They Did Not Receive Him

So this morning, we're going to be continuing on in our study of the Gospel of Luke. We're in chapter 9. And the central theme of our text this morning is Jesus' disposition towards sinners. Meaning, what does Jesus think about and how does he interact with sinners? Now, there are a couple of different types of sinners. We're going to see two different types in our text. There are sinners who love him, and those are the disciples. And there are going to be the sinners who hate him. And those are going to be the Samaritans. And as we read our text and as we open it up and study it, you're going to see how these different groups of people, the disciples and the Samaritans, how they interact with Jesus and what he's doing, what he's said to them. And then you're going to see how Jesus responds to them. And I'll tell you that before we get started, that both the disciples and the Samaritans say and do foolish things. We're not to look at one of them and go, oh, I want to be just like them, because the disciples who love Jesus Christ in this text and who follow him and who sit underneath his instruction don't always do what they should do. And in this text, they indicate again that they don't understand what it looks like for Jesus to establish his kingdom on earth. They still envision that him establishing his kingdom and his reign on earth

is going to function like a military conquest. That he's going to show up and he's going to, by force and by power, exert his authority over creation. And at a number of times leading up to our text this morning, Jesus has demonstrated and taught them that, no, that's not how my kingdom is established here on earth. And it's most clearly demonstrated when he says to them, in the midst of all of the amazement, that all of the people are gathered together and they're going, What an amazing thing. This guy's healing people. He's feeding thousands of people. He's doing all of this amazing stuff. He's casting out demons. And in the midst of that, Jesus says to his disciples, he says, they're going to kill me. I'm going to be handed over into the hands of men, and they're going to kill me. And his disciples didn't understand it. I told you a couple of weeks ago, it didn't jive with their conception or their desire of what his rule and his reign would look like.

They were looking for a kingdom to come and to overthrow the kingdoms of the world by force, because that's how the kingdoms of the world at this time functioned. The one who was the strongest, the one who was the most powerful, it was he who would lead, who would rule. And so their conception was, if Jesus is going to establish his kingdom, he's going to have to overcome them, and the only way to overcome them is by power. And then they see his power in him healing people, in him teaching. and him casting out demons. And they go, he's doing what we think. And then he says, they're going to kill me. And the disciples don't understand. They don't want to understand. Then they get into an argument just later on down the road. And they're arguing about who's going to be the greatest. And they're saying, you know, how are we going to divvy up the spoils? How's this all going to land? Once Jesus sets everything right, which one of us is going to be the greatest in this kingdom? And Jesus rebukes them. And he says, he who is the least among you, he shall be the greatest. And again, we see that they don't understand his kingdom.

and what it's going to look like here on earth. And again, in this text, we're going to see yet again that the disciples do not understand what Jesus' kingdom being established on earth looks like. And it's important for us to understand what Jesus' reign looks like in this season, in this age, so that we know what we should expect and how we should respond. And that's what we're going to see in our text this morning. Hey, Miles, can you put up the text? Thank you. Skip to the next. Okay, you took it out. No, you didn't. Okay, so you see in verses 55 and 56, I'm going to read this in a minute. You guys see those brackets? Okay, I want to talk to you a little bit about those brackets. What those brackets indicate is that there is some disagreement as to whether that section of Scripture is actually Scripture, whether it's actually included in the original manuscript that was handed down.

And so for our purposes this morning, I'm not going to be focusing on that section, though I don't deny that the things that are said in that section are true. I'm not convinced that this was in the original manuscripts. If you have questions about what I'm talking about, I'm glad to explain it to you later. It's technical. But suffice it to say that the Bible wasn't written in English. It was written in Hebrew. It was written in Greek. The portions of it were in Aramaic. These are all languages that we don't understand. None of us read, and so they've been translated. It's also been that they didn't have printing presses back then, and they didn't print out thousands and millions of copies of exactly the same thing. People used to spend their lives transcribing things, taking a document. People who were wealthy would come and say, copy this, and they would pay someone literally to take it and to copy it so that they had two copies instead of one. This is transcription.

