Senior Pastor, Robert Dennison, preached this message on February 23, 2025. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Audio Transcript
Take your Bibles and turn to Luke chapter nine. We have the passage on the screen, but it’s always good if you turn in God’s word and see it there for yourself. We’re talking about the necessity of Jesus identity in regard to the Gospel. And we come to a climactic point in the Gospel of Luke that everything has been leading up to. And that climactic point is the question, who is Jesus? If we go back to the beginning, just as a matter of review, in Luke, first we had the miraculous birth of John the Baptist, who was the herald of the Messiah. And then Gabriel the angel announced the birth of the Messiah and the miraculous conception. Godly men and women declared that he is the Christ. Angels proclaimed his birth. Did any of you have a child that an angel proclaimed their birth? I mean, all this is supernatural stuff pointing to who Jesus is. At age 12, he affirmed that his Father was God in heaven. And then the Old Testament prophets speak through John the Baptist about who he is. God the Father and the Holy Spirit themselves identify him at his baptism. His genealogy shows that he had the pedigree all the way back to David and the kingly line all the way back to Adam. And then we have Jesus, who is directly tempted by Satan himself. But Jesus is successful in not falling for that. He fulfills prophecies. He fulfills prophecies. And Isaiah especially, where it says he is anointed by God. He preaches good news to the poor, he releases those held captive by sin, and he restores sight to the blind. Luke goes on to share how he drives out unclean spirits. He heals all diseases, even diseases that were considered unhealable in those days. Leprosy, paralysis, shriveled hands. Not only can he heal in person, but he heals from a distance with the centurion. He raises a widow’s son from the dead. He drives out demons. He teaches with unrivaled authority. He just healed a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years, and he raised another girl from the dead. What more proof does Luke need to present before us in order that we can answer the question, who is this Jesus? If someone can answer that question correctly, then the rest of what Luke shares with us is going to make sense. But if we don’t answer that question correctly, nothing that follows matters. Because if someone cannot answer that question correctly, the Gospel is meaningless to them. So what is the identity of Jesus and why is it critical? Why do we have to answer this particular question? Let’s read summoning the 12. He gave them power and authority over all the demons and to heal diseases. Then he sent them to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. Sick take nothing for the road, he told them. No staff, no traveling bag, no bread, no money, and don’t take an extra shirt. How many of you travel that way? Kind of a different way to go, isn’t it? And whatever house you enter, stay there and leave from there. If they do not welcome you when you leave that town, shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony against them. So they went out and traveled from village to village, proclaiming the good news and healing everywhere. Herod the tetrarch heard about everything that was going on. And he was perplexed because some said that John had been raised from the dead, some that Elijah had appeared and others that one of the ancient prophets had risen. Herod scratched his own head. He said, I beheaded John, but who is this I hear such things about? And he wanted to see him. When the apostles returned, they reported to Jesus all that they had done. And he took them along and withdrew privately to a town called Bethsaida. When the crowds found out, they followed him and he welcomed them, spoke to them about the kingdom of God and healed those who needed healing. And late in the day, the 12 approached and said to him, send the crowd away so that they can go into the surrounding villages and countryside to find food and lodging, because we are in a deserted place here. You give them something to eat. He told them, we have no more than five loaves and two fish, they said, unless we go and buy food for all these people. For about 5,000 men were there. Then he told his disciples, have them sit down in groups of about 50 each. They did what he said and had them all sit down. Then he took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke them. He kept giving them to the disciples to set before the crowd. Everyone ate and was filled. They picked up 12 baskets of leftover pieces. Then later, while he was praying in private and his disciples were with him, he asked them, who do the crowds say that I am? They answered, john the Baptist, others Elijah, and still others, that one of the ancient prophets has come back. But you, he asked them, who do you say that I am? And Peter answered, God’s Messiah. But he strictly warned and instructed them