Who Makes Jesus Marvel? - [Matthew 8:5-13]

In Omaha, Nebraska, we don't have the DCU Center. We have the Omaha Civic Auditorium.

Lots of good memories from the Omaha Civic Auditorium. My father would take me to Golden Glove boxing matches.

He'd take me to indoor motorcycle races. I can still smell the exhaust as I think about it.

There'd be concerts there. But I remember going to the circus a lot, the Schreiner Circus and the

Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus and all kinds of fun things that you could do.

Actually, one of my memories is, remember, they would sell the little chameleons. They would sell geckos.

Green anoles, I think, is what they're technically called. And they would put a little pin through them. And then you would pin them onto your lapel.

They'd at least last until the circus was over. And they were called, the men who sold them, they were called bug men.

And I just remember having little chameleons. They'd be alive just on your shirt. Couldn't go anywhere. Lots of good memories.

Wholesome Nebraska. The Three Ring Circus sometimes had three things going on at once.

And you'd have the monkey riding the motorcycle in a circle over here. And you'd have somebody doing a juggling deal here.

And then some acrobats over here. And then the MC would get up.

And he would say, and I draw your attention now to the center ring. And this light would go out. And that light would go out.

And then the main attraction was right there in the center. Everything dimmed out so your eyes know right where to go.

You know what I love about the book of Matthew? It does the exact same thing, portraying in the center ring,

Jesus is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. The light of, oh, he was just a good person, goes out.

Well, he was kind, but he really wasn't fully God, goes out. Jesus is shown as a

King. We need a King these days. The closest we have is probably was

FDR. The King of all Kings, Matthew portrays.

And so let's turn our Bibles to Matthew chapter five to start, we'll be in eight, to take a look at this great

King who has power, who has credentials, who has sovereignty, compassion. He is the great

King. Now we have finished Romans, finished first Corinthians and then Romans. And I'm trying to figure out what to preach next.

I have on my list, Ruth, Jonah, Malachi, Jude, Hebrews, first Peter, just pretty much every book of the

Bible. I just don't know what to preach quite yet, but I'm captivated by Matthew chapter eight.

I can't get out of it. And I'm a soldier and I'm a soldier that says, when you get done preaching one passage, you just pick up where you left off.

And last week I was so fascinated by the Messiah as he touches the leper, I will be cleansed.

The next one with the centurion is just as fascinating. And so for a few weeks, I think we'll be in Matthew and then we'll pick one of these other books.

But today, Jesus, the regal, royal, risen King of the universe.

Matthew one says that she'll bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus and he will save his people from their what?

Sins. Everything about this King lends itself to yes, sovereignty, yes, power, yes, authority, but also he's compassionate as he saves sinners.

It's book ended with royalty. Matthew one, the son of David and Matthew 27, the charge they put up over Jesus's head.

This is the King of the Jews. And what I love about Jesus as King is it not only motivates ladies to serve, but also motivates men.

Why are most churches filled with ladies, 60 to 65 % ladies? I don't know the real answer for that, but I do know is if you present

Jesus as King and Lord as Matthew does, men are going to say, do you know

Freemasonry, this kind of guy's religion, it's not as attractive. The God of sports these days attracts a lot of masculinity, not that attractive.

Islam, not that attractive. Where are the men these days in churches? Well, if you only give them a

Jesus who's close and who's eminent and who's a friend who sticks closer than a brother, and I like all that, but if that's all you get and you don't get the transcendent glory of God as King, nobody will follow

Jesus who's masculine. If you take a look at a soldier and a soldier who's weathered, hard, rough, and he says, you know, when

I see Jesus, I don't see kind of the effeminate Jesus, the feathered hair.

I see somebody who has power, authority, and sovereignty. He's the

King of kings. That's exactly what we see in our passage today. And so I love to talk about Jesus, the

King, because real men and women wanna serve this

King, herald for the King, honor the King. I don't know about you, but even the language of, just think if you have a

King. I have a personal relationship with the King. Well, that might be true. How about I'm in love with the

King? No, maybe I'm just burying my soul here, but I'm not in love with Jesus. I love

Jesus, but I'm not in love with him. Maybe you talk that way, maybe you don't talk that way, but I better get back to my notes here before I get in trouble.