As soon as you have that happen, and that's what happens with the Bible, as soon as you have that happen, you have the opportunity for error to be introduced. And so that's sort of the real quick snapshot of why some manuscripts, old, old manuscripts, can have this section of Scripture and some of them don't. There are different text traditions. Which manuscripts do we follow? What is our... translation based on which manuscript, and that's the discrepancy. And so we're not going to be relying on that portion of Scripture this morning. But having said this, I don't want you to think, oh, is he telling us that the Bible's not true? No, I'm not telling you that the Bible's not true. The Bible is true, and we do believe in the verbal plenary inspiration of Scripture. Now, raise your hand if you know what verbal plenary inspiration of Scripture means. One, two, three, okay.

Okay, so what it means is that we believe that God gave his word and he literally inspired, that the words that we have and what we consider the Bible are the very words of God and that every bit of it is inspired in the original text. And we acknowledge that, and we believe that what we have is sufficient. to inform us of everything we need to know and to believe to come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. We also acknowledge that men throughout centuries have been copying God's word and reproducing it, and that during that time, error has been introduced in some way. And yet that error doesn't rise to the level of taking away the truthfulness of God's word. In 2 Timothy 3.16, it says, we read that all scripture is inspired of God and profitable for teaching, for exhortation, for rebuke, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be equipped for every good work. And it would be unfaithful of us to understand that God is not able to preserve his word throughout the ages in such a way that we have everything we need to believe in his son. And so will you find...

in scripture that have brackets around them? Yes, you will. And when you do, you should be thankful because some translators being honest with you and saying, everything's not nailed down. We're not entirely sure and we're not going to act like we are. And so I'm thankful for translators who are honest and say, here's something that we're not sure about. We're not God. We don't possess infinite knowledge. And so we won't be relying on that section. of our text this morning, though we will be reading it. Would you please stand now for the reading of God's word from Luke chapter 9, verses 51 through 56. When the days were approaching for his ascension, this is Jesus Christ, when the days were approaching for his ascension, he was determined to go to Jerusalem, and he sent messengers on ahead of him. And they went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make arrangements for him. But they did not receive him, because he was traveling toward Jerusalem.

When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them? But he turned and rebuked them and said, You do not know what kind of spirit you are of. For the Son of Man did not come to destroy lives, but to save them. And they went on to another village. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated now. I want to give you a little bit of context, Bible history, about who the Samaritans were, what Samaria was. When the Israelites came in to the promised land, way back Old Testament, early, early on, when they're brought out of Egypt and they go through the 40 years in the wilderness, God establishes Joshua to lead the people of God into this land that he chose. And there were already people living in that land. But God had chosen that land and he'd set the borders of it. And he said, this is going to be the land for my people.

You'll remember when Joshua sent spies into the land, or when Joshua went as a spy into the land, they came back saying, this is a wonderful land. It's exceedingly fruitful, and it's flowing with milk and honey. It's really great, but there's all these people there, and they're really big, nasty dudes. And they're going to kill us if we go in there. And everyone thought that, except Joshua and Caleb. And so the Israelites spent 40 years in the wilderness, and all of the men who were over 20 are killed, save Joshua and Caleb. And at the end of that, Joshua leads the nation of Israel on what's called the conquest of Canaan. And the conquest of Canaan was a military endeavor. It was God telling his people, you're going to go in and you're going to dispossess this people that live in the land. You're going to kill them. You're going to get rid of them. You're going to destroy everything that's there. And you're going to take this land for yourself because that's what I have given you. And so they cross the river and they go in and they start about this work.

dispossessing the people who live there, and that means killing them. And so they come into the land, and there was this command that was given to them that was very clear. You are to get rid of all of the people, and it's imperative that you get rid of all of the people because if you don't, you're going to be tempted to worship the gods that they worship. And so the Israelites start off well in coming into the land and eradicating all of the people, but they don't finish well. And what they end up doing is instead of... removing and killing all of the people that are in that land according to God's word. What they do is they say, well, you know what? We're going to make these people our slaves. What good is it for us to kill them? We can turn them into servants of ours and we can more quickly be fruitful in the land. And so they end up not killing the people. And what ends up happening because they don't kill the people is that the religion that those people clung to remained in the land. And eventually the Israelites intermarry with these people.

