A Question Of Authority - [Luke 20]

Let's take our Bibles, please, tonight and turn to Luke chapter 20. You did not come to hear about me or my friends.

You came to hear the Word of God, and that's what I want to give you tonight. It's so wonderful that we can look to God's Word so we can take our eyes off of ourselves.

We all, in different shapes and forms, have different problems, and some are very difficult problems, and seemingly there's no way out and what to do.

Yet we can go and look to the Lord and see how wonderful Christ is, and we know He has the answers. And in this particular case,

He not only has the answers, but He has a question for those who are questioning Him the wrong way.

We're doing parables on Sunday night, and Lord willing, this fall we'll start up a series on Ruth. I think the ladies just did

Ruth at the retreat, and so they should have all the answers down when we get to the book of Ruth.

Tonight, the parable that answers the question, what authority,

Jesus, do you have? Why can you say these things? And Jesus will answer that question.

Why does Jesus have authority? Very important question, especially in our day today, where people are wondering about the

Bible, questioning the Bible. It's your interpretation, that's what you think, and everybody's got a

Bible verse for everything else, but Jesus basically says, I have authority. And He does it in such a way that when we read the passage tonight, and go through it, you're gonna say,

I love Jesus. And in this particular case, it's not going to be because He's kind and compassionate towards those who are really needy.

Here, it's the case where the false teachers come, and He just fillets them with His words.

And you just think, I love to serve a Savior like that. Not only the Savior who's the

Lamb, but the Savior who's the Lion. He just has the answer for everything. He's Jesus, there's no one like Him.

Hello. Your lights are on. Luke chapter 20, verse 1.

I'll give you the context in just a moment, but let's just jump right in. It is Passion Week, I will say that.

And it came about on one of the days while He was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the gospel. Remember, that's the real reason

He came, is not necessarily to heal, although that was a sub -point. He came to preach the gospel, that the chief priests, listen to this trio, and the scribes and the elders confronted

Him. They'd been wanting to do this for a long time and have done it on occasion. And they spoke, saying to Him, Tell us by what authority you are doing these things, or who is the one who gave you this authority?

They were very big into chain of command, credentials. They didn't like paper mills for degrees.

And everyone had to be authorized by someone else before they could just get up and begin to teach.

And they are basically trying to put Jesus in a corner here, saying, You have no credentials, no rabbi authorized you, no synagogue, no

Sanhedrin, no bunch of Sadducees have said, Here's our stamp of approval, you are allowed to teach.

And you're going around teaching everywhere. By what authority do you do this? Chief priest did a little research this week.

This is the group that might have included Caiaphas and Annas. The scribes, they're mostly

Pharisees. And what do you think scribes did? They wrote, right? What's the

Spanish word for to write? Yes, yes, so they're the writers. And elders, these were the heads of all the tribal divisions and the influential families.

This was not like an elder of a church kind of thing. And now these ripples that started early in the ministry of Jesus are turning into tidal waves, tsunamis.

There is going to be a collision, and here it comes. And he says, they said, Why are you doing these things? We don't like that at all.

And if you go up to Luke 19, verse 45 to 48, it gives us at least one of these things.

Why are you doing these things? Here's at least one thing. And they didn't like this at all. Luke 19, 45,

Jesus entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling. Remember that? He did it earlier in his ministry in John 2, and now he's back, and there's

Passion Week, and he starts driving everyone out of the temple, cleaning house.

And it is a circus in the temple area. It's a mixture of the stock market with all the money changing because you had to have the right kind of temple tax to get in, and it couldn't be

Canada money when you're going down to Massachusetts. It had to be American dollars. In this particular case, they had to translate these faraway currencies to the right temple currency and pay them.

And, of course, it was 10 % to 12 % upgrade. And here's the stock market, and then you've got the stockyards in there too.

And the stockyards were, oh, we've got the right kind of Passover lamb for you, and we've got all the right sacrifices, and I know it'll cost you.

But it's just this bizarre, bizarre going on in there. Did you get those two words?

Adjective and noun? A bizarre bazaar. They're buying and selling, and that half -shekel payment they have to get.

Jesus said to them in verse 46 of Luke 19, saying to them, It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer.

Here it is, a house of commerce. My house shall be a house of prayer. But you have made it a robber's den.

They're doing all this in the court of the Gentiles. Now the Gentiles can't even come and worship. They can't come and pray.

