Latest / HBCWestminster / 1.12.20 Luke 2:39-52 Pastor Danny Gardner

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1.12.20 Luke 2:39-52 Pastor Danny Gardner · HBCWestminster

• 0:00
  Well, I'm going to read our text this morning, and then pray, and we'll begin. Beginning in Luke 2, I'm going to be in verse 39. I would ask, if you're able to stand in honor of God's Word, that you do that as we read. Luke 2, verses 39 to 52, it says this, When they had performed everything according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom, and the favor of God was upon him.
• 0:33
  Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the Passover. And when he was 12 years old, they went up according to custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it, but supposing him to be in the group, they went a day's journey, but then they began to search for him among their relatives and acquaintances. And when they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem searching for him. After three days, they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.
• 1:03
  And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress. And he said to them, Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my father's house? And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.
• 1:33
  And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man. Let's pray. Creator God, who made heaven and earth and everything in them, and who created us and knows us, who knows our coming in and our going out, and who understands us all together, whose forgiveness receives us into your very throne room. Lord, we approach your throne with confidence today in the name of Jesus.
• 2:10
  asking that your mercy would help us in our time of need. And Lord, give us your spirit that we may understand things loftier than ourselves. Lord, give us insight into your word, challenge our minds with your truth, and challenge our hearts to obey. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you. You can be seated. So, I received a letter in the mail from Los Angeles County when I used to live there, letting me know that I was a wanted man.
• 2:45
  For those of you guys who were here last week, you may recall that I had said that I don't often find myself in court, but one time I didn't have a bench warrant out for my arrest. And so I will fill in the rest of the details. The letter said that I had violated my probation, said that I had failed to appear in court. And because of that, I now had a bench warrant out and I would be arrested. My immediate thought was, there's got to be some kind of mistake. So I took the letter.
• 3:18
  Back to the church with me. I was a pastor at the time of a relatively large church. Had a lot of L.A. County Sheriff's deputies that attended the church.
• 3:30
  And so I found one of them. I had befriended many of them and found one of them. Oftentimes, they would come and sit in the church parking lot in uniform and in their patrol cars. Sometimes even during church, they would come in in uniform, having driven their patrol cars to the church. And so there were many of them, highway patrolmen, deputies, officers of various police departments. And so I grabbed one of these guys. His name was Steve. And I said, Steve, yeah, Pastor Danny, what do you need? I said, listen.
• 3:59
  do you have your car with you? Yeah, I've got my car with you. What do you need with me? What do you need? And I said, listen, I got this letter in the mail. I'm wondering if you can run my license and see if I'm wanted. Really? Yeah. I show him the letter. He says, come out to my car with me. So I come out to the car, you know, and I'm standing out there. He sits in the driver's seat. The door's propped open. Let me have your driver's license. He takes my driver's license. He swipes it, you know, and he's waiting there. I can hear him mumbling under his breath. I can't believe I'm running my pastor.
• 4:31
  I can't believe I'm running my pastor. I said, Steve, I share that feeling. Like, I don't, what are you going to do if you find out I am wanted? Are you going to arrest me right here? Like, my kids are inside, man. Like, I don't, I don't know what I'm going to do. Like, Pastor Danny, you know, and he swipes my thing. My full name is John Daniel Gardner, John Daniel Gardner. And he said, he said, Danny, he said, no, no, no. He said, it's a mistake. John Daniel Gardner, you're fine. But he said, there's a man whose name is very close to yours.
• 5:00
  who is in a lot of trouble. He's in a lot of trouble. And he began to explain to me all of the warrants that he had, a $30,000 warrant, a $70,000 warrant, all of these different crimes that I won't explain to you now. Just know that they're awful things, many of which include the word serial at the beginning of them. And so my identity had been mistaken. They thought that I was that guy.
• 5:24
  who later I found months later had been arrested. It was on the news. I don't know if it went national or not, but certainly in our county, it was on the news that this guy had been picked up. And sure enough, his name was almost identical to mine. Somehow those two lines had gotten crossed. I was the victim of a mistaken identity. And because the consequences of that mistake were severe, I became vigilant, as you can imagine, in setting the record straight.