to tell this to no one, saying, it is necessary that the Son of Man suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and scribes be killed and be raised. The third day May we pray Heavenly Father, we thank you for your glorious word. We thank you for the instruction that it gives us. Help us to understand it today and to apply it to our hearts and lives and also to be able to share it with others that they might understand who Jesus is and the importance of the wondrous gospel that we know. It’s in Jesus name that we pray. Amen. First thing I want you to see is that Jesus gives power and authority to his disciples. Jesus gives power and authority to his disciples, summoning the twelve. He gave them power and authority over all the demons and, and to heal diseases. And then he sent them to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. They went out and traveled from village to village proclaiming the good news and healing everywhere. Here Luke is sharing a new level of proof of Jesus identity. He is able to grant his own power to these 12 men to heal, to cast out demons and to preach to his followers. You have to remember most of these are just men of ordinary occupations, not high levels of academic scale fishermen, tax collectors and others. There was one zealot among them and he maybe had extensive biblical training. But there weren’t any Pharisees, there weren’t any priests, there weren’t any Sadducees. And because of their lack of training and their lives up to this point, it was miraculous that they could do these things. Their power and authority are evidence of Jesus identity at a lesser level. I’ll use Mary as an example. Have any of you noticed she can play the piano? Well, imagine today that she chose 12 of you and she said, I have given you the talent and the power to go out and play the piano. Like everywhere. You’re concert pianist now. I mean, what Jesus did was even more impossible than that because it was showing who he is. Their ministry was widespread. It furthered the news of the arrival of God’s kingdom on earth. And what did that mean? What is the kingdom of God? Just in short, it’s the rule and the reign of God’s Messiah. The hearts of people and eventually over the whole world when it is restored to the new creation. This was just the beginning of that realization. Now it’s not going to progress as the disciples wanted to because they were hoping that Jesus would come in and overthrow the Romans and that then they would all be princes and leaders. It’s not what Jesus has in mind right now. He’s doing something more important. He is being the sacrificial lamb that brings not just physical salvation, but eternal spiritual salvation to those that follow him. But again, Jesus gives power and authority to his disciples. It’s another way that Luke is showing us, who is this Jesus? Because that’s the question that we see over and over in the text. The next thing I want you to see here is that curiosity rises to the highest level of society. He was obscure when he was little. He was out in the outskirts of Nazareth. But now even the highest level of society has heard about him. Herod, the tetrarch, heard about everything that was going on. And he was perplexed because some said that John had been raised from the dead, and some that Elijah had appeared, and others that one of the ancient prophets had risen. I beheaded John, Herod said, but who is this? That’s the question there. Who is this Jesus I hear such things about? And Herod wanted to see him. The preaching and power of the disciples had spread the news exponentially, and curiosity about Jesus was even in the court of the king. But as with John Herod, he’s only interested or kind of fascinated with Jesus. He thinks, maybe he’s John, maybe he’s Elijah, maybe he’s one of the prophets. Where did these ideas come from? If we go back to Malachi, chapter four, the prophet said, I am going to send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes. In other words, Herod may be thinking, well, if the terrible day of the Lord is coming, I should be prepared. So is this man Elijah. It’s kind of different here. Herod was interested in John’s message, but he knew who John was. In Mark 6, we read that he knew that he was a righteous and a holy man. But with Jesus, he doesn’t know that. He’s wanting to know, who is this Jesus? In regard to Jesus, Herod is asking the absolute right question, the question that Luke is leading everyone so far to ask of themselves, who is this Jesus? The next thing I want us to see is that curiosity rises in the common level of society. So not only is it in the upper echelons, but now everyone is wanting to know. When the apostles returned, they reported to Jesus all they had done. And he took them along and withdrew privately to a town called Bethsaida. They had been busy preaching, but when the crowds found out, they followed him. And instead of shooing them away, he welcomed them. He spoke to them about the kingdom of God and healed those who needed