And so this is a problem in and of itself that they're intermarrying with people who aren't Jews. But then we go on hundreds of hundreds of years later and we come to David. The kingdom being set up and you have David being the king and then you have Solomon being the king. And then after Solomon, what happens to the nation of Israel? What happens in the kingdom after Solomon? The kingdom splits into two. And that split, at the center of that split is the question, where? Should you worship? Where are you to worship? And when Jeroboam went aside and he set up, am I, is it, he broke, is that during Solomon's time? Break away from Solomon? Okay, I'm sorry. Rehoboam and Jeroboam, I get these, it's a lot to keep straight. When the nation split, Jeroboam set up another place of worship. He took golden calves who were meant to represent the true God and he set them up.

in the area that was given to the tribe of Dan and at Bethel. And he says, you people, you don't have to go down to Jerusalem, the place where God said you have to come worship me. He says, you can worship that same God up here. And so that's what the people did. Judah and Benjamin worshipped in Jerusalem. All the rest of the people worshipped at these other places. And so as you move forward through time, you find that that area where those false altars are set up, is in what's considered at Jesus' time, Samaria. And what's north of Samaria at Jesus' time is Galilee. And when Jesus is traveling here, he's traveling from Galilee down to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, which is the high point of worship at this time. And so the conflict between the Samaritans, the half-breeds, the half-Jews, and the real Jews, the people of God, is in high relief.

We can see the conflict. Everything that they disagree about is front and center right now. And so Jesus is traveling from Galilee down to Jerusalem. Now, it was not unheard of for the Jews, because of the amount of hatred that they had for the Samaritans, that they would actually travel around Samaria to get to Jerusalem. It would be like being at Washington and... Washington Street and 465 and saying, I need to get up to 56th and 465, but I hate Speedway. I just hate it. And I hate it so much that I'm going to go all the way around the east side. That's what it took. And these Jews, they would do it because they absolutely despised the Samaritans. Now, some of them would go through. And the Samaritans stood to make some money. You see in our text that Jesus...

he's got this big entourage with him, all of these people as his disciples, all these crowds following him. And so in his kindness, he sends messengers ahead to tell the people in the village, hey, we're coming. And the message that they're bringing to them is there's lots of people coming, there's going to be lots of food needed, lots of shelter needed, there's going to be a lot of money spent. Economically, this is going to be good for you. It would be good for you. And the Samaritans understand that and they refuse it. They say, no, you're not welcome here. But we've gotten a little bit ahead of ourselves. We've gotten to the point where they reject him. And I want to go back a little bit into verse 51. It says, And I want you to see that in this verse, you have two things set in contrast with one another. Just before this, when he's teaching up in Galilee, and everyone's amazed at what's going on, what does he say to his disciples? He says, they're going to kill me. And then here,

it would make more sense for it to say, when the days were approaching for his what? For his death, he was determined to go to Jerusalem. Well, why was he determined to go to Jerusalem? Well, because that's the place where he was going to be put to death. That's where he was going to be killed. But it says here, when the days were approaching for his ascension, he was determined to go to Jerusalem. So what do we learn from this text? Well, a couple of things. First, that Jesus' death and his resurrection cannot be separated. They cannot be pulled apart. And when they are pulled apart, They lose all of their meaning. Jesus' death without his resurrection, Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians, is useless to us. It's not beneficial. We're still in our sins if he's still dead. His death without his resurrection does us no good. But what about his ascension? Can you have his ascension without his death? Do you benefit from his ascension? So say he came, he lived, and then he decided to go back with Elijah and Moses. I'm out of here now.

Do you or I, do we sinners benefit from that? If he doesn't die. If he doesn't die. If he comes, he visits and he leaves. Without dying. No, you and I are still in our sins. We still have to bear our own load. Yeah, yeah, I hear you. And so, you have to have his death and his ascension put together. Now, which one of them is more palatable to you? Which one is more attractive? Well, clearly it's his ascension. And yet he has to go through death for his ascension to be of any benefit to you. What we see here, what Luke is giving us is a foreshadowing. It's a kindness of him to say there's something beyond the death of Jesus Christ. And the thing that's beyond the death of Jesus Christ sets the stage in the background for his death. It makes his death not meaningless. Jesus had joy.

That he could see and take hold of that was beyond his death. And it's for that reason that he endured the cross. In Hebrews chapter 12, verses 2 and 3, it says, For the joy set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. And then we are told, For consider him who endured such hostility by sinners against himself. Why? so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. And so we see here Luke comforting us by saying, there's something beyond your Lord's death. There is his ascension. There is his glory to come. And because of that joy that was set before him, that union that he was headed back to with his father, having established a way for you and for me and for all of creation to be able to come through faith into his family, That's the context of his cross, of his death. That's the fruit that it bears. The possibility of reconciliation between you and me, sinners, and a holy God. Many of us suffer. Many of us have hard things, have difficult things, have things we're afraid of. Things we wouldn't have chosen for ourselves. And here Luke puts together Jesus suffering with the glory that is to come. In John 16, Jesus compares it to a...