• 5:52
  I am not going to go to jail for that guy. There's no way. In our passage this morning chronicles the only recorded event of Jesus's childhood. The scripture reveals a few details regarding his birth. We know a little bit about the day he was born. We know about the three and a half year or so period of ministry in Jesus's public ministry. But what was Jesus like as a boy? What was teenage Jesus like? You know, some have
• 6:24
  attempted to fill in the gaps because Scripture, apart from this one story, really is silent. Some have attempted to fill in some of those gaps. You hear about apocryphal gospels. Some of those stories are fanciful, like Jesus turning mud pigeons into real birds, you know, scraping together dirt, making little birds and then breathing on them and the birds fly away. Some of them are terrible. One of these false gospels
• 6:50
  actually describes Jesus as blinding a young boy. Another one actually says that because a kid was picking on him, Jesus killed the kid, one of them says. And then when this kid's parents went and complained to Joseph and Mary, Jesus struck them with blindness. Like, you read the rest, you're like, that doesn't seem like it fits. I don't think that's the Jesus. He came to give sight to the blind, not to take it away.
• 7:18
  There is no other inspired text, this is the only one, that gives any detail regarding Jesus' boyhood. And most startling about this revelation is that 12-year-old Jesus understands who he is, perhaps for the first time. He even says, I would be in my father's house. As we have already studied, many others have given testimony, Zechariah and Elizabeth, John the Baptist, angels, shepherds, Joseph and Mary, Simeon and Anna from last week.
• 7:47
  This morning we hear from Christ himself, his very words, and these are the only recorded words of Jesus prior to his public ministry, beginning at age 30. They are a declaration of mission and deity. The only recorded words we have of Jesus' adolescence, they record him understanding exactly who he is and what he was there to do. Luke's inclusion of these words signifies their monumental importance.
• 8:18
  What they reveal is that Jesus' deity, his incarnation, his ministry, even his eventual crucifixion, were not things thrust upon him by his followers, as some have accused the church of doing. Jesus never intended to be worshipped. Jesus never claimed to be God. It was the church who thrust that deity upon him. His own words declare that not to be the case. In fact, he chose.
• 8:49
  He chose these things before the foundations of the world. There was no mistaken identity. When he was identified by Peter as the son of God, there was no mistake. And when he was clung to by Mary Magdalene and his feet were washed with her hair, there was no mistake. And when he was identified by Judas with a kiss and then hauled away, and when he was beaten by soldiers to within an inch of his life, there was no mistake. And when he hung on the cross and uttered his final words, there was no...
• 9:21
  In fact, in that moment hanging there on the cross, he was exactly where he had chosen to be. When Jesus uttered these now famous words, didn't you know I would be in my father's house and about my father's business, another translation says, was he not referring to the very purpose for which he came? Didn't you know I'd be about my father's business? To bless humanity with salvation? To choose us? To redeem us?
• 9:53
  To give us an inheritance. That was his father's business. And he says, that is the business I am also in. Turn with me, if you would, to the right to Ephesians 1. In Ephesians 1, there's a description in Ephesians 1 of what his father does. This is his father's business. In Ephesians 1, in verse 3.
• 10:17
  It says, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Here is what God the Father does through Christ. This is the business of God. Verse 4 says, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the beloved.
• 10:46
  In him, we have redemption through his blood. The forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. This is the business of God. It's about redeeming people, about saving people, about sealing people, promising them an inheritance.
• 11:14
  pouring out His Spirit into people. This is the business of the Father. And this is what Jesus in Luke 2 says, I am about too. My Father is about that. And I am about my Father's business. This morning's message will be broken into two parts. Part one is the incarnation. We're going to talk about the incarnation itself, how it works, how it functions, why it was necessary for the salvation of mankind. Part two is going to be the incident.
• 11:44
  Here is the incident before us. Previous to my study, I had thought at times, and maybe you have as well, that Mary and Joseph must have been awful parents. Who loses their son for three days and doesn't even realize? There's one thing to say, well, he was lost for a while, but at some point you're like, where is he?
• 12:07
  You don't get three days away. Does that make sense? Not even realizing he was gone? They must have been awful parents. Add to that that not only did they lose their son, but their son was God. How do you lose God for 72 hours? That's impossible. But it makes sense as you study the context how this could have happened. So part one, the incarnation. Part two, the incident. And let's look at verse 39.
