'm thinking, here's an unsaved guy telling me So then we bought the equipment,
we had a youth activity, we tested it, we were out in the woods
over at Bush, and I was praying to God about when to go down,
and God put up my heart about going the next day, I've been
praying about do I use notes or not, obviously here when I'm
preaching I use notes, and God just put up my heart about extemporaneously
preaching. And so Tommy and I went down,
and the first thing that I preached, I preached for 75 minutes just
down there in the declaring the gospel and I say
that because on this track there's a QR code that goes to a five-minute
video. God stirred my heart the second
time I went out this year. There was a point where God really
stirred my heart as I was preaching and somebody had said we ought
to take a short You can see it. It's on sermonaudio.com. If you look up Free Baptist Lothian
or look up my name, you can find all the street preaching that
we've done. And so we put it on Facebook as well as an evangelistic
tool that people can get engaged with. They see it. They're like,
oh, what's that guy doing? You know, start to listen in
and hear the gospel. But I've been challenged to do
a short clip. And so I did a five-minute clip
that has words It's a QR code, takes you to
that, to our sermon audio, and it's just a tool to hand to somebody
and say, will you listen to this, and in the past we've preached
that down the street here in Princess Street, and I'd like
to give that to you, or just say, hey, I'd like to invite you to
visit my church, and it's got the church information and details
on it, but I encourage you to do that, but it's called Scotland
Needs Jesus, and that's the title of the video as well. And so
Luke 4, 13 through 32, his life and ministry. And Luke
begins with a summary from the life of Christ, his first year
of ministry. And you'll remember Jesus' ministry
began after his baptism, then he's driven into the wilderness,
or the temptation that takes place, the blood of the spirit,
rather, into that temptation for 40 days. And then verse 13,
when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from
him for a season. Jesus returned to the power of
the spirit into Galilee and there went out a theme of him through
all the regions around about and he taught in their synagogues
being glorified of all. So, Luke gives a summary of what's
happening after Jesus Christ's baptism and his temptation and
then his earthly ministry begins. Now, a synagogue is he's teaching
a synagogue. It's like an Old Testament church
house. It's a Jewish But Jesus went in all those,
in that region of Galilee, teaching the gospel of the kingdom, that
the kingdom of God was at hand. Many turned to him. It says in
our text that he was glorified of all, and there went out the
fame of him. And so as he's doing that, the
people are finding the Messiah, they're finding the Savior, and
they're finding a friend. And I want to preach this morning
on that same idea as the track. You need to find Jesus. as your
savior and friend. And so, have you found Jesus?
Is he your savior? And is he, are you standing with
him, rather, as his friend? Let's pray and ask God to help
us become the word of God this morning. Father, we're grateful
to you for your goodness. Thank you for all of your many
blessings to us. And Father, I thank you for our
church family. And Father, I just pray, may
the spirit in the cause of Christ here at
Southside Free Baptist Church. Lord, it's such a blessing to
see our church growing, to see, Lord, your people encouraged
in the word of God. Father, to see an appetite for
spiritual things, to see a desire to get involved, to see a desire
to pray for one another, be a blessing to one another, and encourage
each other. And Father, that's why we're excited about this
week, and excited about the care home ministry, excited about
the ladies shoulder up for the cause of
Christ and do something for God. Father, our prayer this morning
has become a text that we just get some insight into the life
of Christ. Father, that those that are without
Christ would know where to find Jesus. Father, that in our evangelism
as we share Christ with others that we know And Father, to think as a church,
as part of I am Christ, am I the friend of Christ? Am I that woman
that is with Jesus in these endeavors of getting the gospel out to
the world? And Father, I pray for the young
people in the crèche, I pray God, your grace in their, may
the Spirit of God bless our children's ministries and power our children's
ministries. And Father, in this place, may
the Spirit of God Father, I pray that the Spirit
of God would help me as well as I declare the truth of the
Word of God, that I would do it biblically, practically, lovingly,
and powerfully. And to the glory of the One that
we focus our eyes upon this morning, it's in Christ's name you pray.
