Luke Chapter 4 Introduction
Well, this morning, turn in your Bibles to Luke chapter 4. Luke chapter 4. It's been some time since we were in Luke's gospel, as we had a few things happening in between with our guest speaker, Chap Bettis, and with the baptism last week. And what an incredible time it was last week, especially as we celebrated with Matt and Cody as they illustrated to all of us what it means to die to their old way of life and to be risen again with Christ to live the Christian life. It was so encouraging to see so many family and friends that were here to support our brothers.
Well, this morning we're back in Luke's gospel as we're working our way through this gospel systematically. And it's in Luke's account of the life of Jesus that he's writing to Gentiles to convince them of Christ and both his humanity, but especially his deity. And Luke is pointing out over and over again who Jesus is so that people would believe Jesus and accept him as their Lord and Savior.
So far, Luke has introduced Jesus as one born to Joseph and Mary, but born of supernatural origin, not coming through the ordinary means of husband and wife but coming through the impregnation of the Holy Spirit acting upon Mary. And then we've seen Jesus growing in wisdom and stature and favor with all people. And then at the beginning of this chapter, we saw Jesus being tested by Satan and even being opposed by people who followed Satan rather than him.
Jesus Exercises Divine Authority
Now in the second half of chapter four, beginning in verse number 31, we're going to see Jesus exercising his divine authority, speaking words of authority and all for our good. So listen as I read beginning in verse number 31.
Then Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and on the Sabbath he taught the people. They were amazed at his teaching because his words had authority. In the synagogue there was a man possessed by a demon, an impure spirit. And he cried at the top of his voice, "Go away! What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God."
"Be quiet," Jesus said sternly. "Come out of him." Then the demon threw the man down before them all and came out without injuring him. All the people were amazed, and they said to each other, "What words are these? With authority and power, he gives orders to impure spirits, and they come out."
And the news about Jesus spread throughout the surrounding area. Then Jesus left the synagogue and he went to the home of Simon. Now Simon's mother-in-law was suffering from a high fever, and they asked Jesus to help her. So he bent over and rebuked the fever, and it left her. She got up, and at once she began to wait on them.
At sunset, the people brought Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. Moreover, demons came out of the people, shouting, "You are the Son of God." But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Messiah.
At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place and the people were looking for him. And when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving and they said, "Stay," but he said, "I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also because this is why I was sent." And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.
In this passage we see very clearly Jesus exercising authority that set him apart from other teachers of the day. Jesus was no ordinary man. He was, in fact, the Son of God.
As we see in this passage, authority, it made me think of an experience that I had when I was in college related to authority. College is a period of time when young men especially are sort of flexing themselves, testing the limits of authority and finding out where they are in the pecking order of life.
And while I was a student at Pensacola Christian College in Pensacola, sometimes my friends and I would visit the Naval Air Station to go to the museum there for the naval museum or to go see the Pensacola Lighthouse. I didn't do it a lot, but when I went, it was always interesting because being a young college-age guy and going with my friends, we looked like we could have been in the Navy, but none of us were in the Navy.
And when we would drive up to the entrance gate, the military police would of course stop us and say, "What's the purpose of your visit?" And we knew from experience and our friends, we would simply say, "We're here to go to the Air Museum" or "We're here to see the Blue Angels" because Pensacola is where the Blue Angels are headquartered. And after checking our IDs and asking us a few questions, they would let us through the gate and they would direct us to the tourist areas. Because we were simply civilians. We had no authority and no power on the Navy base. There were restricted areas that we were not allowed to go to. And they made it clear that our activities were being surveilled. So we only did what tourists were allowed to do. And that is we went to the museum or the lighthouse and then we left.
Well, one year, I think it was my junior year in college, my younger brother was also in college at Pensacola. And one of his roommates, Father, was a Navy Admiral. And this roommate was a great guy. And my brother got to know him well, and I got to know him. And we had a lot of fun together.
And once in the middle of the school year, the admiral came to town and he decided to stay on the Navy base since he was an admiral. He could get accommodations there. He also liked to play golf at the golf course and do all the things that an officer could do on a Navy base. Well, on this one particular visit, the admiral told his son and his daughter, "Invite your friends to come over to the base and we're going to have a cookout. We're going to play some volleyball and we're going to have a good time together."
Well, my brother and I were available. We were invited and we went. And that time when we went to the base and we stopped at the gate and the MPs asked us, "What's the reason for your visit?"
