Senior Pastor, Robert Dennison, preached this message on September 8, 2024.
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Audio Transcript
We invite you to take your Bibles now and turn to Luke, chapter seven, verses 18 through 30. It’ll be on the screen, but it’s always wonderful to have you turning in your own copy of God’s Word.
The main point today is that God’s way of righteousness is the only way to a restored relationship, which is friendship with God. And God’s way of righteousness requires repentance, and it requires faith. The two go hand in hand. We’re going to see that repentance is necessary to be prepared to receive Jesus.
In the text we’re going to be reading about John. John the Baptist, his life and message were all about repentance so that people would be prepared to accept Jesus. John’s life and message of repentance would lead people next to having faith in Jesus Christ. I begin reading in verse 18.
Then John’s disciples told him about all these things. So John summoned two of his disciples and sent them to the Lord, asking, “Are you the one who is to come? Or should we expect someone else?” And when the men reached him, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to ask you, are you the one who is to come? Or should we expect someone else?”
At that time, Jesus healed many people of diseases, afflictions, and evil spirits. And he granted sight to many blind people. He replied to them, “Go and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor are told the good news. And blessed is the one who isn’t offended by me.”
After John’s messengers left, he began to speak to the crowds about John. “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed swaying in the wind? What did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothes? See, those who are splendidly dressed and live in luxury are in royal palaces. What then? Did you go out to see a prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written: ‘See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you. He will prepare your way before you.’
I tell you, among those born of women, no one is greater than John. But the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he. And when all the people, including the tax collectors, heard this, they acknowledged God’s way of righteousness because they had been baptized with John’s baptism. But since the Pharisees and experts in the law had not been baptized by him, they rejected the plan of God for themselves.
Now we pray: Heavenly Father, give us understanding of your Word that you have so graciously and freely given to us. We thank you that you have preserved it over the years so that we know that it is without error and we can trust it to know how to have a right relationship with you and how to live in this world. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Who is John? This is John the Baptist here. And in Luke seven, again, verse 18, it’s John the Baptist’s disciples that have told him about all these things. Let’s just review this particular John, who he is.
In Luke one, we learn that his birth was predicted by Gabriel, the angel of God. He was the son of aged parents, Zechariah and Elizabeth, who were well past childbearing years. He was filled with the Holy Spirit before his birthday. And during that time, while he was still in the womb, he recognized Jesus Christ, the Messiah, in the womb of his mother Mary. He was a Nazirite, having never touched grapes or any fruit of the vine, wine, or anything associated there, and more than likely had never cut his hair.
As the Nazirites took that vow, he fulfilled the prophecy of Elijah’s return that we’re going to see today. And he preached a message of repentance.
The thing about repentance is that we have to continually think of it as a turning. It’s a turning from going my way, instead choosing to go God’s way. It goes beyond feeling sorry for your sin. It goes beyond acknowledging your sin. It even goes beyond confessing your sin to the Lord. It says, “Lord, I don’t want to walk in that way anymore.” It’s turning to a new life, to God’s way.
He also preached to prepare people for the Messiah’s return. Let’s go back to Luke one. What does it say about John? It says he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to make ready for the Lord a prepared people.
What’s repeated over and over is this idea of turning, this idea of repentance. He talks about families being reunited. John preached turning and repentance.
And what did that repentance look like? Repentance is acknowledging that you have sinned and you are a sinner. When we talk about sin, we’re talking about anything that is against God or against what he commands. So there’s an acknowledgment of that in your life. But then there’s also this feeling of sorrow for your sins. You’re sorry for them. You know that they’re painful to the Lord and they’re painful to others.
Then there’s this act of confession that you tell the Lord, “I’m sorry, and I’m confessing in your sight that what I have done is wrong. Please forgive me.” And God is willing to forgive all of our sins 70 times seven. There’s no end to his compassion for us.
But repentance, once again, goes beyond that. It means now you say, “I’m not going to commit that sin anymore. I’m going to walk in a new direction. I’m going to have a change of heart. I choose to walk on God’s path instead of walking on the path of the world or my own.”