Amen. points this morning about where
somebody goes, where they look to find the Christ or Jesus. You find Jesus in the house of
God on God's holy day, okay? You find Jesus in the house of
God on God's holy day. Look at verse 16, it says, he
came to Nazareth where he had been brought up and as his custom
was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and he stood
up for a reading. Now, the Jews, Sunday. They met on what day?
Saturday, right? The Sabbath day that God had
ordained. That was the holy day for the was her holy day that was set
aside for worshiping God. The Bible says in Exodus 20 verse
8, remember the Sabbath to keep it holy. In other words, sanctified,
set apart as a special day, not an ordinary day, not like Friday,
you know, back through Monday or like Sunday to them, but Saturday
was a very special day for God. Exodus 35 verse 2, six days shall
work be done, but on the seventh day there shall be to you an
holy day rest up physically though it
was that for man who work in six days shall he work the seventh
day rest and so it was a day of rest but it was a day specifically
of rest unto you the Lord my holy name and so Isaiah 58 13 from doing thy pleasure on my
holy day, and call this sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord,
honorable, and shall honor him, not doing thine own ways, and
finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words. And
God said to them, look, this day is the day set aside to just
focus on God. Not go after your own things,
not even really talking about your own things. They can talk
about the normal days and all the carnal things and all the
things of this world, but focusing on the things of God Almighty. God says that's what the Sabbath
is about. And so Jesus never went to a
church house. He did not worship on the Lord's
day. He's the church. Spirit of God came. He's the
one that baptizes us into the body of Christ in the church,
okay, that the Bible speaks about, okay? And so, Jesus worshipped
on the Sabbath, on Saturday, and that was God's holy day,
so he was there to do that. Church meets on the first day
of the as a memorial of Christ's resurrection. Let me just speak
about that. In John 2, 20 verse 1, on the first day of the week,
come with Mary Magdalene early when it was yet dark, come to
the sepulchre, the tomb, and see if the stone taken away from
the sepulchre. So what day did Jesus Christ
rise from the dead? He rose from the dead on And upon the first day of the
week, when the disciples came together to break bread, okay,
that was the communion time, Paul preached unto them, ready
to depart on the morrow, and continued his speech until midnight. All right, so he's preaching,
it's the Lord's day, in that case, I'm not gonna say that's
the standard of what we're gonna do, but he's preaching. We refer to Sunday as the Lord's
Day because that's what John the Disciple did in the book
of Revelation. It says in Revelation 1 verse
10, it says, I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day. Okay, and
so you heard behind him a great voice as a trumpet. The Lord
begins to give of the revelation that we read about there in that
book. So we find Jesus here at the
synagogue. Now what do I say about Jesus?
Jesus is there at the synagogue on God's holy day, and he had
learned faithfulness to God from his youth. It says in verse 16,
where he had been brought up. Now it's not referring to the
synagogue, but it's referring to Nazareth. It's his home village. He's back in the area where most
of his youth had been spent in this place. We know that Mary was a very
godly woman. Hail, thou that art highly favored
of God. Very special woman. Not somebody
that we venerate and worship like a Catholic church, but somebody
that we do rightly hold in high regard as a godly, godly woman. So godly that the Spirit of God
and God the Father looked down at this lady as the one that
we can see in her womb, Jesus Christ. this grew up. Jesus as an infant,
remember, was taken to the temple to do for him after the law. to the ways of God that was in
his his home. At 12 years of age, we find him
in the temple. They'd gone for the festival,
I think Passover, and then they left and accidentally left the
Lord there because he's in the temple and sitting in the midst
of the doctors both hearing them and asking them questions. And so I would say this, Jesus
from his youth, he day, he was there in that place
because that was the upbringing that he had. Understand that
he's God in flesh, that his godliness is not dependent upon his parents,
but we understand that he had godly parents that would have
brought their son up in this way. And so Jesus had the good
habit of attending public worship. It says in verse 16, as his custom
was. Okay, in the temple at 12 years
of age, he said to his parents, whisper not that I must be in the work of God and what God
desired to do. And, you know, I read a quote
recently, it said this, Christians are not leaving church, but they're
just not attending church as much. We're seeing this all over
the United States. We understand churches are cancelling
their Sunday nights, or cancelling their Wednesday nights, or cancelling
maybe other services. They're going to bi-weekly, bi-monthly
services, because it's not that Christians are leaving the church,
but they're not, as their custom was, attending church as they
did. You know, if you were raised
in a Christian home, and I was talking with some of you about this past
week, but if you're raised in a Christian home, You will remember
that when the church doors were open, that your family was there
in the house of God. because that's the way that it
was. If you didn't understand that,
maybe I'm speaking to some today that just say, you know, pastor,
I don't have that Christian background. I don't have that in my past
that I can look back and I say, I remember when it was like that.