What Matthew wants to do is, he wants to make your heart and mind wrapped around Jesus, the

King. So you sing with Robert Grant. Oh, worship the King, all glorious above.

Oh, gratefully sing his power and his love. Our shield and defender, the ancient of days, pavilioned in splendor and girded with what?

Praise. There's nothing like Matthew to show Jesus as King. Jesus gives a

Sermon on the Mount, if you look at Matthew chapter five, and he lays down how to get into his kingdom, and then once you're in, how to live.

And it's important to see this before Matthew eight, because here we have this wonderful sermon, the

Sermon on the Mount, and it begins with Matthew five, three, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs, and the

Greek is, and theirs alone is the kingdom of heaven. It's one thing to feel internally and subjectively happy.

It's another thing to be outwardly approved. And that's the word here, blessed. It's not the feeling you have in your heart.

It's when God sees you, he gives approval. It's the opposite of the word, woe.

Instead of God saying, instead of us saying, we have a cursed relationship with God, we have a blessed one.

And look at the one who is blessed, the poor in spirit. It means someone that's a beggar.

It's someone who is so thin and emaciated, you can see their ribs. But of course, as you know, this is a spiritual beggar.

One crouching, one begging for food who doesn't wanna look you in the eye, cowering.

We have no spiritual worth. We're not like the Pharisees. They're not the approved ones of God who think they have it going on.

They think they're spiritually rich. Spiritual bankruptcy is approved in God's eyes.

There's an emotional side to it. Verse four, blessed are those who mourn. They're mourning over their sins, for they shall be comforted.

Nine words in the New Testament for sorrow and sadness and mourning. And this is the one that's used of when you bury your mom and your shoulders shake and you cry and you can't stop it no matter what.

This is the mourning for the dead type of grief. Mourning over our sins.

Knowing we have a need so that we realize we need the righteous one, that we need a physician. And that's how

Jesus starts off the sermon and look at how he ends it. Take a look at chapter seven, verse 24.

All leading up to Matthew eight, hang in there with me. Jesus preaching. There's no preacher like Jesus.

He is the Prince of Preachers. Somebody said, no, that's reserved for Charles Spurgeon. No, Spurgeon would say Jesus is the

Prince of Preachers. And when Jesus preaches, since I've got the circus deal on my mind, remember those knife throwers in circuses?

And they would stand over there and throw knives and then there would be some person standing here and they intentionally miss, right?

But they're throwing knives and the goal is not to hit the person, to get close but not hit.

Some people say modern preachers try to do the same thing. They preach in such a way that they never hit. When Jesus preaches, verse 24 of Matthew seven, everyone then of those who, everyone, excuse me then, who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock.

Everyone who hears these words of mine, it's Matthew five, six, and seven, and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.

The rain fell, the floods came, the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell and great was the fall of it.

And look at the response of the people. You need to understand this to understand chapter eight.

When Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority and not as their scribes.

Jesus has authority, he has the credentials, and now Matthew says, let me show you some of these credentials.

It's one thing to say it, it's another thing to back up what you say with what you do. So first he gives the example of the leper, and then the centurion.

So this morning, let's look at Matthew eight, verses five through 13, the second demonstration of his authority, his credential as Messiah, the

King of the universe, so that you might believe, you might see the wonder of Jesus here and worship the

King. Matthew chapter eight, verses five and following. We'll go over the passage, and then we'll look at some lessons stemming from that at the end.

Verse five, when he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him,

Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly.

Now, when I see the word centurion, I don't really think of much. I would think to myself, if I was gonna teach a kid,

I'd say, how many pennies in a dollar? They'd say 100. What's a synonym for, what's another word for penny?

And they would say, what? Cents. And so a centurion is a soldier who has 100 men under him, and then

I wouldn't go any farther. But as I studied some of the military history of the day, listen to what historian

Michael Grant said. These formidable men combine the functions and prestige of a modern company commander and sergeant major or top sergeant.