And why did John tell people that they needed to repent? It’s there in that last underlying phrase: to make them ready for the Lord. Repentance makes our hearts ready so that we can then accept Jesus Christ by faith.
Let’s go back to the last book in the Old Testament, Malachi. In the last chapter, this is where God’s final word ended to the Jewish people and the world. There was a gap of 400 years before anything else is heard.
In this passage, we’re going to see that there was a prophecy about this Son of Righteousness, this Son of Light, and also the precursor in the likeness of Elijah that would come before him. Look, the day is coming, burning like a furnace, when all the arrogant and everyone who commits wickedness will become stubble. He’s talking about Jesus Christ’s final, what we call the second return, when he will come to make the creation new.
He will rid the world of all evil and all sin. The coming day will consume them, says the Lord of armies, not leaving them root or branches. But the promise is here: “But for you who fear my name, the Son of Righteousness will rise with healing in its wings, and you will go out and playfully jump like calves from the stall. You will trample the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day I am preparing,” says the Lord of armies.
In this final word from God before the Old Testament ends, God gave a warning that He is coming to set the world straight, and that means that He will destroy the wicked. He also gives an exhortation here that we are to fear God, which means that we have respect and honor for Him that leads us to want to obey Him and serve Him.
Not only is there an exhortation, but there’s the promise of this Son of Righteousness, who we know in the New Testament is Jesus Christ, that He will heal you, He will restore you to joy, and you will overcome the wickedness in the world with the Lord of armies.
Thinking about John’s message, turn to God, also turn the hearts of fathers to their children, turn the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, and prepare people for the Lord. Malachi also added in this chapter, “Remember the instruction of Moses, the statutes, the ordinances I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel. Because look, I am going to send you the prophet Elijah,” and this is the prophecy of John before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.
He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, the hearts of the children to their fathers. John’s message fulfills this prophecy. Luke picks up where Malachi ends, and Luke begins his gospel with the prophecy of John’s birth, the birth that Malachi prophesied 400 years before that. What did he come to preach? He came to preach turning and repentance.
He did this so that people would be prepared for the arrival of Jesus. He wanted them to have an understanding of not worldly righteousness, but of true righteousness. It’s interesting here that in this repentance, it talks about fathers turning to their children and children to their fathers. Because when God comes into our lives, He allows us to have the love of God, we no longer think about ourselves.
We are able to truly love others. So when we turn to the Lord, as the first commandment says, “Love the Lord your God,” it also creates a change in our lives that we now have a turning towards others, and we love them too.
Let’s go back to Luke, chapter one now, verses 76 through 79, and let’s read what Zechariah said about his son John. “And you, child, will be called a prophet of the Most High. For you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give his people knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins. Because of our God’s merciful compassion, the dawn from on high will visit us to shine on those who live in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of knowledge.”
Zechariah had spoken the same words that basically Malachi had shared. This person that comes, who we now know as John the Baptist, would prepare the way for the Lord. He would give people a knowledge of God’s salvation and preach to them that there finally would be forgiveness of sins, and the Son of Righteousness that Malachi mentioned is now referred to as the dawning from on high that will visit us.
Jesus Christ is the light that shines on everyone living in darkness to guide them in the right way. What did John preach? Matthew 3:1,2: “In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea and saying, ‘Repent, because the kingdom of heaven has come near.'”
It’s a very short sermon. You might like it if that’s all I said on Sunday mornings. I imagine that John’s messages were quite a bit longer than this. But Matthew was trying to distill down what was the main thing that John was telling them. Over and over, he was telling them to repent, turn from your way to God’s way.
You need to do that because the kingdom of heaven has come near, and he’s telling them this because Jesus has not publicly appeared on the scene yet, but John knows that he is coming.
Eventually, John was imprisoned because not everybody responded well to this message of repentance, especially when he confronted Herod, who had married his brother’s wife, Herodias. They didn’t want to turn from their ways and follow God’s ways. So instead of doing that, they tried to silence John. They put him in prison, and eventually, you know how the facts go: he was beheaded because a young woman danced a beautiful dance.