I want you to know that's the way that it was when the church
was open, the God's people, if they could be there, they were
there in the house of God. I read this about Jesus. I just
think, you know, what a great statement. As his custom was. Where's Jesus on God's holy day? He's in the house of God. Jesus
wasn't just there, he's ready to minister there. The Bible
says that he stood up for to read. So he's not just a spectator,
he's getting involved in the worship that's taking place.
And you know, to read as he would and speak as he spoke, there
was time, understand, and I understand I'm speaking about the word this
morning, but there was time of growth. where he could minister
even as we see him coming to his earthly ministry at the age
of 30. The Bible speaks about it. Luke
2, 52, Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and favor with God
and with man. All right, the choir typically
would be up behind the pulpit, you know, and up here, the choir
would be sitting here. The choir would have to come
to my church on Sunday nights at, you know, five o'clock or
whatever it was, we had choir practice, and they'd be there
for the evening service, and they'd be preparing for the next
Sunday morning to be there, and there were requirements there
to be in the choir of faithfulness and things like that. So when
you speak about preaching to the choir, it means preaching
to okay you find Jesus in the church
house on God's holy day okay so I get that there might be
somebody listening in you know praise God and get some videos
and we put it out there might be somebody listening in that
needs to understand that Christ is not out there he's not out
there he's not there how often we're in the house
of God. Can we say, as my custom once, to be able to say, as a
parent, am I teaching my children faithfulness to the house of
God? As a grandparent, am I teaching my children faithfulness to the
house of God, so they can say, in my upbringing, as my custom
was, there I was on the Lord's day. I'll tell you this, as older
believers, and each one of us is growing in the Lord, as older
believers, are we teaching the next of God, by our consistency and
our consecration and our commitment to be in the house of God. You know, I say with confidence,
on a Sunday night, Wednesday night, Wednesday afternoon at
the care home, Sunday school at 10 o'clock, Sunday morning
at 11 o'clock, I'll tell you this, Jesus Christ meets with
us at South Side Free Baptist Church. How do I know that? Matthew 18, 20, for where two
or three are gathered together in my name, There am I in the
next. And I'll tell you this, you might
wonder, why is it, Pastor, when we come together, there's such
a sweetness at our church? Because Christ is here. He's
here in who? I believe this. And so when we come together,
we are the body of Christ, and there is a sweetness about that,
isn't there? So I would say, in your evangelism,
you're talking to somebody, say, look, you know, Jesus Christ,
find Him at the house of God. Go to that place of public worship
to hear the truth about Him. You find Jesus in God's house
on God's holy day. You find Jesus in the answer
of God to man's greatest needs. Verse 17. And so there was delivered
unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he had opened
the book, he found the place where it was written. All right,
let me read, open the book. What do you pick? Isaiah scroll and and miraculously,
I believe he just opens it up to the scripture that he wanted
to preach uh from and he finds that place uh Isaiah uh chapter
sixty-one. Yes, I was praying about what
god wanted me to preach this morning. I opened my Bible to
Isaiah sixty-one. I read uh verses one through
three. It reminded me of Luke chapter four. I had to look it
up and see uh where that story is where Jesus uh goes to that
text but that's why we're He's going to speak about God's
answer to man's greatest need. So, verse 18, it says, The Spirit
of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach
the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovery of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are at bruise, to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. Now, I said Jesus is the answer
to man's greatest need, but let me ask you this. Did man have