We said, kind of casually, not knowing what was going to happen, "Well, we're coming to visit Admiral so-and-so," and we named his name. The demeanor of the MPs completely changed. We were no longer civilian tourists; we were now honored guests because we knew an admiral and we were going to his party.
They knew about this party because they were told that people would be coming on base to have this barbecue and volleyball game. They treated us very special. They made sure that we knew exactly where to go because we were now going to be going into parts of the base that civilian tourists normally did not go into. They wanted to make sure we knew how to get there and that the admiral knew that the MPs were taking good care of us.
Well, this extended so far that at the end of the night, as we had had a great time together that day and we were coming back off the air station, I was with my brother and one of our friends and we were in a jeep and we looked like troublemakers. We had the top off on the jeep and we were speeding on the naval air station. Now, granted, the speed limit was something like 25 miles an hour and we were probably going 30.
An MP pulled us over. And when he pulled us over, he said, "What are you doing?" And we said, "We've just come from the party that the Admiral was hosting, and we're going back to our college." And we explained this.
The MP, again, his demeanor suddenly changed. When he pulled us over, he probably assumed that we were seamen who were heading into town to do something wild or crazy. But when he found out that we were just college students that had been with the Admiral, they let us go. And they said, "Have a great night. Thank you for coming and being on the base with us today."
What I learned through that experience was that the Admiral was not just a title, but the Admiral carried authority. Just the mention of the Admiral's name changed the way people responded and reacted to us. The MPs who were there to protect the base welcomed us on their air station. And those MPs gave us incredibly kind treatment as we were there, guests of the Admiral. The Admiral, through his rank and his authority, opened doors and changed.
Jesus as the Holy One
People certainly had to respond to his orders when he gave them. And those were things that, as a civilian, they could completely ignore me. They could even deny me access to the air station because I had no right to be there unless I was an invited guest.
Well, as Jesus is going to minister here in Luke chapter 4, he's going to demonstrate his authority. He was no mere civilian. He was not simply a guest teacher or an intellectual person that showed up in the synagogue at Capernaum.
But Jesus appeared as the Holy One of God, the demons say. The one that God had sent to demonstrate his authority over life and death. The one God would send to deal with demonic forces and to heal the sick and ultimately to cure us of our sin.
Jesus was more than an admiral. Jesus was the Son of God. And as he came and he spoke, his words carried tremendous authority, as did his actions.
Authority to Stop Demons
So as we look in Luke chapter 4, the latter half this morning, I want us to see how Jesus exercises his authority for our good. And we see it at least three different ways.
First, in our section this morning, we see that Jesus exercises divine authority to stop demons. As Jesus was ministering in Galilee around his home region, he was speaking both in Nazareth, where he grew up, but also in Capernaum. It seems that this section, beginning in verse number 31, may have happened before what happened in the first section of this chapter. I gather that because of verse number 23, where he said the people in Nazareth are accusing Jesus and saying, "You're doing here in your hometown what we've heard that you have done in Capernaum," why Luke and verses the order is not completely clear, except to say that in the context, we see Luke presenting Jesus as one who has authority over Satan.
Luke first presents the confrontation that Jesus had with Satan and people rejecting Jesus. And now he's going to show that Jesus has authority over Satan and his demons. So as Jesus came to the synagogue, he began teaching on the Sabbath. And it says people were absolutely amazed at his teaching because his words, it says verse 32, had authority.
Jesus was speaking in a way that they were not accustomed to hearing. It wasn't simply because his rhetorical skill was superior to other teachers. It wasn't simply a matter of mastery that Jesus knew more than other teachers. No, Jesus taught with authority because he had the very authority of God. Jesus was speaking the words of God.
In fact, in Matthew's gospel, Jesus' style could be summarized this way: Jesus would say, "You have heard that it was said, but I tell you." And Jesus would expand upon what the Old Testament said and give them more instructions because of his authority as the Son of God. Jesus was preaching God's word. He was not simply talking about God's word. He wasn't there to inform them. He was there to challenge them and to confront them so that they would come to recognize him as the Messiah.
Jesus' words bore authority because he was speaking the very words of God. He was not simply sharing a human opinion, not simply critiquing one rabbi over another, but he was speaking with authority. The demonstration of his authority was not just a rapt audience that was listening to him with great intention, but it was also the response of demonic forces that were present in that synagogue.
