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The Book of Luke Like You_ve Never Seen Before - The Gospel That Changes Hearts_ · Bible stories

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  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Bible Stories. You may notice there
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  Speaker 1: you can listen offline and access exclusive episodes. Or, if
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  Speaker 1: QR code to donate directly. Thank you for helping us
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  Speaker 1: keep these Bible Stories going. Most people read the Gospel
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  Speaker 1: of Luke without ever noticing the room it happens in.
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  Speaker 1: Go through it from start to finish, and you will
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  Speaker 1: find Jesus sitting down to a meal ten separate times,
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  Speaker 1: more than in any of the other three Gospels. And
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  Speaker 1: there is one complaint his enemies make against him over
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  Speaker 1: and over in this book, in four different chapters, almost
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  Speaker 1: word for word each time. It is about who he
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  Speaker 1: eats with. That is the Luke almost nobody sees, and
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  Speaker 1: it changes what the whole book is doing. In one chapter,
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  Speaker 1: Jesus hands a wealthy host the guest list for his
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  Speaker 1: next dinner, then tells a story where God sends out
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  Speaker 1: invitations to that exact same list. Once you catch it,
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  Speaker 1: you cannot read this gospel the way you read it before.
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  Speaker 1: It matters because most of us picture God at a distance,
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  Speaker 1: up high, waiting for us to become worth approaching. Luke
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  Speaker 1: spends 24 chapters closing that distance, and he starts before
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  Speaker 1: Jesus can speak a word. Luke never met Jesus. He
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  Speaker 1: was not one of the 12. He did not stand
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  Speaker 1: at the cross or run to the tomb. Everything he knows,
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  Speaker 1: he got from people who were there. He tells you
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  Speaker 1: that himself in the opening lines. With this in mind,
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  Speaker 1: since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning,
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  Speaker 1: I too decided to write an orderly account for you,
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  Speaker 1: most excellent Theophilus. Luke chapter 1 verse 3 Then he
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  Speaker 1: explains why he went to all that trouble. So that
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  Speaker 1: you may know the certainty of the things you have
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  Speaker 1: been taught. Luke chapter 1 verse 4 That word certainty
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  Speaker 1: is the whole point of the book. Luke was writing
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  Speaker 1: for a man who had heard about Jesus secondhand and
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  Speaker 1: needed solid ground under his feet. Theophilus is a Greek
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  Speaker 1: name that means friend of God or lover of God.
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  Speaker 1: Nobody knows for sure who he was. What we do
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  Speaker 1: know is that Luke wrote for someone standing on the
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  Speaker 1: outside of the story, trying to decide whether to trust it.
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  Speaker 1: Paul knew him well. Writing to the church at Colossae,
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  Speaker 1: Paul sends greetings from our dear friend Luke the doctor.
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  Speaker 1: Colossians chapter 4 verse 14. A few verses earlier, Paul
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  Speaker 1: had named the Jewish believers who were with him, and
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  Speaker 1: Luke was not on that list. That is the reason
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  Speaker 1: most readers have always understood Luke to be a Gentile,
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  Speaker 1: an outsider by birth, the one man who wrote Scripture
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  Speaker 1: without belonging to Israel. He also wrote a second volume.
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  Speaker 1: The book of Acts picks up where his gospel stops,
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  Speaker 1: and in parts of it, the writing shifts from they
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  Speaker 1: to we, which means Luke had joined the journey himself. Together,
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  Speaker 1: those two books make up more of the New Testament
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  Speaker 1: than anything else written by one person. Hold that picture,
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  Speaker 1: because it explains everything that follows. The account of Jesus
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  Speaker 1: that goes deepest into the homes of the poor, the sinful,
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  Speaker 1: and the shutout was written by a man who was
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  Speaker 1: himself outside the family. He knew what it felt like
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  Speaker 1: to stand at the edge of a room full of
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  Speaker 1: people who belonged. So he collected the stories where Jesus
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  Speaker 1: walked over to the edge and pulled up a chair.
