Under His Almighty Wings — Anton Bosch

The weeks. So we're in Luke chapter 13 and I want to look at and read from 31 through 35. Luke chapter 13 reading 31 through 35. On that very day some Pharisees came saying to him, get out and depart from here for Herod wants to kill you.

And he said to them, go tell that fox, behold I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow and the third day I shall be perfected. Nevertheless I must journey today, tomorrow and the day following for it cannot be that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.

Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her. How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings but you were not willing.

See your house is left to you desolate and assuredly I say to you, you shall not see me until the time comes when you say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And so the Pharisees were opposed to Jesus.

Herod’s Threat and the Pharisees’ Warning

There were obviously a few Pharisees who liked him and who believed his message. Nicodemus was one of those, Joseph of Arimathea was another, but generally they opposed him. And so they come with this warning that Herod wants to kill him.

We don't know what their motive was. There's a lot of speculation. Some say well you know it was a trick to get Jesus to move to another area where Herod could more easily get to him. The point of him going to Jerusalem wouldn't help Herod because Herod had no jurisdiction in Jerusalem.

His jurisdiction was in Galilee and so as long as Jesus was in that sort of area he would be at Herod's mercy. And remember Herod had killed John the Baptist. We're not sure whether Herod really wants to kill Jesus.

Obviously he doesn't particularly love Jesus, but he's fascinated by him. He wants to hear from him. He wants to see him perform miracles. But remember that he had killed John the Baptist and while he maybe had not initiated that process and he had been tricked into killing John by his wife, this had bought him a lot of acrimony and enmity from the people of Israel who thought that John was a prophet, as indeed he was.

And so I personally think it's unlikely that Herod would repeat the same mistake again. Remember that these Roman rulers were there at the at the good graces of Rome and just one foot wrong and they would be deposed and kicked out.

Remember this was behind the whole issue of Pilate having Jesus crucified. Pilate didn't believe that Jesus was worthy of crucifixion and yet he knew that if there was a rebellion, if there was trouble in Jerusalem, he would lose his job.

And so these guys were more concerned about their jobs than any kind of righteousness or any kind of other decisions. So personally I don't think that Herod particularly wouldn't have been politically expedient for him to kill Jesus.

Nevertheless, the Pharisees come with this warning. So part of it may be to play into Herod's hands, but part of it may be a genuine warning. They may have been genuinely concerned for Jesus' safety. It really doesn't matter.

It seems that they were conveying some kind of message, but the text doesn't tell us what that message is. And so they say to him, get out and depart from here because Herod wants to kill you. And Jesus' response is very significant.

Speaking Truth Without Malice

So he says, go and tell that fox. Now that's not a very kind thing to say. Obviously Jesus, not sinning and being perfect in all that he said and did, did not cross the line. What he was doing was speaking the truth.

And he speaks the truth without any malice. It's possible to speak the truth without malice. Today we seem to confuse these things and we get our own emotions and our own anger and frustration mixed up when we speak the truth.

And it comes out, and even though it may be the truth, we're speaking it with an agenda. Jesus has no agenda, but his commitment to truth. This is also the only time, and obviously the word fox obviously means a cunning character, somebody who is not to be trusted.

And obviously that was true about Herod. And I'm not going to get into the history of all the different Herods. There were five different Herods in the New Testament. This is Herod Antipas. He took for himself the title King of the Jews.

While he was not Jewish, he was in fact an Edomite, which were related to the Jews and the people against whom the Lord has indignation forever, according to Malachi. So he was of the enemies of Israel, and yet he took the title King of the Jews.

He wasn't a Jew. He wasn't of the royal line. He had no right to that title. But he had cleverly married a woman who would get him a foot in the door. He had manipulated his political connections, and he had by trickery and craft got himself in this position.

And so that was his character. That was who he was. Now this is the only time Jesus uses a term like this for someone. Jesus speaks to the Pharisees, and he says, you're a brood of vipers. He speaks to the Israelites, and he says, you are of your sons of your father the devil.

And so Jesus speaks these things of groups of people, and here he speaks of Herod. I want us to be careful that this does not give us permission to use bad language concerning people we don't like. There are two reasons for this.

