Law & Grace - Firsts & beginnings in Christs ministry
Vern Peterman · May 29, 2011
Law & Grace, No. 21
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926236321407

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

We'll now move into this passage. We're continuing in our series in Law and Grace, and we begin with this slide here. It says, To really get things started, Jesus began with a stopper, capital S. Chapter 4 of the Gospel of Matthew has two main parts, and verses 1 through 11 tell of Christ's temptation by Satan when he was for 40 days largely out in the wilderness and fasting.

And now this stopper, that's the seditious sidetracker. You know who I mean. That's the one who's the primitive prevaricator, the terrible tempter, Satan. You know, that's who I mean. Okay. So, now, it was during a time of fasting, and I need to address this issue of fasting. When it comes to fasting, I'm pretty slow. Oh boy, that's a groaner. I'm sorry. When it comes to fasting, I'm pretty slow.

One reason it's difficult for me is that I end up with blood sugar issues, and there are other people who have that problem too. Nonetheless, we do want to address the question of fasting, because it's a question that I get from time to time. There's a two-page supplement on that, which is on the cabinet to the right as you exit this room. Or alternatively, we've also uploaded it to the church website. And you can take a look at that there. This is sort of some perspectives on fasting. We're going to address this issue again, at least in chapter 6 of the book of Matthew, a couple chapters away from now. And so hopefully that will address some questions that you may have.

Now, verses 12 through 25 tell of Christ beginning his time of ministry. As a matter of fact, one of the things you may wonder, why is it that we hear about Christ's birth, we hear about Christ at about age 12 in the temple, and when his mother and his father, Mary and Joseph, find him in the temple, and then from then on you don't hear about Joseph. And why is it that Christ begins his ministry at age 30? Well, we're going to answer that question, actually, as we progress through our study in weeks and months ahead.

But one of the things that has to do with this very passage here is prior to that age where Christ was, as another gospel lets us know, at about age 30, when he began his ministry, is that he would not have been regarded as old enough yet to have been a teacher, and as we'll soon see, a rabbi. So that's one of the reasons, I believe, why he waited until that period of time, and why he didn't start earlier.

Where did he go? This is Israel from space, and essentially zeroing in on the Sea of Galilee in that area. We'll get a little closer here. This little peninsula that sticks out that you see is the city of Tyre. The Sea of Galilee is there in the middle of the picture. This is zooming in on Galilee and showing some of the towns and cities around all the way over to the Mediterranean Sea. Capernaum was on the north side, kind of the northwest part of the Sea of Galilee.

And that's where Jesus decided to settle. As a matter of fact, later on in the Gospels, after having been raised in Nazareth, it actually says, his own city. So he made this his new home, at least for the time of his ministry. Nazareth, as you see, is over here. That's where he had done his growing up from very early years up until just before he moved essentially to Capernaum for his ministry.

Here is a picture of that northwest portion of the Sea of Galilee. Here is Capernaum and Bethsaida and the Mount of Beatitudes. We'll take a closer look here. Here is the excavation, archaeological excavation of Capernaum. A lot of the rocks in Capernaum are rather dark, dark colored, and so you can imagine being inside one of the houses there with small high windows, rather dark dwellings in there. Here is an aerial view of Capernaum.

You see some of the smaller dwellings around. There's a large synagogue that you see there in the photo. And then there's a covered area also in that photo. That covered area that you see covers what is thought to be, not for absolute certain, but thought to be Peter's house there in Capernaum. So these verses tell the beginning of Christ's ministry here.

He located himself here in northern Galilee, that is the northern part of the Sea of Galilee, selecting disciples as well as healing people, as the account tells us. So he would go along the Sea of Galilee, which was on the northern end, particularly a very well-known fishing area. You can imagine the Jews gathering around that area, they would go fishing, and one of the first things that they would have to do when they caught the fish is guess what?