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  Speaker 1: Luke tells you about the manger before he tells you
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  Speaker 1: anything else about where Jesus was. She wrapped him in
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  Speaker 1: cloths and placed him in a manger because there was
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  Speaker 1: no guest room available for them. Luke chapter 2 verse 7.
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  Speaker 1: A manger is a feeding trough. It is the box
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  Speaker 1: the animals eat out of. That is the first physical
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  Speaker 1: detail Luke gives you about the newborn Christ and he
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  Speaker 1: is the only gospel writer who gives it at all. Matthew,
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  Speaker 1: Mark and John never mention it. Then Luke says it again.
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  Speaker 1: When the angel tells the shepherds how to find the child,
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  Speaker 1: the sign is not a star or a palace. This
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  Speaker 1: will be a sign to you. You will find a
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  Speaker 1: baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. Luke
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  Speaker 1: chapter 2 verse 12. And when the shepherds arrive and
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  Speaker 1: find him, Luke describes the trough one more time, three
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  Speaker 1: mentions in one chapter. When a writer repeats a detail
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  Speaker 1: three times in a few paragraphs, he is telling you
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  Speaker 1: to look at it. The town made the picture even sharper.
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  Speaker 1: Bethlehem in Hebrew means house of bread. The child who
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  Speaker 1: would one day break bread and say, this is my body,
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  Speaker 1: was born in the house of bread and laid down
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  Speaker 1: in the place where food goes. His mother had already
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  Speaker 1: sung about this before he was born. In her song,
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  Speaker 1: Mary says of God, he has filled the hungry with
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  Speaker 1: good things, but has sent the rich away empty. Luke
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  Speaker 1: chapter 1 verse 53. She is not talking only about grain.
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  Speaker 1: She is describing the way God works, and she says
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  Speaker 1: it in the language of a meal, because that is
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  Speaker 1: the language this whole gospel is going to speak. So
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  Speaker 1: the very first image Luke hands you is a hungry
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  Speaker 1: world and a saviour lying in a feeding box. Everything
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  Speaker 1: that comes later is that same picture grown up. The
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  Speaker 1: first thing a man does after Jesus calls him in
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  Speaker 1: Luke is throw a party. His name was Levi and
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  Speaker 1: he sat at a tax booth collecting money from his
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  Speaker 1: own neighbours for Rome. That job made a man rich
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  Speaker 1: and hated in equal measure. Jesus walked past his booth,
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  Speaker 1: said two words, follow me, and Levi got up and
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  Speaker 1: left it. What he did next tells you what had
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  Speaker 1: happened inside him. Then Levi held a great banquet for
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  Speaker 1: Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax
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  Speaker 1: collectors and others were eating with them. Luke chapter 5
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  Speaker 1: verse 29. He did not slip away to study in private.
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  Speaker 1: He filled his dining room with every disreputable person he
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  Speaker 1: knew and put Jesus at the center of it. The
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  Speaker 1: religious leaders were watching, and the question they asked was
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  Speaker 1: not about doctrine. Why do you eat and drink with
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  Speaker 1: tax collectors and sinners? Luke chapter 5 verse 30 The
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  Speaker 1: offense was the eating. In that world, sitting down to
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  Speaker 1: a meal with someone was not casual. You did not
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  Speaker 1: share a table with a person you considered unclean. Eating
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  Speaker 1: together meant acceptance, family, a public statement that this person
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  Speaker 1: belongs with me. That is exactly why it upset them
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  Speaker 1: so much, and exactly why Jesus kept doing it. He
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  Speaker 1: answered them plainly, I have not come to call the righteous,
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  Speaker 1: but sinners to repentance. Luke 5.32 The habit stuck to
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  Speaker 1: him for the rest of his life. Later in the book,
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  Speaker 1: Jesus describes how people talked about him and John the Baptist.