The first is our judgment is not righteous. It doesn't matter how righteous you think you are and how righteous I think I am. The fact is that we we find it very difficult to separate our judgment from our personal ideas and our personal opinion and agendas.

And so when we judge, our judgment is by definition tainted. Doesn't mean we're always wrong, but we can be wrong. Jesus could not be wrong. Jesus's right judgment is 100 righteous. So when he makes a judgment, it is a righteous judgment.

When we make a judgment, it may be righteous, it may not be. So we have to be careful the judgment that we pass on others. But also the New Testament and Jesus's own teachings are clear about loving our enemies.

Jesus does not hate Herod. Jesus did not hate those who crucified him. He loved them and he wanted to see them saved. Our problem is that we we tend to hate so easily. We have the sort of black and white situation.

So if somebody isn't on our side, well then they're our enemy and we're going to hate them and we're going to say whatever we want about them. And it creates all sorts of other problems. We can use this, as many do, as an excuse to call people all sorts of names.

No matter how much of a heretic they may be, no matter how much of a of a false preacher or teacher they may be, we need to be careful how we address other people. But Jesus calls him a fox because that was who he was.

So Jesus's response is, he says, now go and tell Herod. Now it's interesting that these guys seem to have a relationship with Herod, who really was their enemy. He was the enemy of the Jews. He wasn't there for their sake.

He wasn't there to bless them in any way. He was just there for his own sake. And while the Herods had built the temple, or rebuilt the temple, they didn't do it because of the people. They did it for their own glory, to be able to say, look what I've built.

And so Jesus's response is, I cast out demons and I perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected. So what is Jesus saying? I'm going to deal with the cures and demons first, and then the perfected, because there's a technical difficulty there.

What was Jesus, what had Jesus been doing all along? He'd been casting out demons and healing the sick. So what is Jesus's response to Herod? He says, I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing. I'm not going to change my program.

This is what I'm doing, and I'm going to do it today, and I'm going to do it tomorrow, and on the third day. We're going to come back to that in a moment. Folk, I believe in this is a very important lesson.

In fact, there are a number of important lessons here. The first here is that we cannot be dissuaded from doing what God has called us to do by the threats of men. We so easily don't do what we should be doing because we're afraid of people.

We're afraid of what they will say to us. They were afraid of what they will do to us. We're afraid of whatever influence they may have. Jesus is not afraid of Herod. He says, I'm going to do what I need to do.

I'm going to do the will of my Father who has called me to heal the sick and to deliver those that are bound, and obviously attached to that is the preaching of the gospel to the poor, as we saw in Luke chapter 4 and Isaiah chapter 61.

So Jesus says, I'm going to do what I need to do. I'm not going to be dissuaded by you. I'm not going to be threatened by you. At the same time, Jesus wasn't going to be bribed by anyone into doing something other than what God had called Him to do.

The Meaning of “Perfected” and the Third Day

Now I'm going to come back to the third day, but I need to deal with the last word. On the third day, I shall be perfected. Now the problem here is that this is the only translation, the King James and New King James are the only translations that use the word perfected there.

The same Greek word is used in Hebrews, and in Hebrews it is correctly translated perfected. Remember that words have different meanings in different contexts. The English Standard Version says, and he said to them, let's get down to the bottom, and the third day I finish my course.

On the third day I finish my course. This is the way this word is used in every other case in the New Testament, except in Hebrews. In the American Standard, New American Standard Version, it says on the third day I reach my goal.

Now remember the word, the idea of being perfected means also to be completed. And so Jesus says, Jesus didn't need to be perfected. He was perfect in every way. So there's no sense in which Jesus needs to attain perfection the same way as we need to attain perfection.

But he has a job to do, and he says on the third day I'm going to finish my course. I'm going to reach my goal. Now when we look at the idea of third day, there are two things that we need to understand.

The first is that obviously this is an inference or a reference to the resurrection. I don't believe that there is, that there are times when the third day, when Jesus refers to the third day, it always refers to the resurrection.

