Luke 6:20-49 - The Way of Jesus

Well, church, as I said, we are in this passage in Luke.

Before, when we were in Luke, we were a large chunk of all of chapter 5 and up to where we're at in chapter 6, so through verse 19 of 6, we're seeing this pattern of Christ, that he is a king who heals, and he's a king who can transform, and he is a king worth following.

And then here we get into in Luke 6, Jesus teaching his disciples.

You know, one of the phrases that you hear from the book of Ecclesiastes, and you hear a lot from people, is that there's nothing new under the sun.

And it's true.

Sometimes we think things are novel or new, unique.

Scripture reveals that nothing's new, and then when you kind of watch something unfold long enough, you realize, man, there's nothing new.

People's hearts are still depraved.

People's desires, although they might be good, still have part of them that are selfish.

There's nothing new.

So when Jesus starts teaching his disciples, he wasn't really teaching them something new, but he was teaching them something that was upending, in a sense, revolutionary.

It flipped the script.

It was a 180, if you will, for the people.

For the cultural ideas and the practice of the day was religiosity, law-keeping.

Jesus came to reveal that we're not made or created to keep law, we're created to worship.

And worship, lawkeeping, excuse me, is what happens as a byproduct of us worshiping God.

A lot of times how we approach a passage, like when we just, how we how we're going to approach a text, reveals.

Do we want to learn something new?

Do we want God, Holy Spirit, through God's Word to reveal and convict?

Or are we here to have our own thoughts and ideas just continued to be affirmed?

Have we made peace with certain sin in our life, certain areas of weakness?

We just kind of made peace with those things.

And so our approach to the text is going to allow us to not be too convicted over things, not be too deterred, but rather we're going to hold to the parts of the text that we kind of like and they make us feel good, and the parts that don't, we'll acknowledge they're there in their scripture.

But we won't let them convict.

We won't let them have our way with us.

So how we approach this passage this morning, and as Brother Dave read, this is a long, lengthy passage with lots in it.

So my question for you is what will you do with all these verses that instruct, that flip the script?

We're not Jews in first century Jerusalem, but our hearts have the same tendencies as theirs did.

To make things about us, to justify ourselves, to take what God has given us and not worship Him as we should, but to find ways where we can affirm ourselves, encourage ourselves that we're not doing too bad, and we're actually better than most people.

Actually, shame on most people.

They should be better.

Thankfully, we're not like that.

So our heart is the same.

And Christ has come to reveal.

And this teaching does that.

It's a sort of test.

So we're heading into the spring.

We're in the spring, a lot of tests going on, finals, and all these papers and all these things.

This testing of what do you know?

Where are you at?

It reveals the heart.

Here's a little insider information.

Nobody aces this test.

That's why we need Jesus Christ.

In this passage this morning, Jesus reveals kind of two primary things: the way of the kingdom and the way of the world.

The way of the kingdom and the way of the world.

And he does this by walking through how we view our situation, how we view others, and then begin kind of two examples or two tests, if you will.

So we begin with how we view our situation.

Again, the way of Jesus is very different than the world.

And this shouldn't surprise us.

If you've been a Christian or around Christians or you understand anything of the Bible, it's pretty different than what we're called to, but it is challenging.

It's hard.

We, even as Christians, have this vision of how we think life's going to go.

We're going to grow up, we're going to go to school, this kind of school, study this thing, we're going to fall in love with this kind of person, and we're going to have these kinds of kids, and we're going to work this kind of job.

And it's, you know, we have a vision.

We know it's going to be hard and all those things, but we have this vision.

And even in that, Jesus kindly, mercifully comes in and reorients our hearts and our thinking on these things.

Look with me in verse 20.

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples and said, Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.

Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil on account of the nay of the Son of Man.

Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven.

For so their fathers did to the prophets.

Verse twenty four, but woe to you who are rich, for you have received consolation.

You have received your consolation.

Woe to you who are a fool now, for you shall be hungry.

Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.

Woe to you when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.