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  Speaker 1: John came fasting in the desert, and they said he
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  Speaker 1: had a demon. Then he says, The Son of Man
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  Speaker 1: came eating and drinking, and you say, Here is a
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  Speaker 1: glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 7 verse 34 That was the insult. Jesus
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  Speaker 1: repeats it without flinching. He never denies the eating, and
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  Speaker 1: he never denies the company. He simply lets the accusations stand,
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  Speaker 1: because the thing they meant as a slur was an
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  Speaker 1: accurate description of his mission. He was a friend of sinners.
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  Speaker 1: He proved it at their tables. Then Luke shows you
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  Speaker 1: what happened at one of those meals, and it is
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  Speaker 1: one of the most uncomfortable scenes in the Bible. A
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  Speaker 1: Pharisee named Simon invites Jesus to dinner. In that culture,
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  Speaker 1: guests reclined on low couches around a low table, leaning
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  Speaker 1: on one elbow, feet stretched out behind them. That detail
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  Speaker 1: matters for what comes next. A woman comes in. Luke
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  Speaker 1: calls her a woman in that town who lived a
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  Speaker 1: sinful life, which is as much as he says. Everyone
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  Speaker 1: at that dinner knew what she was. She had no
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  Speaker 1: invitation and no business being there, and she comes anyway,
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  Speaker 1: carrying a jar of perfume. She stands behind Jesus at
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  Speaker 1: his feet, and she starts crying, and she cannot stop.
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  Speaker 1: Her tears fall on his feet. She wipes them with
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  Speaker 1: her hair, which no respectable woman would have let down
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  Speaker 1: in public, and she kisses his feet and pours the
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  Speaker 1: perfume on them. Simon says nothing out loud. Inside, he
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  Speaker 1: decides Jesus must be a fraud, because a real prophet
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  Speaker 1: would know what kind of woman this is. Jesus answers
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  Speaker 1: the thought Simon never spoke. He tells a short story
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  Speaker 1: about two men who owed money to the same lender,
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  Speaker 1: one a small amount, one a large one, and neither
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  Speaker 1: could pay. The lender cancelled both debts. Which one loved
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  Speaker 1: him more? Simon gives the obvious answer, the one who
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  Speaker 1: owed more. Then Jesus turns and looks at the woman
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  Speaker 1: while he speaks to his host, and he lists what
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  Speaker 1: Simon did not do. no water for his feet, no
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  Speaker 1: kiss of welcome, no oil for his head. Those were
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  Speaker 1: the ordinary courtesies any host owed a guest, the equivalent
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  Speaker 1: of taking a visitor's coat. Simon had skipped all three.
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  Speaker 1: The woman who owed everything and was invited to nothing
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  Speaker 1: had given all three with her own tears and her
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  Speaker 1: own hair. And then the verdict— Therefore, I tell you,
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  Speaker 1: her many sins have been forgiven, as her great love
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  Speaker 1: has shown. But whoever has been forgiven, little loves little.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 7 verse 47. Read that room again. The
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  Speaker 1: man who owned the house did the least. The woman
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  Speaker 1: who did not belong there did the most. She had
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  Speaker 1: never been given a seat, so she did not wait
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  Speaker 1: for one. She came in and knelt on the floor
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  Speaker 1: behind him, and she went home forgiven while the host
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  Speaker 1: sat there with dry hands and a clean reputation, and
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  Speaker 1: no idea what he had just missed.' If you have
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  Speaker 1: ever assumed your history disqualifies you from getting close to God,
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  Speaker 1: this is your scene. She had a name in that town,
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  Speaker 1: and it was not a good one, and it did
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  Speaker 1: not slow Jesus down for a second.' There is one
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  Speaker 1: meal in Luke where the food itself becomes the problem,
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  Speaker 1: and it happens in the home of people Jesus loved.