So he's saying I'm going to do my work, and on the third day the work will be completed at the resurrection. Now we understand that at the cross he says it is finished, but in a sense it wasn't yet complete because the resurrection had not yet happened, and as Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, that without the resurrection our faith is in vain.

So the work is actually finally completed as Jesus is raised on the third day. So he says the job's going to be done. But now let's come back to where Jesus is at now. He's six, seven months away from Jerusalem, from the cross, and he says I'm going to do this for two days, and then on the third day.

So we don't even know what day of the week this is, but clearly this is not literal as far as Herod is concerned. For those who understood, for those who had heard Jesus speak about Jonah being in the belly of the fish for three days and being brought to life on the third day, about the erection that Jesus had spoken about, they caught the inference.

But as far as the Pharisees and Herod was concerned, Jesus was saying something different. And when he says then the second and the third day, the first, second, and third day, when he's speaking to them he's not meaning the resurrection.

He's simply saying I have a schedule, or a scheduled, depending on your language. I have a program, and I'm going to work along that program. And when I have finished the first part, we finished on the second day, then I'm going to get to the third day.

And so Jesus is just saying the same thing again. He is saying I'm going to finish the program. I'm going to finish the course that God has set for me. And so he is showing an absolute determination to do the will of God.

Jesus’ Determined Journey to Jerusalem

Now verse 33, nevertheless I must journey today, tomorrow, and the day following, third day, for it cannot be that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem. Now I know this is a maybe a technical passage and it's not so exciting, but I think it's very important because Jesus is teaching us some very important lessons.

So nevertheless I must journey. And again the days here are not literal because it's not going to take him three days to get to Jerusalem. It's going to take him some more months. So but there's a program.

So first of all he says you're not going to make me do what I don't want to do. Now he says but I will still do what I must do. And I will go to Jerusalem and I will not be deterred by any threats or by any pleas.

Remember Simon, Lord don't go to the cross. I will go and I will do what I've been called to do. I will die on the cross. But there's this very scathing thing. He says it cannot be that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.

Now we'll see in the next verses Jesus says Jerusalem you who killed the prophets. Remember Jerusalem is the capital. Jerusalem represents the nation. Galilee doesn't represent the nation. Nazareth doesn't represent the nation.

If he was killed in some other place, in a sense it wouldn't be representative of the nation. If you have something happen in Los Angeles, it doesn't have the same, when we're talking about a political event happening in LA, it doesn't have the same meaning as the same thing happening in Washington DC.

Because you're dealing with something that represents the whole nation versus a city that represents just itself. Jesus is really being sarcastic. What he is saying is all the other prophets got killed in Jerusalem.

Now that's not technically correct in the sense that they didn't all die in Jerusalem. But the nation was responsible for their deaths. Remember that Hebrews chapter 11 speaks about these prophets and how they were sawn asunder and they were fed to lions and they were starved and they were hacked with swords and all sorts of things.

And Israel treated the prophets miserably. Well obviously the false prophets, they loved them. But the true prophets who spoke the truth, they didn't like them at all. And they persecuted them and silenced them through death.

And so Jesus says every other prophet was killed representative by the nation in Jerusalem. And now he's calling himself a prophet. Was Jesus a prophet? Yes he was. Remember Moses thousands of years before had predicted and he said a prophet like unto me will the Lord raise up.

And so Jesus is a prophet. Remember Jesus is an apostle. He is a priest. He is a king. He's a prophet. He's all of these things. He's an evangelist. He is a shepherd. He's all of those things. So he's a prophet.

And he says if I'm a prophet then I need to die in Jerusalem. So Jesus understood the timescale. He understood the plan. And he says I'm going to Jerusalem. Now remember that we've emphasized this over these months that we've been in these verses in Luke as Jesus begins his journey towards Jerusalem.

That he has set his face as a flint towards Jerusalem. He knows what's waiting for him there. But he is not deterred. And one of the important things about these chapters is that it shows us how Jesus is determined to fulfill the will of God.

Jerusalem’s Rejection of God’s Messengers

And obviously that is compared to how easily we are distracted from doing what we ought to do. How easily we are tempted or threatened to not do what God wants us to do. So then in verse 34 he says, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem.