There's a word of warning here in these verses.

We see the blessed blessings.

Blessed are you whether you're poor, you're hungry, and you weep, when people hate you.

But woe to you when you're rich, you're full, and you laugh.

People speak well of you.

And then there's kind of two reactions we can have to this text.

Again, what's our approach?

We can approach it and say, yes, well, the world doesn't love me, and so that's okay, and I don't have that much money, so I'm doing okay, and I laugh, but I definitely, there's hard things.

I'm not just looking for entertainment.

And we can kind of check the box and move on.

Good thing we're okay with that.

The other approach could be that we read this and we think, well, I live in America, of course I'm rich.

Nobody dies of hunger anymore in our country, so we're full.

We mourn, but not that much.

We don't really see death anymore.

We go to nursing or we go to funeral homes.

We don't see death away, we don't see the darkness of it.

We weep some, but we're quick within a few days or even hours to go to some kind of entertainment to distract us.

I must be someone who falls in the woe category.

I must be destined for whatever woe brings, this destruction.

The Lord is revealing our situation.

As followers of Christ, the blessings are not the riches.

The blessings are not the fullness or the joy or the laughing, the good times, or when everyone likes you.

If that's going on, woe to you.

And Christ isn't saying you're an unbeliever, but he's reorienting the very pattern and thinking of his disciples.

Some commentators differ if this is just Luke's account on the Sermon on the Mount, or if this was a completely different setting.

J.C.

Ryle makes the argument that this is actually a different setting.

This is Jesus just with his disciples, teaching them these things.

Either way, he's revealing to them how they should be thinking.

And as Christians, we too should be shaped by this.

So our thinking about the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of the ways of the world or the way of the kingdom, well, we look at verses 20 through 26.

Are we looking for as for these kinds of blessings?

Hey, we don't have much, but praise the Lord.

For ours is the kingdom of heaven.

Not even that we will have eternity with God one day, or that we will be made perfect one day, but even here and now in this life, blessed are us that because we are in his kingdom now, this day.

To those who proclaim to be teachers of the law.

Blessed are you when all these things happen to you, when they revile you, when they count your name as evil because of the Son of Man, rejoice, leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for so their fathers did to the prophets.

And then likewise at the end of verse 26.

Woe to you when they speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.

And how easy it is for us to chase after man's affirmation.

Affirm affirmation from people who do not love God, they're not following the ways of God.

Now I want to encourage you.

I don't think most of us are going throughout our days trying to find people to affirm us who are pagans, who hate God.

But yet we do want people's approval.

We do want their pat on the back.

We do want to be liked.

We do want to be affirmed by people.

So Jesus is revealing to us our situation and how we should be thinking about the things of the kingdom.

Not going after the things of the world, but reorienting our think our thinking so that we go after Christ.

We understand eternity that we are just passing through.

Then he goes after our view of others.

This is the next thing that gets revealed, our view of others.

Are we loving our enemies?

This whole all this text from verse 26 through 30, sorry, 27 through 36.

But bless those who curse you.

To one who strikes you, turn the other cheek.

To one who takes this thing, give them more.

Verse 32, look down in your Bibles.

Verse 32.

If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you?

For even sinners love those who love them.

And just think about that for a moment.

Just keep your eyes on verse 32.

Don't let your discomfort take you and try to justify yourself and just say, Is am I doing am I living this out?

Am I loving those who are against me?

And I don't, Jesus isn't just saying, are you acting kind to these people?

And you might think, well, I don't have enemies.

Like I don't have people out trying to beat me up or trying to kill me.

I don't have enemies.

I just encourage you, you do have people in your life, whether you know them personally or you watch them on the news, that you don't like.

That when you hear them talk and you hear their ideas that repulse you.

Maybe because they're anti-God and they hate God.

But Jesus is saying, Do you love them?

Sure, you can love people that love you.

Big deal.

You love your siblings, you love your parents, you love your friends.

Big deal.

Of course you love them.

Sinners do that.

What's the difference?