What can I sell to Jews and what can I sell to Gentiles? They'd separate everything out. If it's got fins and got scales, I can sell it to the Jews. If it doesn't, then I sell it to the Gentiles. If you catch an eel, guess what you're going to do? You're going to sell it to the Gentiles. If you catch things that look like a crab or a crawdad, something like that, you're going to sell it to the Gentiles.

So in this environment here where Jesus is getting to know these people in the northern part of the Sea of Galilee, here he begins to call his disciples. And as we would expect, some of those first disciples, not all of them, fishermen. right along this Sea of Galilee there.

And he also does healing here at this time. Real interesting, we don't hear accounts of him doing that until he begins his ministry. Right here. When he's in Nazareth, we don't hear about him going about healing, but he does here. And we'll take a look at why in just a little bit here. This introductory ministry here in Matthew chapter 4 is about the people in the land of Israel. It is, in fact, in northern Israel. And he is talking to the Jews who live there. All of his disciples are Jews. And it's also about the law of Moses, as we'll see increasingly as we go through here. In the first 11 verses of the chapter, It's paralleled in the counts as we have referenced there in Mark and in Luke.

Christ didn't just encounter Satan in the wilderness by accident. What's interesting is the passage makes it clear the Holy Spirit led him there. Which tells us one thing. If you happen to run into the enemy, if you come across a difficult time spiritually or otherwise, it doesn't automatically mean that you're somehow running contrary to what the Lord wants. The Lord may in fact call you into a situation which is difficult. That may be exactly what he has in mind. You see, the Holy Spirit led him out into the wilderness. Did the Holy Spirit know that he was going to encounter temptation by Satan? Yes. The Holy Spirit was not surprised. He was led by the Holy Spirit there into the wilderness.

Now Satan certainly will be held responsible for what he's done and what he will do. And matter of fact, the Bible even spells out things that Satan is yet to do that are certain to take place. But he doesn't do anything that's out of God's control. And I think that's something that we can take comfort in. God is not pacing the floor of heaven thinking, Now that Satan's done this, what am I going to do? God's not wondering. God's not at loose ends trying to figure out what he's going to do next because of what Satan's done. The other thing is God's purposes will not be thwarted. Romans 8, 28 and 29 says you will be conformed, you are predestined to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.

Is that going to be thwarted by anything Satan does? Not ultimately. No. Satan is limited in what he can do and where he can go. Christ's temptations by Satan were three appeals to Christ to use powers and privileges of his deity to step back from the pains and vulnerability of his humanity. or to grant Satan high honor. Christ was fully God and fully man. It is only in that Christ was fully man that Satan had access to him at all. Satan said three things.

You're hungry, because you're a man, and you've been fasting out here. Make these stones into bread. I mean, you can do it. Can't you? So Satan said, go ahead, make the stones into bread. That'll take care of your hunger problem and problem solved. Next, he said, throw yourself down, you'll be rescued. And thirdly, he gave Christ the direct invitation, worship me.

Oh, Satan offered some kind of a reward for each one of these things. at least to the extent that he could seem to do so. One of the things that we find, Philippians 2, 5-11, which, by the way, was mentioned in the previous selective. One of the things we find is that what Satan was doing was sidetracking Christ, or attempting to, from each one of the things that's spelled out in Philippians 2, 5-11. It reads like this, and you have it also on your handout there.

Have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men. Christ became, as fully God, fully man. Being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. For this reason also God highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father."

Satan's temptations were all an attempt to sidetrack Christ from this that we've just read here out of Philippians. Matter of fact, Where Christ would ultimately have every knee bow, Satan says, no, let's have you bow to me. Where Christ became a man with all the vulnerabilities of a man, including I'm hungry, Satan says, yeah, but you can fix that.

Just turn these stones into bread. You can do it. Turn the water into wine, right? Stones into bread, no problem. And matter of fact, you could throw yourself down and be rescued. You wouldn't even get hurt. Your vulnerability as a man doesn't have to be.