They can't even get in because all this stuff is going on, and Jesus says, It's supposed to be a house of prayer. This is like going to a church expecting a worship service, but finding only bingo being played, but a hundred times worse.

Has there ever been bingo played at this church? We have not done bingo yet. Hey, it's all about church growth, the

ABCs of Christian growth. Attendance, buildings, and cash. And we could just switch that around here a little bit.

Attendance, bingo, and cash. Pack them in. You come here, we'll give you $5 of chips to start.

It's all about the numbers. Of course it's not. Try to think of a fair that you've been to, the

Sterling Fair. How would you like to go in the middle of the Sterling Fair? And right in the very middle there, where they have kind of the most action going on, 7 o 'clock on a

Saturday night, we'll get together and have a worship service and have scripture reading and prayer time and preaching.

It's not going to happen. What's the place up there in Maine or New Hampshire, right along the beach that's all kinds of merry -go -rounds and everything and rides?

Pardon me? That sounds good. That's not what I was thinking about, but if they have that, you just can't worship in those kind of settings.

Pardon me? I'm thinking Hampton Beach. Do they have those things there? Oh, okay, it's a boardwalk.

Well, you can't worship at a boardwalk either. Let's just get back to my notes before I take us farther away from where we're going.

We don't want to do that. But if you notice the text there in Luke 19, and it shows, You have made the house a robber's den.

It's supposed to be first a prayer of all nations. Now it's a den of thieves. And so what they've done here is if you are a thief, you go out and commit a crime, you quick run back to the temple and say,

I'm in the temple, King's X. I have sanctuary. And they were allowing that to happen. Listen to what one man said.

No matter what they did, even grossly violating the sanctity of their own temple, they imagined that their adherence to this temple will protect and shield them from any penalty.

The scholar Garland said, The den is the place where the robbers retreat after having committed their crimes. Jesus indirectly attacks them for allowing the temple to degenerate, listen, into a safe hiding place where people think they will find forgiveness and fellowship with God, no matter how they act on the outside.

Run to God's temple, King's X, no judgment. Sounds like Jeremiah seven to me.

They will come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name and say, we're delivered that you may do all these abominations.

So there's all kinds of stuff going on. Let's go back to Luke chapter 20, verse two.

What were these things? He just cleared out the temple again, and they didn't like it. What authority did you do that by? And he spoke, saying to them,

I mean, they said to him, tell us by what authority you're doing these things are. Who is the one who gave you this authority?

Luke 20, verse two. We demand an answer. And we run the show around here with the big shots. And we have authority, by the way, if you haven't noticed, and we want to know what your authority is.

Verse three, so beautiful. He answered and said to them, I shall ask you literally a word.

I will ask you a question and you tell me, I'm going to ask you a little one little word. Jesus isn't scared.

Jesus isn't intimidated. And by the way, is he looking for information? I've got a question. I need some facts.

And I don't know. Of course he's not doing that. By the way, it's a very common way to teach is asking questions.

And so he said, verse four was the baptism of John from heaven are from men.

I remember Jews didn't like to say from God very often. And so the real question is, is

John the Baptist ministry from God are from men. He's asking them. Now remember, there's all kinds of other people around and why.

And I'm eliciting a response. Why would he ask this question? What is it going to make the Jews, the

Jewish leadership do anybody pardon me?

Hem and haw. Fume and foam. Good. What else?

What's the dilemma that he's putting them into here? What are the two? What if the answer from God or from heaven,

Wesley? Okay.

If he says John, the Baptist, if they say John, the Baptist ministries from men, then the people are going to be mad, right?

If he says it's from God, then Jesus is going to say, well, then why didn't you follow him? Right. True or false.

John, the Baptist had no authority or credentials granted to him by these same very people.

He had no credentials. What a great illustration. In Mark 11, the parallel passage, Jesus says, was the baptism of John from heaven.

Our men present imperative. Answer me. Now remember when

Jesus is around a tax gather or a sinner or a prostitute, he was kind. He was gracious.

He was loving. He ate with them. He loved them. But when he was around false teachers and hypocrites, he blistered them.

Answer me. He said, and Jesus here is staking his authority on John's authority.

Do you think God was behind John's mission or not? And so what they do, verse five, the reason among themselves saying, if we say from heaven, from God, he will say, then why did you not believe him?

