The Sufficiency of Grace, part 2 (Luke 10:25-42, Jeff Kliewer)

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Luke - Walking with Jesus: The Sufficiency of Grace, part 2 (Luke 10:25-42) Pastor Jeff Kliewer March 12, 2017

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James (part 3)

James (part 3)

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So, Bart Campolo is a name that might be familiar to some of you because he was very active in the city of Camden, running an inner city ministry.
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He worked with homeless people, worked with youth, and was very active for actually almost three decades.
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But I'd like to read a quote from Bart Campolo that he just recently said.
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Goes like this, I became a Christian as a teenager and spent nearly three decades as an evangelical inner city minister before losing my faith in God and eventually becoming the first humanist chaplain at the
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University of Southern California. Unless we're actually discussing theology, however, even my closest friends can't really tell the difference.
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I always believed in the power of love, and I still do. Bart Campolo, the power of love is important, but it's not the gospel.
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The true gospel includes the power of love in that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son.
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That whoever believes in him will not perish, but have everlasting life. It's truly sad to see someone lose their faith.
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But one thing that we learn from the book of First John is that when someone goes out from us, they never truly were part of us.
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Otherwise, they would not have gone out, according to John. So what was missing in Bart Campolo's faith?
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Well, he had a distorted view of the gospel. From the beginning, he evidently assumed that the good work that he was doing in Camden to care for homeless people, to care for inner city youth who didn't have a great opportunity where they were, was the gospel.
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He thought that the gospel was love. The giving of himself to help someone in a circumstance that was difficult.
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In short, Bart Campolo never had the gospel that he claimed to believe. He says he became a
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Christian as a teenager, but according to the scriptures, that once you become a Christian, you will endure.
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And so I conclude that he never was a Christian in the first place. Can you tell the difference between the so -called gospel of love and the genuine gospel?
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Today we're gonna talk about salvation by grace through faith. And the result of that salvation through faith is that we will go forth and love.
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And that is why today we are turning our sanctuary and our building into a homeless shelter for a week.
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Why do we do that? Yes, because of love. But it's a love motivated by a God who loved us first.
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And if we keep that in the first place, the love of God, we have a true understanding of the gospel.
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Now there's another misunderstanding that many Christians have. One is to say that love itself is the gospel without proclaiming
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Christ and him crucified and the necessity of faith in Christ. A second misunderstanding is of the parable of the
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Good Samaritan. I'm sure that most of us in this building have heard of the
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Good Samaritan, right? Have you heard of the Good Samaritan law? The Good Samaritan law is that if someone is in dire need and you try to assist them, but somehow you cause harm, you can't be held liable, like for giving
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CPR to someone whose heart has stopped. If you do that the wrong way, the Good Samaritan law is a protection which encourages people to step up and help when somebody's in the ditch.
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But the parable of the Good Samaritan is often misunderstood because we don't take the full context of the scripture.
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Now last week, I tried to put all of Luke chapter 10 into context so that we could get into the
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Good Samaritan. But I think sometimes when I'm teaching and when I'm preaching, I get really excited.
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I kind of picture it like a little kid on the basketball court. When he gets the ball, he right away just throws up a shot without really thinking what he's doing.
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Sometimes when I get to preaching, I'll get going on a rabbit trail or I'll just keep getting excited about a subject and I don't stay focused.
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And last week, I confess, that happened to me. I tried to cover all of Luke 10, but I was just like a little kid throwing the ball up and messing things up.
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So we only got halfway through. And yet, the foundation of what we learned last week helps us as we come in.
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So let me remind us about the two most important things that I should have focused on last week.
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And that is number one, the outward call. The subject of the message was the sufficiency of grace.
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And grace extends an outward call of the gospel.
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In Luke chapter 10, Jesus sends out 72 disciples to go and proclaim, to call out to people, repentance and faith in the king, that the kingdom of God is near.
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There is an outward call of the gospel which comes by grace. That's why missionaries go to the ends of the earth, to offer this outward call, so that whosoever is willing to come, will come.
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And yet, the next part of Luke 10 tells about how many people don't come. Remember Bethsaida, Capernaum, Coruscant, these cities rejected the outward call.
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Which brings us to the second important point about grace. There also needs to be an inward call, where the
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Holy Spirit works in the heart of a sinner to bring conviction of sin and turn that heart from stone to flesh.