a problem in the beginning when God created him? No. No, it was perfect. There was
no problems in the Garden of Eden when God designed it. In
fact, every day as God created it, it says, and God saw that
it was good. Then verse 31 of Genesis 1, God says, you can eat of every
tree that's in the garden except for one. Of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil, thou mayest not eat thereof. The day thou
eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. And so death, sorrow, sickness,
all the heartache that we see in life, it's not a result of
God's perfect creation, it's a result of man's sin against
God. They took the tree, so we got
death, sorrow, sickness, war, oppression, I mean all the things
that people say, if there is a God, why is the world like this? And
praise God as believers, we can say, well let me tell you, it
was perfect. And then man sinned, and we violated
God's law, and so all that this has come upon us because of our
disobedience to God. Beyond that, Romans 6.23, for
the wages of sin is death. We know it's not just speaking
about physical death, And the Messiah, the one that
we're reading about, that Isaiah 61 spoke about, Jesus Christ,
was the answer to all of that debt. He's coming to pay that
debt. Jesus could have gone back in
this world. Isaiah 53, He was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace
is upon Him, and with His stripes God could take away all the bad
that's in our lives. Because what's bad in our lives and the angel said to them, fear
not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which
shall be to all people. I've got some good news. That's
the what? year of the Lord. Now I want
to point something out. If you look back in your Bible
at Isaiah 61 this afternoon or something, and look at what Jesus
was quoting, he stops his quote, okay? He stops after speaking
about the acceptable year of the Lord, but in Isaiah 61 verse
2, the next phrase is, and the day of vengeance of our God. But guess what? He didn't come
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through
him might be He could have spoke about the
wrath. He could have spoke about the
judgment, but he wasn't there. He came to seek and to save that
which was lost. He's coming another time in wrath,
in Sinner's wrath. See, he stops right there. Galatians
4, verse 4. It says, but when the fullness
of the time was come, acceptable here to the Lord, God sent forth
his Son, made of a woman, made under the law to redeem them
that were under the law, Now, we just read about those
things, Jesus said, He's gonna do this, He's gonna do this,
He's gonna do this. I wanna point out, those things are both physical
and spiritual. So you can read them and say,
well, is He speaking physically or is He speaking spiritually?
I would say, you know, either way is accurate. Men, because of sin, men are
physically poor, broken-hearted, captive, blind, and bruised.
Sometimes that's a result, direct result of sin, or it's just the
fact that because of sin we've got childhood cancer, because
of sin we've got horrible warfare that's taking place. So some
things are direct, like a drunkard, because of their sin they fall
and they bruise themselves, okay, and they're in bondage debt because
of their sin, or in jail because of their sin. You can look at
it in a physical level. But there's a spiritual level
as well that is all of man's spiritual needs that he's got.
There's no spiritual currency, so they're spiritually poor.
They're taken captive by sin. They're brokenhearted by guilt.
They're spiritually blind and bruised. Whichever way, it's
accurate. And so the simple truth this
morning is that you find Jesus. when you find the answer to man's
greatest need. So when somebody is unsaved,
they're thinking, okay, you know, what do I need? The answer is
what? Christ. And so when you find that answer,
that's Christ, Jesus. Revelation 21.4, God shall wipe
away all tears from their eyes. There shall be no more death,
neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain
from the former things, are passed away, praise God. And so, if
you don't have Jesus, there's nothing else to be here, do you
know what I mean? Jesus said to the woman at the well that
had five husbands, and he whom she now had was not her husband.
She's seeking satisfaction in relationships that was empty.