How can we do that? Why didn't you believe John? And by now, John's.

Ministry has grown to tremendous in proportions in their mind because John has been a martyr.

And so you can see he's almost like this folk hero spiritually, and we can't dog John in front of all these people and they're in Christ trap and they're going to be in trouble.

Verse six. But if we say from men, all the people will stone us to death for they are convinced that John was a prophet.

Only time in the new Testament. It says here in Luke, they will stone us down. They will throw stones down on us.

Bob done. What's the Greek word for down. Kata. They will Kata stone us, throw us down.

Bob's going, whoo, got that one, right? It is Kata where they would get people down in this pit.

And it's not like the TV shows. Well, let's pick up a little dirt cloud and throw it. They would pick up these huge stones.

And there was one big, huge one that would go down, right on the person's skull for the coup de gras. They'll throw stones down on us.

So word for stone and down, they'll throw stones down on us. Because look at the text in verse six.

They're convinced they're persuaded. They're always persuaded. It's a settled persuasion. Mark 11 says, these

Jewish leaders were afraid. Now, verse seven of Luke 20. And the answer that they did not know where it came from.

Don't you want to just say you're a bunch of cowards. You're a bunch of liars. If truth is truth, tell the truth.

Come what may. They're saving face here or trying to.

And Jesus said to them, neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things. Game's over.

You forfeited your right to know the answer. And you don't really want to know the real answer anyway, because your motives are wrong.

So I'm not giving you any more information. And it's one of the most terrifying judgments of all. When God says to a people or a group,

I'm just not going to talk to you anymore. Let people alone. Now, Jesus gives a parable to match this point.

He gives a parable to answer this question about authority. But before we go to that one, he gives another parable before this one, and it's found in Matthew.

So would you go over to Matthew? And we're going to just build on this parable of authority. What kind of authority does

Jesus have? And towards the end of our message tonight, we'll talk about what kind of authority Christ has in your life.

And what kind of authority does the word have? If we have time, but let's look at these parables. Matthew chapter 21.

So we have how many gospels in the Bible? Four. How many are really similar?

Or we call them synoptics because they're so similar. Three. And what are those three? Matthew, Mark, Peter.

Good. Matthew, Mark, and Luke. They're the synoptic gospels. John is a little bit different. Matter of fact, when

Scott read John chapter one this morning, the very beginning of that gospel is very different because it gives the genealogy of Christ.

The divine genealogy, not the human genealogy. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was

God. But we have three similar gospels. And now we're going to the other gospel that's similar,

Matthew. And there's three parables that Jesus tells us here. And so we'll look at the first one.

Then we'll go back to the first one in Luke, which is actually the second one. Matthew 21, 28. And he's going to blast them and say,

I want your worship from your heart, not just externally. Verse 28.

But what do you think? A man had two sons, and he came to the first and said, Son, go to work today in the vineyard. And he answered and said,

I will, sir. And he did not go. And he came to the second and said the same thing, but he answered and said,

I will not yet afterward. Regretted it and went. Which of the two did the will of his father?

Answer, congregation. There's the text right there.

They said the latter. He's getting those Jewish leaders to admit this.

Jesus said to them, Truly, I say to you that the tax gathers and the harlots will get into heaven or get into the kingdom of God before you.

And they jumped for joy. They sang and danced. No. Now look at how he brings

John the Baptist in here. Verse 32. For John came to you in a way of righteousness. He obviously came from heaven, from God.

It's righteous. And you did not believe him. But the tax gathers, do they like tax gathers, by the way?

Completely opposite. I mean, this is the dregs of the dregs, the scum of all life in their view.

And the harlots did believe him. And you seen, this did not even feel remorse afterward.

So as to believe him, the first son, I'm your guy. God, I'm going to obey you.

We're going to do the right thing. Everything's straight up. And totally did not obey.

The second son, though, look down at verse 31, which of the two did the will of his father? They said the latter.

Jesus said, truly I say to you that the tax gathers and the harlots will get into the kingdom of God before you.

That is amazing. Jesus forced them to tell something that would be self -incriminating.

Did you see, look, did you see verse 32? For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you, there it is again.

You didn't believe him. You think they were happy about that? No. Now let's go back to Luke chapter 20.