• 12:34
  Chapter 2, verse 39, it says, and when they had performed everything according to the law of the Lord. Now, we've talked about all of that from last week. That was the circumcision. That was redeeming back of their firstborn son. That's what it's talking about. They returned into Galilee to their own town of Nazareth. And so they had left then Judea and the temple and returned back to their own hometown. And this is why Jesus was raised in Nazareth. Verse 40 is interesting. And it says, and the child grew and became strong.
• 13:05
  Filled with wisdom and the favor of God was upon him. If you look down at verse 52, there's similar wording. Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man. Scriptures teach that Jesus was fully human. He grew physically just like every other human child. He grew emotionally just like every other human child.
• 13:32
  It also says that he grew in knowledge and maturity, just like every other human child. Hebrews 2 and verse 17 says, therefore, he had to be made like his brothers in every respect. In every way you are, Jesus was, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God. One feature, an important feature of the incarnation,
• 14:00
  was the relinquishing of the voluntary use of Jesus' divine attributes. And you say, what on earth did you just say? That means the voluntary relinquishing of His divine attributes. That means that although Christ and His deity was fully omniscient, His knowledge while on earth may have been limited at times in His incarnation. So there were times, although Jesus is fully God,
• 14:29
  fully aware and has all knowledge because he is God and God is omniscient, there are times when he may get asked a question that he legitimately can say, I don't know the answer to that. Only the Father knows the time and the hour, right? There were times, although he was all-powerful, his power was limited in his incarnation. And so here's what happened. In the incarnation, when God, fully God, the second person of the Trinity became
• 14:58
  A man. He didn't lose his attributes. Because to lose his attributes is to lose his deity. Right? Does that make sense? A God who is not all-powerful isn't God. A God that doesn't know everything isn't God. Instead, what happened was he relinquished the voluntary use of those attributes to the Holy Spirit. So although he retained all of the attributes, he basically said, Holy Spirit, you tell me when and where to use them.
• 15:28
  And this is why for the first 30 years of his life, there were no miracles. This is why. I don't think the story is true that he breathed on mud birds and they flew away. In fact, John chapter 2 says the very first sign that he ever performed was what? Water into wine. This is the first sign. It even says that. This was the first miracle he ever did. It was after his baptism.
• 15:55
  where the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove. The Holy Spirit comes and anoints Christ. This is my son, the Father says, with whom I am well pleased. And from that moment forward, you begin to see miracles in the life of Jesus. It wasn't that he couldn't do miracles before. He had just given the control, the use of those miracles over that power over to the Holy Spirit. Everybody follow that? Okay, now this leads to a bunch of fun questions for us to debate.
• 16:26
  There are people who disagree with my kind of understanding of the incarnation, and that's okay, as long as you're coming away with fully human, fully God. There are some fun questions for us to debate, like this one. If he was human, fully human, couldn't Christ then have sinned? Couldn't he have sinned? Could Christ have sinned? And I think to answer this, there's a real simple way to illustrate it.
• 16:57
  Christ had two natures, okay? Imagine his human nature being like this. This is aluminum foil, okay? And I'm gonna ask, oh, I was hoping that somebody tiny and cute would be sitting in the front. Sorry, Henry. Strikes one and two. You know, you can imagine, okay, if I were able to call up a tiny little human like this.
• 17:23
  and tell them, three-year-old little boy, like, hey, you can bend metal. I can? Yes. And then I hand them this. Yeah, of course I can bend this. Listen, aluminum foil, it is metal, right? If I had to bend it and crumple it, I mean, you can do whatever you want. This is our human nature. If you want to think of it this way, this is how much strength we have.
• 17:46
  This is the amount of strength that we have. This is why we sin so often. This is why it's easy. We're easy to break. We're easy to bend. We're easily pliable. Now, I had imagined in my head, a little three-year-old like this, and then saying, okay, let me get another piece of aluminum for your dad to bend. And I could pull out something like this. This is also aluminum, right? It's aluminum.
• 18:10
  but very different in its compound and structure, right? I mean, it makes sense. This is an aluminum baseball bat. Now, if you can imagine, this would be like the divine at nature. This is God's nature, not pliable, right? You ain't been in this. You could whack it on your knee as many times as you want. You are not gonna break this thing. It is unimmovable, okay? In the incarnation.
• 18:37
  Jesus, yes, had a human nature. Could this bend? Could this sin? Yes, we saw it in the garden. Adam and Eve sinned. Yes. But if you took this and you fused it together with his divine nature and then said, okay, now I want you to break that human nature. I want you to bend this, right? Now fused it together. There's no way you're bending it. Everybody follow that? Can Jesus have sinned? Could Jesus sin? No.