A statement of love and of care and of concern. Absalom, Absalom, my son. Many times the scripture uses this idea of using someone's name or a place's name twice in a row. And it's an expression of deep emotion.

It's not just, hey Jerusalem. No, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. He's crying out and he's saying the one who kills the prophets and stoned those who were sent to her. Remember Jesus told a parable of a man who owned a piece of land and he put a vineyard in there and he leases the vineyard out to farmers and he sends his servants and he says it's time to pay the rent.

Give me my rent. And they beat the servants up and they chase them away. He sends other servants and eventually he sends his son and he says maybe they'll hear my son. And they take the son and they kill him.

And kill him. And so the prophets were the messengers. God had sent the prophets over thousands of years. And over thousands of years God had pleaded with Israel to give him his due. To give him the work.

To give him the love that he was entitled to. But Israel refused to do that. And in fact what they did is not only do they not respond to the message of the prophets that is calling Israel back into a relationship with God, but they in fact kill the prophets one after the other.

And of course the same is still true today. False prophets are readily accepted in the world today, in the churches today. But you speak the truth and they will kill you. Maybe not physically, but they will.

Under the Almighty Wings of God

What's this new idea? Cancel culture. They will cancel you. And kill your reputation. And kill your platform. How often I wanted to gather your children together. As a hen gathers her brood under her wings.

You were not willing. Jesus is expressing the heart of God. For 2 ,000 years. Just short of 2 ,000 years. From the day he brought them out of Egypt. God was pleading with Israel. God was reaching out to Israel.

And he's saying come, let's have a relationship. Come under my wings. And as we read through the Psalms and through the prophets, you find this idea of sheltering under the wings of God over and over.

Sometimes as a hen. Sometimes as an eagle. But sheltering under the protective wings of God. And yet Israel is God. And the same thing is happening today. God is calling out to the church. And I mean the universal church.

And he's saying come and have a relationship with me. Forget about your relationship with your denomination. Or with your guru. Or with your favorite teaching. But have a relationship with me. Come under my wings.

And yet Christians are resisting God. Because they have their own agenda. They have their own gods. And they say yeah we'll give you your, but we're going to worship Baal as well. And the spirit in the age today is that Christians are saying, yeah we'll serve God.

But we're going to serve ourselves and our own pride and our own agenda and our own hedonism and our own pleasures at the same time. And God says no, come and have a relationship with me. You find the same spirit in the book of Revelation chapter 3, the last church, the church of Laodicea, where Jesus stands at the door and he's knocking.

And remember we've said that over and over. It's not the sinner's door that he's knocking at. While he does want to enter into the sinner's heart, Revelation 3 speaks about the church that had locked him out.

They said we're rich and with goods. We have need of nothing. They had no need and no time for Jesus. And Jesus says I'm standing at the door of the church. And I'm knocking. And I want to come in. But if any man will hear my voice, I will come into him and sup with him and hymn with me.

You see, he'd be going to the church, seven churches, to the church, the church, the church, the church, read Revelation 2 and 3. Now finally he comes down and he says if any one. I believe that's where we're at today in God's timing.

He's no longer calling churches. He's calling individuals. And he's saying if you will come, hear my voice, open your door. I will come and fellowship with you. I will sit down and sup with him, dine with him and hymn with me.

Again he's trying to reach out. He's reaching out to the churches. And yet the church is too busy with their programs, too busy with their politics, too busy with their doctrines, too busy with whatever it is that they're doing.

There's no time for Jesus. How often would I have gathered you? And obviously I must ask the question this morning. How often has he reached out to you and have you resisted him? Is he reaching out to you again this morning and saying come under my protection, come under my shelter, come and be under my care?

My grandfather told me a story of when he was a missionary up in the mountains of Lesotho. He would watch how the hawks would come. And the moment the hen saw the hawks or a hawk, she would make a sound and the little chickens would all run.

And she would put her wings over and she would sit there and the chickens would be there protected because she was too big for the hawk. And they were safe as long as they were under her wings. And folk, we're safe as long as we're under the almighty wings of almighty God.