So we get it in context because the whole thing's building steam. It's like a snowball rolling down a hill and here it comes to anybody who's going to crush it and they're going to become part of the snowball and that's what's going to happen here.

Luke chapter 20, verse nine, the answer to the Christ authority. Kind of a little background of Israel as well.

And he began to tell the people this parable. So he first told the last one about the two sons. Now this one, a man planted a vineyard.

Stop right there. If you were a Jew and you heard that, what would you start saying? What bells and whistles would go off in your mind?

You hear about a vineyard. You say, we sing songs in synagogue about a vineyard. We have something over the temple.

Matter of fact, let's see, I have the information right here. The vineyard connection was so much part of their national consciousness that the very temple in which

Jesus was standing sported a richly carved set of grape vines, 70 cubits high, sculpted around the door that led from the porch to the holy place.

When you said vineyard in those days, you would immediately think of one thing and one thing only, and it would be, besides grapes and what grows on them,

Israel. Israel. Let's go to Isaiah chapter five for a minute.

I just wanted to let you know that if I'm teaching you 2004, a bunch of people who are

Westerners and not Easterners and didn't live in the time, when I give you the story about the vineyard, you might not get it, but if I told the story back then and there, you would say vineyard,

Isaiah five, vineyard, Israel. God treats Israel like a vineyard and it's all over scripture.

Jeremiah chapter two, Psalm chapter 80. It's in a lot of different places. And look at Isaiah chapter five, verse one.

Let me sing now for my well -beloved a song of my beloved concerning his vineyard.

A well -beloved has a vineyard on a fertile hill. He dug it all around, removed its stones, and planted it with the choices fine.

He built a tower in the middle of it, hewed out a wine vat in it. Then he expected it to produce good grapes, but it only produced worthless ones.

Oh now, here's the vineyard, people. Oh now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah judge between me and my vineyard.

What more has there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it? Why then when

I expected it to produce good grapes, did it produce worthless ones? So now let me tell you what I'm going to do for my vineyard.

I'll remove its hedge and it will be consumed. I will break down its wall and it will become trampled ground.

I will lay it to waste, it will not be pruned or hoed, but briars and thorns will come up. I will also charge the clouds to rain, no rain on it.

For the vineyard of the Lord, of the host, is the house of what? Israel.

When you think of vineyard, you would think of Israel, and that's exactly where it comes from, is Isaiah chapter five.

Mark's account quotes Isaiah five two. The vineyard is

Israel. Now lots of times parables only have maybe one thing that represents another thing.

This one has a few more, and we know here this is, the vineyard represents Israel. But let's just keep reading now, in the passage of Luke chapter 20, verse nine.

A man planted a vineyard and rented it out to vine growers and went on a journey for a long time. This was a long -term deal.

It took probably four years to get the plants to grow so you could harvest the grapes and make some money.

And so if you were a landowner and you owned lots of land back in those days, first of all you were really rich to own any land, you would hire people to go ahead and get grapes to do all the dirty work, to watch it and protect it and take care of it.

And then in four years, you would send your folks to get some of the product, some of the produce, some of the fruit.

They did that all the time. So that's exactly what happened here. Verse 10, at the harvest time, he sent a slave to the vine growers in order that they might give him some of the produce of the vineyard, but the vine growers beat him and sent him away empty -handed.

Who are the vine growers, by the way, in this story? The priests, the leaders, that's exactly right.

And they knew it because Mark chapter 12 says, and that they knew he spoke this parable against them.

So God in his love and his grace makes Israel. He hoes around and he puts a tower there.

Towers cost a lot of money. They were 15, 20 feet high. Some of the vine growers would live in there and you could use it as a watchtower.

This is a big deal in vats and irrigation and everything else. And so God makes

Israel and he says, I'm putting you men in charge. You are the spiritual leaders. You're in charge of Israel. Well, they don't do exactly what

God wants. So he starts sending some prophets. And what does Israel do to the prophets that God sent her?

Can you give me any examples? I'll take that as a no.

Let's keep going. By the way, Jeremiah chapter 7,

Jeremiah chapter 25, talks about prophets as servants. I've sent my servants, the prophets.

And so what happens? Verse 11 of chapter 20, and he proceeded to send another slave.

They also beat him and treated him shamefully and sent him away empty handed. And so now God sends the prophets to preach the gospel, to preach repentance.