The lowest grade of centurion received nearly 17 times as much pay as the ordinary legionnaire.

Sometimes up to 16 years or more, it would take for him to serve before he would be a centurion.

These men were the best of the military best, Gentiles. Greek statesmen and historian

Polybius said, 200 years before Christ's birth, in choosing their centurions, the

Romans looked not so much for daring, fire -eating type, but men who are natural leaders.

Not men who will open the battle and launch attacks, but those who will stand their ground even when hard pressed and will die in defense of their post.

And it's interesting, when you read the New Testament, every centurion mentioned is mentioned in a positive light.

Truly, that's the Son of Man, the Son of God, the centurion who stood by the cross.

He was a battle -weathered man, a military man. Now, keep your finger on Matthew 8, and I want you to go to Luke 7, because there's some details in what we call the

Gospel according to Luke, another synoptic gospel, a lot of similarities between Matthew, Mark and Luke. There's some information in Luke that you need to get because Matthew is a summary.

Matthew condenses things because his point is Jesus has powerful credentials,

He is the Messiah. But there's a couple of things you need to know in Luke for your edification and for your knowledge of this.

Luke chapter 7, the same account with more data. We're gonna see that what a person does through his agent is what he does through himself.

What he does himself, rather. And he had finished all his sayings, Luke 7, and the hearing of the people, he entered

Capernaum. It's the same account. Now, a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, we don't know what they were dying from, who was highly valued by him.

That's even surprising in and of himself because these are just slave people. You don't have to value them if you're a typical

Roman centurion, but this man does. When the centurion, Luke 7, 3, heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the

Jews asking him to come and heal his servants. He's a man of authority and he sends the elders of the

Jews, they go. He sends his servants, they go. He's a man in command. So the elders of the

Jews go, and then it says in verse 4, and when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, they the elders of the

Jews, on behalf of the centurion, he is worthy to have you do this for him. That is the centurion.

For he loves our nation and he is the one who built us our synagogue.

And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends saying to him,

Lord, do not trouble yourself. Now let's go back to Matthew chapter 8. What you do through someone is what you do for yourself.

When Pilate had Jesus scourged, did Pilate scourge Jesus? No, he had people under him who would scourge

Jesus, but it would be fair to say Pilate scourged Jesus. I teach at theological seminaries on occasion and I try to find a graduate student or a student at the top of the class, and then

I can have them give the test for me. I step out for a double espresso Campana and all the students study away and they don't take the test.

Eric Johanson is my latest helper. And so I would say,

Eric, give this test to the students. I'll be back in a half hour or so. And the students would not take the test and say,

Eric Johanson's test is easy today. They would say, Dr. Abendroth's test is very hard.

Matthew is giving a briefer account saying that the centurion is directing all this.

It's from him and through him, but it's coming through the elders and through his friends.

I still find it fascinating. As I said earlier, the centurion hears about Jesus and what does he hear about Jesus?

When a soldier hears about Jesus, what does he hear about? I'll tell you what he hears about. That's a man who has authority, strength, sovereignty, and power.

Far cry from what the effeminate Jesus in the media looks like. Paul wrote of Jesus, he himself is before all things and all things are held together in him.

So, Matthew 8, 7, the story goes on. And he, Jesus, said to him, the centurion through the messengers, says something very fascinating here.

Emphatically, I will come and heal him. I'm not gonna send my posse out there.

I'm not gonna send my folks. I personally will go. And by the way, that was a major deal because Jews didn't go into Gentiles' houses.

It wasn't against Mosaic law, but it was against every sensibility in the world because Gentiles were

A, Gentiles, and B, Gentiles did a lot of abortions right there in their house and there's been dead bodies in the house.

And you will certainly, if you go to a Gentiles' house, it's as good as done that you're going to be defiled.

But Jesus, the one who can touch a leper and not be defiled, can walk into a Gentiles' house as well.

I'll come and heal him. I'll come and give him therapy.