What's going on in your heart with those people that you are against, or those people who are against you?

The people who hate Christians, the people who want to hold high the right to abort your child, or who think it's okay that you can change your genders or try to change your genders.

What's your heart toward those people?

Do you love them?

The dialogue going on in your mind, the things you're not saying, but the feelings in your heart isn't to love them.

Because that's what you're called to do.

Don't try to get out of this.

And I just want to say, I'm preaching this to myself as I'm preaching it to you.

This is not a thing that is easy for us.

Verse 35.

Love your enemies and do good and lend expecting nothing in return.

And your reward will be great and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and evil.

Be merciful, even as your father is merciful.

And I just want to tell you and me, if you're struggling with loving your enemies, if this is something that you just you can't even hardly even get on board with it, you were God's enemy.

He has been merciful to you.

So do not think it's okay for God to show me mercy.

I was somehow worthy of God's mercy, but this brother or this person is not worthy of me showing them mercy.

For the Most High, God, holy, righteous, just in all that he does, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.

There isn't a person here who is just crushing this, who's, yeah, I figured out how to love ungrateful people.

And I love how to I learned how to be merciful to people who are evil.

No, there's something in us that is repulsed by evil things and ungrateful people.

And I'm not here to say that you have to do away with all that.

There's something in us that we we want to worship what's good and right and true.

Right?

And that's Christ.

Not us.

But God has come to us.

And how often, still, in our walking with the Lord, we are ungrateful.

How often are you ungrateful for what the Lord has given you?

But Christ has been merciful.

The Father has been merciful to us.

So we are merciful to others.

I'm not saying this is new information.

I'm not saying this is easy.

But this is what Christ has called us to.

And so he's teaching his disciples, he's teaching us the ways of the kingdom.

And we so we struggle, we contend, we encourage.

I mean, what area of our life do we need more encouragement from our brothers and sisters in Christ than to love hard, ungrateful, evil people?

I mean, I can't think of an area in my life where I need other people to come and remind me to keep loving ungrateful, evil people.

Not because they're worthy in and of themselves.

And not because I want some kind of pat on the back.

But because it's really, really hard.

But this is what Christ has called us to.

So there's this loving our enemies, and then there's humility about how we're going to judge others.

Verse 37 is probably one of the most misquoted passages in the New Testament in our day and age.

Judge not and you will not be judged.

Condemn not and you will not be condemned.

Forgive and you will be forgiven.

Verse 38 Give and it will be given to you.

Good, good pressure, good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap.

For with the measure you use it, it will be measured back to you.

Again, we can really miss this on either side.

Hey, we're just not to judge.

It says literally, judge not, and then you won't be judged.

Don't do those things, don't condemn.

So there's that impulse.

And then the other impulse is no, we're supposed to judge, actually.

And so we're just gonna judge everyone.

And we're gonna judge them, and we're gonna hold them to standards that we don't follow, we're gonna hold them to standards that we don't even keep ourselves or even believe in.

We're just gonna judge everyone.

There's a warning about walking in humility.

That we are not to go around assuming we know everyone's heart, that we know what's going on in their lives.

For you are not the you are not the lawgiver.

You will not stand and hold your law and have all humanity judged against your law.

Now we are to make judgment calls according to God's word and say, brother and sister, we love you, but you're not living according to God's word.

So we'll let God's word do the judging, we'll let God's word speak.

And we're supposed to point to others and say, look what God's word says.

Now, are you living that?

Your defense should never be, only God can judge me.

It should never be your defense because he will judge you.

If your attitude is of pride and arrogance, as if God has no standard, as if God's standard is lower than everyone else's standard.

That he's gonna look at your life and just be like, yeah, I'm God.

I don't really judge people harshly, I don't have standards, do what you want, I don't care.

No, he will judge.

And our response is that as we prayed in our assurance of grace, we don't have fear of judgment to come because Christ has stood in our place.

He's taken our test for us.