He said to her, the water that I shall give him, if you'll drink
that, ye shall never thirst. John 11 25 Jesus said unto her,
and she is grieving the death of her brother Martha, I am the
resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me, though
he were dead, yet shall he live. Praise God. The death was defeated
by Christ. He answered to man's greatest
need. It's God saying ahead of time
what's gonna take place. It's not like a curse where you say it and
then you make it happen. It's that God just reveals ahead of
time that this is what's gonna happen and it happens because
God knows all things and has revealed it. And so verse 20,
he closed the book and he gave it again to the minister and
he sat down. And the eyes of all that were
in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began to say unto
them, this day is this scripture for Now this statement that Jesus
has made is one of the clearest testimonies that He ever gives
about the fact of His Messiahship. As He says, this day, this is
fulfilled in your ears. They knew this was a Messianic
text. As He went to Isaiah 61, very familiar to them as Jews
and Jewish leaders, that this is speaking about Messiah. And
then He says, this day is as fulfilled in your ears. He had
just said, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. The Spirit of
the Lord we know came upon Jesus Christ at His baptism. How God
anointed Jesus with the Holy Ghost and with power, who went
about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the
devil, for God was with Him. So Peter's declaration and extent
that I just quoted in Isaiah 61 are both powerful arguments And they were fulfilled in ways
that somebody could say, oh, you know, Jesus just thought,
I'm going to fulfill prophecies. I'm going to study about the
Messiah, and I'm going to go and I'm going to make all these things
happen. So many of these things could not be things that the
Messiah could in any way make happen. For instance, his birth. Micah 5, 2, but thou bidst for
them Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of
Judah. Yet out of me shall he come forth
unto me. That's to be ruler in Israel. Mary and Joseph, they were from,
well, they were from Bethlehem, but not from Bethlehem, all right?
They had to go back there to be taxed, and so God had them
there, but Jesus couldn't have done that. His crucifixion, Psalm
22, 16, a thousand years before the cross, for dogs encompassed
me, the assembly of the wicked having closed me, they pierced
my hands and my feet. But He was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace
was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. Speaking about
the flesh that was ripped off the back of the Lord Jesus Christ. gambling for his clothing, Psalm
22 again. They parted my garments among
them, they cast lots upon my vesture, they gambled for my
clothes. The price of Jesus' betrayal and the potter's deal
that would be purchased with the money that was thrown down
in the temple, Zechariah 11, 13. The Lord said unto me, cast
it unto the potter, a goodly price that I was prized at of
them. And I took the 30 pieces of silver,
to the potter in the house of the Lord. Okay, so all these
things were fulfilled in Christ. This day, this is fulfilled in
your hearing. About 10 years ago, we had a
young man that lives not far from the church here, just about
a block and a half away. Last time I knew, that's where he
was. before and and lo and behold,
I got in that day and he contacted us and he came to church. His
father just recently passed away but he visited on a Wednesday
night. We're studying through Psalms and we got to Psalm twenty-two.
We did that study. They pierced his hands and his
feet. They cast lots upon his pasture. Dogs have compassed
me in doubt and and Michael said this. He wasn't a religious person.
He wasn't a church person but he said, I see that that is Jesus
and then he was amazed because he understood. It's a And again, I just encourage us
this morning in our evangelism, you find Jesus when you find
the fulfillment of the prophecies, because they're fulfilled. west of the United States, very
hot, very dry. And as you drive along, you're
looking at the tarmac on that long road that sometimes, if
you've been out there, I don't know if Joy, if your family too,
trips out west, but I mean, you get out there and you can see,
I don't know, 10 miles, and it's just straight road in front of
you. But in the distance, you see
shimmering, and it looks like water. And you think about it,
I mean, if a child or somebody saw it, huh, what's the lake
up there? deceive you by what they perceive. You know, God's Word does not
and will not deceive us. Sometimes our eyes can deceive
us, but God's Word will not. 2 Corinthians 5, 7 says, for
we walk by faith and not by sight. And so, naturally, as Jesus comes,
they're looking through the eyes of the flesh, but they need to
begin to look through the eyes of faith. It says in verse 22,
And all bear witness and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded
out of his mouth. And they said, is this not Joseph's
son? And he said unto them, he will
surely stand to be this proper. Physician, heal thyself. Whatsoever
we've heard done in Capernaum, do also hear in thy country. And he said, verily I say unto
you, no prophet is accepted in his own country. Now in those
three verses, there's a lot of statements about sight instead
of statements of human reasoning based on what
they can see. Look at verse 1 to 2. They ask
the question, is not this who? Joseph's son. Alright, isn't
this Joseph's son? Well, answer about Joseph and Mary when they
got married. It says in Matthew 1.24, Joseph
being raised from sleep, did as the angel of the Lord had
bidden him, and took unto him his wife, and knew her not. He
didn't have a physical relationship. So she had brought forth her
firstborn son, and he called his name Jesus. Jesus was not
born of Joseph. Jesus was born of who? God. Luke 1.35, the angel answered
and said unto him, and the power of the highest
shall overshadow thee. Therefore also that holy thing
which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." They
looked at it and they couldn't understand the Virgin Virgin.