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That that sinner will repent of sin and come to the Savior. Not all who hear the gospel believe in the gospel.
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There needs to be a supernatural thing happening when the gospel is preached. I, as I stand here to preach today, am very much aware that I cannot convince any of you to believe in the
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Lord Jesus Christ. I can give an outward call, but unless the
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Holy Spirit of God confirms it to your heart, you'll never believe.
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That's what we learned in Luke 10 last week. We need grace. We are a people who are hardened in our sin.
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And our sin blinds us so that we don't have eyes to see. It makes us deaf so that we don't have ears to hear.
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Our hearts are hard so they can't receive the truth. We are beggars in need of grace.
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An outward call and an inward call. So now as we move into the second part of Luke chapter 10, we're gonna pick up in verse 25.
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And I want us to notice that right away, and behold, the verse begins with, and behold, we have an example of the very thing we're talking about.
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Here we have someone in the very presence of Jesus Messiah, the anointed one.
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And the gospel call is going forth, yet he doesn't hear. And so Jesus will speak to him in a parable.
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Looking back, now if everybody would, to Luke chapter 10. Looking back in verse 21, where Jesus is explaining the freedom of his grace.
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He delights, he rejoices in the Holy Spirit. And then oddly says, I thank you,
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Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding.
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The prideful of heart, who are wise in their own eyes.
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And yet God does reveal these things to little children. We will have an example today of the wise and the understanding and the little child.
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The little child is Mary. The wise and understanding we are introduced to here in verse 25, a lawyer.
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So let's read it. And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, teacher, what shall
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I do to inherit eternal life? He said to him, what is written in the law?
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How do you read it? And he answered, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength, with all your mind.
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And your neighbor as yourself. And he said to him, meaning
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Jesus speaking back to the lawyer, you have answered correctly, do this and you will live.
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But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, and who is my neighbor?
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So before we get into the parable of the Good Samaritan, which will be Jesus' answer to that final question, who then is my neighbor?
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We need to consider these five verses which precede the parable. It says, and behold, so we notice that right after Jesus gives this teaching, suddenly somebody, boom, steps up and becomes an illustration for us of the very thing that Jesus was teaching.
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Here then is the wise and the understanding man. This is the man who gets it in his own mind.
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It says a lawyer, lawyer jokes at this point, right? Lawyers often have a bad reputation, because many are simply trying to defend someone who's innocent, even though if somebody's innocent, they will defend him.
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But if somebody else is guilty, often lawyers will defend that guilty person as adamantly as an innocent person.
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But listen, the lawyer here is not a defense attorney or a prosecuting attorney.
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The lawyer is an expert in the law of Moses. This is one of the scholars of the
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Old Testament. In fact, they were known to wear phylacteries on their head.
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A phylactery was a little box that would be affixed to the forehead and which would contain pieces of scripture, often from the book of Deuteronomy.
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So he would have parts of the scripture tied to his head, and he has devoted his life to study.
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He is an expert in the law of Moses. So he would know what the law of Moses means, or so he thinks.
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A lawyer stood up and put him to the test. Now notice the first thing we learn about the lawyer when he stands up to speak is he's putting
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Jesus to the test. That reveals for us something about the lawyer's motive.
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He's not coming to the rabbi, to Jesus the teacher, like a student, eager to learn.
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He's coming to test Jesus. Now recall the temptation of Satan in the wilderness.
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When he tempted Jesus three times, one of the answers, when Satan told
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Jesus to jump off the temple, and surely the angels will catch you. Jesus said what?
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Do not put the Lord your God to the test. Here you have a scholar with the motive of putting
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Jesus to the test. Something is wrong in his heart. But he asks a question which is a good question, and hopefully all of us have asked this question.
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In fact, Ecclesiastes 3 .11 says that God has put eternity in the heart of man.
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And so this question should be on the lips of every person. Even if they bury it and they don't want to think about it, this question matters to every living man and woman.
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It says, what? What shall I do to inherit eternal life?
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What shall I do to inherit eternal life? How can
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I be with God in the kingdom of heaven after this body goes to the grave? How can
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I have eternal life? Verse 26,
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Jesus said to him, what is written in the law? How do you read it? So Jesus is graceful in this instance.
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He's not condemning. But he does use kind of a Socratic method here. And he answers the question with a question.
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What's written in the law? You're a lawyer. You know the law of Moses.