healing. Mark tells us that Jesus and his disciples took a boat across the lake, which would have been a distance of about 4 miles. But the scripture tells us here that everybody figured out where they were going. And it was eight miles around the lake. And it says that they were all running on foot from all the towns. Everybody was coming because their curiosity is rising. Who is this Jesus, then? Verse 12 tells us, late in the day, the 12 approached and said to him, send the crowd away so that they can go into the surrounding villages and countryside to find food and lodging. Because we are in a deserted place. There’s no quick trip anywhere around. How would we live without Quik trip? They’re like, in the middle of the Sahara Desert. It’s deserted, and they have all of these people there. There are 5,000 men alone. And if their wives or children had come with them, it could be 10, 15, 20,000 or more. And Jesus says to them, you give them something to eat. Wow. Imagine that 5,000 people show up at your front door and someone says, you feed them. I can’t even imagine where your mind would be going. Do we even have enough money to go and buy food? And they said, we have no more than five loaves and two fish. I mean, we got three loaves of bread. They had two more than that. And these aren’t fish. These are like sardines that they have. Very, very small amount. They hadn’t quite realized completely who Jesus is up to this point. They’re questioning. I mean, what are we going to do? They just went out casting out demons. They were performing miracles, and they were preaching messages that they didn’t even come up with themselves because the Spirit was speaking through them. And now we talk about fixing dinner for company, and they’re just completely at a loss. They said, we have no more than loaves, five loaves and two fish. They said, unless we go and buy food for all these people. They were trying to come up with some answer. And again, it was this huge number. So what we find here is that Jesus now performs his largest miracle to date. He’s been healing a person here. He’s been healing 10 people there. Small crowds, just in one town. But now this is this huge number of people that are there. And it reminds us of a passage in Second Kings, chapter 4, where Elisha asked his servant to feed a large group of people. That servant only had 20 loaves of barley bread, and there were, I believe, 400 men there. And he didn’t think that he could feed them, but God performed a miracle that was 400 men. We’re talking 5,000, 10,000, 15,000, maybe more than 20,000 people here. It’s a miracle that everybody is going to see and understand. And it’s quite a miracle because as we read through the passage here, I want you to see, they didn’t all just get a little crumb. It wasn’t like us having the Lord’s Supper where we take one loaf of bread and we all get a little square. Okay, let’s see how much food there was. He told his disciples, have them sit down in groups of about 50 each. They did what he said and had them all sit down. Then he took the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke them. And he kept giving them to disciples to set before the crowd. And he kept giving them to the disciples to set before the crowd. And he kept giving them. And it tells us that everyone ate and was what, what’s the word there? Filled more than enough. And then just so that people couldn’t say afterwards, well, nobody really got much that day. They didn’t have that much. They picked up 12 whole baskets of leftover pieces. Now imagine that you eat leftovers out of your refrigerator and then you have more leftovers than you had leftovers when you started. Does that happen? It’s not the way that it is. It was evident that Jesus had done a tremendous miracle. And in regard to the kingdom of God, not only can Jesus heal and cast out demons, but he can provide for for our needs. And his provision is always more sufficient than needed. Jesus is showing us another reason Luke is relating this because he’s wanting us to answer the question, who is this Jesus? Not only was Jesus like Elisha, but he was also like Moses. In Acts chapter three, we read Moses said, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers. They were to be looking for someone like me, like Moses. And when that man comes, you must listen to everything he tells you, because everyone who does not listen to that prophet will be completely cut off from the people. Let’s think what’s similar to Moses. You got a vast desert area and you’ve got enumerated thousands of people that are hungry. What did Moses do? With God’s help? He provided them manna in the wilderness. Jesus in essence is showing here I am the one that Moses prophesied about. Listen to me. Verse 18 says, Then after that, while he was praying in private, the people finally left him alone with his disciples. They were with him and he asked them, and here’s the question again. Who do the crowd say that I am? Who is this Jesus? And they answered, John the