That's the word. I'll go to the Gentile house and heal the

Gentile centurion's Gentile servant. Verse eight, but the centurion replied, see, he gets it.

That's what the point is here. He gets that Jesus has authority. I'm not worthy,

Lord, to have you come under my roof, but only say the word and my servant will be healed.

For I too, verse nine, am a man under authority. With soldiers under me,

I say to one, go. And he goes. I have the authority of the emperor backing me up.

And when I give an order, the emperor gives the order. In 30 BC, the Roman Republic is over and now we have emperors.

And when the emperor says, do something through an agent, you do it. And if you defy them, the agent, you defy the emperor.

I say, go, and he goes. And to another, verse nine, come. And he comes. And to my servant, do this. And he does that.

And here, the centurion, by the work of the Spirit of God certainly, realizes that God's Son is sent by God the

Father. He has authority. He has authority to do these things. He's come from heaven.

He's the Messiah. And when God the Son says something, it's God the Father's good prerogative just as well.

One man said, here was a man commissioned, a man authorized. And he looked upon Christ in the same manner, sin of God under divine authority with a heavenly commission.

The man says, I too am a man under authority. Even I have authority. I have less authority.

I have the authority of only the emperor, but you have a greater authority from the lesser to the greater. You speak for God.

You are God. And why does he call him Lord there? Look at the text. People say, ah, that just means sir.

Oh, it could mean sir in the original, but I think it means Lord. I know you can heal somebody without even showing up.

You've got to be God to heal somebody that's not even there. He realizes through the

Messiah's, through the Spirit's work rather, that Jesus is a Messiah. Verse 10, when

Jesus heard this, he said, don't talk to me. I'm a Jew. You're a Gentile. When Jesus heard this, he marveled.

Now, most every time that word is used, it's used of people who look at God and they see

Jesus and they go, I'm out of my gourd. I can't get over this.

I'm astonished. But here, it's used for the incarnate

God -man. He's marveled. And said to those who followed him, truly

I tell you with no one in Israel, have I found such faith.

And now he begins to think of the end Messianic banquet. The end times Messianic banquet where not just Jews will be there, but Gentiles.

And he says, I tell you, many will come from East and West. Gentiles recline at the table at the

Messianic banquet with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom, that is

Jews, will be thrown into outer darkness in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

You think I have authority and you're right because I'm gonna tell you this truth with my authority. I'm now thinking about, this is

Jesus, Jesus is now thinking about end times of view to the inclusion of Gentiles with the redeemed of Israel.

Matthew 10, it says of Jesus, Jesus says, go not into the way of the Gentiles.

Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Matthew 15, I'm not sent but to the house of Israel, but eventually the

Gentiles are going to glorify him for his mercy, Paul says in Romans. I see the centurion's faith and I'm reminded about the end times where the

Gentiles also believe. And look at verse 10 again. No one in Israel have

I found such faith. This is amazing.

No one has thought like this, believed like this and Jesus just transported to the future as it were, thinking about the

Messiah banquet. I have a question. When you look at Mosaic law, what's the thing that separates

Jew from Gentile the most? Say, well, it's clothes and it's worship but on a day -to -day practical level, how are

Jews and Gentiles separated the most? And you can read Acts to find out and the answer is gonna be what? Food.

But at the end messianic banquet, there are gonna be Jews and Gentiles eating together. And when this

Gentile gets saved, Jesus is reminded of this Isaiah 25 for instance, a feast of rich food, a feast of well aged wine, a rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.

Jesus is thinking, blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the

Lamb, the end time messianic banquet where Jews and Gentiles will recline at the table to eat together with the

Lord. Verse 13, now to the centurion Jesus said, go and just say this little chant.

Go and here's a little bit of oil that you can rub on there. Oil, special rituals, magic, that's how people healed back in those days because there really wasn't real healing.

When Jesus just says go, let it be done to you as you have believed. You believed I could do it and to the extent that you believed

I could do it which is complete full healing, it is done for you as you have believed.