Jesus was teaching the people, but his authority extended beyond his teaching. It also attracted the attention of evil spirits and earthly adversaries. It says, beginning in verse 43, that while Jesus was teaching on the Sabbath, a man possessed with an evil spirit cried out in a loud voice. This man who was crying out, it says, was possessed by a demon. This man was doing the bidding of the evil spirit that was in him. He was violating the sacred space of the synagogue on the Sabbath, and he was instead coming in, mingling with devout worshipers to distract them from Jesus and to try to stop Jesus.
So this demon-possessed man abruptly interrupted Jesus and he challenged Jesus' authority. So a demonstration of the authority of his words was the reaction of the demonic spirit. This demonic-influenced man was heckling Jesus from the audience, telling him to leave, to get out of there. "What business do you have here, Jesus?"
You see, the demon knew Jesus' true identity as the Holy One of God, verse 34. And he was commanding Jesus with all his might, "Go away, leave us alone." The demon knew Jesus. And he knew that Jesus was more than a humble man from Nazareth. He knew that Jesus was none other than the Son of God. That's why he said, "Jesus of Nazareth," he identified him in his human identity. But he also said, "I know that you are the Holy One of God." You're more than just the son of Joseph and Mary, but you are none other than the eternal God.
Demons, if you don't know, are fallen angels who rebelled against God with Satan. And these demons, who wander the earth doing the bidding of Satan, are destined for destruction. They serve Satan until the final judgment when they will be destroyed once for all. In the meantime, it says that they roam the earth looking for people that they can disturb. They're trying to oppose the work of God. And here, when the Son of God himself appears, the demon had the audacity to try to stop him. But they could not stop him. The demon was responding not as one with authority, but he was responding as one with fear. He feared what Jesus would do to him.
And notice Jesus' response, beginning in verse number 35. As the demon-possessed man shouted with a loud voice, Jesus simply said, "Be quiet." "Shut that down. We don't need to hear from you right now." And he said sternly to the man, but really to the demon who was in the man, "Come out of him." And immediately the demon reacted.
He heard Jesus' authoritative words and he threw the man to the ground and he came out. And yet it says the man was not injured. The demon, though he had possessed the man for a season, did not ruin the man. The demon instead responded to Jesus' words and he left him. He came out and the man was restored.
Jesus possessed divine authority over this demon. The demon could not stop him. This is why Jesus did not respond to the demon's command and say, "Okay, I guess I'll leave. I guess there's opposition here. Maybe this isn't the place for me to speak." No, instead, he just simply commanded the demon, "Be quiet. You have no right to speak here." And he told the demon to leave the man alone.
The people in the synagogue observed all of this, and as they observed it, their response was again amazement. Verse number 36: "What words these are, they said. With authority and power, he gives orders to the impure spirits, and they come out." The people had witnessed something incredible. Jesus, who was a relative stranger in Capernaum, had now come into their synagogue, had taught them with authority, and demonstrated his power over evil spirits.
Luke was contrasting in this section Jesus' identity as the Holy One of God with the impure spirit that had possessed the man. The Holy One of God was not an ordinary man. He was not merely from Nazareth. No, this Holy One of God was the eternal Son of God who by the Spirit of God would fulfill the scriptures. And he was proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. Pastor Dan covered that in the first section of this passage, that Jesus was channeling Isaiah's words and declaring the kingdom of God that he had come to fulfill.
This is Jesus' first miracle recorded in the Gospel of Luke. And with this miracle, the physician wants us to understand Jesus' divine authority. Evil had great angst in the presence of Jesus' righteousness. Yet even the evil of a demon could not stand up to Jesus' words. Any victory that the demon may have appeared to have short term over influencing this man and directing him and even speaking through him was short-lived at best, because Satan did not ultimately have control. Jesus was powerfully in control. He was exercising his authority and he was doing it for the good of his audience.
What you should think about in this passage by implication is that Satan does not spare God's people when they gather for worship and teaching. That here you have a group of people that have come together at the synagogue to worship and to be taught. And among their midst is a demon-possessed man who interrupts the service and he comes to stop what is happening. In fact, I would make the point that Satan purposefully finds his way among God's people in order to oppose God. He aims to lead the church into darkness while he pretends to be an angel of light.
The work of demons has much less to do with spectacles and much more to do with subtle deceptions. Paul in his charge to Timothy warned him of this in 1 Timothy 4:1. He said, "Some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons." The idea is that Satan wants people, even in a church, to doubt Jesus' full humanity and doubt his full deity.