Baptist, others, Elijah, still others, that one of the ancient prophets has come back. So what Herod heard is what everybody is saying, who is this Jesus? But then Jesus makes it very personal in verse 20. He’s interested in what everybody thinks, but he’s also interested what the individuals think. And he says, but you, who do you say that I am? It’s a third time here that we have this question. Whenever you see repetition in a narrative in Scripture, there’s an emphasis on that. The important question, who is this Jesus? Is he a man? He is a prophet, is he a priest? Is he a king? Or is he the Messiah? He’s all of these things. And Peter understood and he answered, you are God’s Messiah. What does that mean? He’s the anointed one, he’s the chosen one that God has sent to bring salvation, to usher in the kingdom. What do you think? That’s the question that everyone must answer correctly. And if you don’t get the answer correctly to that question, your understanding of what the Gospel means is incomplete. You can have a man, a prophet, a priest or a king, but none of them can fulfill the need that Jesus fulfilled when he came as the anointed Messiah. Got three statements for you here. The Gospel is not man centered. And you may take issue with this. The Gospel is not God centered. It is around God, but it is very specifically Christ centered. All of the Old Testament scriptures point to Jesus Christ. Jesus shared that himself on the road to emmaus. In Luke 24 says, Beginning with Moses and all the prophets, that refers to all of the Scripture that they had in Jesus day. He interpreted for them the things concerning himself, not in just part, but all the way from Genesis to Malachi. It’s all about Jesus. Because the Gospel is specifically Christ centered. Not only in the Old Testament do we find that, but Paul tells us that all of his messages point to Jesus Christ. In First Corinthians, chapter 2, we read, When I came to you, brothers and sisters, announcing the mystery of God to you, I did not come with brilliance of speech or wisdom. I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. The Gospel centers around Jesus Christ and who he is. First Corinthians 15. Paul tells us what the most important message he shared was. And let’s count how many times it speaks of Jesus Christ. For I passed on to you as most important what I also received. That Christ, there it is, once died for our sins according to the Scriptures. And that number two, he was buried. And then number three, he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. And that again, number four, he appeared to Cephas, then to the 12. Then he, number five, appeared to over 500 brothers and sisters at one time. Most of them are still alive at that time. They’re not alive today, but some have fallen asleep. And then he, number six, appeared to James, then to all the apostles. And last of all, as to one born at the wrong time, number seven, he also appeared to me. Who is at the center of this most important message? It is Jesus Christ. Why is it so important that we understand who he is? He had to be God and he had to be man. He couldn’t be partial God and partial man. He had to be both completely. And here are just a couple reasons why he had to be God. Because only God is perfect. And we needed a perfect sacrifice to die on the cross for our sins. No non perfect sacrifice would do, and only secondly God can withstand his own wrath. If any man, simply a man, had been on the cross, he would have been obliterated by the wrath of God. But just as it takes one diamond to cut another diamond, so it is that Jesus had to be God so that he could withstand the wrath of God. But on the other hand, he had to be a man. Because in order to be born as a baby, to live, to die, to actually be buried and then raised back to life, he had to have a physical body. He had to be completely human in nature. And because of that, he understands us. He empathizes with us as our great High Priest. Who is this Jesus? He is the anointed Son of God. He is God and he is man. Why does the answer matter so much? Who is this Jesus? It’s so important that every cult or false religion always undermines the true identity of Jesus. They all attack who he is. I’d just like to go through a list and I got this list off the Internet and I lost my note. I can’t give you who it’s to be credited to, but this concise list is not for me. Okay, I can look it up for you. What did Jehovah’s Witnesses say? They say Jesus is not Jehovah God. He was the first Son that Jehovah God brought forth. He is the first creation by God. Michael the Archangel is no other than the only begotten Son of God now, Jesus Christ. So they say if he was the first Son, then that implies there was a second Son, and a third Son, and a fourth Son. There are many sons of God. It’s just that he happened to be the first he created. But John chapter one says he was with God in the beginning. He wasn’t created, but that’s what Jehovah’s Witnesses teach. And then they relegate him to a