Luke 5:16-17; A Hole in the Roof (Part 1)

Luke chapter four. There I did it again. It's Luke

chapter five. Luke chapter five. Today we're just gonna look

at verses sixteen and seventeen. So the and I'm calling

this a Hole in the Roof part one because we're

going to do the story of the four friends and

the hole in the roof and all that. But this piece,

Luke gives us this lovely transition between what happened with

the leper in a certain city, and then we have

this little interlude sort of that sets up for us

the next the next event, which is Jesus teaching in

the house. So today we're just going to look at

sixteen and seventeen here in Luke chapter five. And if

you have trouble seeing your Bible, you can use the

flashlight on your phone if you want to, or whatever

you need to see it. So why don't we just

read verses sixteen and seventeen and then I'll make a

few remarks. And he withdrew himself into the wilderness and prayed.

And it came to pass on a certain day as

he was teaching, that there were pharisees and doctors of

the law sitting by which were come out of every

town of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem, and the power

of the Lord was present to heal them. Father, that

you would open the rock today, that you would blow

through the hall today, that you would ignite hearts today, Father,

that we might hear your voice today. Give me unctions

a preach for a praying Jesus' name. Amen. So you'll

notice there verse sixteen, and you see the little transition

that Luke gives us. Jesus has just cleansed the leper

there in twelve through fifteen, and then it says in

sixteen and he withdrew himself into the wilderness and prayed.

First thing I want you to notice here is this

language he withdrew himself. Here we have the second time

that Jesus retreats to the wilderness for prayer, peace and quiet. Now,

the other occasion was in chapter four, verse forty two,

after lunch at Simon's house and the healing at Simon's

door that night, and he gets up the next morning

and he goes off by himself. And I'm sure I

remarked at that time that he goes off for prayer,

because that's what he's always doing. And Luke is very

careful to get us these moments when Jesus retreats, very careful.

Luke is on the job. When it comes to showing

us Jesus going off for prayer. We're going to see

a lot of those. We'll see another one, I think

is in chapter six, and then there's another one in

chapter nine and so forth. That Luke's always mentioning that

which is so important. Notice that he noticed the language here.

He withdrew himself. No one had to tell him. Jesus

made this a priority. Now, Remember who we're talking about here.

This is the king of kings. He's a servant now

because he's taken on the form of a servant and

being made man. But he needs this, and he knows

he needs this because of his humanity. He needs this,

He needs the moment to get away. Jesus made this

a priority. He withdrew himself. And if our savior needs this,

how much more do we need this? What can you

stop doing and reapply those minutes to withdrawal and prayer.

Remember that Jesus taught us I am the vine. You

are the branches. He that abideth in me, and I

and him the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me,

you can do nothing. Well, if you look at any

of our lives, including this preacher's life, what the testimony

would be is I can do a lot of things.

You know. I'm self confident, so are you. You just

look at how we conduct ourselves and we think we've

got it all figured out. Jesus tells us the complete opposite.

Without me, you can do nothing. So why is it

that we sacrifice our time with him for the vanity

of our own busyness. I'll just put it that way.

We need to ask him to give us the strength

to withdraw, because you know what I found out. I

found out that my busyness is addicting, like a drug.

I'm addicted to my busyness. I'm addicted to the noise.

I'm addicted to my lists that I make. I'm addicted

to all those things. And it's very difficult to pull

myself aside from that. And even when I pull myself

aside from that, guess what I'm thinking about all my busyness.

Jesus withdrew himself. He knew he needed, that his flesh

needed that he needed time away. I mean, how exhausting

would it have been? I mean, you just look there

at verse fourteen. Well in fifteen there in chapter five,

so much more went out there of fame abroad of him,

and great multitudes came together to hear and to be

healed by him of their infirmities. He must have been exhausted.

He needed this. Friends, you do too, And the great

multitudes aren't coming and knocking at your door and asking

you to do a healing work for them and to

teach them the gospel. But guess what, all the things

that you're doing that God has put into your hand,

that He has given you to oversee, do you too

not need to withdraw yourself for prayer and quiet? I

asked that rhetorically he withdrew himself, and it says he

went into the wilderness. Now, wilderness suggests a place that

is devoid of things. It's barren, no one around, a

place of focus. Doesn't mean that it has to be desert.