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What did Moses say? What does the law say? What is written in the law?
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And the second part of that question, how do you read it? In other words, how do you interpret what the law says?
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What have you come to understand about this question? In verse 27, the lawyer answered, you shall love the
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Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.
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Recognize those verses. Deuteronomy 6, verse 4, the Shema of Israel. Hear, O Israel, the
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Lord your God is one Lord. Deuteronomy 6, 5, you shall love the Lord your
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God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And then he goes to Leviticus 19 to say, verse 18, love your neighbor as yourself.
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Now, notice the answer that Jesus gives him. You have answered correctly.
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You have answered right. This is the summation of the law. To love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as you love yourself.
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That is what you are commanded to do. You've answered rightly. And notice what else that implies.
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This is a side note sermon, okay? Could be a rabbit trail if I get going too far. But I'm just gonna stop myself.
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There is a right and a wrong way to interpret scripture. Notice that?
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You have interpreted correctly. Scripture is not a subjective thing that each person comes and brings whatever meaning or understanding we have to the text.
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And finds it there. Rather, to interpret correctly is to think the author's thoughts after him.
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When Luke writes the book of Luke, what is he thinking? What is he intending as he writes a sentence within a context?
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The correct interpretation is the author's intended meaning. And we come to that by following ordinary rules of reading.
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The history, the grammar of the sentence dictates what it means.
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Not how it makes us feel or some kind of subjectivity that we bring to the text. The reason we have so many cults, the reason we have so many misunderstandings of scripture is because people come with their own meaning to the text and find it there.
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Rather than letting the author's intended meaning speak to us. It's so important, how do you read the text?
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That whole field of study is called hermeneutics. It's the rules by which you interpret scripture.
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And here Jesus says, you're right, your hermeneutic is good.
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Lawyer, you did well, but he's not off the hook. Now Jesus said to him, do this and you will live.
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Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.
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And love your neighbor as much as you love yourself, and you will live. There's the command, we have a problem.
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But he, remember he's a lawyer, he has a phylactery on his head. Desiring to justify himself, and there's the key to understanding the parable of the
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Good Samaritan. It is the lawyer's desire to justify himself that is driving him.
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He wants to be declared righteous before a holy God by doing good.
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By obeying the law, by keeping the law. And we will see here that in his mind, he has found a way to justify the fact that he doesn't love his neighbor as much as he loves himself.
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Jews, as a people at that time, looked down on anyone who was not Jewish, any
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Gentile, as a mere dog, a second class citizen. And Pharisees had a way of narrowing that group of those who are truly the neighbor to an even smaller class,
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Pharisees. Other groups of Jewish people did the same thing. The Essenes who had moved out by the
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Dead Sea only considered themselves, other Essenes, to be their neighbor.
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And they did as well as they could, they took care of their neighbor, they loved their own. And so the parable of the
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Good Samaritan will expose the folly of trying to justify oneself.
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Jesus is going to take the law, the very thing that teaches us to love
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God and to love others, and he is going to use that law, catch this, as a mirror.
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He's going to take the word of God, the words of Moses, and turn them and hold them up to the face of the lawyer and say, look in this perfect law.
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And see yourself. How do you measure up with the law of Moses?
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The lawyer thought he was the one doing well, but he never understood his need for a savior.
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So let's read the parable. Verse 30 through 37, very familiar parable, so rich in meaning.
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And I will point out before we get into it, yes, this does teach us to love and to show mercy.
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That is the secondary meaning of it. How do we show mercy and how do we care for people who are hurting?
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Yes, we go to the inner city. Yes, we care for homeless people, but catch the primary meaning first.
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It exposes how far short the lawyer really falls, even though he thinks he can justify himself.
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Jesus replied, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he fell among robbers who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead.
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Now by chance, a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.
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So likewise, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.
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But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.
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He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him.
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And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper saying, take care of him and whatever more you spend,
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I will repay you when I come back. Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?
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He said, the one who showed him mercy. And Jesus said to him, you go and do likewise.
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Notice in that last verse, the one who showed him mercy. The Pharisee or the lawyer couldn't even bring himself to say the word
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Samaritan. He just says the one who showed him mercy. Such was his heart towards Samaritans.
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But going back to the beginning of the parable, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho.
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That's about a 17 mile journey. And it says going down, it's really toward the north.
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Really in the Old Testament, whenever you see Jerusalem, it's pictured as the chief of the mountains.
