Jesus is Lord (Part 1)

Cancer, Writing Projects, and a New Book on Suffering

Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry. Michael Lee Abendroth here, host of the Pactum. Pat Abendroth and Mike Abendroth. Sorry Grimes. You, me, duplex strata, off we go. Well, what's going on? I just finished a book.

I don't know if I like the title yet, but the working title is Cancer is Not Your Shepherd. And I had so much garbage rolling around in my brain about cancer and blood tests and all that stuff, doctor's appointments and pills and refills and prescriptions and outlooks and outcomes and diagnosis and prognosis and dialysis.

I don't know.

Anyway, I just needed to put it out on the keyboard. So, I spent about a week, Kim was gone in California and gone to California. In my mind, I'm going to Carolina. She went to California. And at nighttime, what else am I going to do?

So I just was working, working, working. Tried to work, I tried to write 3 ,000 words a night. Anyway, the book is Cancer is Not Your Shepherd, a 31 day guide to suffering. So, the Gospel Assurance book, I wrote 6 ,000 word intro and then had 31 chapters from Thomas Brooks, Thomas Watson, Thomas Goodwin, Thomas Nelson.

And this book, I wrote the first 16 days and then the last 15 days, Charles Spurgeon, Charles.

Norris, Charles.

My dad's best friend was named Charles. He died, I don't know, 5, 10 years ago. Anyway, his nickname was Pug, P-U-G. So, what do you know? All right. Let's see. Today, on No Compromise Radio, I've got too many things going on here in my mind.

I've been immersed in the book of Luke, the Gospel of Jesus, according to Luke. And I thought I would talk about that a little bit today. What else is going on in the news that I might make mention of?

Not exactly sure.

I want to give some, you know, current events stuff.

I don't know anything today.

Did I mention I wrote a new book? Oh, okay. One other comment and then we'll get back to the show. I'm working on a 31-day guide to parenting. Not because I'm an expert in parenting. I'm an expert in what not to do, but I do have some experience in parenting.

My children are 31, 27, 24, 22. Those are hard to keep track of. And then all of a sudden, then you're like, okay, and my son-in-law is 32, my daughter-in-law.

Is 28.

I don't remember. And then my grandson, how do you, I guess you have to write these things down to figure.

It out.

The Person of Christ and the Whole Christ

Today, on No Compromise Radio, I'd like to talk a little bit about the Lord Jesus. I read someplace that you blink about 25 times every minute. So 25 times every 60 seconds. And blinks usually take one-fifth of a second.

I don't know how they time that, but there must be a way. If you drive 10 hours in the car at 40 miles an hour, I don't know why you would drive that slow driving down 95. You will drive 20 miles with your eyes closed.

That's pretty impressive. But it's not all at once. It's split up, you see. The little comment below that, someone wrote, some people go through life with their eyes closed to the real person of Jesus Christ.

They settle for only believing in his death and resurrection. They seem to care little about his person and his life. And as you know, especially as we read John Owen or Sinclair Ferguson, many others, that we don't want to separate Jesus's benefits from his person, because his person gives us the benefits, the whole Christ, total Christ, totus Christus, Christus.

And what we have to do is we have to say as much as we love forgiveness, justification, sanctification, one day glorification, redemption, propitiation, reconciliation, that it's from the Lord Jesus. And what's so wonderful about the gospels, they don't start with Good Friday slash Golgotha slash Calvary slash the death of Christ.

There's a lead up, and there are many reasons for the lead up. We need to see the last Adam, totally obeying God's law, not sinning. We need to see prophecy fulfilled. That's all true, but we also get to see who Jesus is, his person, his life, his heart, his attitude, his demeanor, the way he comes across.

So today I want to go back to Luke chapter four and talk a little bit about the Lord Jesus, and I want you to just admire him, believe in him, keep believing in him. As I say to the congregation over and over and over, we go through rough patches in life, and sometimes the exhortation to Christians is keep believing Jesus, even though things are very, very difficult.

I'm writing down the show title tonight, and it's a show title right now, and it could.

Be tonight.

You don't even know what time it is. It is a rainy day. It is February 23rd, 2024, 1 .23 in the afternoon. I've started a intermittent fast diet, and so I eat from noon until eight, because I'm all things diet.

