Book of Luke - Ch. 6, Vs. 1-19 (03/16/2003)

All right, Luke 6, verse 1, we are given this incident, and see if you can figure out why.

And it came to pass, on the second Sabbath after the first, that he went through the cornfields, and his disciples plucked the ears of corn, and did eat, rubbing them in their hands.

Now, isn't it strange that if this was breaking the law, that the disciples broke the law?

Did they know what the law said, Russell? But certain of the

Pharisees, I've always wondered, were they trailing along behind them?

The certain of the Pharisees said unto them, Why do you that which is not lawful to do on the

Sabbath days? Roger, are you staying with us?

Come over here. Now, come up on the pew with David.

I can't see that far. In fact, the three of you, you're just a shape, and that's all.

But if I know where you sit, and no more than there are here, I'll try to keep track of you.

All right. We've been given this incident that occurred in the fields,

Roger. I want you all to listen and discover why he gave it to us.

Certain of the Pharisees, they were trailing along with him, said to them,

Why do you that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath days? Well, Jesus being very wise,

Jesus answered them and said, Have you not read so much as this? What David did, when himself was a hungred, and they which were with him, how he went into the house of God, and did take and eat the showbread, and gave also to them which were with him, which it is not lawful to eat, but for the priests alone.

And he said unto them, That the Son of Man is Lord of the

Sabbath also. Also Lord, also of the Sabbath. Now, first of all, we see the disciples were going with Jesus.

They were behind him, and as they walked, they picked the heads of,

I think it's wheat. It's all called corn, but it was ripe.

And they rubbed them in their hands, and blew the chaff out, and would eat the wheat.

And it was on the Sabbath. What is meant by the statement,

The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath? David, what does that mean?

That's right, that's right.

The Son of Man, why not the Son of God here? Yes. Well, that was the crux of the whole thing.

They were claiming that the disciples were thrashing wheat. Of course, they claimed that they broke the mosaic law, as it permitted people to eat of the grain that they would pull.

You can go back to Deuteronomy 23, 24, and 5, and find that they could pluck the ears.

They couldn't take a sickle and cut it. That would be harvesting. Now, the

Lord did not insist that they had not broken the

Sabbath. He doesn't address that at all. He refused to argue the issue with them.

And he cites this incident of David. And it came to pass, well, it seems like I have...

And it came to pass also on another Sabbath that he entered into the synagogue and taught.

Now, here he is, his normal routine, go to the synagogue and teach.

And there was a man whose right hand was withered. Roger, I wonder how long the

Pharisees had to search to find him. But they put him right in front of Jesus, and I'm sure of it.

And the scribes and Pharisees watched him, whether he would heal on the Sabbath day, that they might find an accusation against him.

Now, the first incident was to prove that the Sabbath was no different than any other day, as far as man is concerned.

Man is to worship God. This is to see if Jesus will heal.

They're really paying him a compliment.

Now, how is that a compliment, Roger? Yes, yes, that's right.

But he knew their thoughts, and said to the man which had the withered hand, Rise up, stand forth in the midst.

And he arose and stood forth. Then Jesus said unto them,

Now, he turned from the man to these wicked Pharisees, I will ask you one thing.

Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?

By the way, is there such a thing as doing neither good or evil?

No. So all that we do is either evil or good.

Well, you do what God has already ordained, but to you it's evil.

How is it? David explained that. But your doing of it is of God, and that's good.

We can't put the two together. That's right.

10. And looking around about upon them all, he said unto the man,

Stretch forth your hand. Then he did so, and his hand was restored whole as the other.

He did exactly what they thought he would do. And they were filled with madness.

Now, here. That's right.

Filled with madness. That's more than anger. But they were mad at whom?

Jesus. They were really mad at themselves, although they didn't know it. And communed one with another what they might do to Jesus.

The man with the withered hand was planted, I'm sure. In doing this, they really paid him a compliment, as Roger pointed out.

They believed that he could heal and that he would heal. Even knew that he was both powerful and compassionate.

They were exactly correct in their estimation of him. Our Lord healed the man.

Then his enemies used the occasion to accuse him of breaking the Sabbath. What an incident.

Matthew tells us that from this point on, they plotted how to kill him. Now we move to him choosing the twelve.