And the servant was healed at that very moment. Jesus, Matthew's point is, is the

Messiah. He is the King. He's the Son of God. He wants you, the listener, the reader to believe that.

Now let me give you the lessons, four practical lessons that grow out of this passage today.

Number one, I'll put them in the form of imperatives so that you personally have to deal with the questions or statements.

Believe that hell is a grim reality. You must believe hell is a grim reality.

Now some Jews, of course, will be there at the end times banquet. Some Gentiles. But take a look at verse 12.

Here is the Lord of love. Here is Jesus, the Messiah, says while the sons of the kingdom,

Jews, the unbelieving Jews, oh some will believe certainly, will be thrown into, and the

Greek here is to make it bold, to make it underlined, thrown into the darkness, the outside.

And he does the same thing here with the next sentence. In that place there will be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth.

So you're horrified by the idea, weeping and gnashing of teeth.

I'm telling you friends, hell is on the way out around here in our society.

No person who's sophisticated and educated believes in hell anymore.

But Jesus believes in it. Survey of evangelical seminary students, 20 years ago even, it's probably worse now, said 46 % felt preaching about hell to unbelievers is in poor taste.

Same survey, three out of every 10 self -professed born again people surveyed believe good people will go to heaven when they die.

And one out of every 10 evangelicals say they believe that the concept of sin is outmoded.

You can just turn on your TV and watch somebody with a big smile say that every single week. Tozer said the vague and tenuous hope that God is too kind to punish the ungodly has become a deadly opiate for the consciences of millions.

But friends, hell is real and the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ talks about hell. Why? Because it's true.

Because we should be thankful we don't have to go. The only hope is through Christ our Lord so we evangelize. The more

I study about it, even lately, people are trying to figure out a way to tell hell to go to hell as far as I'm concerned.

Get it out of my thinking. So what do they do? Well, you know what? Let's believe in universalism. Jesus just dies for everybody, hell's empty that way

I could sleep better. Jesus dies for them, they just don't know it but he takes them to heaven anyway because we've got an empty hell.

Or maybe annihilated. You know the Bible talks about fire and destruction. They just cease to exist somehow, sometime, somewhere.

Popular these days with evangelicals is, you know what hell is when people just don't want

God. Self -exclusion, I don't want God anymore. They follow only C .S. Lewis who says, hell's gates are locked on the inside.

We don't want anything to do with God so we won't have anything to do with God. Somehow protecting

God. But what does Jesus say? Look at Matthew 8, 12. Friends, it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living

God and here Jesus says they're going to what? Lock the door on themselves. What's it say?

I wouldn't believe it if it wasn't in the Bible. I don't want to believe it but it's in the Bible. They're going to be thrown in.

Thrown in hell. When people don't bow the knee to the eternal Son of God, the

Messiah, love incarnate and they reject him with unbelief and immorality and every other kind of foolish idolatry then it is thrown actively by God into hell.

The strongest support for hell is found in the words of Jesus. Matthew goes on to say in Matthew 10, do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in where?

Matthew 13, and cast them in actively, cast into the furnace of fire. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Now when people listen to Paul and Paul talks about women's roles or authority or this, that or the other, people are always like, well you know what,

I don't really like Paul but I like Jesus. And now they have to quick switch that back around because Paul talked about hell a lot less than Jesus did and now they're like, well

I don't really like Jesus, I like Paul. I mean even in the testimony of John, if anyone's name is not found written in the book of life he was thrown into the lake of fire.

I truly believe that if you could just take a peek in hell right now and see what was going on and it's not even the lake of fire yet, you would go insane.

Calvin said, for there can be no doubt but that by such modes of expression, unquenchable fire, worm dies not, day and night forever ever.

The Holy Spirit intended to confound all our faculties with horror. Spurgeon said, in that place we dare not look, perhaps it would not be possible for any man to get a fair idea of the torments of the lost without at once becoming mad.

Deep down though in the heart of people they have a conscience and they know, read this week, an old account of the

US News and World Report, what people like to be buried with. British actor

Robert Morley, I want to be buried with my credit cards. M .L.