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  Speaker 1: Martha opens her house to him. Her sister Mary sits
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  Speaker 1: down at his feet and listens. Martha keeps working, and
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  Speaker 1: the longer she works, the angrier she gets, until she
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  Speaker 1: says something in front of everyone that she probably regretted later. Lord,
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  Speaker 1: don't you care that my sister has left me to
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  Speaker 1: do the work by myself? Tell her to help me.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 10 verse 40 It is a fair complaint.
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  Speaker 1: Somebody has to cook. She is being generous with her
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  Speaker 1: own house and her own food, and she is doing
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  Speaker 1: it alone. His answer is gentle, and it lands hard.
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  Speaker 1: Martha Martha, the Lord answered, you are worried and upset
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  Speaker 1: about many things, but few things are needed, or indeed
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  Speaker 1: only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it
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  Speaker 1: will not be taken away from her. Luke chapter 10,
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  Speaker 1: verses 41 and 42. He says her name twice. That
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  Speaker 1: is how you speak to somebody you are trying to
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  Speaker 1: calm down. Notice what he does not do. He never
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  Speaker 1: tells her to stop serving. He never says, the meal
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  Speaker 1: does not matter. He tells her that the anxiety wrapped
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  Speaker 1: around the meal is stealing the very thing the meal
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  Speaker 1: was supposed to create. She invited him into her house
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  Speaker 1: so she could be near him, and then she got
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  Speaker 1: so busy being near him that she never actually was.
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  Speaker 1: Plenty of tired believers live in that exact spot. They
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  Speaker 1: keep serving, keep showing up, keep carrying the load, and
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  Speaker 1: somewhere along the way, the serving replaced the sitting. Jesus
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  Speaker 1: is not asking for a better performance from Martha. He
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  Speaker 1: is asking her to put down the tray and take
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  Speaker 1: the chair that was hers the whole time. Chapter 14
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  Speaker 1: is where Luke shows his hand, and almost nobody notices
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  Speaker 1: what Jesus does in it. The setting is another dinner.
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  Speaker 1: One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house
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  Speaker 1: of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched. Luke
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  Speaker 1: chapter 14 verse 1. He is a guest in a
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  Speaker 1: powerful man's home, surrounded by people studying him for a mistake.
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  Speaker 1: He watches them back. He sees the guests choosing the
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  Speaker 1: best seats, the places closest to the host, and he
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  Speaker 1: gives them advice that sounds like table manners and is
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  Speaker 1: actually a description of the kingdom. Take the lowest place.
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  Speaker 1: Let the host move you up. For all those who
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  Speaker 1: exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves
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  Speaker 1: will be exalted. Luke chapter 14 verse 11. Then he
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  Speaker 1: turns to the man who owns the house and tells
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  Speaker 1: him how to plan his next dinner. Do not invite
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  Speaker 1: your friends, your family, your rich neighbors, because they will
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  Speaker 1: invite you back and you will be paid in full. Instead,
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  Speaker 1: when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled,
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  Speaker 1: the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although
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  Speaker 1: they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the
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  Speaker 1: resurrection of the righteous. Luke chapter 14 verses 13 and 14.
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  Speaker 1: Now watch closely, because here is the part that gets missed.
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  Speaker 1: One of the guests, uncomfortable with where this is going,
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  Speaker 1: says something safe and religious about eating in the kingdom
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  Speaker 1: of God. Jesus answers with a story. A man prepares
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  Speaker 1: a great banquet and sends out the invitations. When everything
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  Speaker 1: is ready, the guests all start making excuses. One bought
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  Speaker 1: a field. One bought oxen. One just got married. Nobody comes.
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  Speaker 1: The host is furious, and he gives his servant a
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  Speaker 1: new list. Go out quickly into the streets and alleys
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  Speaker 1: of the town, and bring in the poor, the crippled,
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  Speaker 1: the blind, and the lame. Luke chapter 14 verse 21.
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  Speaker 1: That is the same four words Jesus had used a
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  Speaker 1: moment earlier, the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind.