And they say, forget you. Beat him up. Send him home. Verse 11. He proceeded to send another.

They beat him, treated him shamefully, sent him away empty handed. Treated him shamefully and beat him.

The beat him is used only here and one of the places where we get the word to traumatize. It made him black and blue.

They wounded him. Mark actually gives them another one.

They sent him another slave and they wounded him in the head. Send him away empty handed.

My research, I found Elijah was driven into the wilderness by the monarchy. Isaiah, tradition says, was sawn in half.

When that man got his head sawn off, Mr. Berg over in Iraq, I thought of Isaiah getting sawn in half for the gospel.

Zechariah was stoned to death. Second Chronicles 24. They conspired against him at the command of the king.

They stoned him to death in the court of the house of the Lord. John the Baptist, what happened to him?

Beheaded. Legend says, Amos, Micah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Joel, Habakkuk were all killed for the sake of the

Lord. God sends him in his grace, in his mercy, in his care.

You kill another one, I'll send you another pastor preacher. God's patience increases the enormity of the crime.

Verse 12. He proceeded to send out a third. You could have said, well, he just should have said he sent out one and they beat him up and then they sent his son.

But God's trying to show, Jesus is trying to show how he's patient and kind and long -suffering. And this one they wounded and cast out.

And the owner of the vineyard, God, said, what shall I do? I will send my beloved son.

Perhaps they will respect him. Any idea you want to take a stab in the dark who the beloved son might be?

Luke chapter 3. This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. As the dove comes down, inaugurating

Christ's public ministry. Transfiguration.

This is my beloved son. Listen to him. Verse 14, though, but when the vine growers saw him, they reasoned with one another, saying, this is the heir.

Let us kill him that the inheritance may be ours. It's one thing if you don't know he's the son, but you kill him.

But when you know he's the son and still conspire to kill him, then the guilt is even all the more.

We don't want God telling us what to do with our nation. We want to run the nation. Let's kill Jesus.

John 11, verse 53. So from that day on, they planned together to kill

Jesus. Verse 15, they threw him out of the vineyard and kill him.

We would hate to have somebody killed in the vineyard because if somebody was killed in the vineyard and then some water was rained, there was water there, a rain and some of the water seeped onto the dead man and then onto the vineyard.

That would be ceremonially unclean and we wouldn't want to make our vineyards unclean. They cast him out of the vineyard and kill him.

They wanted Jesus dead. He's upsetting the apple cart, the entire man -made system of religion.

He's saying, forget it. Verse 15, what therefore will the owner of the vineyard do to them?

What do you think? What do you think God's going to do? Yes, Luke. Kill them. If you were sitting, listening to this parable, would you somehow have a desire in your heart for justice to be done?

God's mercy sending one, sending another, sending another, sending his son. You would sit there and think, justice needs to be done.

Somebody has to pay. Verse 16, he will come and destroy these vine growers and will give the vineyard to others and that's exactly what he did in 70

AD and elsewhere and when they heard it, they said, may it never be. Now, he's talking not directly to these leaders here.

He's talking to the people but the leaders are right there listening. Luke, I asked the question, what will he do to them?

Do you know what Matthew chapter 21, verse 41 says? It's hard to imagine. They said to him, this is answering

Jesus, the people, he will bring those wretches, those wretches to a wretched end and will rent out the vineyard to other vine growers who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons.

He's going to destroy the vine growers. He's going to destroy that whole issue and if there's any doubt at all, here's chapter and verse.

Keep reading verse 17. But he looked at them, that's a piercing glance.

He looked at them and said, what then is this that is written? Literally in Mark 12, he says, have you not read the scripture?

By the way, it's Passover time and guess what's sung and read all the time at Passover? Psalm 118, which is part of the praise psalms, 113 to 118.

They just would have read that and now Jesus says to the elite seminary teachers at Harvard and Princeton and Yale, do you ever read your

Bible? Have you ever read it? It's like at Christmas time going to the leader of Harvard Divinity School and say, have you ever read

Luke 1 and the birth of Christ narrative? I mean, he is really blasting them.

And your text, if it's like mine, shows all capitals where there's the Bible quote from the Old Testament.

The stone which the builders rejected, this became the chief cornerstone. If you were going to build the temple, build anything with stones, you'd have to pick and choose certain kind of stones.