• 19:08
  We say in his human nature, but he didn't just have a human nature. That human nature, that aluminum foil was fused to the strength of the divine. Could he have sinned? No, he could not have sinned. Well, you say, okay, then what about, you take that the next step, then were his temptations that big a deal then? If he couldn't sin, then were the temptations real? Yes, yes.
• 19:37
  You know, the proof of and severity of a temptation is not reliant upon the indulgence in that sin. Anybody follow that? Let me ask you, has there ever been a time where you have been tempted, really tempted, and you succeeded? You had victory over that temptation. Was there ever a time where you're like, I didn't indulge. I said no to my flesh.
• 20:04
  My flesh wanted it, and I said, no. Has there ever been a time where you had victory over that? Let me ask you at the end of that. Was that temptation real? Yeah, it was real, but you didn't sin. Well, no. The indulgence in the sin, right, doesn't determine the severity or genuineness of that temptation. In fact, I even think that Christ may have experienced temptation to a greater degree than we did.
• 20:33
  Because when we are tempted and indulge in sin, at least for a moment there is a release, right? There is a satisfaction, at least it's very temporary most of the time, but there's at least our flesh giving in and saying, okay, I'm going to leave you alone for a little while. Christ didn't get that, right? Never did he cave, never. This onslaught of temptation combined with the fact that the enemy of our souls was...
• 21:03
  focused on him, trying to get him to fail. The whole time, I mean, honestly, I don't know that Lucifer himself has ever taken any time on me. You know, we always say this thing, you know, the devil made me do it, or the devil is tempting me, or the devil is... Man, I don't know. I don't even think he knows my name. Is my guess? There's no way. There are way bigger fish to fry than me. Maybe one of his, you know...
• 21:31
  52nd ranking privates in his little army. You know, that's probably who I get. And that's enough. I'm not asking for more. But right, does that follow? No, I don't think the indulging in the temptation or the caving into that temptation determines the genuineness. But he had these two natures, human and divine. And listen to Hebrews 5 in verse 8. It says, although he was a son,
• 21:59
  He learned obedience, this is talking about Jesus, through what he had suffered. Being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest. So why did he suffer? Because he was learning what it's like to be us. Hebrews chapter four and verse 15, for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect hasn't been tempted as we are.
• 22:29
  yet without sin. And so the Bible describes Jesus as our high priest. Jesus is our mediator. He is the go-between between us and God. And he learned, he's able to sympathize with our weakness because he was tempted. The Bible says in every way that we are, whatever way you are tempted, Jesus was tempted and he succeeded. Where we fail, he succeeded. That's first. That's part one, the incarnation. Now let's look at the incident.
• 23:00
  Pick up in verse 1. The incident before us, how did the incarnation look in the life of Jesus? Verse 39 had said that they went home to Nazareth. So that's where they lived. Verse 41 says his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover. Now the Old Testament describes three main Jewish festivals where every man in Israel was required to travel to Jerusalem and attend.
• 23:28
  One was the Feast of Pentecost, the Feast of First Fruits. Another was the Feast of Tabernacles, where Jewish families would set up and then live in, for a short time, tents to remember the wilderness wanderings, but also to commemorate the dwelling of the presence of God with man. That was Tabernacles. The third was the Passover, immediately succeeded by the seven-day festival known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
• 23:58
  From Egypt, the lambs being slain, the blood causing the destroying angel in Egypt to pass over each of those faithful Jewish houses. Now, for these three festivals, only Jewish men were required to attend. The fact that Mary accompanied her family shows again her extraordinary religious devotion. Not all wives came, but she did. And notice first that Jesus is on the brink of adulthood.
• 24:29
  When this incident happens, look at verse 42. When he was 12 years old, they went up according to the custom. His age, being 12 years old, is important to note. He would have, as an adolescent young man, recently celebrated his bar mitzvah. Bar mitzvah literally means son of the law. Son, bar, mitzvot, son of the law, bar mitzvah. Young ladies also went through something similar called a bat.
• 25:01
  All right, a daughter of the law. And this coming of age party was had on a young man's 12th or 13th birthday. And it meant that from that moment forward, he would have been considered a man. He would have been responsible for his own actions. He would have begun learning a trade, probably carpentry is my guess, right? His dad was a carpenter. Would have been expected in his community to contribute as a man.