So what was Satan doing? He was wanting to corrupt and subvert everything that we see in this passage. Everything that is a part of what Christ came to do. And what he came to be and what he will be eternally. Satan wanted to corrupt it. Satan even quoted scripture in the process. Very interesting. He quoted scripture in his second temptation of Christ. Scripture says that you will be preserved from harm. So why not just count on it? Throw yourself down here. You'll be rescued.

What did Christ do? In every case where Christ responded, he responded with a quote from the last book of the Law of Moses, the book of Deuteronomy. In every case. See, it was not Satan and Christ just having an arm wrestling match to see who wins. It was not that at all, at any time. Because Christ pointed to the Word of God. What did he do the first time? He says, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Scripture. Scripture. The next thing where Satan said, Oh, just throw yourself down. You'll get rescued. You'll be alright. The angels will come and just bear you up. You won't get touched. But Christ answered from Deuteronomy, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. You shouldn't presume upon the Lord like that. Don't put yourself in a circumstance of that sort. Don't put the Lord your God to the test.

And finally, go Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only. All three responses to Satan from Deuteronomy there. How about the binding of Satan? Do you find that Christ said, I bind you, Satan? Some Christians are into that these days. Do you find that? Actually, not at all. What you do find is he resisted Satan with the word each time. Ephesians 6, 13, 4, 7, and 1 Peter 5, 9 all say, resist Satan. Resist him. With your own strength? Nope. With your own power? Nope.

Resist Satan based on what the Word of God says is true. 1 Peter 5, 8 says that Satan roams about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Is he ferocious and vicious? Yeah. What's the proper response of a Christian? Resist him. Resist him spiritually. Resist him with the resources you have in Christ. Resist him with who you are in Christ. Stand your ground.

We don't need to try to bind Satan. I don't know who lets him loose anyway. We don't need to bind him. We don't need to go and take him on aggressively. We simply resist. That's what scripture is consistent with. So we have a question here. It's a question Christians have asked for a while. So was Christ able not to sin or was he not able to sin? What do you think? Which one? Both. Okay? Both.

He was fully God and fully man. He had to be man in order for him to be our replacement, our substitute there on the cross. In order for that to do any good, he had to be man, but he was also fully God. It meant that Satan could appeal to his humanity, and he did. Christ, you're hungry. You're very hungry. Just turn these stones into bread.

He could appeal to his humanity just as we can be and are likewise tempted so Hebrews 4.15 says he was tempted as we are there was however a difference Christ for the human body like ours did not have a sin nature as we have as believers in Christ we have been separated from that is we've died to the sin nature or as I called it with the guys in Uganda I said the sin source We have died in relationship to that sin nature.

Christ did not have that sin nature to deal with. He was Christ, the Son of God. He never was in Adam. While Christ had the vulnerability of a human body to appeal to, that's what Satan did. There was no sin nature to appeal to. You see, for us as Christians even, one of the things that the enemy can do is to say, doesn't that voice sound familiar to you? You see, the sin nature is a deposed monarch. So was Christ able not to sin or was he not able to sin?

Yes. Both. And to give us some perspective in here, Adam was made innocent, but Christ was born and is fundamentally righteous. See the difference? Adam was innocent, but had the ability to choose contrary to God's spoken will. Don't eat of that tree. You can eat of anything else, but not that one. Adam was innocent as he was created, but he had the ability to choose contrary to God's will. Christ, however, was not just innocent. Here is Christ, born of Mary, as Mary held him, and as Joseph was there beholding Christ, this infant's face. As that took place, Christ wasn't just innocent.

He was fundamentally and deeply and wholly righteous and remained so until that day that He took our sins upon Himself. As a matter of fact, that's the only thing that qualified Him to take our sins upon Himself. Christ, when He died on the cross, was completely and wholly righteous. Therefore, His payment for our sins made sense. He was infinitely righteous and therefore had infinite capacity to take our sins upon Himself.