I think I've done most diets. I haven't done keto all the way. I do low carb sometimes, but anyway, pretty hungry by noon. Let me rephrase that, restate that. By 11 a .m., I'm starving. By noon, I'm thinking, I can go another hour, two hours, so I just fast the rest of the.

Day.

I mean, you're already used to nagging, gnawing, hungry. Today I broke my fast with something I should not have. I broke my fast with Dots Pretzels. You know what I'm talking about? Dots Pretzels, D-O-T-S.

Maybe her name's Dottie Dorothy. I don't know. There's a picture of her on the back. It's harder in my neck of the woods to find the Dots Pretzels with cinnamon and sugar.

It tastes like it's candy.

It tastes like ice cream. Oh, man. I don't know if I've ever tasted anything so yummy, because it's not only sweet, very.

Salty.

That's the kind of stuff I'm going to just give Dottie a little hint. You need to put those pretzels chopped up in a vanilla bean ice cream. That's what I would do. Vanilla bean. Our next-door neighbor's dog was named Bean.

My other next-door neighbor in North Hollywood, he had a dog. The dog's name was not Walter, but my next-door neighbor's name was Walter. Anyway, that dog hated me. One day I put my hand up to pet the dog, and I knew I should have a glove on, because that dog bites.

Jesus’ Authority in Teaching and Over Demons

It had one tooth remaining, and it bit my glove so hard, its last tooth fell out. I said, you deserve it. Luke 4 .31, when you think about Jesus, you ought to think to yourself, he's powerful. He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and he was teaching them on the Sabbath.

They were astonished at his teaching, for his word possessed authority. In the synagogue, there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice, ha, what do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God. But Jesus rebuked him, saying, be silent and come out of him. And when the demon had thrown him down in their midst, he came out of him, having done him no harm.

And in this passage, we see his power. You see his power in preaching, you see his power over demons, and Luke, the author, wants you to know that Jesus has power. When he teaches, he's not like the scribes and others who quote people.

That's what they would do. A scribe so-and-so said this, a rabbi such-and-such said that. When Jesus teaches, he just teaches. And many times, he'll say things like, for truly I say to you, unless heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the law until all is accomplished.

That's Matthew 5. Matthew 5 goes on to say, for I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. And then, in the rest of the Sermon on the Mount, there are several of these.

You have heard it said, you shall not murder, and whoever murders will be liable to judgment. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council, and whoever says you fool will be liable to the fire of hell.

You have heard it said, you shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So Jesus, God-man, I could say he doesn't quote chapter and verse, but he does.

Many times he does quote the Old Testament, but he is chapter and verse. He doesn't quote scribes and Pharisees or someone else, right? Why do I quote people? Because they say it better than I do, number one.

And number two, so that you know I'm not the only one teaching this. If I said, and John Calvin said, he'll go, oh, well, at least Gaben draws close to Calvin. He can't be that off unless you hate John Calvin.

And then why else do I quote? Well, I want you to think through it in terms of authority, right? Somebody with greater gravity than me is saying it. And Jesus doesn't need any of that. He doesn't have to quote people.

He is the ultimate prophet. He is the prophet that Moses talked about. The Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers, and it is to him you shall listen. Verse 18 of Deuteronomy 18, I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.

This is the authority of Jesus, and people responded with, they're amazed, they're listening. Jesus has the authority of the Father and the Spirit, and he preaches and they are dumbfounded. And it's in perfect tense, which just means it just going on and on and on.

They're just kind of driven out of their mind, shocked in their senses, as some writers say. Jesus is teaching not as the teachers of the law, not as the scribes, but with authority. And of course, Jesus is teaching about grace and God's kindness, God's covenant keeping ability and desire, and the other people, especially in these days in Jesus's life, excuse me, they're doing legalistic things.

They're doing traditional things, traditions. Jesus said in Mark 7, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition, right? That's what they did. They made void the word of God because the tradition overruled it.

And now Jesus, he preaches with authority and he's got authority to just cast out demons with words, be silent and come out of him. That's all it took. Here's the first miracle in Luke. Now, Jesus has done other miracles, but this is the first miracle that Jesus has done.

And I think I talked about that a couple of weeks ago or whenever we were on the air last, haven't recorded that many shows lately. This is the signal miracle, as some call it, to let you know that if Jesus has power over demons, he must have power over everything so that you can be confident in your day to day and at the end, that Satan's not going to overrule, override, undo.