And yet Jesus exercises authority through his word. Jesus is not here this morning to stand behind the pulpit and speak to us in physical form, but we have Jesus' words in the pages of the Bible. And they're recorded for us to remind us that Jesus is who he said that he is and that he has come to save us from our sin. Jesus, in speaking his words of authority, demonstrated his authority because he had authority over even the demons. He could stop the demons in their tracks.
Some have taken Jesus' interaction with demons to think that the church ought to be in the business of exercising demons and that our work really should involve supernatural acts and miracles that we should look for. I don't believe that that is the aim of the church at all. I would say it the other way around, that when we declare the word of God and we point people to the Son of God, there is demonic opposition and demonic influence. It may not be as spectacular as what is illustrated in our popular culture and in our entertainment, but it is certainly present.
Satan wants to do anything that he can, even through a respectable person, to try to oppose the authority of God. And so many times in our culture, the demonic teachings of Satan are, "Did God really say? Is that really what the Bible says about Jesus? Can Jesus really forgive your sins? Is that really all there is to it?" And there are so many twists and turns that people add, and Satan delights in the confusion because the confusion draws people away. And yet Jesus' response to the demons then and his response to demons now is to be quiet, shut their mouths, and to stop their influence.
Because the church depends on the authority of Jesus, and where the authority of Jesus is declared, there will be demonic resistance. So as we have the opportunity to minister to the gospel, know that there will be resistance to our efforts. There will be efforts that we don't fully understand and yet that are probably demonic influenced.
Now that doesn't mean that people are going to grow horns on their heads and have red eyes and breathe flames of fire. But it does mean that people will oppose God and his work, sometimes of their own sinful volition, but other times because of the influence of demonic activity. Whichever the case, our obligation and our comfort really is to stand on the authority of Jesus and to know that it is his authority through his word that drives out and stops the influence of devils.
And as we do that, we know that he's working for our good because he wants more and more people to know. This is why it says in verse number 37 that the good news, or the news about him, spread throughout the surrounding area because Jesus had authority.
We want the authority of our church to be none other than the person of Jesus, not some hocus-pocus ritual or some exorcism tradition, but we want it to be that we declare Jesus and that we invite people to follow Jesus. And when we do that, we know some will respond in repentance and faith and some will respond by opposing every effort to declare this message. Yet Jesus exercises his divine authority to advance his message. And that involves stopping demons, but we see secondly in this passage that Jesus possesses divine authority to heal diseases.
Authority to Heal Diseases
He possesses divine authority to heal diseases. After all that happened in the synagogue in the view of everyone who was there, Jesus left and went to the home of Simon. We learn later that this Simon is Peter, one of Jesus' closest disciples that has not yet been called.
But here in the afterglow of the synagogue and the teaching, Jesus retires to the home of Simon and they discover that Simon's mother-in-law is there sick. Luke does not say that her sickness was the result of her sin or of a demon. She had simply had a high fever, it says, that she was suffering and that she was laid up at home. So Jesus came in and privately and tenderly rebuked the fever and it left her, it says in verse number 39.
Sickness like this is a result of the fall and it is a consequence of the curse that sin places over our creation. It's not to say that because Simon's mother-in-law had done something that he punished her and made her sick. It's to simply say that we all experience illness and disease and maladies because we're under the curse of sin. But Jesus exercised his authority and showed that he was the Son of God by rebuking the illness. And it immediately left her.
And when it left her, it says that she got up at once and began to wait on them. There was no recovery period. She didn't say, you know, I've been sick for the past few weeks or days and it's going to take a little bit of time to get my strength back. No, her strength came immediately back because Jesus healed her completely.
What we see in this is that Jesus' ministry not only affected crowds, but it touched the lives of individuals. First, the individual who was possessed by a demon, and now Simon's mother-in-law, who had been affected by illness. When Jesus came into their home, he expressed and demonstrated his tender affection toward her. He knew Simon and his mother-in-law, and he cared for them in a deeply personal way. Just as powerful as casting out the demon in the synagogue, Jesus cured her illness probably in her bedroom.
The result of this is that at the end of the day, people flocked to Jesus. From all around Capernaum, they brought people of various kinds of sicknesses, verse 40, expecting Jesus to heal them. These sicknesses probably involved more than just a runny nose or a seasonal allergy. They came with all kinds of problems, perhaps birth defects and chronic illnesses, things that were beyond any physician's ability to cure. And without fanfare, without bureaucracy, Jesus simply laid his hands on each and every one and he healed them. He had already spoken words of authority. And now he offered the tender touch of his compassion. He welcomed each unwell person, and he welcomed the people that cared for them. And he touched the ill, and he tenderly healed them.