We talked about that before, when the spirit drove him

into the desert. Desert just means there's nobody else. There

could have been green and lush, it could still be

deserted of people. This wilderness is the same idea, no

one's there around. It's a place where he can focus.

And you know what, in our current world, it's hard

to be still and know that He is God. We

have too many things turned on, don't we. Yeah. A

wilderness place is hard to find in the suburbs. A

wilderness place is hard to find in the city. A

wilderness place is hard to find in the country. Not

because we can't find a spot where there's nobody else.

It's just because wilderness really has to exist in our heart.

We can find wilderness, but we have to be willing

to turn some things off. We have to make one

in our home, a wilderness in our home, or somewhere

within the place of our orbit somewhere, or that we

go some place where we can get away and just

be with him. We must turn off and allow the

Word of God to speak and make an appointment with

the Throne of Grace. And it must be the appointment

of your day every day that you're not going to

compromise on it. It's going to be the thing you

do every day, an appointment with the Throne of Grace.

And I don't think that we can make too much

of this. Actually, we are so starved of quiet time

with the Lord. Our weaknesses our lack of strength is

in part due to the paper thin nature of our devotion.

Jesus didn't have that problem because Jesus withdrew himself into

the wilderness. And what did he do there? Right? He prayed.

Sometimes we retreat, but we fill the time with everything

but prayer. Remember who Christ is. He's the prophet, priest

and king of our mediation. Yet he needed to commune

with his father. Dear Christian friend, so do you how

much more do you need to pray? If Jesus needed to?

So do you, and so do I. Yet sometimes when

we go to pray, we simply don't have the words

to pray. I'm sure you've experienced that I have two.

But when that's the case, I encourage you to pray

from the Bible. Pray the Bible's prayers. Look to the psalms.

The psalms are an easy go to when you just

don't what to say, look to the psalms. Take, for example,

Psalm five is a starting point. That's just a great

psalm is in general, it's a good Psalm, and it's

a wonderful prayer. Just pray Psalm five. And when you

begin to pray Psalm five, you'll you'll engage the Holy

Spirit because you're praying the Word of God, and suddenly

you'll realize that a moment ago you couldn't think of

what to say. Now suddenly you have all kinds of

things to say because the Word of God has generated

something in your heart. If you're wrestling with sin, here's

another psalm. Pray Psalm six. They're just right there together.

If you're wrestling with sin. If you've committed a transgression

and you need to confess it, go to Psalm six,

go to Psalm fifty one. Pray those psalms. Are you

struggling against disappointment, pray Psalm thirteen. Psalm thirteen is a

great one when and when struggling against disappointment? Do you

want to know what happens when you pray? Read Psalm eighteen.

It'll tell you that when you pray, God comes down

in battle array to answer your prayer. It's a great

encouragement for prayer. It's also another good prayer to pray.

The Holy Spirit will speak to your heart. Is the

Word of God has read. Meditation happens when you're reading

and praying it out loud for yourself. When you're inserting

your specific requests into the words of the psalmists, and

all the wonderful effects of contemplation then will just fill

your heart. If you need a little help with that,

I recommend this book. It's called Praying the Bible. This

is by doctor Donald Whitney. Doctor Whitney was one of

my professors. As a matter of fact, Donald Whitney wrote

the outline for the program that I graduated from in

twenty nineteen, one of my professors, and he wrote this book,

Praying the Bible. It's you know, you can see how

little it is. It's just a little thing, a nice

little handbook to keep around. Has a scripture index in there,

his notes, and then it has just you know, probably

eighty ninety pages of texts that you can just read.

You can read this in an afternoon. It's really good.

It's nice help and it's important. As I said, I

don't think we can make too much of this. The

need for the church today to pray. So the decision

of Christ to withdraw himself into the wilderness is something

that again we can say, how much more do we

need to withdraw ourselves into the wilderness and pray as well?

That's his decision. The subject of his prayer is found

there in the next verse, in verse seventeen. And it

came to pass on a certain day, he says there

as he was teaching that there were pharisees and doctors

of the law sitting by, which will come out of

every town of Galilee and of Judea and Jerusalem, and

the power of the Lord was present to heal them.