This sort of momentary light affliction, this sort of pain, this agony, this difficulty. He compares it to childbirth. For a woman, he says, truly, truly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. And he's talking about his death. You will grieve, but your grief will be turned into joy. And then the analogy, whenever a woman is in labor, she has pain because her hour has come. But when she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy that a child has been born into the world. Our lives are filled with hardship and difficulty and pain. And yet for the Christian, there's a context surrounding our present trouble. And it's that those things will be turned into joy by our Heavenly Father and turned into good because of his kindness toward us in Jesus Christ.

And that mercy, that kindness, that love is only available to Christians. Everyone will face death, Christians or not. But only Christians have the expectation of reconciliation with God and joy in his presence forever. And it was because of this ascension, because of this glory that was to come, this joy that Jesus had burned into his brain and fixed in his heart that he went to the cross. It says that he determined to go to Jerusalem. Now he knew what was going to happen to him in Jerusalem. Nothing was hidden from him. He knew he was going to die. He'd already told his disciples, they're going to kill me. And he knew that Jerusalem was the place where he was to die. And he determined to go to Jerusalem. He set his mind to do what God was requiring of him, what his father required of him. Like the woman who was in labor, his hour was coming and he knew when it was.

And if you've had children, there's like false labor and there's all these kind of things where you're not really sure. But when the hour comes, when it's time, you know. It's now time. And there ain't no stopping it. And Jesus understood this to be the case with his death. His time was approaching. He had to go to Jerusalem. And so he set his forehead like flint. He prepared his heart and his mind to go and to endure. the pain and the agony and the shame of his cross and his death. And so this is the context of his traveling through Samaria. He's looking forward to the joy of his ascension. And he's troubled in spirit because of the death that he's going to endure. And he's going through Samaria and he has all these people and he sends his messengers ahead, tell them we're coming. And the word comes back to him, you're not welcome here.

So what's going on when they say, you're not welcome here, we don't want your type here? Well, there's a number of things going on. First, he's being lumped in with the Jews. Now, who was it that were going to kill him? It was the Jews, right? They're the ones who put him to death. When Pilate's got him, and he says, I don't find anything worthy, anything this man's done to make him worthy of being killed, you see to it yourselves. And the Jews say, hand him over. And they take him and they kill him. And yet when Jesus is passing through Samaria, He gets accused of being one of them, and not just one of them, but the best. You're the teacher. You're the one that's been going around and promoting the religion of the Jews over and against what we believe. We won't have any part of you being here. Move on. And it says they did not receive him. Why? Because he was traveling toward Jerusalem. They wouldn't have anything to do with him.

They did not refuse Jesus Christ because they didn't know who he was. They knew who he was. They'd heard about him. And they refused him. Which, if you think about it, is contrary to what the disciples thought about Jesus' life and ministry and what his kingdom being established was going to be like. They were, just before this, amazed at all of the people just going, wow, who is this guy? Look at what he does. We've never seen anything like this before. And Jesus says, they're going to kill me. And the disciples are going, how could they kill you? How could anyone hate you? And yet now, just a little while later, they're traveling through Samaria and they find people who hate Jesus Christ, who will not offer him room and board because of his affiliation with the people of God. And so then the disciples, with James and John, the sons of thunder, these guys are sort of, of the disciples, these are the guys who are all full of beans and vinegar. They'd make good youth leaders. They're all...

They're zealots. They're super excitable. They just can't wait. And so when they catch wind, we know that Jesus sends these messengers on up ahead to the city, go and tell them we're coming. And then they're there. And then Jesus and his group, they get there. And the messengers say, they won't have us. John and James, they hear it. And they're just beside themselves. They're appalled. Now, why are they appalled? They're appalled because their Lord, Jesus Christ, is being refused and rejected. And they understand who he is. And they think, who are you to refuse the Son of God? Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to destroy these people, to consume them? Up to this point in his ministry, it seems like a strange thing to request, doesn't it? Here we are, we're going along, and they don't want to have anything to do with Jesus Christ, and then the request comes, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to consume these people? Where'd that come from? Well, that came from Elijah. Because that's exactly what Elijah did after...