Oh, that one's no good, that won't fit here and this one's not good. These religious leaders had tried to pick the right kind of stone to cap off the temple and they picked the wrong stone.

They accidentally on purpose said no to this stone. It wasn't accidentally.

They rejected this stone. Mark says they rejected and discarded him after fully testing the word in Greek signifies.

Have you ever read this? The stone which the builders rejected, this became the chief cornerstone. Turn over to, no,

I'll just read it. Mark 12, verse 11. This came about from the Lord and it is marvelous in our eyes.

That's the rest of Psalm 118. It's marvelous in our eyes?

What's all that about? Bible knowledge commentary says this dramatic reversal of the builder's decision and exaltation of the rejected stone was

God's sovereign doing, a remarkable thing. God overrules in amazing ways rebellious humans' attempts to block his purposes.

These leaders of the Jews said no, we don't want that stone, yet God says that's the stone I pick and the psalmist says that was marvelous in our eyes.

Who could do something like that? Verse 18 of Luke 20. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces and the same is true today.

But whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust. And the scribes and the

Pharisees, what did they try to do? Verse 19. Tried to lay hands on him that very hour and they feared the people for they understood that he spoke this parable against them.

Let me give you a few practical things. One, all authority in the Christian life is derived authority.

True? Did I say that this morning? All the authority we have is derived authority. But Christ's authority is ultimate.

And I was talking to, I think, Bernard today on the way out to the car. There you are. And does the

Bible have authority, by the way? Is the word of God authoritative? Well, my challenge to you is would you think of that when people assail the

Bible? So many interpretations. That's what the

Bible means to you. It's written by men. A lot of mistakes in the

Bible. 5 ,000 different manuscripts. And all these things that make you not trust the

Bible and all of a sudden, if you're not careful, you become on the defensive and you want to defend the

Bible. Don't you want to defend the authority of Christ and you want to stick up for Him?

But even though you might want to do that, my challenge to you is just don't. I usually say something like this because first of all, if I say to them, yes, it was written over 1 ,500 years by 40 different men and it all has the same theme and it all has the same solution to that theme, sin and the

Savior Christ Jesus, then they'll say, well, that's your own interpretation. And I'll say, well, that's my interpretation, yes, because that's

God's interpretation. How would you interpret Jesus as the way, the truth, and the life? No one gets to the Father but through Him. How would you interpret that?

Well, that was written by men. It's a long time ago. It's a different culture. And you mean to tell me that the Muslims don't go to heaven?

And how about all the Jews? And before you think about it, you're just caught in this web of arguing.

So here's what I like to do. Maybe you won't want to do it just because I do it, but here's what

I like to do. I like to say nicely. It can happen. I can be nice. I say, you know, the thing is,

God's Word's not on trial here. You are. And one day you're going to die and stand before God.

And the Bible teaches you how you can have forgiveness. And so if you'd like to talk about the Bible, I'd love to talk to you about the

Bible. If you want to argue about the authority and inspiration of the Scriptures, unbelief is a moral problem.

And there's sin in your life. I mean, and I can go farther and farther, but why defend the Bible? Remember Spurgeon? He said, if you've got some tigers or lions in a cage, why are you standing outside of the cage with little peashooters and little swords trying to defend that lion?

The best way to defend the lion of Judah is what? Open up the cage, as it were, and get out of the way.

And they're questioning Christ's authority. And even though this verse doesn't talk about our authority, but the authority is in Christ's Word.

I just say don't defend it. Don't try to rationalize it. Just proclaim God's Word. You know, how many times

I've talked to people, I remember once I was, oh, a new Christian and super zealous for the Lord. And I would go to the gym and I had it all down to a science.

So I had little notes. And I did not study Greek outside of Gold's Gym, North Hollywood, California, because I would just go there, do a set, read my

Greek. Do a set, read my Greek. It wasn't that fast, but that's exactly what I would do. And there's all kinds of people there in Denzel, Washington.

Remember the American gladiators? They worked out there. I mean, the girls were 95 times bigger than I was.

I just look at the American gladiator girls going, wow. But when I wasn't doing that, I was studying Greek and so guys would say to me, can

I work in? Oh, sure. And they'd say, what are you studying? I'd say, Greek.