lower level than God and they make him at what angel? I mean, what level? He’s just an angel. They’re undermining who Jesus is. Mormonism does the same thing. Among the spirit children of Elohim, the firstborn was and is Jehovah or Jesus Christ to whom all others are juniors. This is a quote from Joseph Smith. He’s just one of many spirit children of who they call God because the Mormons believe that our God was the child of a God before him and that God was the child of a God before him. So there’s this line of what we call emanations. It’s God after God after God and Jesus is just another child of our God. And then he says Jesus was the executive, he was the main one in the work of creation. But also there helping him was Michael or Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Peter, James, John, Joseph Smith and others. Now they don’t believe that they were there in their bodies helping Jesus because they say that God has all these spirits that are in heaven that are put into bodies when we are born. So Jesus along with Abraham and Moses and Peter, they were spiritual entities in the heaven that God had borne through his wives there. And they eventually go into bodies. But the whole point is Jesus is not supreme son of God. He’s not God in the flesh. And they would go on to say that even Satan is his brother because Satan is just another one of God’s spiritual children. Christian Science what does it say? Life, truth and love constitute the triune person called God. It’s not God the Father, God the Son and God the Spirit. It’s life, truth and love, God the Father and mother. Christ is just the spiritual idea of sonship, divine science or the holy comforter. Jesus is the human man and Christ is the divine idea. So basically Jesus just had the right idea, you know, I’m God and that made him special. And that tells us that Jesus was the offspring of Mary’s self conscious communion with God. Now how many women do you know that have gotten pregnant because they had a self conscious communion with anyone? They’re demeaning Christ. All of the cults and false religions undermine who Jesus is. They have to come up with some way to explain that he is not God in the flesh, in unity. We read the ka. The Hindu is the same as the Christos of the Greeks and is the same as the Messiah of the Hebrews, Krishna, Christ, the Messiah. Different, but all the same. This same Christ lives within all of us that lived in Jesus. In essence, we are all anointed Christ and therefore there is no need for a Savior because we are all our own Saviors. Spiritualism, the science, philosophy and religion based upon communication by means of a medium. And when we talk about a medium there, we’re talking about a demon that people are talking to by means of a medium to those who live in the spirit world. So it’s the idea we talk through demons to spirits that are dead. Christ himself was nothing more than one of these mediums, just at a higher order. And he is now an advanced spirit in the sixth sphere, just, just one of many. But he is not the unique Son of Christ. I’m going over these things because when you read news articles, when you talk to people, you’re going to hear little snippets of this. Everybody has different ideas about Jesus, who he is, and they are all wrong. New Age movement does not even acknowledge that sin or sin nature exists and therefore eliminates the need for a Savior. We had four kids. Did any of you have kids? Do they have a sin nature? But. But people believe this New Age says all one needs to do is realize their own divine nature. We are all gods and Jesus is a man upon whom the Christ Spirit came at baptism. But the Spirit left before he died on the cross. If you go back in church history, you’re going to find that the early church had lots of people coming up with these different ideas and they’ve just remained consistent or they’ve come back into vogue here in our time. Eastern mysticism says God is omnipresent and always in the hearts of everyone. Christ is considered one of a long line of divinely realized masters. Again, he’s just one of many. All religions are just different branches of the main trunk of the eternal religions represented by the Vedas. So in Hinduism and Eastern mysticism, all roads lead to God. It doesn’t matter what you believe. They don’t believe that Jesus is the unique son of God and we have salvation in him and by him alone. What does Islam say? Jesus is neither God nor the Son of God, but merely a prophet to Israel. And not only is he just a prophet, but he’s a lesser prophet than Mohammed was Hinduism. Jesus attained God realization was thus an enlightened guru. He was not a savior, nor the Son of God, nor did he rise from the dead. Just another spiritual teacher. Buddhism says Jesus was Just an enlightened master. So there are many Jesuses out there. Taoism says there is no personal creator God. The Tao or the Way is viewed as an impersonal absolute. They don’t even worship anything that they know. They just know that something’s