After he had prayed and there was a drought, and then he prayed and there was rain, and he put to shame all of the false prophets under King Ahab's reign, and then he flees because he goes, they're still going to kill me. So he flees away. And when the king figures out where Elijah is, he sends soldiers to go get him. Bring Elijah back here. And they call upon the mountain and they say, Elijah, you son of God. you come down here. And Elijah responds to him and he says, if I'm the son of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you. And it happened. And then the king hears about it and he sends more people and it happens again. Jesus, Elijah calls upon heaven and says, consume these wicked people. And that's what happens. And so the disciples are passing through the area where this event took place years and years ago. And they go, this is how God deals.

With opposition. He destroys them. He consumes them. And he actually did that in this very place. Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven and consume these people? Who are they? Who do they think they are to refuse the Son of God? And yet that's exactly what they do. And it should go without saying that what they did was wrong. And that they should not have done what they did. So how many of you think that he should have said, go ahead. Do it. I have my glory to protect. And who are they to think that they can dishonor me, treat me this way? If you're honest, many of us think that that was perfectly reasonable for the apostles to ask. Won't you destroy your opposition? And there was something good about what they requested. These men understood who Jesus was, and they had a vision for his glory. And they couldn't abide opposition to it.

And yet they didn't understand his kingdom. Never once has Jesus called fire down from heaven. And it's not because he couldn't. You remember when they came out to arrest him in the middle of the night. What's he say to Peter? When he draws his sword and cuts off his ear. He puts it back on and he goes, don't you think I could call 10,000 angels if I wanted to? It's not because of any lack of power on Jesus' behalf that he endures this rejection. And if you'll remember back to a couple of chapters ago, he's over in the land of the Gadarenes, or the Gerasenes, depending on which translation you read. And so he takes a boat and he goes over to this land. And there's this guy who's naked and he's nuts. And he lives in the tombs. And the people cannot control him. They can't do anything with him. They are just content to know that he is over there, not over here.

They've tried imprisoning him and he's just wacko and so they want him away. And so Jesus gets there and he meets this man and what does he do? He heals this man, you remember? And he takes the demons and he casts them out into the pigs and the pigs all go into the sea. What is the response of the people of the land? They say, Jesus, you have to get out of here. We don't want you here. And so this time in Samaria is not the first time we see Jesus being rejected. People saying, we don't want you around here. You're going to upset our way of life. You need to go away. And you know what? They're right. Jesus does upset our way of life. He does. In ways that we wish he never would. Ways we can't even conceive of having monkey wrenches thrown into the gears of our life. He does it. And he doesn't do it just to...

to make us miserable. He does it to sanctify us, to bring us to repentance, to bring us to greater faith. But it is difficult. It is hard work. The times where I've had that most clearly happen in my own life, I say, I don't want this. Lord, please use it. Please make it profitable to me. Please help me to honor and to glorify you. But this here, this is not pleasant. And I would not have chosen it for myself. And those sorts of difficulties come to Christians and non-Christians alike. This isn't a distinct privilege of Christians. It's that Christians and non-Christians will process this thing differently. When the difficulties of Jesus showing up on the scene, Christians are going to say, I'm made for him. He came and he's bled and he's died to save me. And I don't deserve that. I don't deserve a good thing. All of the world can tell me that I deserve kindness and mercy and that I'm not as bad as they are. But I know that's not true because I know who I am and I know that I'm a sinner and I know that any mercy that's shown to me is undeserved. And you cannot come to Jesus Christ unless you understand that. You understand who you are and it's a painful, difficult thing. Very similar to him having to go to the cross.

You must come to the end of yourself. You think you know how the world works. You think you know how life works. You think you have visions and plans and expectations for how everything's supposed to come. And then what happens? Difficulty happens. Then what happens? Someone dies. Then what happens? A relationship falls apart. Then what happens? You lose your job. Then what happens? You get in a car accident. This is what happens in our lives. And in the midst of that difficulty, Christians have the hope of that difficult situation that they cannot see. how it's going to end, and they certainly don't see how it's good. By faith, they say, I trust God to use this situation for his glory and for my growth. And it reframes their suffering. And so when the disciples say to Jesus Christ, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to consume your adversaries, to consume those who hate you? They have reason to hate him. And the reason is that they love their sin.