As Jesus did this, he brought restoration to their broken bodies. He cared for their bodies and he pointed their souls to himself. Jesus' approach to the sick went completely against Jewish custom. He made himself ceremonially unclean by touching people that had maladies and diseases. Priests would have been far removed from this kind of thing. They would not have even come into the physical presence of people who were sick. But Jesus didn't screen the candidates and say, well, what illness do they have? What exactly are they asking for? Instead, he touched them all and he restored their health. The holy one of God, as the demon declared, touched the unholy ones and he made them whole.
Jesus was doing this as a demonstration of his power, of his divinity. At the same time that Jesus was healing people with incurable diseases, verse 41 reports that demons were coming out of many people and they were shouting, "You are the Son of God." But he rebuked them too and would not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Messiah.
Think about that. We get all the attention on the first demon-possessed man because he interrupted the church service, so to speak. He stood up and shouted, "Stop, go away," and created a ruckus. And yet here in the presence of Jesus, as he's healing many, it says, moreover, verse 41, demons came out of many people. Who was declaring the divinity of Jesus? It wasn't the people that were being healed. It was the demons who hated Jesus. But Jesus rebuked them and did not allow them to speak. He silenced them.
And why? Well, he silenced them because Jesus—or he knew—that the demons wanted to stop his ministry. They understood that if they revealed Jesus to be the Son of God, then the Jewish leaders would arrest him and kill him. And eventually, that is exactly what happened. But it wasn't time for Jesus to be arrested and to go to the cross. Furthermore, the demons wanted to make people fear Jesus so they would not follow him. They wanted to make Jesus untouchable and unapproachable, that there would be more questions about him than answers.
And ironically, the demons were trying to use the truth about Jesus' divine nature and his divine power in order to stop him. But Jesus responded by silencing the demons and driving them out of their human hosts, knowing that it was not the right time to reveal himself as the Son of God.
The demons were correct that indeed he was the Son of God, and it was worth sharing. But they were sharing it in a way to try to undermine him. And Jesus would exercise his authority for people's good. Diseases and demons operate under the curse of sin.
And there was no telling how many people that came into the wee hours of the morning to see Jesus and to be touched by Jesus. But what ought to be surprising in this section is how many people were suffering and how many people came for help. The people heard that there was a cure and they heard that Jesus was the one providing the cure, and they came, not asking a lot of questions, but simply wanting the answer: Can you heal me? Can you solve my problem?
All of these things ultimately point to our need for power and authority beyond ourselves. In our current culture, we put tremendous hope in medicine, as if medicine and doctors can solve all problems. While we ought to be thankful for medicine and doctors and seek their professional help when appropriate, they cannot ultimately cure us because our sicknesses and our diseases remind us that we're under a curse, and that curse is sin.
I'm not saying that you're being punished because of a particular sickness or a particular illness. But what I am saying is that all of our maladies, all of our illnesses, all of our problems should point us to our need for divine authority, that we need intervention from God himself.
And though Jesus will not be coming to someone's house this afternoon and receiving guests that he can touch and simply heal, Jesus has left us with his word and his Holy Spirit that give us tremendous hope and healing. Some would take this to mean that the church should have a ministry of healing, that we should have healing services where we welcome people to throw away their canes and walkers to be healed of their cancers and all the rest.
And I would say that misses the point of what Jesus was doing and what the New Testament calls us to do. Our ministry is not one of healing the sick, but of healing souls. God has called us to declare Jesus with authority, to tell people that he is the Son of God and that all of their problems, all of their sins have been dealt with by Jesus.
Authority to Declare Good News
That Jesus came to heal our souls, and he will one day transform our bodies as we enter into his eternal presence. You see, in this passage, Jesus is using his divine authority for our good. He's stopping demons. He's healing diseases. And third, he's using his divine authority to declare good news.
The reason I say that our ministry is not one of exorcisms or healings, but one of declaring, is because this passage begins with Jesus declaring and teaching words with authority, and it ends the same way, as if Luke has put bookends on this section of the narrative. It says in verse number 42 that at daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place, and the people were looking for him. And when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving. But he said to them, "I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent." And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.
Although Jesus' authority over demons and diseases garnered a lot of attention, he focused first and foremost on proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. He already said that in verse number 18 when he was quoting Isaiah. He says it again here to put the focus on what his mission actually was. As Luke introduces this, this is the first time he uses the phrase "the kingdom of God," and it will appear 30 more times in this gospel.