If we were to say, you know, let's take a rock, a 150-pound rock, and put it here, and let's take our sins and put it on the rock, is that going to work? No, the rock is not like us. Christ was like us, except for his fundamental and infinite righteousness.

2 Peter 1.2, To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ, his basic and fundamental righteousness, So Christ, as it begins in verse 12, begins His public ministry. As Christ began that public ministry, He located Himself here in the northern part of the Sea of Galilee.

And He selected disciples. As a matter of fact, the passage there says that He selected four. Two sets of brothers. Real interesting, the brothers that He chose. Two of those would be James and John. sons of Zebedee. What's interesting is we find out later in scripture James and John were the first and the last of the Apostles to die. James, Acts chapter 12, by the sword. John, shortly after he wrote the book of Revelation. The first and last, like bookends.

Real interesting how the Lord knew that. And we're going to find out more about a selection of disciples right in this same area Chapter 9, it's going to tell about his selecting Matthew, the tax collector, as one of those disciples. He also performed miracles of healing during this time. It's amazing, we have no account of him performing such miracles until this time. And he began performing miracles of healing, even to the point where this passage itself says people came from all around to be healed. He also proclaimed the kingdom at hand at this point.

This northern region of the Sea of Galilee was the part of the land of Israel. It was originally intended for the Jewish tribes. Remember some months ago we studied back where Joshua led the tribes into the land of Israel and they were to take over all the land and drive out the Canaanites. Zeroing in here, Zebulun and Naphtali were to take these areas on the north and on the west side of the Sea of Galilee. And so that passage there talks about this is the area where Christ, the Messiah, would settle and carry out ministry.

These two areas of Zebulun and Naphtali around the Sea of Galilee. Now there's a term in there that we need to talk about. Galilee of the Gentiles. Hmm, what's that mean? I thought this area was supposed to be for the Jews. It is. Why would it say Galilee of the Gentiles? Especially with mostly Jews living there. Is that a mistake? No, not really. Think about it.

When the Romans came in to capture Israel, where did they come from? They came from the north. And where did they come first? Here, in the area just on the northern part of Galilee. Before that, the Greeks came in under Alexander the Great. Where did they come from? The north. Before that, it was who? The Persians. Where did they come from? The north.

So this area of Galilee, as you step back, all the way back to the Assyrians, over the centuries was the place, that's where the Gentiles came in. They had Gentiles essentially to the north and to the east and coming from the ocean on the west as well. Three sides. They had Gentiles. So it's Galilee of the Gentiles, not because it was a Gentile place, but because it had plenty of exposure to the Gentiles. And when the Gentiles would come in, that's where they would start. Every time.

So Jesus selected his disciples. Two sets of brothers, initially, out of the 12. Simon Peter and Andrew, and then James and John, the sons of Zebedee. And we'll see more of all of them. Jesus, in selecting disciples, was typical and also a very unique rabbi.

Yeah, rabbi. Jesus was a rabbi. The New Testament repeatedly calls him a rabbi. And what was a rabbi? A rabbi was a teacher, right? A Jewish teacher. So he was beginning his ministry as a Jewish rabbi. He was of a sufficient age to do so. But now, here uniquely, he had no other rabbi that had taught him. Where did he learn all these things about God's Word? He was God. He was God and it was through his doing in part that it was inspired ultimately by the Holy Spirit.

It will be critical as we go through these passages here in the book of Matthew to understand Jesus as both a typical and also a very unique rabbi. He said and did things that all the rabbis did. But he also said and did things that no rabbi would ever dare do. And it's the contrast between those things that's going to surprise us as we go through the rest of the book of Matthew.

To give you an example, here is Jesus meeting with Nicodemus. At night time, and people speculate as to why, but at night time he met with Nicodemus and he tells Nicodemus, Nicodemus starts off with this nice introduction, Jesus is blunt, gets to the point, says, Nicodemus, you must be born again. Well, guess what?