Notice the first little thing it says there, it came

to pass on a certain day, a certain day. Remember,

in the previous passage in twelve through fifteen, he was

in a certain city, but we don't know which city,

because that's not the focus of the passage. The focus

of the passage was the mercy of Christ on the

leper and the leper's healing and all that happened, all

that transpired with that. So here we have a certain day.

Well we don't know what day it is. This wasn't

probably wasn't a special day, wasn't a Sabbath day. As

far as we know. It was just an ordinary day

with ordinary things happening. Jesus needed to withdraw and to

pray so that he could be ready for the regular

pull of his regular day. He didn't pray because it

was a special day to get ready for a special day.

He was out in the wilderness praying because he had

another day to go and he needed God's power for

that day. Sometimes we pray for the big events of life,

but we missed the blessing of praying for the mundane,

the regular, the unremarkable events unremarkable to us, for it's

in the regular events of living where we see the

hand of God most clearly. And he was teaching, it

says there in verse seventeen, and that there were pharisees

and doctors of the law sitting by. Notice that we

have Jesus' prayer list before us. He was in the

wilderness praying. Who do you think he was praying for.

He knew about the ordinary day, he's praying for that.

He knew about the fact that he would be teaching.

He's praying about that. He knew you who would be

in his audience that day, so he's praying about that.

He knew how far they had to travel, so he's

praying for that, for their travel to get there. He

placed all of these things in the hand of his father,

and I'm sure so many other things that he was

praying because he was praying about a regular day, and

you know, every regular day is just full of lots

of things. He was praying for wisdom, for teaching, patience, insight,

salvation for the hearers, that God his Father would oversee

the ordinary events of that day, and safety for the

ones traveling to hear him. How precious our Savior is,

how gracious to receive us, even when, like the Pharisees,

we come with contrary motives. And Jesus was praying, He's

praying for them. These are the subjects of his prayer,

no doubt, in the wilderness. And they were come, it says,

out of every town of Galilee, Judea, and Jerusalem. Now

these are Pharisees and doctors of the law, and these

men have come and noticed, it says, Galilee, Judea, Jerusalem,

every town of Galilee, Judea. That's a lot of towns.

So if you had one pharisee or doctor of the

law coming from all of these towns in Galilee and Judea,

and you have the group that came from Jerusalem, no doubt,

from the Temple itself, emissaries from the High Priest. All

of these converging somewhere in Galilee, somewhere in a house,

and Jesus is praying for them. Not only is Jesus

teaching and preaching in the towns and villages of Galilee,

but now they're all coming to him. The message was

spreading and multiplication was happening, and Jesus was praying for

all of it. And then we have the benefit of

his prayer. It says in the power of the Lord

was present to heal them. The power of the Lord

was present. Who needed the power of the Lord to

be present. The Pharisees and the doctors of the Law

needed that power. His teaching was filled with it. And

we've seen since the baptism the Holy Spirit came upon Jesus,

and he was full of the spirit, and he came

out of the temptation of the wilderness, as Luke tells us,

full of the Spirit of God. And we've seen the

Spirit of God working through him from the moment he

set down in that synagogue to read Isaiah sixty one,

it's been for Luke's telling of the Gospel, it's been

nothing but the power of the Spirit of God. In

here we see that the power of the Lord was present,

and we say, well, yeah, you know, like the kidd

o say, duh, of course it was because Jesus is there.

He's the one teaching. So yeah, the power of the

Lord is present to heal. But I think there's something

more than that, because Luke records it for us. I

think the power of the Lord was present because Jesus

went into the wilderness and prayed. And who did he

pray for. He prayed for these pharisees and doctors of

the law because he knew they would be there, and

he wanted them to have exactly what they needed, his

teaching full of the power of the Lord, full of

the Holy Ghost. We've already seen the amazement that the

people had for his teaching there in chapter four, and

in thirty six and thirty seven. They were all amazed,

Luke tells us, and spake among themselves saying, what a

word is this? For with authority and power he commanded

the unclean spirits, and they come out, and the fame

of him went out into every place of the country

round about. So his power has created a fame which

now has attracted all these pharisees and the doctors of

the Law to hear Jesus because they want to find

out who he is and what it is exactly that

he's teaching the people. They want to make sure it's okay.