Imagine if that’s how justice was carried out in our world today. Completely ridiculous. But here, this servant of God died in that manner.
What did John want people to know? Luke 7:18-30: “John’s disciples told him all about these things.” So what did John want to know? Not what us. “Are you the one who is to come? Or should we expect someone else?”
John was in prison. I imagine he was hungry, he was cold, he was uncomfortable. All that led to discouragement and doubt in his life. He’s an example for all of us. Even this most righteous and godly man still had doubts and concerns in his life about whether Jesus was truly the Messiah. Jesus didn’t get onto John. He didn’t scold him, “You should know better.”
Instead, he responds to his question of doubt with encouragement. Just as all of us are prone to doubts at times about our salvation, and we’re prone to doubts about whether Jesus is really the Messiah, God never scolds us for that. We have His Word written down so we can go back and read the encouragement over and over.
This is what Jesus did. This is the proof for us, so that we can know if we ask God for reassurance, He gladly gives it to us. There were many others in Scripture who doubted God at times. Some of them are even famous heroes of the faith you might have heard of. Has anybody heard of doubting Thomas? He was one of the twelve disciples. He had doubts. Here’s an obscure couple you probably don’t know: Abraham and Sarah. Did they have doubts? Yes. Gideon had doubts. Even King David himself in Psalm 77 expressed doubts.
But God’s Word is our resource when we do have doubts, to read it, to read the facts about what happened. It reassures us who Jesus is. How does Jesus respond? Let’s go on reading in verse 21, where we find that Jesus reminds them to tell John of the proof of the things that they have seen and heard.
It tells us that Jesus healed many people of diseases, afflictions, and evil spirits. He granted sight to many blind people. So he replied to them, “Go and report to John what you have seen and heard,” along with hundreds and thousands of people that had seen Jesus’ miracles and attested to them.
He said, “Tell John that the blind received their sight, the lame walk, those with leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor are told the good news. And blessed is the one who isn’t offended by me.”
These very same words and happenings that Jesus referred to are what we have recorded in the gospels today, that we also might be encouraged through our doubt, as John was.
Then what did Jesus say to them about John? He told everyone, “This is the one about whom it is written.” He’s referring back to Malachi: “See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you. He will prepare your way before you.”
And I tell you, among those born of women, no one is greater than John, but the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.
What is God’s way of righteousness? Let’s go back and read verse 29. It tells us when all the people, including the tax collectors, heard this, they acknowledged God’s way of righteousness.
The reason why they acknowledged God’s way of righteousness is because they had been baptized with John’s baptism. Here’s the test: because it was a baptism of repentance. They had prepared their hearts. They were saying, “God, we don’t want to go our way anymore. We want to go your way.”
Paul preaches the same message. In Acts chapter 19, it says that John baptized with a baptism of repentance. But then he says that John also told the people that they should believe in the one who would come after him, that is, Jesus.
When the people in that day heard this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. John preached a baptism of repentance, but it didn’t stop there. He said, “After you repent, now you need to believe in the one that is going to come.” Repentance and faith, in order to have God’s way of righteousness, go hand in hand.
John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. Those that had chosen to turn to God’s way accepted readily that Jesus is the Messiah. This repentance is turning to God’s way, and it goes hand in hand with believing in Jesus Christ.
What is God’s way of righteousness? John was a righteous man. Many were righteous, following God’s way. Even some of the tax collectors were. But there were those in verse 30 that were not following the way of God’s righteousness.
It tells us the Pharisees and the experts in the law had not been baptized by him. They hadn’t prepared their hearts. They didn’t want to turn and walk God’s way. They wanted to continue to walk in their own. Because there was no repentance, they rejected the plan of God for themselves. They rejected His very Son, Jesus Christ.
God’s way of righteousness is not the way of the religious leaders. When we have true righteousness in our life, we have what we say is a relationship with God. You can have religion and not have a right relationship with the Lord. That’s what the Pharisees were that Jesus warned about.