Evans, I want to be buried with a fire extinguisher. Heather Tanner, I want to be buried with a good map.

In case the choirs don't sing well in heaven Sir David Wilcox of Cambridge, I'd like a pair of earplugs. Only one that made any sense to me was

Maurice Godbold, who said I'd like to be buried with a crowbar in case the affair proved premature.

What do you want to be buried with? I'll tell you what, bury me with nothing but the confidence that all who call upon the name of the

Lord shall be saved. How about that? All who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Saved from sin, saved from wrath, saved from hell, saved from God's blistering holiness, saved.

If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, like the centurion, and believe in your heart that God raised

Him from the dead, you will be what? Given a fulfilled life? You get it all in life?

No, you will be what? Your greatest need will be taken care of. Saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

For the Scripture says, everyone who believes in Him will not be put to shame.

And if you're not a Christian here today, you do exactly what Jonathan Edwards says. You flatter yourself that you'll escape hell somehow, some way outside the cross.

And these words of Jesus are here to just rip that short -sheeted,

Isaiah -like covering off, thinking somehow you can cover your sins with your own righteousness.

The cross is the only hope. Jesus is the Messiah. Lesson 2. The first one is hell's a grim reality.

Number 2, don't fall for the lie that religion can save you or anyone else from hell.

Don't fall for the lie that religion can save you. Spiritual privileges learned from the passage of Israel can't guarantee salvation.

Look at v. 12 of Matthew 8. The sons of the kingdom. They had it all.

Read Romans. They had everything. Promises, the glory, the Shekinah, the pillar of light, the oracles.

They had it all. Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah. They had it all. You know who the humanly most difficult people in the

Bible were to save? Religious people. I'm fine.

I don't need anything. It wasn't the wicked. Those had a lot of notoriety for being evil.

It was the people who were outwardly religious. When Jesus sees those who have no righteousness,

He's kind, close, eats with them. And when Jesus meets a self -righteous person who externalizes their relationship with God, He blisters them.

Jesus answered and said to Nicodemus, John 3. Well, first of all, Jesus wasn't asked a question by Nicodemus, but this is probably the question of Nicodemus' heart.

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is what? Born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus, the time for you to go to school is over.

Well, if I just learn a little bit more about Jesus and if I just had to figure out all these other things. Here's the thing for religious people.

You don't need more instruction. You need to repent and be born again. That was the point to Nicodemus.

As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.

Well, you know, Jesus, I know you're a religious teacher. And here's Jesus, stop that. You don't need a religious teacher.

You need a savior. Quit all this, you're a good religious teacher. When people say that, oh, you know, he's a good religious teacher, he's a nice, well -meant, quit it because that doesn't help you at all.

Religious education isn't the answer. Leon Morris said in one sentence,

Jesus sweeps away all that Nicodemus stood for and demands that he be made remade by the power of God.

I love the story of Bishop John Taylor Smith. He was a former chaplain general of the British army.

Seems apropos talking about the centurion. And he preached a text in a large cathedral. You must be born again.

My dear people, do not substitute anything for the new birth. You may be a member of a church, but church membership is not new birth.

Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. The rector was sitting on his left.

Pointing to him, he said, you may be a clergyman like my friend the rector here and not be born again. For except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

On his right sat the archdeacon pointing to him. You might be an archdeacon like my friend here and still not be born again.

For except a man be born again, he cannot inherit the kingdom of God. You might even be a bishop like myself and not be born again, but except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Several days later, as Harry Ironside tells the story, the letter arrives to the bishop from the archdeacon.

Dear Bishop, you have found me out. I've been a clergyman for over 30 years, but I've never known anything of the joy that Christians speak of.

I never could understand it. But when you pointed to me and said that a person could be an archdeacon and not be born again,

I understood what the trouble was. Would you please come and tell me and talk with me?

The account says he was gloriously saved as God regenerated his soul. The church is finally over.