And so our response isn't to go around and start judging all these other people, saying, Well, let me let me, here's my standard for you, here's my standard for you, meet those things.

About Jesus who has kept the law, who has passed the test, and who they will be judged by if they do not repent and turn and follow him.

This idea of a blind leading the blind.

How fitting does that feel in our day?

Just blind people following blind people.

And we say to one another, listen, I've made the law, I've made a standard for us.

Let's let's go and do it this way.

And you get enough people who have the same thought.

And they just kind of do their own thing.

They're not looking to God's word.

They're not repentant of their sin.

And you know this because what they're professing with their mouth and then the way they're living are completely different.

They're going around saying, listen, you have sin in your life, and you have this speck and you have this issue and this issue, and here the brother has a log in his own eye.

How is it that he can then help others or be a guide to others?

Christians, the danger that we have is that we can walk around as if we know everything and how we know how every single person is going to live.

And so we're just telling them, this thing you gotta live, this thing you gotta live, this thing you gotta live, but we're not living it.

We're calling everyone else to repent and follow Jesus, but we're not repentant.

We're prideful and arrogant.

Another danger we have, another misapproach to the text, is that we think, well, I can't find the log in my eye.

So how dare I just go and tell other people that they have something in their eye?

So one side, we're blinded by our legalistic, prideful arrogance.

Because we're telling everyone how to live and we're not living it.

On the other side, we're not telling anyone how to live.

Because we don't even, in our pride, we're just assuming we don't really know.

And so, how dare we tell other people how to live?

Both of these things are errors and make us blind.

First, we confess, we repent, we understand what Christ has done for us so that we can see clearly and help one another that they might see clearly as well.

So it's revealed to us what's our understanding of the kingdom of Christ?

What's our understanding of the king of the ways of this world?

Well, how do we view others?

How do we view our enemies?

How are we judging others?

Are we walking in?

And then we're given this these tests, if you will.

Look at verse 43.

For no good fruit bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit.

For each tree is known by its own fruit.

For figs are not gathered from the thorn bushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush.

The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.

This analogy of fruit, which is common here in Luke.

Are we bearing good fruit?

Are we bearing evil fruit?

What Jesus is getting after is is listen, you're one or the other.

You're not a bad tree who occasionally, every once in a while just happens to do a few good things and it bears some good fruit.

Likewise, you're not a good tree that produces good fruit, and then every once in a while, every now and again, some evil fruit just kind of slips out there.

What he's calling for is perfection and saying that you're either doing everything wrong all the time or you're doing everything right all the time.

But he's saying either our hearts are following and have been regenerated and made alive, and there is a pattern of good fruit producing in our life, or our hearts are unregenerate.

They're dead in our sin, and there's a pattern of evil being produced by our hearts.

And then there's this language of a house and a foundation.

Verse 46 Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not, and do not do what I tell you.

Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like.

He's like a man who builds a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock.

When a flood arose and the stream broke against the house, it could not shake it, because it had been built, and it had been well built.

But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built his house on the ground without a foundation.

When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great.

So this picture, this image of two houses, one's being built on the just the ground, no foundation.

One, the foundation is laid deep on the rock, it's tedious, it's great effort put into that second, the first house.

Well, you might say, well, I'm not sure what house I'm or what I'm doing.

Am I the house on the ground with no foundation, or am I the house that's kind of built a foundation?

What's going on?

And verse 46.

Are there more cunning words in the New Testament than verse 46?

Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I tell you?

How often in our lives we just go through the week.

Lord, Lord, I have a need.

Lord, Lord, help me figure this out.

Lord, Lord, can you help my spouse figure this out?

We do not do what he tells us to do.

We don't obey him.

We claim him as king, we call him our God and our savior, but we do not obey him.

Jesus is saying, listen, if you want that house laid with a strong foundation, then you've got to obey my words.

You must obey my words.

So here Jesus is again revealing to them the ways of the kingdom, the ways of Christ, and the ways of the world.

And how easy it is to let our pride get in the way.