Now, remember, he chose some of the men some time ago.

But they returned to fishing. And this time he is walking by Galilee.

And it came to pass in those days that he went out into a mountain to pray.

This is before he chooses the twelve. And continued all night in prayer to God.

Now, Roger, that seems rather strange to me. This is the Son of God. And he's praying all night to the

Father about these twelve men that he's going to pick. But he knew who he was going to pick, did he not?

Well, then why pray? That's true.

We're a little handicapped in that we don't know the future. We don't know beyond now. Jesus did.

He knew what he was going to do. Yet he prayed all night. Why was that,

David? Why did he have to pray all night?

That's absolutely right. But remember, Jesus was learning how to be a man.

That part of it he had not experienced. So the Jesus side was learning how to be a man.

Although he was different than you and I, he was

God and man. Well, when it was day, he called unto him his disciples.

Now, how many disciples? No. No. He called all of them.

And out of that, he chose twelve. So there was a bunch of them. And after he had chosen them, they were named apostles.

He refers to them as apostles. Simon, whom he also named

Peter. I know Peter. I don't know

Simon. And Andrew, his brother. James and John. Philip and Bartholomew.

Matthew, Thomas, James, the son of Alphaeus. Simon, called Zealots. Judas, the brother of James.

And Judas Iscariot, which also was a traitor. There were two Judases. We don't hear much about the first one.

We heard quite a bit about the second one. Now, he prayed all night.

He knew who he was going to choose. He spent the entire night communing with God.

One of the disciples betrayed him. Another one denied him, but repented.

This tells me that God's work is ultimate. It is the most important thing that we can do.

Roger's getting ready to go. He doesn't know where. That's very important. But it's not the most important.

Something else. These twelve were chosen.

They didn't decide, I'll go. You don't, and I do, and you don't. You have not, in John 15, 16, it says,

You have not chosen me, I have chosen you. And that's what he's doing. I have chosen you.

We each can say that today. He chose me long before there was ever a me.

But it was a choice that was never made. The Lord found it essential and practical to spend the entire night in prayer before selecting.

The robe of Elijah didn't fall by accident, did it? Say no.

The present day procedure by the church for choosing men to fill an office is far from God's standard.

We follow our feelings. Consult our own selfish desires. We use human measuring rods rather than God's measuring stick.

We should spend time with God before making our decisions. I have several incidents of Jesus praying.

I won't go through all of them, but if you look it up when he prayed, several, and it's interesting.

17. And he came down with them and stood in the plain.

Now, this is not the Sermon on the Mount, although it sounds like it. It's the Sermon on the

Plain. It's almost like the

Sermon on the Mount, but some differences. Plain version.

And the company of his disciples, of the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all of Judea, Jerusalem, from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases.

And they that were vexed with unclean spirits, and they were healed. And the whole multitude sought to touch him, for there went out virtue from him and healed them all.

Well, as I have said many times before, multitudes were healed.

In our Lord's day, literally thousands of people were healed. A lot of them are mentioned by name.

A lot of them were not mentioned by name. The book would not hold if they were all mentioned by name.

There were healing lines, if you please. No slapping or patting of this one.

No having people fall backwards when they hit them. Fall forwards.

The people whom the Lord healed did not have to do anything. The Lord would even heal them at a distance.

The healings performed by the Lord were genuine. And we have Dr. Luke's statement to prove it.

I do not believe in faith healers. Understand that. I do believe in faith healing.

A vast difference. If you take your problems to the great physician, he's the best doctor there is.

But you better search out a good physician to go with it. God doesn't send you a bill, either.

You have to be on Medicare. Now we come to the so -called

Sermon on the Mount, which is not a Sermon on the Mount, as it was delivered on a plane.

Of course, the Sermon on the Mount was delivered on a mountain, as recorded in Matthew. The similarity is in content and indicates that the

Lord gave his teaching again and again and again, over and over. We don't need a harmony of the

Gospels as much as we need a contrast of the Gospels. The remarkable thing about this sermon is,

Luke is its dissimilarity to the

Sermon on the Mount. There are omissions, certain inclusions, blessings, woes, attitudes, and judgments.

And let's stop here. We'll start with 20, I think, next week.

Six and 20. Roger, you're going away.

As David said this morning, we will be with you as much as we can.