And if they didn't say anything else, I didn't say anything else. Then if they said, well, why are you studying Greek? I'd say, well, the

New Testament's written in Greek. If they didn't say anything else, I didn't say anything else. If they'd say, well, why do you want to study the

New Testament in Greek? I'd say, because it's the word of God and I'm studying to be a pastor and I can talk about forgiveness of sins to people who want to listen.

Oh, and he dropped the weight right on my neck. Then he'd say, oh, you know, there was that verse in Matthew chapter 22 that seems to be contradictory to Mark chapter 13 or whatever it is and I just have a real problem.

Could you help me figure that out? I would rush over there, find out the answers. I would give the person the answer. I'm going to make a convert.

They're going to repent and believe and then they'd say, oh, that's very interesting. Well, I was just reading the other day that Revelation 1 says this and Habakkuk 3 says that and I can't reconcile those two.

Okay, I'll go get all the answers. I'll come back and here it is and give them the answers. Oh, okay,

I understand that. Well, what about, and it just kept going on and on. I felt I was in a catch -22. I could not give the right answer and finally, when you think of the line here and there's a spectrum of where did

Cain get his wife and did Adam have a belly button and all these questions. Did he?

I think he did. Even though he didn't need it, I just think God made him.

Where am I? You try to get people right back to the center and the center is

Christ Jesus and his substitutionary death and what does the Bible say? Beloved, don't try to defend the

Bible. You're not going to win. If you meet some professor from Princeton, they will tie you up and spit you out and make a pretzel of you because they seem to have all the real answers.

But the word of God is living. It's an abiding word. It's a supernatural word. It lives forever and it's powerful and it says it performs its work.

And so, get your sword out and say, well, the Bible says and if they poo -poo you and oh, I don't like that and this and that and I can't believe the

Bible, then you just keep giving them God's word because people get saved as they sit underneath the hearing of God's word.

And when you're defending the Bible, could it be? And I don't think it is, but could it be that you don't think the

Bible has enough legs to stand on by itself? I don't make a very good crutch for the

Bible and prop that thing up. It doesn't need me and when I'm dead and gone, the word of God will abide forever and ever and ever and so just proclaim the truth.

When unbelievers say, ah, you can't trust the Bible, I just say this, I know I have lots of sins and I know you sin too and my real question is how are you going to get rid of those sins?

Here's what the Bible says. I'm not on trial, the Bible's not on trial, you're on trial. Secondly, loving

Jesus is the way to honor God. Loving Jesus is the way to honor

God. God the Father, who had the vineyard, sent his son to proclaim the truth and there are people now in Christianity who basically say you don't need

Jesus, what's going to happen to the person out in the Amazon that's never heard about Jesus? They need to hear

Jesus. Faith comes by hearing and hearing abides. It's easy for me to say, just slow down.

Romans 10, 17, faith comes by hearing and hearing by a message or a speech about Christ, literally.

We have to give them the gospel. I hear people say this, I preached the gospel to somebody and now they're accountable because I told them about Jesus.

What's right about that and what's wrong about that? They've always been accountable because they are in Adam and they have suffered.

They are in Adam and sinned in Adam and they've also sinned their own sins and how many sins does it take you to stay out of heaven?

One sin. And so now they're more accountable but at least God has graced them to give them the view and the special revelation to show here's who

God is and here's how you can be right with God. So of course preach the gospel but if you preach the gospel to someone don't say, well now you're accountable because if the opposite is true then let's pull back all the missionaries from India and just hope

Indians are good people without Jesus because once they hear about Jesus as the only savior and reject him they're not going to make it.

There's a huge ministry in Texas. A great man. He'll be a better pastor than I ever thought about saying and he's into this thing now called transdispensationalism that people can get saved by Christ's death and burial and resurrection even if they don't know it was

Jesus who saved him. So it's Jesus doing the saving but they don't know who he is. Now, beloved,

I want to have mercy on those who have never heard the gospel either but it's not my problem to say somebody in the middle of some little

Haitian islands never heard the gospel. That's God's problem to get them the gospel and if they are chosen before eternity

God will get them the gospel, won't he? That's the good news about election, by the way, is not that God chose some and didn't choose others.

First of all, he would choose any as the good news. People go, well,

I don't like election because God didn't choose those. Well, would it have been fair of God if he would have said to us like he did to the angels, a third of you angels have fallen and there's going to be no recourse.