• 25:29
  There was no teen years. There was no guessing. Am I a man? Am I a boy? I'm 12 and whatever. I want to be treated like a man, but if I commit a crime, I'm tried like a boy. There was none of that. Before bar mitzvah, you're a boy. After bar mitzvah, you're a man. You're expected to act like one. That's the cultural background. But now put yourself in Joseph and Mary's place. Their firstborn son was becoming a man. I have been tempted to think at times as I've...
• 25:58
  just confess that Joseph and Mary must have been the worst parents on earth. They lose their son, also the son of God, and they don't notice for three days until I put myself in their shoes. Communities at this time, when this says that Joseph and Mary went to Jerusalem to offer their sacrifice at Passover, it wasn't just Joseph and Mary. The entire city of Nazareth would have traveled, right? I mean, all of them have to go. And so you can imagine a massive group of people traveling together. There are these...
• 26:28
  pass over pilgrims traveling by the thousands from all over Israel. Oftentimes what they would do, and this makes sense, is put the women and the children together, right, in one big ball. Some of the men would travel in the front, some of the men would travel in the back for security and safety, right? We do the same thing here at the church. Nobody knows, nobody really pays attention, but there's always somebody whose job it is
• 26:54
  to make sure the good people are okay and the bad people stay out. There's somebody right now whose job it is to make sure that happens. They're not wearing uniforms. There's none of that stuff, right? But if a bad guy comes in, there is a system in place, right? And we don't choose the little girls like you're our security detail, right? No, we choose the big guys who you don't want to roll around on the ground with.
• 27:20
  All right? That's what we do, and that makes sense. Well, the same thing there. As they're making this three-, four-, five-day journey, the women and children are typically balled together, the men in front and back. Now, Jesus has just recently celebrated his bar mitzvah. So who does he walk with? Well, the men. Joseph looks around, and he's like, I don't see Jesus. Ah, it's all right, buddy. One more year.
• 27:46
  You know, it's not a big deal hanging out with mom. Mary looking around, doesn't see Jesus. You can imagine her mindset. My little baby is all grown up. She, you know, he's up with dad. Dad assumes he's with mom. That's all right. He's just celebrated his birthday. Not a big deal. We can wait one more year. Her looking around and running through the baby scrapbook.
• 28:07
  As moms do, they do this every birthday. They're looking through the first year scrapbook. You can imagine Mary doing that. Little baby Jesus, he's gone. He's a big boy. He's up with dad. And dad's saying, ah, that's all right. Another year isn't going to be that big a deal. Poor little dude. You know, by the time they get to Jerusalem, the temple courts were even broken up.
• 28:36
  The temple mount was a massive patio. Up to 50,000, 60,000 people could fit on top of this thing. Then the temple building itself was divided so that there was an outer court called the court of women where women and children were allowed to go. Then the court of Israel where only the men were allowed to go. So even during the sacrificing, you can imagine Joseph looking around for Jesus. Where is he? That's okay. Too scared to come in?
• 29:01
  intimidated by all of these guys that are massive. You can imagine a 12-year-old boy might be intimidated by that, right? Okay, that's all right. He can hang out with mom outside one more year. That's okay. So it makes sense as you begin to put it in that context, how as the group has now offered their sacrifice and then gathered back up and begins to travel home, they get a day out. Now suddenly everybody's linking up. Families are getting together. They're pitching their tents for the first night.
• 29:28
  And Joseph and Mary find each other. Where's Jesus? I thought he was with you. I thought he was with you. Where is he? We left him, right? I mean, they're just going white and turning around and running back. That's first. He was on the brink of adulthood. But notice, his attention was especially focused. You pick up in verse 42. And when he was 12 years old, it says, they went up according to the custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. Notice, this was not a mistake.
• 29:58
  He stayed. He didn't get lost. He didn't misplace his parents. He stayed. His parents didn't know it, but supposing him to be in the group, they went a day's journey and then began to search for him among their relatives and acquaintances. When they didn't find him, they returned to Jerusalem searching for him. Now here is this special focus of Jesus. After three days, they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding.
• 30:27
  And his answers, what do they find him doing? I can only imagine that now that Jesus was a man, his parents had probably begun to explain in greater detail about the Passover. His parents knew exactly who he was, exactly why he came. But as he grows, they're probably revealing a little more and a little more and a little more. And as they're doing family devotions, you can imagine reading through your Old Testament and family devotions and realize it's your own son that all of these verses are talking about.