Don’t follow their teaching. Don’t give in to what they are saying. We’re going to see that they looked good on the outside. They were squeaky clean religious, but they hadn’t changed on the inside. Because there was no repentance and there was no faith. They were following their own way of righteousness instead of God’s way of righteousness.
Let’s look in Matthew 23:25-26. It starts out with the word “woe.” Jesus isn’t scolding them here. “Woe” means He has this deep compassion. He’s trying to warn them. “I just feel so strongly for you because you don’t get it. If you don’t understand what you’re doing wrong, you’re going to suffer the consequences.”
So, with that in his heart, he says, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside they are full of greed and selfish indulgence. Blind Pharisees! First, clean the inside of the cup so that the outside of it may also become clean.”
If you get up in the morning and you eat a bowl of cereal, and you only have the choice of it to be clean on the inside or clean on the outside, what would you prefer? You want the bowl to be clean on the inside. It doesn’t matter how beautiful the china cup looks on the outside. But if it’s got icky stuff in it, it’s not pleasant to drink from.
The Pharisees were doing this. They were so clean; they looked so good. They were following the law, and they believed. They taught that following the law and keeping the outside of the cup clean would make a person righteous.
They changed all their external behavior. They cleaned up their act. They looked really good to the world. But Jesus said that they had a greater need, and that was a need for repentance and change—not on the outside, but in their heart.
Changing their heart was not something they could do themselves. You can dress yourself up, but there’s no way you can make your heart look different. Only God can do that.
Let’s go to Ezekiel 36:25-26. I want you to see the emphasis here. This cleaning of the heart is all about what God does for us. It doesn’t mention anything here that we can do ourselves.
God’s way of righteousness requires Him to work in us. I, God, will also sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I, God, will cleanse you from all your impurities and all your idols. I, God, will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I, God, will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
God does everything for our salvation. God does everything to make us righteous. There’s nothing that we can do. What is it that He does for us? He changes the way that we are on the inside, and then that leads to a change in how we look on the outside.
God has to change our hearts. We have to walk in His way, not our own. But the Pharisees weren’t doing that. They thought that they could cleanse themselves. They thought that they could look good on the outside, and that would be enough.
What is God’s way of righteousness? It’s repentance towards God, away from self in the world. Again, this is turning from walking my way and the world’s way to walking God’s way.
It’s then placing your faith in the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ. John’s message in Matthew 3: repent because the kingdom of heaven has come near. He preached that message over and over until Jesus Christ came walking toward him that day. Then he said, “Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”
I want to take some time to talk about why Jesus is called the Lamb of God. We recognize all the sacrifices in the Old Testament, that a perfect lamb was slain over and over and offered up on the altar. Its blood was shed for the forgiveness of sins, but it was never enough.
The thousands or millions of lambs, however many they killed over all those years, were just a picture of the perfect sacrifice that was to come. I want to take it back to a story in Genesis, chapter 22, where Abraham was asked by God to show his faith in God.
It wasn’t to give a large sum of money. It wasn’t to build a building. It was to take his only true son, Isaac, the only one that he had had with Sarah, the child of promise, and to actually slay him and sacrifice him. But we know that Abraham believed that God would provide what was needed.
Let’s read just before verse 8. They’re walking along. It’s just Abraham and Isaac. They had the fire, they had the wood, and Isaac had asked his dad, “Where’s the sacrifice? We’ve got everything else.” Abraham answered, in his faith, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”
Then the two of them walked on together, leaving behind the others that had come with them. Just as Abraham was about to slay his son with the knife, an angel appeared and stopped his hand. When that happened, it tells us that Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught in the thicket by its horns.
So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son. Abraham named the place “The Lord will provide.” So today it is said, “It will be provided on the Lord’s mountain.”
That ram in the thicket was a substitute, and that’s what Jesus Christ is for us. We say that He died a substitutionary death, meaning we didn’t die for ourselves on the cross or anyone else died. Christ died as a substitute for us.
The picture was here that this lamb was a substitute for Isaac. Why did there have to be a lamb? Well, God tells us that without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. Scripture tells us that the sacrifice had to be spotless and it had to be perfect.