If you were a rabbi, the Jews already determined that you were born again, and depending on other accomplishments, you might have been born again several times. Nicodemus was at the top of the charts for how many times you could be born again according to the rabbi's traditions. So for Jesus to come to Nicodemus and say, you must be born again, it's what?

You're telling me I'm as born again as they get. Nobody can be more born again than I am. I mean, I'm part of the Sanhedrin. I'm at the top of the heap. I'm born again, again, again, again. Right? Jesus comes to him and the first thing right out of his mouth, you gotta be born again. That must have shocked him. We'll take a look at that some more. Here's another one. According to the traditions and rules long established, a rabbi was not permitted to ask his disciples to wash his feet. So Jesus says, that's fine, I won't ask you to wash mine. I'll wash yours. No rabbi would ever think of doing that.

But Christ did. Christ did. He turned it upside down, didn't he? Jesus said, I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. And in several ways, in those words, he claimed to be God. One of them is the way he said I am was a claim to be God. The good shepherd, Psalm 23, Ezekiel 34 and 37, Isaiah chapter 40, that's the Lord God of the Old Testament, is the Good Shepherd. Christ multiply, in these words, claimed to be deity.

No rabbi would dare claim to be God. Jesus was even bold to say, My Father. No rabbi would say that. So Jesus was both a rabbi like everybody else had already come to expect and a rabbi like nobody else expected. And there were things that he said that everybody said, yeah, that's what rabbis say. And there were other things that he said that no rabbi would ever dare say.

Oh, unless you happen to be God, which he was and is. As a rabbi, Jesus would seek and select his disciples. Gamaliel, who was Paul's rabbi from the records outside the New Testament, he had about a thousand pupils over the period of time of his being a rabbi. Paul was one of them. Jesus would select his disciples, and at least as of the group that he picked,

12. Now, one of the things you get the impression looking at this passage, and in other places of the New Testament, that Jesus just came up to these guys and said, Hi, my name's Jesus, want to be my disciple? And they said, Sure, and dropped everything. Right? That's the impression that you get.

What we have to understand is that it said that Jesus had already gone in there and established this as his home, and it meant that he went around presenting himself as a rabbi, which means that he spoke at the synagogues regularly, and went around teaching at other opportunities.

And so they had already been introduced to him and heard him. And so when he gave the invitation, they already knew what it meant to be a disciple. They knew what it meant for him to be a rabbi. And when he gave the invitation, they, on consideration of all these things, immediately left what they were doing to follow him. So in our ongoing study, we'll be taking a look at what it meant for Jesus to be a rabbi there in Israel. There were over a hundred rabbis in Israel at this time, by the way.

And so he was one of them. And so we'll be taking a look at that because we're going to find again and again, it matters in how we understand the passage. Even things like telling Nicodemus, you've got to be born again. And washing the disciples' feet.

All these things would have been shocking things for a rabbi to say. The disciples did respond right away to this rabbi's appeal, but only after he had already presented himself as a rabbi worthy of following. Now, why the miracles? He performed these miracles and carried out healing to validate, to say, yes, it's true. and to verify that he was indeed the long-promised Messiah. See, all the rabbis didn't go around healing all the time. That's one of the ways in which Jesus was like no other rabbi. Jesus would heal again and again and again and again. Because he was a rabbi, but much more than a rabbi, he was the long-promised Messiah. The one promised for centuries.

This would make sure that people knew it was true. Later in Matthew, after John the Baptist is jailed by Herod the Tetrarch, John asks if Jesus is the promised one. So Jesus tells these ones from John the Baptist to say and testify about the things Jesus is doing. He says, tell John I'm healing and I'm proclaiming. That's in quick account. So why the miracles? In Matthew 11, as we'll soon see or later on see, verse 2 through 6.