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  Speaker 1: He told the Pharisee to invite those exact people to
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  Speaker 1: his table, and then he told a story in which
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  Speaker 1: God invites those exact people to his. The advice and
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  Speaker 1: the parable are the same guest list. He was telling
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  Speaker 1: that man in his own dining room that the people
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  Speaker 1: he considered beneath his table are the ones heaven has
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  Speaker 1: already seated. And it does not stop there. The servant
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  Speaker 1: comes back and says, There is still room. So the
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  Speaker 1: master says, Go out to the roads and country lanes,
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  Speaker 1: and compel them to come in, so that my house
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  Speaker 1: will be full. Luke chapter 14 verse 23 Compel them.
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  Speaker 1: Go past the town, out onto the country roads, where
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  Speaker 1: the people nobody counted were walking, and do not take
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  Speaker 1: no for an answer. The people who were sure they
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  Speaker 1: had a seat sent excuses. The people who never expected
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  Speaker 1: an invitation got dragged in off the road because the
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  Speaker 1: host refused to eat alone. That is the heart of
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  Speaker 1: this gospel in one parable. God is not sitting at
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  Speaker 1: an empty table hoping the worthy show up. He is
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  Speaker 1: sending someone out to find you. The most famous chapter
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  Speaker 1: in Luke exists because of a complaint about a meal.
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  Speaker 1: Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around
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  Speaker 1: to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of
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  Speaker 1: the law muttered, This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 15 verses 1 and 2. Every word of
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  Speaker 1: chapter 15 is the answer to that muttering. Three stories
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  Speaker 1: told back to back, all of them found nowhere else
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  Speaker 1: in the Bible. A shepherd loses one sheep out of
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  Speaker 1: a hundred, leaves the ninety-nine in open country, and goes
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  Speaker 1: after the one until he finds it. He carries it
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  Speaker 1: home on his shoulders and calls his friends together to celebrate.
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  Speaker 1: A woman loses one silver coin out of ten. She
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  Speaker 1: lights a lamp, sweeps the whole house, and searches carefully
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  Speaker 1: until she finds it. Then she calls her friends and
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  Speaker 1: neighbours and throws a party over a coin. A father
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  Speaker 1: loses a son who asked for his inheritance early, walked
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  Speaker 1: out and spent it all. And when the boy finally
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  Speaker 1: turns for home, ruined and rehearsing an apology, while he
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  Speaker 1: was still a long way off, his father saw him
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  Speaker 1: and was filled with compassion for him. He ran to
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  Speaker 1: his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 15 verse 20. Three stories, and every one
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  Speaker 1: of them ends in food and celebration. The shepherd throws
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  Speaker 1: a party, the woman throws a party, and the father says,
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  Speaker 1: Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a
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  Speaker 1: feast and celebrate. Luke chapter 15 verse 23. That is
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  Speaker 1: Jesus answering the accusation without arguing with it. They said,
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  Speaker 1: he eats with sinners. He said, yes, and so does heaven,
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  Speaker 1: and here is what the meal sounds like when the
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  Speaker 1: lost one comes home. Look at who does the searching
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  Speaker 1: in each story. The sheep does not find its way back.
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  Speaker 1: The coin cannot roll itself into the purse. Even the
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  Speaker 1: son who does get up and walk is met on
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  Speaker 1: the road by a father who was already watching for
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  Speaker 1: him and covered the last stretch of the distance himself.
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  Speaker 1: In all three, the one who moves first is the
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  Speaker 1: one who lost something. The third story does not end
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  Speaker 1: with that. the party. It ends with a man standing
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  Speaker 1: outside of it. The older son comes in from the field,
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  Speaker 1: hears music, finds out his brother is home, and the
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  Speaker 1: calf has been killed, and something in him breaks. The
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  Speaker 1: older brother became angry and refused to go in, so
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  Speaker 1: his father went out and pleaded with him. Luke, chapter 15,
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  Speaker 1: verse 28. He is the one who stayed. He worked,
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  Speaker 1: he obeyed, he never embarrassed the family, and now his
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  Speaker 1: father is throwing a feast for the son who wasted everything.