• 30:57
  So you get to Isaiah 53, and by his stripes, we are healed. You can imagine now he's just had his bar mitzvah and Joseph telling Mary, it's probably time for us to tell him what all of this means. The lamb of God, he will be the lamb of God who will take away the sin of the world and him revealing that. Buddy, listen, this time when we go to Jerusalem and you see all of those lambs, he begins to explain it. And now suddenly the mind of Jesus is just...
• 31:28
  It's me. I'm going to do that. I'm going to be the sacrifice. You can imagine questions. His mind is spinning. Questions beginning to formulate in his young brain. Imagine him beginning to connect those dots for the first time as he's seeing these lambs slain. His staying behind was not an act of disobedience, but instead a marked shift in his position in his home and in his relationship with his parents.
• 31:57
  Verse 51 says that he returned to Nazareth and was submissive to them. So it's not like he's rebelling against his parents, but there was something different from this day forward. It changed the nature of their parenting even. It says that they found him sitting among the teachers, listening and asking questions among the teachers. You know, after this incident, only one other time does Luke use the word teacher to refer to someone other than Jesus. This incident changed.
• 32:28
  who the teachers were. He calls them teachers and Jesus the student until after this incident. Then Jesus is the teacher and everybody else pay attention. Says all who heard it were amazed. They had encountered a perfect and sinless prodigy. That he was full of wisdom, the text says. And here he puts that wisdom on display. This would not be the last time that Jesus' teaching would elicit wonder.
• 32:54
  At least a dozen times in this gospel, people's responses to Jesus' teaching is described as amazed or astonished. So you had a special focus, notice last. Jesus, for the first time, I think understood exactly what his mission was. You pick up in verse 48. When his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, son, why have you treated us so?
• 33:16
  Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress. And he said to them, why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my father's house? And they didn't understand the saying that he spoke to them. This is the first time in scripture that any individual claimed God to be their personal father.
• 33:36
  Throughout the Old Testament, we know the Jews had claimed God as Father in the creative sense. He is our source. He's the one who made us and therefore is our Father. But no one had ever had the audacity to claim the God of heaven as their Father in a personal, intimate sense as Jesus was doing here. And it would not be the last time Jesus would do this. In John chapter 5, he said the same thing and the people tried to kill him because he was making himself equal to God.
• 34:01
  John 6, the same thing. God is my Father. John 8, the same thing. God is my Father. Again, in John 8, they try to kill Him. John 10, I and the Father are one. And again, they try to kill Him. In fact, it was Jesus' claim to be the Son of God more than anything else that agitated His enemies to the point that they demanded His execution. John 19.
• 34:27
  It says, Pilate went out again and said to them, see, I'm bringing him out to you so that you may know that I find no guilt in him. So Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And Pilate said to them, behold, the man, the chief priest, the officer saw him. They cried out, crucify him, crucify him. Pilate said to them, take him yourselves and crucify him. I find no guilt in him. But the Jews answered, we have a law. And according to that law, he ought to die because he has made himself.
• 34:57
  the Son of God. He has claimed God as his Father. We find in our text this morning that Jesus' mission had suddenly become clear and articulated in his own mind and words. He would become the Passover Lamb, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And here is kind of a thought to take away. Jesus says in this moment that he understood his mission. He says in this moment that he accepts his mission.
• 35:30
  There was no, there's got to be some mistake. His only response for the remainder of his life would be, my father is in the business of saving souls and making disciples. And I am about my father's business. And the question I have this morning, what we can think about and really reflect on this week is, are we, are we in the same business? Our heavenly father is in the business of saving souls and making disciples. And he has commissioned us in Matthew 28 to do the same thing, save souls and make disciples.
• 36:03
  He was in his father's business and I would encourage us to be as well the business of our father. God, thank you for this morning. Thank you for this text. God, thank you for this remarkable story in the life of Christ. And God, I pray we would take up that challenge to be about our father's business, to win others to the gospel and then disciple them, teaching them and baptizing them. God, thank you for including us in this mission.
• 36:32
  God, there is no mistake. There's no mistake. There was no mistake then. There is no mistake now. There's no mistake why people are here, what we're doing here. God, we want to be about your business and in your house. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.