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It's on top of the world. And everything from Jerusalem, whether you're heading south or north, that's going down.
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You're going down from Jerusalem because that's the city of God, that's Zion. So going down 17 miles, there is an elevation drop down toward the
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Dead Sea of over 3 ,000 feet. And because of all those hills, it's a very windy road that heads from Jerusalem to Jericho.
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And so, because of all the bends and turns, and because it's kind of a more desolate place, it was very much haunted by robbers.
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Often robbers, bandits, would hide out. And if there's just a single traveler heading down the road, they could fall prey to a robber.
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And so Jesus uses this very known, this very ordinary story, to tell about a poor man, a
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Jewish person, he's coming from Jerusalem, heading down to Jericho. He falls among the robbers, he's stripped and beaten and departed.
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Doesn't say so, but we assume that the reason they did that was to take his money. And he's left half dead, half dead.
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As in, if someone doesn't help him, he probably will die. He's on the side of the road, barely alive.
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Now by chance, a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him, he passed on the other side.
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A priest, a descendant from Levi, but also from Aaron. These are the Kohen, these are the ones who offer sacrifices in the temple.
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These are the most religious of the Israelites. In Deuteronomy, we're told that the descendants of Levi don't even get their own share of land in Israel.
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They are to live amidst the people and serve as kind of a clerical function, leading people in worship.
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Now a Levite, who's not a priest, would do some of the same religious duties, but not be the priest who offers sacrifices.
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So the Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. This is still maybe a singer, or a guard, or someone who carries things for the priests.
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These though, the priest and the Levite, are the most religious in Israel.
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These are the ones set apart to serve God. Their inheritance is God himself.
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And so the expectation here, I think as the lawyer is listening in, he's probably thinking, okay,
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Jesus is gonna draw a distinction now between a Levite and a priest, and maybe an ordinary
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Jew from Judah. Jesus is gonna push the envelope here.
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He's gonna do some pushback against the lawyers and important religious people, that's what he's gonna say. Excuse me, but he doesn't do that.
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He follows but a Samaritan. Now that cleaned his clock.
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A Samaritan, not a Samaritan. As he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.
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He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. The wine would be like a disinfectant, and the oil would soften the wound and make it less painful.
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Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day, he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper.
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That may have been able to sustain his care for up to two months. I mean, think of the sacrifice that this
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Samaritan is making for a complete stranger, considering him a neighbor. Take care of him, and whatever more you spend,
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I will repay you when you come back. Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?
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And now you have the response, the one who showed him mercy. And notice the command that Jesus gives in response.
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Go and do likewise. Here's the problem.
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As hard as the lawyer tries to love God with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, he cannot fulfill that command.
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His love for a Samaritan will fall short of perfect love.
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His love will not measure up to the law. So Jesus commands him to do something impossible.
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It is a hypothetical command. Go and do likewise.
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Now, yes, we are called to love. And yes, that is the command, and it's supposed to direct our behavior.
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But there's this deeper level of meaning going on that I don't want us to miss. It's essential.
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It's why people depart from the faith, because they never understood this in the first place. Go and do will never bring us to heaven.
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Because for all those 30 -some, let's say this lawyer is 35 years old. For 35 years, he's hated the
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Samaritan. For 35 years, he's sinned by sins of omission.
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Whenever he saw a Samaritan in need, he's passed on the other side. He has sin in him that needs to be atoned for.
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His eyes are closed to the meaning of the parable. Jesus commands him to do something impossible.
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Are you familiar with the story of the rich young ruler? The rich young ruler had a similar question.
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What do I need to do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said, you know the commands, and he begins to list the ten commandments.
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And the rich young ruler says, yeah, I've done all of those. He didn't get it.
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He didn't understand that every time that he lusted after a woman, he had violated the deeper meaning of thou shalt not commit adultery.
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And every time that that rich young ruler had hated somebody, he had violated the deeper meaning of thou shalt not commit murder.
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And the command that says do not covet, every time he was jealous of somebody else's possessions or wanted something that wasn't rightfully his, he had violated thou shalt not covet.
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It was a command that cut to the heart. The rich young ruler didn't understand that he was falling short.
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And so Jesus said this to him. Okay, go sell everything that you have. Rich man, sell it all, give it to the poor, come follow me.
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He commands this absolute obedience to the law.