But you think you can go it on your own. You're in a very, very dangerous place. And so there is safety, there is protection, there is warmth, there is joy, there's fellowship in his presence. And yet we resist him and we want to do our own thing and live our own lives and flee to him only when we're desperate.

How often would I have gathered you as a hen gathers a brood under her wings but you were not willing. Now he says, very, very important prophecy and I need to spend a little bit of time here. See your house is left to you desolate.

Israel’s Desolation and Future Recognition of the Messiah

And assuredly I say to you, you shall not see me until the day comes when you say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. When would this happen? Obviously they didn't understand because they were looking forward.

We're able to look back and we understand it didn't happen until AD 70, AD 68, AD 70 when Israel rebelled against Rome and Rome came in and destroyed the city and scattered Israel and the nation has been selected until 1948 when they came back together or started going back to the land of Israel.

But for almost 2 ,000 years Jerusalem has been desolate. It's been trampled underfoot by the Gentiles and even today we see what's going on in Israel. We see the enemy surrounding it. Even now we see that Jerusalem is a divided city with sections ruled by Jews and sections ruled by Arabs.

Even have an Arab been the cabinet right now. For 2 ,000 years Israel has been desolate under God's judgment because Jesus said I've pleaded with you and you would not. And so he eventually turns away from Israel and hands her over to her persecutors.

But it's going to end. Your house will be left to you desolate and assuredly I say to you very very assuredly I say to you you shall not see me again or see me until Matthew says again see me until the time comes when you say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

So Jesus is saying two important things. I'm not going to be too much longer but this is important to get stitch these together. Your house is going to be left desolate and you won't see me. So Israel being desolate and not seeing the Lord are synonymous.

When will they see the Lord? When they say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. When will Israel be restored? When they see him and they say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Remember just by the way that when Jesus comes into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday they say these words Hosanna blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. But it made no difference because Israel was not restored.

They did not see him. They may have seen him physically but they did not see him. How does Israel need to see him? They need to see him as the Messiah but they didn't see him and the house was not restored.

In fact the house was not even destroyed yet. So clearly Jesus is not speaking about Palm Sunday. He's speaking about another event when Israel will acknowledge Jesus as their Messiah. This is what Jesus is speaking about.

So how long will Jerusalem and Israel be left desolate until she recognizes her Messiah? Until she says blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Now this is very important because many Christians are praying earnestly for the peace of Jerusalem as the Old Testament says we should do.

Many Christians are fighting for Israel for the restoration of Israel. Now I know I'm going to lose some some friends here but where is Israel now in relation to God? Israel is still under God's judgment.

Israel has not been restored in its relationship to God. She's back in her land since 1948. She'll be back in the land. The stage is being set for the end time but Israel has not recognized her Messiah.

Israel is a secular nation, a secular state. It is not a religious state. It does not acknowledge God very much let alone Jesus. Jesus is still a false prophet as far as they're concerned. So Israel will remain under the judgment and the wrath of God until she finally acknowledges Jesus.

So you can pray for the restoration of Jerusalem as much as you like and I'm sorry because I know I'm touching a sacred cow here. But you cannot pray against the will of God. God will not lift his judgment of Israel until Israel acknowledges Jesus.

So you say shouldn't we pray for Israel? Yes we should. But what do we pray for Israel? Not for the restoration of a secular state. We pray for the salvation of Israel the same way as we pray for the salvation of America and of other peoples and other nations.

God save Israel. Lord help those who are preaching the gospel in Israel that they may bring people into a relationship with Jesus. That needs to be our prayer. And folk we need to get with the program.

Isn't this the point that what Jesus is making as far as Herod is concerned? He says I have a program and I'm not going to run according to your program. I'm running on God's program. And God has a program for Israel and you cannot make God change his mind because your program doesn't fit with his program.

The best we can do is get with God's program. And God is not going to restore Israel until Israel acknowledges her Savior. And so Zechariah chapter 12 verse 10 and the whole of Zechariah 12 is relevant here.