This is the picture of what Jesus Christ is for us. He came as the spotless, perfect Lamb of God. He came in our place. He was a substitute for us.
When we read this text, we have to see this isn’t just talking about what happened with Isaac and Abraham; it’s also a prophetic text of what is going to happen in the future. Because after he saw the ram and after he took the ram, he didn’t name the place “The Lord did provide.” What does it say there? It says, “The Lord will provide.”
He’s looking forward to the day when God will send the perfect sacrifice. So it is, even to that day when this was written, the place was still called, “It will be provided on the Lord’s mountain.”
One day, Jesus Christ did come, and He died on the Lord’s mountain for our sins—a substitutionary death. Even if we wanted to die for our own sins, we would not be able to because we are not perfect due to our sin nature.
Even if we died for our own sins, our death would accomplish absolutely nothing in regard to salvation, healing, forgiveness of sin, or a new life or a change of heart. Jesus Christ alone fit the bill. He was what we needed. It was who we needed to die for us.
It’s interesting because in regard to salvation, in the New Testament, the word healing and salvation mean the same thing. Notice if we went back to the examples that Jesus gave to John, the examples weren’t about His miracles feeding the 5000 or making the water still. Instead, they were all about this healing that He was going to do for people.
The blind received their sight, the lame walk, those with leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, and finally, He showed that the dead are raised—all pictures of what salvation is for us. God brings about complete spiritual healing in our life, and eventually in eternity, we will have complete physical healing and we have the promise of being raised from the dead.
This is what Jesus’ substitutionary death on the cross provides. It provides healing; it provides resurrection to a new life. Going back to verse 29, when all the people, including the tax collectors, heard this—poor tax collectors—they get picked on all the time. But you probably don’t like the IRS showing up at your door either, do you?
Even they acknowledged not their own way of righteousness. They acknowledged God’s way of righteousness. They realized that following what the Pharisees said was not the way of righteousness. They acknowledged God’s way because, and here’s the reason, they had been baptized with John’s baptism.
On the other hand, the Pharisees, the experts in the law, the people that had God’s Word and understood it the most, refused to be baptized. In other words, they were not going to repent and follow God’s way. They wanted to continue to be religious because they thought that was the way to salvation.
Therefore, because they continued in their own way—though it was highly religious—they rejected the plan of God for themselves.
So there are two statements today. Either you have repented and acknowledged God’s way, or you have not repented and rejected God’s way. Faith and repentance go together.
Repentance is a difficult thing for people. Our sinful nature says, “I am number one. No one else comes before me.” In order to be repentant, you have to say, “I’m no longer number one. God is number one.”
It’s difficult for people to surrender to anyone, and even more difficult to surrender to God. Because when you give your life to Him, you’re just giving Him a blank slate and saying, “Whatever you write on this slate, whatever you write on this piece of paper, I accept it right now, and I’m willing to do that.”
Repentance is difficult because it requires us to put aside our desires. It requires us to put aside our wants and to accept God’s desires and what He wants for us. That’s hard to do.
Repentance is difficult for people because even well-intentioned people, like the religious leaders of Jesus’ day, are called to actually leave behind all the good things that they’re doing to follow God’s ways. I’m not saying God isn’t going to have you do good things, but there’s a difference between doing what you think is good and doing what God tells you that He wants you to do is good.
True faith is always accompanied with repentance. I leave you with this verse again: Mark 1:14-15. “After John was arrested, Jesus went to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. He said, ‘The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news.'”
So, I ask you today, as we come to a close, that you would examine your hearts. It’s all of our desire here that know the Lord that you would have true repentance and faith in your life, and if you’ve not experienced that, today is the day to do that.
We invite you to talk to anyone who has a name tag after the service so we can explain this more with you and rejoice as you come to true faith and repentance in your life.
May we pray? Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Word today. We thank you for your great compassion and love for us, that you would send Christ as a substitution for us to die in our place, that we might have a right relationship with you, that you would be our friend now and throughout eternity.
Thanksgiving and appreciation for that, we give ourselves to you today, Father, to your service. In Jesus’ name, amen.