They couldn't understand God impregnating Mary and putting
Jesus Christ into her womb. They saw it and they said, it's
not this Joseph's son. And they were wrong. It's kind
of starting to believe, but isn't this Joseph's son? I wondered
how many evolutionists start to believe and it's like, man,
I kind of feel like Instead of understanding what
God says in the beginning, God created it. Catholics, Hindus,
Muslims may start to believe, but then they think, but then
if that's true, then all the religion that I grew up with,
how could that be? If that's, they can't both be
true, and maybe they started to believe, but they looked back
at their life, and based on what they could see, they didn't put
their faith in Christ anymore. Here they started to believe,
but then they demanded visible Jesus is saying this but he knows
what's in their heart as he speaks to them about it and says, you
say to me, physician, heal thyself. Do thy It reminds me of those words
at the crucifixion. He saved others, himself he cannot
save. If you come down from the cross,
then we'll believe it. We can just see a mighty mirror,
but that would bring us to faith in you. You know, as I read that,
or thought about that as I studied it, I wondered, these Jews that
were here, I wonder, and I don't know that I've had this thought
before, to think at the crucifixion of Christ, was there, were there
people there that he looked at from his own village of Nazareth,
that would crucify him, that maybe said those things, if thou
be the Christ, save thyself. You know, if you want to see
it, you're admitting you do not believe. And that's a problem,
because salvation is They started to believe but were
too familiar with Jesus. Verse 24. He said, verily I say
unto you, no prophet is accepted in his own country. You know,
we fear more greatly somebody that's unfamiliar to us. You
know, I guess Kim Jong-un had a childhood. Hard to believe,
right? You look at that serious man and that oppressor of his
people. But he studied in Switzerland,
and there at the college, there would be some of his classmates
that were there, and I read an article that said, you know,
his classmates would love to see him again, you know, and have
the opportunity to catch up. And they look at him, but they
don't see him like the big dictator that those that are maybe less
familiar with him have a greater respect and a greater awe of
him, because they didn't see him grow up. You know, again,
Jesus is back in his home country, and he's just too familiar. They
saw him grow up, they're too used to having Jesus around to
recognize that they've got the Messiah opening up to them, the
Word of God. You know, very sadly today, Britain
is too familiar with Christ. Britons are looking to Buddhism
and Hinduism and all these other things because surely Christianity
isn't the answer because that's too familiar. Is your heart hearted? It kind of scares me sometimes
that we have somebody come up and they don't get saved. earned their salvation by doing
all these wonderful works, and the Jews were like that. They
thought, you know, we're in favor with God, and God just loves
us and adores us for all our hard work and our self-righteousness. And Jesus is gonna shock them
with two powerful stories, stories of faith. The first is of a Gentile
woman that's ready to receive God's word by faith. It says
in verse 25, It says, but I tell you of a truth. Many widows were
in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut off
three years and six months, when great famine was struck all the
land, but unto none of them was Elijah sent, save unto Sarepta,
a city of Sidon, unto a woman that was a widow. Interesting,
Jesus unveils something that I don't know. In my Bible study,
if I was reading through the Old Testament, I wouldn't stop and
really meditate on this because of the godliness of the
nation, the prayers of the prophet, and saying to God, God stay the
rain, as you said, because you said if a nation turns, if Israel
turns its back on you, you're gonna withhold rain, God withhold
the rain. And God takes care of his prophet
first, remember, by the brook Cherith, and he goes there, and
the ravens fly in with food, and they're feeding him. And
then God says, I've got a widow, But he says, first give, and
then take yourself. And that woman, by faith, obeyed
the word of God. And I read what Jesus is saying. He's speaking about one woman
that God sent the prophet to, and it was not a Jew, it was