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Go and do likewise. Here's the point of the parable. The lawyer was blind to his need for Jesus.
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He's there in the presence of a savior, but he sees no need for a savior.
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He's a good lawyer, he has the scripture attached to his head. He is going and he is doing what he thinks justifies himself, verse 29.
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And he's only putting Jesus to the test. He's not there to sit and learn from the rabbi.
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Go and do will never bring you to heaven. Because here's the problem.
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We all fall short of his glory. Turn with me just two quick scriptures.
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Romans chapter four, verse five. This then is the good news.
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The bad news is that we fall short of his glory. We're not keeping the command to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.
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We don't love him like that. And we don't love our neighbor, which includes everybody, as much as we love ourselves.
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The fact is, we love ourselves, and we care for our own self -interest. Our works are not cutting it.
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But Romans 4, 5 brings us the good news. And to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.
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The one thing that lawyer needed to do was to be quiet, to sit down at the feet of the teacher, and receive the message of the gospel, to believe.
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And then he can go and do, after he's been transformed by sitting and listening, believing to the one who does not work.
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Isn't that a profound statement? The one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly.
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There's a distinction between working, going and doing, even for the man in need, good deeds that we call religion.
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The person who ceases from this work and believes in a savior is justified, justifies the ungodly.
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His faith is counted as righteousness. Another verse is Titus 3, 5, and then we'll return to Luke 10.
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Turn with me to Titus 3, verse 5, after the
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Timothys. Speaking of Jesus, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the
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Holy Spirit. The lawyer's question was, what must
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I do to inherit eternal life? And the answer comes by way of a parable.
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Here's what you would need to do. Perfect love for God and perfect love for neighbor.
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But what the lawyer couldn't see was that he was falling short and he needed another way. Because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
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Titus 3, 5, he saved us not because of works done by us.
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You can't save yourself by helping Samaritans or being the
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Samaritan that helps the man on the side of the road. Not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, we need the washing of regeneration, the new birth, a new heart, and renewal of the
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Holy Spirit. We need God to do for us what we cannot do.
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So returning now to the end of Luke chapter 10. Jesus leaves this lawyer in his own self -righteousness.
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If you turn a page over to Luke 11, verse 45, and following again, you have a lawyer who asks him a question.
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Teacher, in saying these things, you are insulting us also. And Jesus gives one of the best smack downs in the
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Bible here. Verse 46, he says, woe to you, lawyers also.
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They were looking for a little bit of a brotherly connection there with Jesus. Like, you're not really talking about us too, because you kind of sound like you're talking about us,
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Jesus. And in verse 46, he says, 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.
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You see, the context of the Good Samaritan parable is a lawyer who adds to the law of God, throwing burdens and burdens upon people.
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And seeking to justify himself by works, he needs mercy.
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He said to the one, the one who showed mercy, and Jesus said to him, you go and do likewise.
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He cannot do that on his own. He needs regeneration and the new birth to do it.
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Here's someone who gets it, the final five verses. Now, as they went on their way,
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Jesus entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house.
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And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet, and listened to his teaching.
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But Martha was distracted with much serving, much doing. And she went up to him and said,
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Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.
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But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary.
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Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.
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The good portion is to sit and listen, to receive the teaching of the scriptures, the message that God is merciful towards those who believe.
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The law is useful as a tutor to bring us to Christ. So in conclusion, here is the story of a lawyer who seeks to justify himself and put
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Jesus to the test. He is trusting in his works. And I will tell you right now, of all of your friends that you know, and your family members, and your loved ones that don't bow the knee to Jesus Christ, they are trusting in their works in one way or another.
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If they follow Islam, which is about one and a half billion people on planet Earth. They read
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Surah chapter 6, verses 6 to 9, which says that God will do this in the end. He will take your good deeds and put them on one side of a scale.
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He'll put your bad deeds on the other side. And if your good deeds outweigh your bad deeds, you will be justified.
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You will go in to eternal life. And the cults, which are spinoffs of Christianity in many cases, do the same thing.
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They always come back to telling you, you can go and do what is necessary to be saved.
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Ephesians 2, 8 and 9 says what? For by grace you are saved through faith and that not of yourselves, not by works.
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It's a gift of God so that nobody can boast. The Book of Mormon, 2
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Nephi 25, 23 says you are saved by grace through faith after all that you can do.