He says. The power of the Lord was present to

heal them. What healing did they need? They weren't sick

in body, at least we don't know that they were.

We probably imagine in our mind's eye the pharisees in

their clerical robes, and the doctors of the law with

their funny hats and you know, the phylacteries and all

the rest. We don't imagine a group of sick people

sitting before Jesus in this instance. No, these were the

doctors of the law. These were the sharpest minds of

that day. What healing they needed was a healing from

sin and from their own iniquities, and from their awful pride.

It is for pride to fill a man because he's

he has a trained intellect. You know, I've been around

a lot of men who are very proud about how

smart they are. Surely these guys had that as well.

It's a it's an easy thing to be proud of,

and yet pride is so insidious that even a man

who is simple and untrained can think he's better than

another because of his experience, his family, his place of birth, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

We build pride on the foundation of lots of sandy things,

and don't think for a moment that you're you escape it.

So healing here is not a sickness. Healing here is

a sickness of heart. It's a sin problem. And what

was their sin problem? Well, we know we can assume

some things about them, as we have, but was it healed?

Was it healed? Well, we're not told that it was healed.

We don't hear the whistling of the Holy Spirit through

their hearts like we did with Peter, and like we

did with the Leper. It is possible to sit before Christ,

you know, not be changed when the spirit of God

does not give faith to believe. What an awful moment

this is, because the power of the Lord is present

to heal them, and yet we don't see it happen.

A wasted moment for them. However, we're about to see

a man transformed, and you know, there comes the four

with the one on the couch, and we're going to

see something marvelous. I'm going to save that for next week.

But what about these guys, Well, this just shows us

the corrupting nature of sin because they are unable to

see who Jesus was. They are unable to understand that

the power of the Lord is present there to heal them.

The Spirit of God has not given them faith to believe,

and so the moment when the power of the Lord

is present and they're seated there before Christ, they do

nothing about it because they cannot. However, we're about to

see a man transformed. He will be the beneficiary of

the power of the Lord present, not only to heal,

but to forgive sins. So how do we apply just

this little piece here? Number one? And I think probably

the most important prayer for the Christian. This is your job.

There is no other job. You do that first, and

everything else falls in place. Pray. No matter how thin

your prayer life is, right now, you can improve it.

No matter how thick your prayer life is. Right now,

you can improve it. And I challenge you to do

that because that is your first duty as a believer.

Pray And you say, Pastor, I don't know how well.

I just gave you some ideas. Go to the Psalms,

get down on your knees, open up Psalm five and

pray it, Psalm six, pray it, just pray the words,

and suddenly it'll all just appear before you. The spirit

of God will take the word of God, apply it

to your heart. Meditation will happen. Contemplation comes next, and

suddenly your praying and you don't know where the time went.

Do that, do it and pray for the benefit of others.

There are so many we can pray for, so many lost.

You know them, you know who they are, you know

their names. How about this, how about you take them

to Christ in prayer. So many names. You don't need

to try to gen something up for prayer. You know

people that are lost who need to know Jesus. You

know people that are sick who are also lost, and

they're on our deathbed, and you need to pray for

them as well. This is one way to apply it.

The other way is that, ladies and gentlemen, we need

to be teaching the word of God. We need to

be witnessing for Christ because there are many seated before

us who have not yet heard the Gospel. I mean

heard it, heard it, heard it with the heart, and

when the Spirit of God comes and gives them faith,

suddenly they'll receive. This is the word of the Lord

to us today. Father, help us walk with us. Help

us to just as Jesus did, withdraw ourselves into the wilderness,

and pray for our ordinary days, for our regular events.

Help us to pray, Father, for our witness and for

those who will hear it. Help us to pray for

those who are about us, related to us, in our

circle of friends, in our orbits, Father, that we might

pray for them and ask the Lord for salvation for them,

no matter where they are. We're grateful today, Father that

we were able to pray for that young man in

Louisiana and that church there, and Lord we just asked

that you had bless them again today on this Father,

make this word real to us today before we pray

in Jesus' name, Amen Laar is going to come and

lead us. Mhm.