And say, I'm gonna take this part of Jesus, the standards, the law, but I'm not gonna take the grace, the mercy that I've been shown because I'm not that bad.

You take the, I'm gonna love and be grateful and generous to those around me and those whom I like, but I'm not gonna be gracious and merciful and generous to those who are against me.

Sure, I'm willing to be not rich and not just out having a good time my whole life, but I'm not willing to be poor.

I'm not willing to be hungry.

I'm not willing to be someone whose life is filled with weeping and sorrow.

So, yes, God, I will follow you as long as it's this way.

A mix, part of the kingdom and part of what I also want.

Again, as Solomon said, nothing, there's nothing new under the sun.

Our hearts are prone to reject God.

And I don't mean fully.

Like few wholesale fully reject God, but we reject parts.

Just like the law, breaking it in part is breaking it in its entirety.

You take all of God or you take none of him.

And so we as Christians let God's word reveal to us our sin.

Lord, where is it that my pride, I just justify my sin?

Where is it that I have chosen comfort?

Be it this little thing in my life, I've carved out this little thing and it's just my comfort.

I'm not super rich and I'm not super uh joyful, I don't have all these great things.

But Lord, I I still have this thing and I'm looking to this.

Not willing to get rid of that for you.

Lord reveal do you let the Lord reveal to you your sin?

Do you let him convict?

Or does this all feel so familiar?

And the aim of the sermon this morning isn't that we just feel this great weight of like, well, I guess we're all sinners.

What are we gonna do about it?

No, but it's that we would not be people who say Lord, Lord, and do not do what he says.

You need this, I need this.

The continued, constant, ongoing reminder that he is Lord, Lord, and that we must follow him, walk in his ways.

You don't get to call him Lord, Lord, and then not follow him.

He isn't just an access point for you to get into a better life or have more prosperity.

Jesus said, Come and die.

That was the calling on your life and mine when he called us to him.

Lord willing, we're gonna continue in this passage going through these verses slower in the weeks to come.

And my aim this morning is that we understand that the way that we approach these texts determines so many things.

And we come in with pride.

Hey, this is great.

Don't judge.

Love your enemies, be generous, be okay if you're poor.

If you have some stuff, give it away, you know, all that stuff.

No, we want to come and let God's word and God's spirit reveal, turn.

So we must be a people who are diligent to remind one another, to not grow weary in doing good.

That we would say boldly to one another, How are you doing in your walk with Jesus?

How are you doing?

How's your relationship with God's word?

Is it stale?

Is it dry?

Is it convicting?

What's God teaching you?

And I know these are these are words and questions that can easily become this manipulated into this status conversation.

Who's more spiritual and who's following Jesus the right way?

But just because things can be used for bad things does not mean that we don't use them for good.

Graciously, lovingly calling one another, let's be faithful to follow Jesus.

Who are your enemies?

Like, what a great question to ask each other around the mealtime today.

Just a genuine, honest question.

And who do I feel like are the hardest people in my world, in my life to love?

Again, maybe it's specific people in your life.

Maybe it's people around you, but you don't see them very often or from afar.

Maybe it's people you've never met, but you you hear from them or you see them on TV or something like that.

But what a great question.

Just to be honest.

These are people in my life that I really struggle with loving.

Or how about the judgment?

Do you feel prone to lean heavy and just judging everyone according to your standard?

Or do you kind of do this apathetic?

Well, I don't judge anyone, but who am I to judge?

And the standards, I don't know, and just kind of wishy-washy, as if God hasn't given us his word.

Question, how are you doing at laying a solid foundation?

How are you doing at digging down?

Wrestling with hard theological questions, wrestling with who do you think God is?

Are we encouraging one another to dig down?

Are we encouraging one another to be honest about God's word, to approach his word with humility and gracious uh hearts of gratitude and grace?

Or are we approaching it as if we've kind of sorted it out already?

We're good with these things.

We figured it out.

May we be a people marked by humility, and marked as those who belong to the kingdom of Christ.

Let's pray.