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  Speaker 1: His anger makes sense to anyone who has ever kept
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  Speaker 1: the rules and watched somebody else get the celebration. But
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  Speaker 1: look at where he is standing. Every other person in
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  Speaker 1: Luke who gets close to Jesus ends up at a table.
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  Speaker 1: This man is the only one in the whole chapter
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  Speaker 1: who has a guaranteed seat and will not take it.
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  Speaker 1: His father leaves the guests, walks out into his own
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  Speaker 1: front yard, in the middle of his own party, and
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  Speaker 1: begs his son to come in. My son, the father said,
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  Speaker 1: you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.
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  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 15 verse 31. Set that beside chapter 14,
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  Speaker 1: and you can see what Luke has done. In the
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  Speaker 1: parable of the banquet, the host sends someone out to
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  Speaker 1: the country roads to compel strangers to come in. One
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  Speaker 1: chapter later, a father goes out to his own front
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  Speaker 1: yard to plead with his own son to do the
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  Speaker 1: same thing. The strangers came. The son stayed outside. Luke
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  Speaker 1: never tells you what the older brother decided. The story
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  Speaker 1: just stops with the father in the yard and the
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  Speaker 1: door standing open behind him. That silence is doing something.
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  Speaker 1: It leaves the ending to whoever is listening. There is
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: one more table in Luke, and it is the one
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: where a man is left outside for good. A rich man,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: dressed in purple and fine linen, lived in luxury every day.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: with sores and longing to eat what fell from the
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 16 verses 20 and 21. Notice how close
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: they were, a gate apart. The rich man had to
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: step over him to get home. Every day there was
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: a full table on one side of that gate and
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: a starving man on the other, and the food never
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: crossed the distance. Both men die. The beggar is carried
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: to Abraham's side. The rich man finds himself in torment,
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: and he looks up and asks for one drop of
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: water on his tongue, which is the smallest portion of
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: a meal a person can ask for. Abraham answers him,' Son,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: remember that in your lifetime you received your good things,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: and you are in agony.' Luke chapter 16 verse 25.
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: That story is the shadow side of everything else in
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: this gospel. Luke is showing you what it costs to
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: sit at a full table and never look toward the gate.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: The rich man had the food, the house, and a
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: fresh chance every single day. He also had a neighbor
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: whose name he never bothered to learn, though Luke gives
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: it to you twice. And it fits the pattern exactly.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: In Luke, the people who end up seated are the
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: ones who knew they were hungry. Mary sang it before
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: any of it happened. God fills the hungry with good
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: things and sends the rich away empty. The tragedy of
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: the man in purple is that he never once felt hungry,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: so he never once reached for anything. By the time
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: Jesus reaches Jericho, the pattern is so well established that
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: a crowd can predict it, and they still cannot believe it.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector, which means he did
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: not just collect for Rome, he ran the men who did.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: He was wealthy, and he was despised, and he was
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: short enough that he could not see over the crowd.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: So a grown man of standing ran ahead and climbed
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: a tree. Jesus stops under it. When Jesus reached the spot,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, come down immediately.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: I must stay at your house today. Luke chapter 19
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: verse 5. He calls him by name, not by his title,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: not by his reputation, by his name. And then he
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: invites himself to dinner, which is the only time in
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: any of the Gospels that Jesus does that. The crowd
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: reacts the way the crowd always reacts. All the people
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: saw this and began to mutter, He has gone to
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: be the guest of a sinner. Luke chapter 19 verse
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: 7 says, Same complaint as chapter 5. Same complaint as
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: chapter 15. Nothing has changed about the objection, and nothing
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: has changed about Jesus. Then comes the turn. Before the
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: meal is served, before anyone can weigh whether he means it,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Zacchaeus stands up and says, Look, Lord, here and now
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: I give half of my possessions to the poor, and
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: pay back four times the amount. Luke chapter 19 verse 8.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: Nobody asked him for that. There was no sermon, no
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: list of conditions, no probation period. A man who had
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: spent his life taking from people announced in his own
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: house that he was giving it back. And he did
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: it because someone had looked up into a tree and
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: said he was coming over. Jesus answers, Today salvation has
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: come to this house because this man too is a
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: seek and to save the lost. Luke chapter 19 verses
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: 9 and 10. Today, before the repayment was made, before
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: the town changed its opinion, salvation arrived at that house
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: the moment its owner was invited into company he never
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: thought he could keep. Then the road runs out and
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: Jesus does something that should stop you. On the last night,
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: with the arrest hours away and the cross a day off,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: he sits down with his friends and says, I have
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Luke chapter 22 verse 15 Eagerly desired. He was not
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: enduring the meal on his way to the harder thing.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: He wanted it. Of all the ways to spend his
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: final free hours, the one he had been longing for
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: was a table with these particular men around it. And
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: these men were not worth waiting for by any normal measure.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: One of them was already arranging the betrayal. Another would
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: swear three times before morning that he had never met him.