And you have to understand that you'll either love Jesus Christ or you'll hate him. You will not, you cannot be indifferent. It is impossible. And so the disciples' request makes sense to us. And yet their request is completely antithetical, completely opposite to why Jesus came to earth. If it was his prerogative to send fire from heaven upon wickedness and wicked people, he could have done that from heaven. He didn't have to come here to do that. Jesus came into the earth to save sinners, not to destroy them. John 3.17 says, That is why Jesus Christ took on our flesh. It was so that you and I might be saved. And that salvation is not something we earn. It's not something that you...

that you become qualified for. It's none of that. You think of the men that he picked to be his disciples. Fishermen, poor stinky fishermen, tax collectors, they're absolutely hated. They're the IRS at this time. That's who the tax collectors are. They're the IRS. Come here, you IRS agents. Follow me. And they do. These are the men that he picks. And he picks them for salvation. 2 Peter 3.9 says, The Lord's not slow about his promises, some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. This is why Jesus came to earth. He didn't come to burn up sinners and to destroy them. He came to save them. In Matthew 9.35 and following it says, Jesus was going throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.

Seeing the people, he felt compassion on them because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore, beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into the harvest. Who was it that needed to be harvested? These distressed, disheveled, dispirited sheep. These miserable people who didn't know him and certainly didn't love him. Beseech the Lord of the harvest that he might send out workers into the field. Because there's lots of people who need to know me. And that's who the Samaritans are. Those disciples that were with Jesus Christ, they were the seed of the workers that would be sent out into the harvest. If you were to track those men's lives on through Jesus' death and his ascension and then into what comes after that in the record of the early church in the New Testament, we see that those men that he chose were the ones that he...

qualified and gave authority to go build his kingdom, to increase his dominion, to spread his gospel. What they didn't understand here, they came to understand. Many of them suffered just as he did and died. They learned compassion from Jesus Christ. But they didn't understand it at this point. They say, do you want us to kill these people? And while it's commendable that they have a vision for the glory of their master, They had no love or understanding for how he was going to do his work or what his work was. They had to learn love and compassion, especially in the face of opposition. Think about it in your own life. Isn't it easy to love people who love you, be kind to people who are kind to you, smile at people who smile at you? Just as easy as it is to ignore people who ignore you and scowl at people who scowl at you.

and say nasty things about people who say nasty things about you. Isn't it easy to repay people just what they give in you? And yet Jesus here is teaching the disciples to learn love and compassion, not when they're receiving love and compassion, but when they're receiving rejection and hatred. This is the process that we must all go through if we're going to be useful to God. You have to learn the love of Jesus Christ and the compassion that he has for sinners, the compassion that he had for you when you were like the Samaritans. You must become humble. You must become like a child. So how did Jesus respond to the disciples? He rebuked them. He turned to them and he rebuked them. Beside himself, how could you want to destroy these people? He looked around. Remember in Matthew, it says he looked around and he felt compassion because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. Do you know what sheep that are distressed and dispirited actually act like with people who come near them?

Emily, you came from a place with sheep. What are they like when they're not taken care of? How do they treat the people? Why did you avoid the sheep, Emily? You're not a big animal person. Okay. So did the Swanson girls tell you what their animals were like if they got upset? It's been a while. Okay. What's a beaten dog like when you try to get near it? That's right, Lucas. Lucas is going, that's what they're like. And do you want to get near them? And when they lash out and they bite you, what do you want to do? I'm going to kick them. That's what you want to do. No. Where is their compassion there? Jesus compares you and me to sheep, beaten dogs. And he has love and he has compassion. And that's what he's trying to teach his disciples. And so when they say, do you want us to destroy those people? He rebukes them. Luke 19, verse 10 says, the son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. It's very easy to romanticize the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. And by implication, to carry over those,

those parameters that we've set up for his life and what it was actually like and assume, well, that's what it's supposed to be like for me. Jesus had, people loved him. He was good. People appreciated him. He was popular. And think, well, that's what my life's going to be like. That's what it should be like. That's what Christians' lives are like. The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which is lost. He's come to rescue those who, by their very nature, don't want to be rescued. don't want to be found, don't want to be helped. And if you say, no, no, no, that's not me. I was never like that. I say, you don't know yourself. And you need to get to know that part of yourself because you can't come to Jesus until you know that there's nothing in you apart from him that desires him. He is miserable and hated by the world. They can't stand him, not the sight of him. You know, when I read scripture, I think about all of the different ways that the story could have gone.