out there. Wicca, when we come to witchcraft, they don’t even talk about Jesus deity. Rather, instead of talking about Jesus or explaining him away, they talk about the Goddess. And God are seen as the manifestations of feminine and masculine forces of nature. So nature is God to Wiccan. They’re all trying to undermine in some way. They have to come up with an answer to who Jesus is that makes him less than who he is. Because otherwise their religions and false other ways to heaven do not work. Who is this Jesus? He had to be God and man, because only God is perfect. Only God can withstand his own wrath. Only man therefore can be born, live, die, be buried and raised. Jesus had to be these two things. He came to establish a kingdom and he came as the rightful king. Because in him and through him were all things created and by him all things are maintained. He’s a warring king because he’s going to finally at some point conquest the enemy. He’s a righteous king. He’s going to bring consequences that are just to the sinful. And he’s a restoring king who is going to bring about a new creation and restore things to the way God originally intended for them to be. Back to verse 20. But you, he asked them, who do you say that I am? And Peter answered, you’re not just a man, you’re not just a prophet, you’re not a priest, you’re not just the king, you are God’s Messiah, the one and only anointed, chosen savior of the world. We often quote from C.S. lewis, kind of indirectly. We talk about that. C.S. lewis said that either Jesus was a liar because he said he was God and if he isn’t, then he was a liar. Or we say that C. S Lewis says that he was a lunatic, he was crazy out of his mind. And if he’s not a liar or a lunatic, then we have to accept the fact that he is the Lord. But I want to read that full quote from CS Lewis here, the way he actually worded it. I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him, about Jesus. And he says, this is what is foolish to say that I am ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. I mean, if somebody says that I’m teaching you how to live the right way and then they turn around and they’re lying all the time, how can we trust them them or even say that they’re a moral teacher? Because they’re already immoral by their lie. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said that sort of thing Jesus said, would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic. On a level with the man who says he is a poached egg. Has anyone ever told you they were a poached egg? If you meet someone, let me know, because I’d like to see what a poached egg looks like. Or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man Jesus was and is the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. Jesus himself has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. What we think about Jesus, according to R.K. hughes, is everything. Acceptance or rejection of him makes all the difference. We must understand that he is Messiah, God’s Son who came to us in human flesh and was crucified, buried and raised from the dead, thus paying the full penalty for our sin. Now he reigns in heaven, and one day he will judge every human who has ever lived to be there with Him. We must believe this, and we must rest our lives on it. You, he asked, who do you say that I am? Peter answered, God, the Messiah. The question for you today is who do you say that Jesus is? Because it affects everything about you and your eternity. John 1:12 says, to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God. To those who believe in his name, his name, Jesus Christ says who he was. And if you don’t believe in his name that Jesus Christ is the Savior, anointed, chosen one, then you do not have a right to be children of God. Since Kelly Jo is coming today to lead us in a song, examine your heart. Has there been a time in your life that you’ve said, yes, I truly believe that Jesus is the only Savior, anointed and chosen by God. Because you have to have that right in your heart in order to understand your need for why he died on the cross and believe that also. So if you’ve ever done that Today while we’re singing you may just want to pray you may want to sing whatever you want to do but express the intention of your heart that yes God I believe that Jesus is your Son and I place my faith in him today as my Savior. May we pray Heavenly Father we thank you that you have made it so clear to us that Jesus is the only anointed chosen Savior that you sent. He is God in the flesh fully God and fully man fully able of being our Savior and being our King and we look forward with hope Father and certainty in our hearts that he is returning to fulfill his work among us. If there’s anyone among us today Father that has not come to this realization understanding we ask that you would lead their hearts to make that decision today and express that to you and reach out to someone after the service to share the decision that they have made. In Jesus name we pray. Amen It.