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: Every one of them would scatter. Jesus knew all of
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: it while he was passing them the bread. And he
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: took bread, gave thanks, and broke it, and gave it
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: to them, saying, This is my body given for you.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: Do this in remembrance of me. Luke chapter 22 verse
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: 19 Then at that table on that night an argument
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: breaks out. A dispute also arose among them as to
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: which of them was considered to be greatest. Luke chapter
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: 22 verse 24. Their friend has just told them his
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: body is about to be broken and they start jockeying
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: over rank. He does not walk out. He answers them
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: with the table itself. For who is greater, the one
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: who is at the table or the one who serves?
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: Is it not the one who is at the table?
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: But I am among you as one who serves. Luke
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: chapter 22 verse 27 Everyone in that room knew the
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: answer to his question. Guests outrank servants, always, in every
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: house in the world. Then he tells them that in
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: his kingdom the ranking is upside down, and he says
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: it as a description of himself. The one who should
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: be seated is carrying the dishes. Earlier in the gospel,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: he had already promised the same reversal to anyone still
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: awake when he comes back. Truly I tell you, he
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: the table, and will come and wait on them. Luke
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: chapter 12 verse 37 That is the master of the house,
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: tying on an apron, seating his own servants, and waiting
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: on them personally. If your picture of God is someone
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: standing over you with folded arms, waiting for you to
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: earn your place, Luke keeps handing you a different image,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: God with a towel, God pouring, God at the side
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: of the table instead of the head of it. The
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: last thing Luke wants you to see happens on a
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: road out of town, on the day of the resurrection,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: with two people walking in the wrong direction. They are
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: leaving Jerusalem. Everything they hoped for died on Friday, and
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: they are going home to a village called Emmaus, about
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: seven miles out. A stranger catches up and walks with them.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: They do not recognize him. He asks what they are
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: talking about, and they pour out the whole story, the trial,
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: the cross, the women, and the empty tomb, and how
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: they had hoped he was the one who was going
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: to redeem Israel. Then the stranger walks them through their
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: own scriptures, from Moses through the prophets, and shows them
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: that all of it had been pointing at this. They
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: still do not know who he is. They reach the village.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: As they approached the village to which they were going,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. But
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: they urged him strongly,' Stay with us, for it is
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: nearly evening. The day is almost over.' So he went
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: in to stay with them. Luke chapter 24 verses 28
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: and 29. He waited to be asked. He did not
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: force the door. And then, inside, the guest becomes the
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: host without a word about it. When he was at
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it,
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: and began to give it to them. Then their eyes
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: were opened, and they recognized him, and he disappeared from
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: their sight. Luke chapter 24, verses 30 and 31. Seven
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: miles of scripture, taught by the risen Christ himself, and
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: they still did not know him. He broke bread, and
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: they did. They turn to each other and say the
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: line that gives this whole gospel its name. Were not
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: our hearts burning within us while he talked with us
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: on the road and opened the scriptures to us? Luke
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: chapter 24 verse 32 They did not feel nothing on
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: that road. They felt everything. They just could not name
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: it until the bread was in their hands. They get
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: up that same hour and walk the seven miles back
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: in the dark. And when they tell the others what happened,
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: Luke says they described how Jesus was recognized by them
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: when he broke the bread. It happens once more before
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: the book closes. Jesus appears to the whole group, and
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: they are so shaken that they think he is a ghost.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: He shows them his hands and his feet, and they