Simply put, the kingdom of God that he was declaring is the rule of God that is both a present reality, but it's also a future hope. That the Jews were looking for Messiah, they were looking for the rule of God to drive out the Roman oppressors. And yet Jesus is saying, "I've come to declare the kingdom of God," which is more than simply liberation from political oppression. I've come to declare my rule and my reign over this creation.
As Jesus cast out the demons and he healed the sick, he did this proclaiming the good news. In fact, we could say he was exercising his authority in word and deed. And casting out demons and healing diseases was a demonstration and a validation of the authority of his words. But Jesus' main ministry was to proclaim the kingdom of God, that it had come, that he was the fulfillment, he was the Messiah, and that he had come to save his people.
The people in Nazareth had violently opposed Jesus and tried to throw him off a cliff at verse number 30. But now the people in Capernaum wanted Jesus to stay and heal everyone. They wanted the benefits that this Messiah brought, although they may not have understood his message. Jesus understood his message, and he was on mission to tell as many people as he could. That's why he said he had to leave Capernaum and he went on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.
The Authority of God's Word
By implication, the only authority that the church has and the only authority that we've ever had is the authority of God's word and the message of the gospel. We must prioritize as the people of God proclaiming the kingdom of God to as many other people as we can. The power source for our ministry comes from God's word, not from strategies. The power source of our ministry is not that we can cast out demons and heal the sick. No, we preach the life, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus, all according to the scriptures, and watch the Spirit of God draw people to himself.
The Apostle Paul clarified this authority that we've been given from Christ when Jesus defeated Satan once for all on the cross. Hear what he says in Colossians 2, beginning in verse 13: "When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all of our sins, having canceled the written code and its regulations that was against us and that stood opposed to us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them triumphing over them by the cross."
Simply put, Paul is saying that Jesus' authority extends to conquering our sin. And Jesus put the demons and all of his opponents to shame by dying on the cross. You see, they thought that in killing him, they would end his influence. And yet it was in his dying that he bought our victory over death and sin. Paul says in 1 Corinthians, "Death, where is your sting? Sin, where is your victory?" They're gone because of the work of Jesus. He has triumphed over them in the cross.
Jesus exercises his authority not just to rebuke and resist Satan, which he did earlier in this passage, and not simply to call out sinners, which he certainly does. But Jesus uses his teaching and his authority for our good. He wants to heal our souls so that we can have fellowship with him forever.
So let me ask, what is your relationship with Jesus? It's possible that even in a church like ours, that we could have the influence of demons that are opposing the work of God. Now, I'm not saying that there's someone here who's demon-possessed and let's have an exorcism. But I am saying that where Jesus is declared, demons oppose him. So be wary of that.
It's also possible that there are those here who are sick, not because God is punishing you, but because he wants to use your illness to make his authority more sweet to you, so that you would trust him, that you would give your life over to him, recognizing how vulnerable your life is, and knowing that we do not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from his mouth.
Application and Final Prayer
The point being that we follow Jesus and he uses his authority for our good. So let me challenge you: if you've not accepted Jesus to be your savior, follow him. Trust him to be your savior. And if he is your savior, know that you will be opposed when you declare him. But declare him you must, because there are many people that don't yet know the good news of the kingdom of God, and it's our opportunity and our obligation to tell them.
So let's be about our Father's business. Let's extend the ministry of the Son and depend on the Spirit to empower us. And as we do that, let's watch God extend his divine authority through us as we declare his word for the good of others.
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, as we come to you this morning, we are deeply aware that we live in a world where there are principalities and powers that oppose you. We see it in so many ways. Sometimes it's not as overt as a man interrupting the service as much as it's the distractions of our culture—it's all the other things that we could be doing on a Sunday that would keep us from you.
And God, I pray that you would help us to resist those things. Help us instead to see the incredible power that you exercise in holding this world together. And God, help us to give our lives over to you, that we've trusted you for our salvation. So help us to trust you with the way we live our lives.
And God, help us to proclaim the goodness of the kingdom and help us to show people your loving authority so that they can respond to you. And God, we pray that as we take this message of the good news of the kingdom forward, that you would be gracious to help people respond and add them to our church, add them to other churches, and continue to grow your kingdom one person at a time. And Father, we pray this, dependent on your power, in Jesus' name. Amen.