a Gentile. Why is that? Perhaps it is because that woman
had faith, but the Jewish widows maybe didn't. She'll believe
God's word, or maybe they wouldn't. The Gentile man that the Bible
speaks about next, that was ready to receive God's salvation by
faith, is said in verse 27. And many lepers were in Israel
at the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed,
saving Naaman the what? Syrian. He's a Gentile. This afternoon at Wim Hall, we're
gonna study the story of Naaman, all right? That's what we're
gonna look at, pray that God uses that to show the residents
there that God can cleanse them of their sin, just like He cleansed
Naaman of his leprosy. But if you look at Naaman, Naaman
goes to all that trouble of going there, he gets there, the prophet
says, go wash in that river, dip yourself seven times, and
he almost doesn't do it. he had what? Faith. It wasn't
much, but he had faith. And again, Jesus says there are
all sorts of lepers at that time. But it was only a Gentile that
got it. What's he saying to them? He's
saying the answer to the greatest need that's in your heart is
what? It is faith. And he's telling it to them in
some difficult truth because they're having to listen to that
Jewish man, to him speaking about the Gentiles receiving God's
mercy, because they are ready to respond by faith. You know, the Bible says about
this story, Jesus, Mark 6, 6, a parallel passage, he knew there
was no mighty work, and he marveled because of their unbelief. In
the Matthew passage, it says, he did not many mighty works
there because of their unbelief. Again, this morning, all right,
is our, when you're ready to what? Receive
Him by faith. Anybody can get saved if you
come to that point of obeying what God says in His Word, turning
from your sin to the Savior in faith. You find Jesus there.
And then, this morning, you find Jesus when you find the world's
object of greatest wrath. When you identify what the world
hates more than anything, you find Jesus. Nobody's more hated
than Jesus. And all day in the synagogue,
when they heard these things, were filled with what? Rapture. Does our world love Jesus? You
know, when they take God's name in vain, they stuff their toe,
or they get really angry, they want to swear. Whose name do
they use? Jesus Christ Lord. Our world hates Jesus. Our world
is actively seeking to destroy Jesus. Verse 29, it says, they
rose up and thrust Him out of the city. They led him up to
the brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they
might cast him down headlong." In 2017, I was there in Nazareth,
and our bus journey took us there, and it was kind of one of the
neater places where I kind of thought about the Lord a lot. He's not
there. Anyway, you go to Israel, you kind of expect Jesus is there.
He's not, okay? When you get there, it's to think,
you know, as that bus was going along and winding its way up
to the village of Nazareth, kind of on a hillside overlooking where Jesus Christ physically
walked. Wow, that's kind of cool. And
I stared at the brow of that hill. And it's to this point,
and it makes sense from the story, and that's the lovely thing about
going to Israel actually and seeing the geography and everything,
it just affirms your faith because it's like, it's just like the
Bible said, like the place where the swine ran down into the Sea
of Galilee and sloped down. I mean, this is a neighbor, this
is a village kid that's in his 30s, and they're gonna take him
and they're gonna throw him off that hill like he's a hater.
You know, sexual perverts are not the most hated people in
Britain. And by the way, we don't hate
homosexuals. We don't hate lesbians. We're
accused of that, but we don't. But they're not the most hated
people in this nation. I'll tell you who's the most
hated people in this nation. It is God's church. Somebody that believes the Bible,
Somebody that speaks out the truth of the Word of God, just
like Jesus did. You're like the world, just like Christ. That's
a hated person, like as they, and they'll seek to destroy that,
and they're trying to destroy that, but praise God, they'll
never succeed in destroying Jesus, verse 30. But he passing through
the midst of them went his way. You know, they've tried to destroy
the Word of God, but they couldn't do it. They tried burning bibles,
they said, get out and buy one of these, you know, we've got
to have Latin mass. But the printing press was designed to print bibles.