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: still cannot take it in. So he asks a question
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: that no ghost would ask. And while they still did
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them,
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: Do you have anything here to eat? They gave him
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: ate it in their presence. Luke chapter 24 verses 41
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: to 43 The risen Lord of heaven proves he is
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: alive by eating a piece of fish in front of
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: his friends. Luke opened his book with a baby laid
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: in the box the animals eat from, and he closes
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: it with the same man, raised from the dead, holding
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: a piece of cooked fish. He even carries it into
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: his second volume. In the opening lines of Acts, he
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: describes the risen Jesus giving his final instructions to the
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: apostles while he was eating with them. From the feeding
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: trough to the fish. That is the shape of the
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: whole thing. So here is what Luke has been doing
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: all along. He collected the meals. He kept the party
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: at Levi's house and the perfume on the floor at Simon's,
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: Martha standing in the doorway with a tray, the guest
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: list nobody wanted, the fattened calf, the older son in
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: the yard, the beggar at the gate, the tax collector
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: in the tree, the bread broken in a borrowed room
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: and broken again in Emmaus. He put them in order
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: and handed them to a man on the outside so
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: that he would know the certainty of what he had
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: been taught. And what that man would learn, reading it
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: straight through, is that the God of the Bible does
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: not keep his distance. He comes into houses, he sits down,
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: he eats what is put in front of him, he
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: gets accused of keeping bad company, and never once defends
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: himself against the charge. That is why this gospel changes hearts.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Every change in it happened up close, and every one
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: of them happened in the same order. Zacchaeus got the
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: invitation first, and the giving poured out of him on
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: the spot before anybody asked him for a thing. The
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: woman walked into Simon's house with her reputation intact, and
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: walked out of it forgiven. The two on the road
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: were fed before they understood anything at all. In Luke,
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: the welcome comes first, and the change follows it home.
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: There is a kind of loneliness that arrives late in
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: life and never announces itself. The body slows down, the
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: friends thin out, whole days pass without the phone ringing once,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: and somewhere inside all that silence, a person starts reading
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: the silence as a verdict, as though God stopped speaking
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: because he had finally run out of patience. Luke wrote
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: his book against that exact reading. He wrote it for
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: the outsider because he was one himself. The house in
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: the story was never going to stay half empty. The
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: master would not have it. He sent someone all the
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: way out to the country roads, past the town, past
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: everyone who had already said no, out to where the
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: uncounted people were walking, and told him to bring them
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: in and not take no for an answer. You are
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: on that road, and the seat with your name on
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: it has been waiting a long time. May the God
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: who ran down the road to meet His Son come
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: out to meet you, and may you find, when you
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: finally sit down, that the bread was already broken and
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: the place was always yours. If this video helped you
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: grow deeper in God's Word, I want to personally invite
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: you to be part of what we are building here.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: Every video on this channel takes many hours of study
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: and careful research to make sure we bring you content
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: that is faithful to Scripture and worthy of your time.
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: If you would like to support this mission and help
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: us keep making these videos, you can find a link
• 36:16
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• 36:20
  Speaker 1: become a monthly supporter. Every gift, no matter the size,
• 36:25
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• 36:30
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• 36:33
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• 36:37
  Speaker 1: is subscribe, share this video with someone who needs to
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: hear it, and keep studying God's Word with us. Thank
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: you for being here, and may God bless you richly.