You can go back and you should read this whole chapter. He says I will pour on the house of David on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and supplication. Then they will look on me whom they have pierced.

Clearly Jesus and specifically the crucified Christ that they pierced. Remember what Peter says on the day of Pentecost. You speaking to the Jews took him with evil hands and crucified him. And so you will look upon me whom you have pierced and they will mourn for him as one mourns for his only son and grieve for him as one grieves for a firstborn.

This is the point when Israel repents. This is the point in which Israel recognizes who Jesus is. When Israel recognizes who they crucified. And obviously I'm not saying that the Gentiles and the Romans and each one of us didn't have a part in his crucifixion.

Obviously we did. But on that day they will see him and they will say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Now that's not in the passage but that's inferred because who is he who comes in the name of the Lord?

Jesus. The prophets came in God's name but Jesus is the ultimate prophet and he is the ultimate one who says that if you've heard me you've heard the father. If you've seen me you've seen the father. And so as he presents his message he is coming as God in the flesh.

Paul’s Teaching on Israel’s Future Salvation

Now if we go to Romans chapter 11 there's many many passages that we need to look at. I'm just giving you two or three important ones and I trust that you can put this stuff together. For I do not desire brethren Paul speaking about Israel that you should be ignorant of this mystery lest you should be wise in your own opinion.

He's just spoken about the branches of the olive tree being broken off. In other words Israel being cut off from God that the wild branches the gentiles may be grafted in. And now he says in that same context lest you be wise in your own opinion.

In other words don't think you're something because Israel has been cast off and you've been grafted in. That blindness in part doesn't mean they're half blind it means for a while. So Israel will not always be blind.

You will not see me again until you say. In other words the time will come when Israel will see. When she will see Jesus and recognize who he is. That blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the gentiles has come in.

Verse 26 and so all Israel will be saved. All right now I don't want to get too far sidetracked here. Remember when he speaks of this moment when Israel looks and recognizes who Jesus is most of Israel is dead.

We've come through the tribulation the war of Armageddon and there is very few say left in Israel. Very few people left in the world. Less than a third of the world's population survived that period and less than that survive in Israel.

So there's a remnant that are that are still left over in Israel. But it seems that they all turn to him. Remember just we dealt with this very recently in a different context. They are not saved because they are Jews.

They're not saved because of the covenant. They are saved because they recognize Jesus as their savior. There is no salvation whether you Jew or Gentile in any other way except through Jesus Christ. The covenants does not save them.

Their ethnicity does not save them. But because they recognize him and they weep over what they had done they are saved. As it is written the deliverer will come out of Zion out of Jerusalem and will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.

Verse 27 for this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins. The comparison between Israel and the church keeps coming back to me. I've mentioned this over and over in recent months and folk we must learn.

Israel as a Warning to the Church

1 Corinthians 10 says these things speaking of Israel were written for our admonition, for our learning, that the things that happen to Israel can happen to us and do happen to us. And I keep being shocked at how similar to Israel the church has become.

Yes we have a tradition but there's no power to it. And yes we serve God on the Sabbath or on the Sunday but we serve other gods on the other days. And Jesus is reaching out his hands and he's saying come unto me.

Come let us reason together. Come and shelter under my wings and yet we're resisting. Is he calling you this morning? And if he is stop resisting him. Come to him. Flee to him and enter into that relationship with him.

Prayer to Recognize Jesus as Savior and Lord

Father we thank you for your word. We thank you Lord for these examples from the Old Testament and from Israel. Lord we pray that we may be hearers of your word. Lord the Jews knew your word. They heard the Lord Jesus speak and yet they resisted.

In fact the same people who cried blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord the very next day cried crucified him. Lord we pray that we may be those who recognize you not just as our savior but as our Lord.

And Lord that we may flee to you and enter into that real relationship with you. Pray Lord that this may be real in Jesus' name. And so Lord I pray for those who may have been offended by this message particularly those who are watching online.

Pray Lord that you would give us each grace that we may understand your purposes and your will according to your word and not according to our traditions. We ask this in Jesus' name. Go with us now Lord.

Keep us, protect us, bring us together again safely on Thursday. I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.