And so in this story, I think, okay, so Jesus was, you know, lumped in with, rolled in with the Jews. Well, you're just one of the Jews, and so the Samaritans aren't, you know, they don't like him. And what I would like to have seen was Jesus to stop and say, no, you don't understand. Those hypocritical, unbelieving, double-minded Jews, I'm not here to save them. You know, the kind of way Romans talks about the Jews and God turning away from them because Because of their unfaithfulness? He says, no, no, no. I'm here to save you. They're going to kill me, but I'm here to save you. He could have garnered support. He could have added to his crowd, his entourage heading into Jerusalem. He could have been careful and parsed out who he was. I'm not like them. They're not who you think they are. God doesn't think of them the way you think he thinks of them. They're wicked. They don't serve God in spirit and in truth. They're not humble. What else could Jesus have done? Well,

When the Samaritans rejected him, he could have just said, you know what, it's not worth it. Why do I have to die for people who don't even appreciate it? Why would I do good to those who don't receive it? But he set his face toward Jerusalem, and he went on to death. And he knew what the people were like that he was dying for. They were not pleasant people. They were not happy people. They did not seek to honor God. They were his enemies. They were dead in their sins. And yet their hatred and their rejection of Jesus Christ didn't deter him from what lay before him. It made his burden more difficult. Think in your own life. There are times when it's easier to do what God requires of you. And it's when there's support and when there's encouragement and when there's help and when there's hope, when there's a community or a family or something around you saying, yes, and go for it, and God's good.

It's a lot easier to do the work in that circumstance. Now, compare that circumstance to opposition, persecution, hatred, indifference. Nobody cares what you're doing. No one understands why you do what you do. No one praises you for it. They just think you're dumb. They think you're stupid. They think you're a fool. And they tell you so to your face. No, you're not welcome here. And yet Jesus went on to the cross. He went on to his death. He went on to Jerusalem. So what are the applications of this text? There are three. The first is you must set your heart and your mind, like Jesus Christ did, upon faithfulness to God. You must. And you may not consume, you know, the thing you want to do and that I want to do is say, I'll be faithful if. If it pans out like this, then I'll do what I should do. I know what I should do, but what I should do is hard, and if it gets too hard,

I'm not going to be able to do it. And if you prepare your heart for unfaithfulness, you will accomplish unfaithfulness. He who is faithful with little will be faithful with much. And if you have a principle of protecting your ability to do what you want, when hardship comes, you will not be faithful when the difficulty comes. Jesus knew what was coming for him in Jerusalem, and he set his head like flint, his forehead like flint, towards Jerusalem and said, I will go and I will do what God has prepared for me, whatever the cost. Jesus going to the cross sets the bar of sacrifice and humiliation that may be required of you or I. And the reason he was able to do that is because he saw beyond the hardship, beyond the difficulty, beyond the agony and the pain and the separation with his father that his death required of him. He saw beyond that. And you similarly must see beyond it.

You will face struggles. You will have trials. There's no question about it. Some of them will be because you're Christian. Some of them will just be because you live in a fallen world. Some of them will be because you sin. Some of them will be because other people sin. But you will face difficulty. And what are you going to do when it comes? Will you be the one who's built your house on the sand that can't take the storm? This is the foolish man. This is the unbeliever. When hardship comes, everything falls apart. Or will you be like the wise man who builds his house on the rock of Jesus Christ so that when the storms come, and they will, you're not shaken and you're not moved. You have to set your forehead like flint in the direction of faithfulness to God, whatever the cost. It's easy to say, it's hard to do, and what will attend that work is prayer that God would sustain you because you know yourself well enough to know you cannot do it on your own. You cannot do it on your own. Even Jesus prayed in the garden, if there's any other way, please remove this cup from me.

Nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done. You will not be able to be faithful to God in your own strength. You're not made of the right stuff. The second application is that opposition to faithfulness is no excuse for your negligence. None. The disciples had no place to hide, saying, but did you hear what they said about you, Jesus? Did you hear what they said? Can you believe what they said? How could they be so dumb? How could they not understand? In this world, you're going to face trials and tribulations, hardships and difficulties. And in the midst of those things, you're going to have people who are less than helpful to you. People who don't encourage you, who don't strengthen you, who don't come alongside you and bear your burdens, but rather add to them. That's what will happen. The Samaritans did that, but the disciples did it too. Because Jesus said, I'm going to die. And the disciples didn't understand his statement.