I'm just going to give you justice. That would have been fine to do, right? But for us, we all fell and God said

I'm going to snatch some out of this fire. That's right. But the way to honor God is to love

Jesus and that's why I love Michael Chang to this day when he was 17 years old and he won the

Roland Garros French Open and he got the microphone in front of all of France and they said,

Michael, you know, what are you going to do today? And it wasn't, I'm going to Disneyland. He said, I just want to acknowledge my

Lord and Savior Jesus Christ without whom I am nothing. And you know what Roland Garros people did?

They booed and hissed him and if any of those people think that you can honor

God by killing the Son, you cannot. It's Jesus or no other way.

That's why he has to be God. Number three, can you see the patience and generosity of God in this parable?

Can you see the patience of God and his generosity? First of all, with all the provisions in the vineyard, working and toiling and making it all right, but then just his good patience.

Luther said, if I were God and the world had treated me as it treated him, I would kick the wretched thing to pieces.

Luther just had a way of saying things, didn't he? One time Luther said, if God told me to go across the street and eat dung on the street,

I would and I knew, I would know it was good for me. I hope you didn't say that in the pulpit.

Yikes, but Luther knew. And here, if somebody did that to your son, if I send

Luke out and you do that to Luke, I know if I have enough power, there's going to be big trouble because I will avenge my son as that's my flesh.

I hope I wouldn't avenge him. Spurgeon said of Christ's patience, if you reject him, he answers you with tears.

If you wound him, he bleeds out cleansing. If you kill him, he dies to redeem.

If you bury him, he rises again to bring resurrection. Jesus is love made manifest.

That's true. Our memory verses for our discipleship say, the

Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to what? Slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness, our great and loving kind.

And then maybe next time, we won't do it tonight, but my final bit of information is, God was gracious to even choose

Israel. And I was going to talk about Israel's future tonight in Romans 11, but we won't have time to get there.

If you want to know what else Jesus said, you can go to Matthew chapter 21, and he gave one more parable about a wedding feast.

We don't have time for that. Jesus has authority. It's not derived authority.

Jesus answers questions with questions, and says, I have entrusted you to take care of my people, and you've tried to make a name for yourself, and now there's going to be judgment one day.

I'd read this story to the kids the other night, and I just thought, I love the way Jesus answers this question. There's nobody like him.

Not to do with the text, but when you get to heaven, do you think you're going to have a lot of questions to ask Jesus? What about this?

And what about that? And God, can you reconcile man's choice and sovereignty?

And God, why did you choose this person, not that person? Do you think you're going to ask those questions to God? I mean, of course, respectfully, but do you think you'll ask those questions?

Anybody? No. Why is that? Well, the

Bible says we will know as we are known. The Bible also says that we have the mind of Christ, and we won't be searching for information up there, although I think we probably will still learn as God reveals his infinite attributes all the time, but I don't think we're going to have any questions.

I don't think we're going to get to heaven and say, I'm going to ask George Washington why he didn't tell a lie. Is that him?

Is that Johnny Appleseed? Whatever. I'm going to ask that person. You're not going to have to do anything.

You're going to get to heaven, and you are going to be in such a state of bliss and such a state of contentment that you're not going to have any questions.

You know how when kids are always, Daddy, why did that happen? Well, this is the answer. Well, why is that the answer? Well, this is the answer.

Well, why is that the answer? Over and over, you'll just see the face of Christ, and you will say, when you ever get to heaven,

I think to myself, well, I know the right way to worship, because when I get there, I want to worship. And that's a worry that I don't need to worry about, because I'll know exactly what to do.

And so will you. All right. Let's pray. Father, we do thank you this night and praise you that there is authority found in Scripture and that your son, when push came to shove, talked about his great authority and to what a storyteller he was.

And he drove the point home, and the people knew it. And we would just ask for our congregation. Father, we're not many mighty, and we're not many strong, and we don't have a lot of numbers.

We don't have things that people would say that's a fast -track church.

Yet, Father, you are pleased to work through people just like us and just like our little church here. Father, would you do great things through us so you may get the glory.

Father, would you give us opportunities this week to preach the gospel? Father, would you protect us from defending the

Bible? And go ahead and just let it out and preach it and talk about Christ's love for those sinners.

And lastly, Father, we're thankful for your son, that he showed real love for us as he would lay down his life.

It's possible that someone might lay down their life for a righteous man, but he laid his life down for us, and we thank you for that.