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They reintroduce works. And even in Roman Catholicism, although there's many believing
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Roman Catholics who are trusting in Christ alone, there has been over the years of tradition coming into the church, layer upon layer of work after work after work called sacraments, do this sacrament.
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If you commit a sin, a venial sin or a mortal sin, this is what is prescribed for you to do, do this and you will be forgiven.
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Penance given by the priest is a list of things you must do. Say this many Hail Marys and this many
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Our Fathers and you will be justified. Grace through faith plus works.
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All of the cults and all other religions that don't trust in Christ alone will say you need some grace.
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You need grace. There is a necessity for grace. But the teaching of scripture is the sufficiency of grace.
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You see the difference? That grace alone is able to save. That forgiveness is freely offered through Christ's blood.
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Just a couple years ago, I debated a Roman Catholic scholar. And we went through the Book of Romans and said, this is the difference of how we're understanding.
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And in Romans 328, he wanted to press the point that it says that a man is justified by grace without the works of the law.
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And he wanted to press the point that you don't need the works of the law of Moses. He was agreeing with that point and I agree with that point.
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But he wanted to stop there and say, the text is only talking about the law of Moses. It's specific only to the law of Moses.
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Romans is not excluding works in general, it's excluding the law of Moses. And the reason he wanted to press that point was so that he could justify himself and the sacraments as something different than what the apostle was talking about.
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But if you read the context of Romans, it's not just talking about the law of Moses. It's talking about works in general.
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It's talking about boasting and God's desire that we would no longer boast in our self -righteousness at all.
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Here's what God wants. He wants a sinner who comes to the front to offer worship to him, who falls down on his knees and beats his chest and says, have mercy on me,
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I'm a sinner. It's the man with empty hands that says, I have nothing to bring.
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But my own sin. The man who sits and says,
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God, thank you that I'm not like that Samaritan. Thank you that I do enough good works and that I'm not like the others.
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It's that person who leaves unjustified. Salvation is by grace through faith in Christ.
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And the works of the law can never add anything to that. Grace alone is sufficient.
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And so what happens then, I said we're closing, we are closing. What happens then is we enter into a
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Sabbath rest. For six days, God worked. And on the seventh day, he rested from all his work.
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The book of Hebrews teaches us that when we come to rest in Christ, our hearts and our lives are at Sabbath with God.
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We are resting from all of our works to the man who does not work but trusts in the one who justifies the ungodly.
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His faith is credited as righteousness. You are justified through faith in Christ and that faith alone.
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Work adds nothing to it. It's what it means to be born again. You come to the end of yourself, the end of your work, and you say,
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God, I have nothing, save me, I'm a sinner. And he gives you that new birth. You're regenerated, you're renewed by the
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Holy Spirit. And now, guess what? Ephesians 2 .10 follows Ephesians 2 .8
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and 9, doesn't it? Once you're justified that way, you're created in Christ Jesus to do good works.
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So that's the secondary meaning of the Good Samaritan. Yes, we go forth and do good works.
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And we love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love our neighbor as ourselves. That's how we go forth as new creations in Christ.
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But if we miss that first part, we're gonna be like Bart Campola one day. Cuz you can work and work for 30 years, but never understand the gospel.
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You can follow so many different religious paths and go to church every Sunday morning.
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But unless you come to an end of yourself, you can miss it.
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There's one way to be saved, by embracing that bad news that you are a sinner, you fall down on your knees, and you beg
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God for mercy, and he is rich in mercy. And he provides mercy. Mary had chosen the better part.
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She was sitting at Jesus' feet and receiving from him. So let's close with a prayer.
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We're gonna call on the worship team. Come on up. Maybe you've been working for it.
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You've been trying to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. You've been trying to love your neighbor as yourself.
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But would you receive the parable today that Jesus told? You cannot justify yourself by those things.
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There is the path of perfect obedience. Hypothetically, if you could love God perfectly and love everybody else like you love yourself, that would mean you had no sin in you.
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No sin nature. You aren't a son and daughter of Adam. But if this morning you get it and you recognize you have nothing to bring but filthy rags, if you will trust in Christ alone, he will make you new.
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Religion doesn't save you. Christ alone can save you. That's the meaning of the parable of the good
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Samaritan. Don't be a lawyer. Don't be a lawyer. Be a sinner.
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Saved by grace. Let's pray. If maybe you've been trusting in your righteousness, just say this.