And God allowed his word to proliferate. They never succeeded. They tried
to take Christ in some, and let me say, in some ways they have
succeeded. They've taken God out of the
schools. They're trying to marginalize
him. like a rock, undaunted, amid
the raging storms of time. His pages burn with the truth
eternal, and they glow with the lights of life. Heaven and earth
shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. They're
actively seeking to destroy, then, God's church. Luke 21,
17. And you shall be hated of all men for my namesake. Now,
praise God, the church is still here. But I just say, and I use
this in evangelism. men ate, and you'll find Christ. That's what we see in her story.
Finally, you find Jesus through the eternal conviction of God's
Holy Word. Verse 31, 31 They came down to
Chordium, the city of Galilee, and taught them on the Sabbath
days, and they were astonished at his doctrine, for his word
was with life. and is preaching so much so that
they send men to arrest Christ in the story of John 7-44, that
some of them would have taken Him, but no man laid hands on
Him. You know, praise God for the
power that God has to work in hearts. As a preacher and in
our evangelism, you know, rejoice in the grace of God and the power
that God possesses to touch hearts. John 16, verse seven says, nevertheless,
I tell you a truth, it's expedient for you that I go away, for if
I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you, but if
I depart, I will send him unto you. And when he has come, he
will reprove the world of sin, of righteousness, and of You know, as a preacher sometimes,
and pastor, I'll just say this. I sometimes, I'll look at the
word God, and I think, man, I want to convey that as best I can.
I want to get it right up there by the grace of God. He can run
that, read with it, so that when you grab hold of it as a church
and say, thus saith the Lord, and it would stir our hearts.
But I'll tell you this, if it ever hits the heart of man, it's
not because of this pastor. And I rejoiced in that this morning.
I praise God. God has some power by His Spirit
to convict harms. Because I'll look at it sometimes,
I'll just tell you this, there are some of you that are praying
and praying and praying and praying, asking God, God, work in the
heart of that lover, work in their heart so that they love
God, seek God, find God. And I'll tell you this, again,
as a people, we just back up from that and say, you know what,
I praise God today. God has some power today. You find Jesus when, with that
internal conviction, not somebody's cleverness or somebody's ability
or anything like that, but when the Spirit of God begins to work
in our heart in such a way that there is just conviction there,
praise God, let's respond to that and say, okay, that's Jesus
knocking on my heart's door. I want to let him come in. God
help us to do that. I think it's a very true statement
that's on our track. Scotland needs Jesus. We want to do our best to help them
find Him. This morning, you might hear
a part of you might just say, well, the pastor got to speak
in my part. I need Jesus Christ as my Savior. I need to obey the gospel. Is
there anybody like that this morning? Let me ask this as well this
morning. Is there anything specific that God spoke to your heart
about that you can change? Alright? Not something just immaterial,
but something real. Maybe God spoke to your heart
about it this morning as a pastor. There's something God spoke to
my heart specifically. morning. I just want to join
us once. That's got to speak to my heart about something. Amen. Let's go over here. Father,
I just praise you for your grace this morning, for the time I've
been able to spend in the Word of God, looking at the truth
and the story of the life of Christ. And Savior, it's such
a sad statement to there do no many mighty works because they're
unbelief, save that he laid his hands on a few sick folk and
healed them. The Father just makes us wonder
as a church family, could God do mighty things here at Southside
Free Baptist Church? Is our faith such that you could
work? Would we have been present at
the synagogue? Jesus, you were there, but would we have been
there on that day? And this day, the scriptures
fulfilled, the Messiah opened up the word of God to a messianic
passage and presented himself as the answer. Father, as a church, I just pray,
God, give us grace to be faithful. And Father, for this one, it's
specifically about something that you're speaking to heart
about. Pray, God, give victory and give grace and even at times when we can't
sense it, we just don't see it, Lord God, we know that God's
are faithful. And Father, we praise you for
your faithfulness and your power. It's in Christ that you pray.
Amen.
Finding Jesus
If you would find Jesus, you must seek Him where He can be found.
| Sermon ID | 39251958274208 |
| Duration | 54:25 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Luke 4 |
| Language | English |
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