So John sends by his disciples, Are you the expected one? I imagine John, after being in jail for a while, is wondering. He says, Are you the expected one or am I mistaken here? Have I been telling everybody that this is the Lamb of God and after I've been here in jail for a while, I'm just not so sure?

I haven't been seeing what's happening. So Jesus tells John's disciples Go back and tell him what's going on. Tell him what he hasn't seen. People are blind and they see. People are lame and they walk. Lepers are cleansed. The dead are raised up. The poor have the gospel preached to them. These are all predicted in the Old Testament. Once John hears that, he'd say, yes, this is the one who was promised.

See, while Christ was the steward who indeed had initiated the church through the apostles in the first coming, this three years of ministry are often misunderstood by Christians. Christ never went to or established a church as we know it today. He never did. Never went into a church building. Christ was first sent on earth to be born a Jew in the land of Israel to appeal only to the Jews to receive him as their king and messiah, telling them the gospel of the kingdom.

The gospel of the kingdom. So you're telling me the gospel of the kingdom isn't for us who are in the church? No, it's not. The Gospel of the Kingdom was the message of good news that was delivered to the Israelites and to them in the land of Israel about Jesus the King of Israel. That's the Gospel of the Kingdom.

Your King is here. What are you going to do? You have an opportunity here to receive your King. Are you? Will you? If only these people These Israelites in the land of Israel would receive Christ as their king. The kingdom reign of Christ as king would come then upon the earth from Jerusalem, the city of the great king, as Christ will say in the next chapter. That's the opportunity the Jews had in front of him. That's the opportunity he was presenting, the gospel of the kingdom. I'm here. Do you accept me as your king? If so, let's get started. But they didn't, did they?

Instead, what's laid out is the gospel of substitution. If the people of the Israelite or of non-Israelite ethnicity will believe that Christ, the Son of God, died for their sins, was buried and rose again, they'll be saved eternally. I put down here 1 Corinthians 15, 1-11. I could also put Isaiah 53 and other passages. Do you believe those things? That Christ died for your sins, was buried, and rose again? If you do, you're saved.

That's the gospel of substitution. Christ died in your place. That's the gospel as we have come to know it and are to tell others. Our place in this coming kingdom, having to do with the gospel of the kingdom, presented Our place in this coming kingdom will be as the Bride of Christ, coming with Him to rule and to reign. So Jesus, here in His initial ministry, He settled here in Capernaum, here in northern Galilee, teaching in the synagogues, not the churches, there weren't any, in the synagogues, the gatherings of the Jews around Galilee, and preaching the kingdom. The kingdom is at hand. I'm your king. Do you receive me? That's the message that he told them. And he selected the disciples that followed him as he went. People came from areas immediately around Galilee, but also from places farther north and farther south.

So this brings us to the beginning of what's called the Sermon on the Mount. We'll be taking a look at our approach to that and be looking at the Sermon on the Mount for some weeks to come. And that's the beginning point where Jesus is introducing his ministry. He is not yet selected at the Sermon on the Mount, all of his disciples yet. He is still going to be talking to Jews in the land of Israel and inviting disciples who are Jews from the land of Israel to join him. Him as the rabbi, the teacher, and they as his disciples, learners.

That's what's happening next. And so as we look at the Sermon on the Mount, we're going to be looking at it. Is the Sermon on the Mount directly aimed at you, or is it directly aimed to the Jews with things for us to learn from it? I would say it's the second. So we'll be looking at that.

Let's pray. Lord, we thank you as we look at this beginning point of history. We thank you that we can look and see as far as Satan is concerned, that you showed the sufficiency of your word and your Holy Spirit in defeating him. And Lord, as you began your ministry, we thank you that you made it clear what you were doing. It has every appearance of being very deliberate and certain. And as we next step into what's known as the Sermon on the Mount, We look for you to make clear what it is you intended and what you want us to take away from it and learn from it. We thank you for these truths revealed to us by your intent. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.