I'm headed for the door. The sermon was inspiring like hundreds were before. The choir sang the anthem the best

I ever heard, and all the people listening were blessed and even stirred. The invitation given was earnest, warm, and strong while the congregation all joined in the final song.

I almost was persuaded to let the Savior in, but church is finally over and I've turned away again.

Church is finally over. I feel almost the same. I guess I wait till next time to call upon His name.

They say He's very patient, long -suffering, and kind. His arms are always open for those who will seek shall find.

I've heard the gospel story. I know it very well, how Jesus died to save me from everlasting hell, and then the ominous last chorus.

Yet I can't help but wonder when my last chance will be, and church is finally over for all eternity.

What about you? If I were to point at you, you must be born again.

You say, yeah, but I'm religious. Do you know of religiosity without worship of the

Messiah? Amos 5 says, I hate your feast days. If you won't bow your knee to Jesus Christ, may

I as kindly as I can, but it has to be stern. If you won't bow to Jesus Christ, God hates your church membership.

He hates your baptism. He hates your Bible reading. He hates everything that you do.

He hates the money you give. Why would

God the Father so crush His Son? It's like if you come to my house and say, you know what,

I'd like to get into good graces with Mike. I'd like him to be friends with me, and we'd like to have a camaraderie and a friendship.

And every time my son Luke walks by, you kick him. These days you wouldn't get away with it very much because he's, but when he was little.

But Mike, you're a neat guy. I think you're a fine guy. Let's spend time together. Let's go on vacation together.

And he walks by Luke and there's another kick. How can you honor me without honoring my son?

You think you honor me with all these externals when you won't believe the Son? So give up your vain religion.

And what does Jesus say? Come unto Me and I will give you what? Rest from that religious merry -go -round.

Lesson three. It is proper for you to have a low estimate of yourself before God.

It is proper for you to have a low estimate of yourself before God. The centurion,

I'm not worthy to come to your house. John the Baptist, I'm not worthy to tie your sandal, loosen it.

In an I am good, I do good world, we need to just come face to face with, we need a

Savior because our hearts, Ecclesiastes, are full of evil. If anybody could think highly of himself, the centurion could.

I am a Gentile military occupier and I can ask elders of the

Jews to go talk to Jesus and they do it. I don't treat my servant like chattel. I care for him.

I don't hate the Jews, I'll build a synagogue for them. But he knew before God, he was lost.

Don't let the people who sell self -esteem nonsense influence you. Salvation is only seen through the eyes of a person with greater intensity because of the length at which

God would have to go to rescue people like us. And lastly, number four.

Have a high estimation of Jesus. This goes together with three. Have a high estimation of Jesus.

That's exactly what the centurion did. You can't think too highly of Jesus. Your view of Jesus can't be too high.

Well, I'm kind of overdoing it. I've been to football games before and I think, oh, that's kind of a little overdone. Baseball games, that praise is a little overdone.

Concerts after the 18th Encore, people still flicking their, holding their iPads up.

Now, if you praise me, here's what'll happen. I'll like it. And on the inside,

I'll say, keep going. On the outside,

I have enough refined sensibilities, allegedly, to say, no, no, no. The sinner's saved by grace.

But inside, here's

Jesus. He just accepts it all. He didn't say, well,

I'm not really God. I'm not really the son of God. I'm not really the Messiah. He receives this praise.

And the praise that Jesus commends is a faith that commends Jesus. I know you.

I trust you. You have authority. You're the Messiah. You do things and say things. You've got authority from God.

I trust you. I believe in you. I honor you. And Jesus accepts it. If anyone could praise himself, he would be the centurion.

But his response is, Jesus is the focus.

Faith in Jesus is the right response. What does the text say? I've not found such great religion among all the

Jews. I've not found such great character, such great love for other people. No, he commends faith.

That's the right response. Low view of ourselves, high view of Jesus. Thomas Brooks, the

Puritan, said, he that believeth on the Lord Jesus shall be saved, be his sins ever so many.

But he that believeth not on the Lord Jesus must be damned. Even though his sins be ever so.

So what's your view of Jesus? Crutch, good man, are the