Jesus is powerful over demons, Satan's emissaries. Here, it's even called for the only time, I think in Luke, an unclean demon to just let you know the severity of it. I mean, demons, as they say, they're all unclean.

You say morally unclean.

Yes.

Probably physically unclean. What did to the man? Probably yes, right? But here we have demons mentioned over 20 times in Luke, but here we have the unclean demon and the demon is using this man's vocal cords.

And it says he cried out with a loud voice, literally with a megaphone, as we say here. Another thing about New England, we don't say in New England, driving down the 405 freeway. We're driving down the 101 because the 405 and the 101 aren't here.

If you're driving here in New England, you don't drive down the 495. You don't drive up the 95. You don't drive across on the 90. You don't drive on the 110. You don't call it the. There are no definite articles here.

You drive south on 495. You drive north on 95. You go down cellar.

You go down Cape.

First time I was talking to somebody here and I said, well, where do you go on vacations in the summer? Oh, we go down Cape.

I just thought that was Batman's Cape. We go down Cape.

Oh, like there's a Batman theme park here or something. We go down Cape. We go down cellar. We go down basement. See the definite articles.

Why bother?

This is like learning Latin. You don't have to say the definite article. You know, Spanish, it's el or los or la or las for the definite articles. Here, it's like Latin.

Who cares?

These demons, they knew Jesus was from Nazareth. They knew that they were going to be destroyed sometime and they knew that he was the Holy One. They knew he was God. And Jesus basically says no demon testimonies here.

No testifonies from demons. No testifies from unclean spirits. And he says, be silent and come out of him. By the way, came out of him in the text to make sure we realize how powerful Jesus is having done him no harm.

Right? Jesus' deliverance ministry is a lot different than the deliverance ministry on TV. Always heals. Perfectly heals. Spontaneously heals. Organically heals. Protects the individual. Back in, I think, 96, 95, somewhere around there, we were going to go see Benny Hinn.

In Anaheim. And if memory serves, there was a lawsuit. It was either there in Anaheim or someplace else because somebody got slain in the spirit and they broke their hip and I think subsequently died.

You want to do your facts check. But just as my memory serves, it was something like that. Now, here Jesus says, be muzzled or gagged, demon, and then get out. And again, big picture. You're reading Mark and you're thinking, yeah, that's all happening.

But Mark is trying to convince the reader, Theophilus, which means God lover, and every other God lover out there, that Jesus is the right Messiah that you can know for certain. And so, you realize how powerful he is in his teaching, how powerful he is in casting.

Out demons.

He has to be the Messiah. He's going to be the one that Colossians says has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of our sins.

This first miracle, this pointer, this indicator should give us great assurance that Jesus has power. And he has power for us today as we live our lives. And he has power at the end. It's like when Paul says in the end of Romans, the God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet to the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

As Paul is confident in the activity of God crushing Satan, demons, emissaries, and him even himself in the midst of a world of chaos and craziness and catastrophes. In other words, it starts with C. If Satan can be dealt with and God gives peace, then we ought to rest assured.

We ought to keep believing. The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him. His rage we can endure, for low his doom is sure. One little word shall fell him. Thomas Brooks, Christ our champion has already won the field and will shortly set our feet upon the necks of our spiritual enemies.

Satan is a foiled adversary. Christ has led him captive and triumphed over him upon the cross. Colossians chapter 2. Don't focus on Satan. Don't focus on demons. Make sure your studies are Christological.

When's the last time you read a book about Jesus?

Good question.

Now, what else is happening here in this passage that it's not, it's not like super obvious, but it's not that hidden either. Remember prior to this section, the people in Nazareth didn't believe Jesus.

Here, someone, some thing, some entities believe Jesus, but it's a demon. It's an unclean spirit. That's in verse 33. I know who you are, verse 34. You are the holy one of God. Same thing in the next little section in verse 41.

Demons also came out of many crying, you are the son of God, but he rebuked them. It would not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Christ. You can bet your bottom dollar. I don't know why that's a phrase, but you can bet your bottom dollar that the demons intellectually knew they understood and they were better off than the people in Nazareth.

I mean, this is not saving faith. Obviously to know certain things about Jesus isn't going to save. I mean, I grew up as a Lutheran and I used to have this memorized. Now I have to look at it. I wish I remembered it, but the demons could sign off on this section of the Nicene Creed.

I believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only begotten son of God, begotten of the father before all worlds. God of God, light of light, very God of very God, begotten, not made being of one substance with the father by whom all things were made.

Who for us men and our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary and was made man. It was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried.

And the third day he rose again, according to the scriptures and ascended into heaven and sitteth on the right hand of the father. And he shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead whose kingdom shall have no end.

All those are great truths, but they need to be more than just intellectual truths. That's why saving faith is knowledge, ascent, and trust. This is what I believe about the facts of Jesus. This is how I agree with those.

And then I trust, I rest, I receive, I rely. Those are the key words, sola fide. The demons believe in tremble, as we have talked about many times. That's why if you're listening today and you're not a Christian, time's ticking.

Are you going to be outbelieved by a demon? That's kind of, that's sad. No wonder James says, come now, you say, today or tomorrow we'll go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade, make a profit.

Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.

So now it is time to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, the writer goes on. Look at how powerful his authority is. See what it did there? And they were all amazed and said to one another, what is this word for with authority and power?

He commands the unclean spirits and they come out. Many words to describe Jesus, but for Luke, if I count rightly, 15 times the word authority, 15 times authority, authority to preach, authority to proclaim, authority to rebuke, authority to forgive, authority to be the Lord of the Sabbath, scribe's authority.

It had to come from God. Pharisee's authority had to come from God. It was a derived. Here, this is innate authority. Yeah, certainly sent by the Father on a mission. But this is the Lord Jesus with complete authority.

And the people start debating, you know, what is this a new teaching? He can cast out unclean spirits and they obey him. And so they were amazed at his authority that he taught a certain way and that he would cast out demons just by words and deeds.

Luke wants you to recognize Jesus's authority. And people started talking back and forth. If you were there, you know, I'd say, talk among yourselves. What do you think about this? There's a conclusion that needs to be met.

And reports about him went out into every place in the surrounding regions. Of course, they did all around Galilee, Mark says. And this is before texting, this is before phone calls, the power of Jesus.

And by the way, this, and I'm not making any slight to what Jesus did at all, but this is just a smidgen of his power. This is just a little tip of the iceberg of his power. This is just a little flicker of his power.

This is like in Job 26, where you talk about the pillars of heaven and the power of the still sea and the winds of the heavens made fair. It says in Job 26, behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways.

And how small a whisper do we hear of him, but the thunder of his power who can understand. That's just the fringes. These are the fringes of his ways. I mean, the ultimate glory is going to be revealed when Jesus comes in the clouds.

What does revelation say? Comes with the clouds and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. The report is spreading like wildfire.

The word report comes from the sounds of a sea wave, this roaring. You can just feel like there's momentum. It's just going and going and going, the report. And what the writer wants you to do is to say, Jesus' words have authority.

Jesus is Lord. He has power. And therefore, it doesn't surprise us when we think through the ramifications. If you've heard the reports of Jesus, and you have, the reports of Jesus have made it here to West Boylston Mass, home of 7 ,000 people.

The reports have roared through, thundered through. The waves have crashed through with the information. Then that means Jesus has authority. And we ought to recognize that. The lordship of Jesus for the Christian.

Jesus is Lord. And so, for you, Christian, He is Lord of your finances and money. He's Lord of your worldview. He's Lord of your sex life. He's Lord of who you sleep with and who you don't. He's Lord of your marriage.

He's Lord of what you view about abortion. He's Lord of how to raise children. And you ought to, Christian, submit to Him and surrender to Him and to yield to Him. You are not your own, for you are bought with a price.

So glorify God in your body, 1 Corinthians chapter 6. Romans 14, 9, for to this end Christ died and lived again, that He might be Lord both of the dead and the living. Colossians 2, and you therefore have received Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk in Him.

This is how we're supposed to, out of gratitude, walk in our lives and kill sin and live righteously by the power of the Holy Spirit who dwells within us. That is our duty. That is our joy. We want to obey God and honor Him.

Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I tell you? Well, my name is Mike Habenroth. This is No Compromise Radio Ministry. We started off kind of, it was rough going for a while, but I think we did it.

We wanted to show you the person of the Lord Jesus so you could appreciate His benefits.

Even more.