They didn't ask him about his statement. And so effectively, they didn't bear his burden. They didn't come beside their master. They abandoned him in their ignorance. And yet, can you even conceive of Jesus going to his father and saying, I couldn't go through with it because the disciples, they didn't understand and they didn't help. No, it's inconceivable to think of Jesus Christ going to his father, making an excuse for why he didn't do what his father required of him. The difference between us and Jesus Christ is you do have one who understands everything you've gone through and everything you're dealing with. And it is Jesus Christ. Because he's been tempted in every way like we are. And yet he's without sin. We have a high priest who understands our weaknesses, who sympathizes with our weaknesses, who bears with us through our trials. And in the face of that, how can you come to your Lord and say, but they didn't like me.

They were going to take my job. They won't be my friend anymore. They won't talk to me. I lost all my money because of it. How can we conceive of coming to our father who's given us his own son and make excuse because it was difficult? Does he not understand? Didn't he send his son to the very same thing? Opposition cannot be an excuse for unfaithfulness. It cannot. The final thing is this. God's mercy and his patience. that he's extended to us in Jesus Christ, has a shelf life. It has an expiration date. It will not be available forever. The thing that the disciples understood something, and what they understood was the power of Jesus Christ. What they didn't understand was when and how he was going to exercise it. From our vantage point, we understand better. So we can describe their misunderstanding this way. They misunderstood his first coming with his second coming.

The first time he came to earth, here, he came in mercy. And he came with compassion. And he came with tenderness. And he offered his blood. But when he comes again, the disciples will get what they asked for. And there will be no chance for repentance. And there will be no time to say, I'm sorry. And no time to say, I didn't really mean it. And can I still get in? That time will be gone. When Jesus comes again, he will come in his glory. And everyone will get what they deserve. And anyone who's found in the position of the Samaritans will be destroyed. And that'll be the end of it. And there won't be a thing they can do about it. That's the warning that you and I must hear. You don't know when Jesus is going to come back. You also don't know when you're going to die. And so it's urgent that you come to Jesus Christ. And it's urgent that you put your faith in him. Because if you don't, you're not guaranteed.

another chance to do that very same thing. It's very easy to postpone, to put off, and to say, I don't understand. I want to comprehend. I want to ease into it. And I say, if you were in a house that was burning, you'd jump out of the third story window if you had to just to get away from the danger. And if you have that understanding of your sin, then praise God that he's opened your eyes and you need to jump now. I don't know how I'm going to land. And I say, you're going to burn if you stay. Those are the terms. And God, being rich in mercy, has promised to catch you and to care for you and to heal you and to bless you with every good thing. But if you wait, you don't know that you'll have that opportunity offered again later to you. Psalm 95 verse 7 says, Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. And in 1 Corinthians chapter 6 verses 1 and 2, Paul writes,

And working together with him, with Jesus Christ, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says, at the acceptable time, I listened to you. And on the day of salvation, I helped you. Behold, now is the acceptable time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. Don't squander what matters and what will be of eternal consequence. You don't understand what's at stake? I've got to stop because you guys have to go eat lunch. But I know you don't understand. Come talk to me. Come talk to David. Don't neglect so great a salvation. Let's pray. Father in heaven, it is a joy to be able to call you our Father. And even calling you our Father, we know that we have not served you as we ought to have served you. We haven't done what we ought to have done, and we haven't...

in ignorance, Father. We've disobeyed to protect our own interests and our own lusts and desires. We ask that you would open our eyes and help us to see your son as you see him. Help us to love him as you love him. And help us to obey him as you have required us. Father, you have been good to us in sending him, giving up your own son for our sakes, miserable sinners. And we ask, Father, that you would, having sent him in the world, to accomplish salvation, to make a way of escape from your righteous wrath. I pray, Father, that you would stir us up and bring us to faith. Help us to see our sin and to flee to the cross of Jesus Christ. You know us perfectly and you see everything that we do. And nothing is hidden from your eye. And so, Father, would you give us faith to flee destruction. Father, we pray that you would...

sustain us, and that you would equip us to live by faith and to be faithful in the midst of difficulty and trial. Glorify yourself in our lives and in the lives of those that we love. Bring them to faith, Father, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.