All right, Luke/Acts for Beginners,
lesson number ten, Jesus Enters Jerusalem, the first part of this section. We're going to cover Luke 18:31 to Luke 19:48. So today's lesson begins the fourth part in our
outline of Luke's gospel record. Here's the outline that we are following. The beginning, chapter one to three, Jesus in Galilee, Luke describes the ministry that goes on in the north. Chapter four to chapter nine, Jesus Facing Jerusalem heading towards Jerusalem, the activities of that period, 9 to 18. And now we begin Jesus Entering Jerusalem, chapters 18:31 all the way to 21:38. And then the final section, the consummation. So until this point, the teachings, the miracles, the confrontations, have taken place outside of Jerusalem. Our outline is based on geography, actually. In the next section of Luke's account, he's going to describe events taking place as Jesus and the apostles are in the vicinity of Jerusalem and preparing to enter into the city. So Jesus and the apostles are now close to the city and the Lord prepares His apostles for what will take place there, so Luke 18, let's read the section. It says, "Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, 'Behold, we're going up to Jerusalem and all things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished. For He will be handed over to the gentiles and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon and after they have scourged Him, they will kill him. And the third day He will rise again.' But the disciples understood none of these things and the meaning of this statement was hidden from them,
and they did not comprehend the things that were said." So Jesus gives the apostles more details concerning what is going to take place as they enter the city. All the prophecies concerning His treatment by the Jews, He tells them, will be fulfilled. They didn't understand that. Still pretty clear here. For example, I've listed some of them: prophecy in Zechariah chapter 9, Zechariah wrote, 'Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, humble, and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey." So Jesus's triumphal entry, sitting on a donkey, was recorded in Zechariah, in Psalms 118, "The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This Is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eye." So here in Psalms, the rejection by the leaders, of the Messiah, when He came, was prophesied. Another prophecy: Psalm 41:9, "Even my close friend, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me." So the betrayal by Judas, one of His apostles, prophesied. Psalm 22, "All who see Me sneer at me; they separate with the lip, they wag the head, saying, 'Commit yourself to the Lord; let Him deliver him; let Him rescue him, because He delights in him." Here, the suffering and the humiliation that Jesus had on the cross, prophesied by the psalmists Psalm 16:9 and 10, "Therefore, my heart is glad and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will dwell securely. For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol; nor will you allow Your Holy One to undergo decay." Here an implicit reference to the resurrection. Made again by the psalmist. Isaiah 53:5, "But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging, we are healed." Isaiah prophesies concerning the reason for the crucifixion. I find this prophecy amazing. It's one thing to prophesy about an activity or an event that will take place, Isaiah talks about the reason why this was to take place. I've only read a few. There are hundreds more. But these demonstrate the point that Jesus was making to the apostles, that everything He is saying, everything that He is doing, everything that the prophet said would happen to Him, will be fulfilled. I simply read a couple of references about this. Now, in verse 34, it says that the apostles did not understand what He was saying and the meaning was hidden from them. Now, it could be that, like John the Baptist, they assumed that when Jesus entered Jerusalem, He would be hailed by everyone, great and small. Or, if rejected, there would be a judgment that would immediately come on His enemies, because that's what John the Baptist was thinking when he sent people to ask Jesus, "Are you the one or are we supposed to wait for somebody else?" John the Baptist thought, well, wait a minute here, when the Messiah came, and I announced the coming of the Messiah, great things would happen: Israel would rise up, there would be a judgment on the evil one. Well, none of that happened, in the sense that Israel was still enslaved to Rome. There was no judgment on the evil. So he started to wonder, what is the problem here? And, of course, John the Baptist, his issue was, he didn't understand that the coming of the Messiah and the judgment on the people weren't necessarily coming on the same day or at the same time. So it could be that the apostles also didn't quite understand this idea. Jesus was actually preparing them for a time coming soon, where neither of these things would actually happen. There would be no triumph of Israel. There would be no, quote, triumph of the Messiah and everybody hailing and welcoming Him. There would be none of that. And there would be no judgment on the people, if they rejected Jesus. Not immediately, anyways. So what was to happen was that the psalmist and the prophets spoke of long ago, they spoke of this. He would be rejected. He would be tortured. He would be executed, but he would rise again on the third day. And this, they couldn't take in this idea. Next section Luke talks about the healing of blind Bartimaeus Luke 18. Let's read some of that. "Just as Jesus was approaching Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the road begging. Now hearing a crowd going by, He began to inquire what this was. They told him, that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he called out, saying, 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.' Those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet, but he kept crying out all the more, 'Son of David, have mercy on me.' And Jesus stopped and commanded that He be brought to him. And when He came near, He questioned him, 'What do you want me to do for you?' and he said, 'Lord, I want to regain my sight. And Jesus said to him, 'Receive your sight. Your faith has made you well.' Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him, glorifying God. And when all the people saw it, they gave praise to God." So Jericho Is about 18 miles from Jerusalem and Luke, once again, situates the action by describing the location Jesus and the apostles are in, as they make their final approach to the great city. This miracle is described in both Matthew and Mark's account. Now it's interesting to note that Matthew says that two blind men were healed, but Mark and Luke focus only on Bartimaeus' reaction. This miracle also contrasts the simple faith and gratitude of Bartemaeus who, without seeing Jesus or His works, called out to Him in faith, and as a result regained his sight. Bartemaeus's faith will later be contrasted to the religious leaders in Jerusalem who actually witnessed many of Jesus's miracles, but nevertheless refused to believe and subsequently remained spiritually blind. The thing we need to understand is, it's always a juxtaposition between those who believe and those who disbelieve. The gospel record, it's just demonstrating those who believe, those who disbelieve, how different they were. So now Luke is setting up Bartimaeus, a blind man, his simple faith. He hadn't seen any of the miracles. He hadn't even seen Jesus. And yet, he believed in Him. He reached out to Him. A little later, we're going to see how the Jewish leaders who actually did see the miracles, who actually did hear the teachings, we're going to see how they reacted, and how that compares to Bartimaeus. The next scene, Zacchaeus is converted, Chapter 19. We don't have time to read all of that, as I mentioned. Once in Jericho, Jesus spots Zacchaeus, a tax collector, Like Matthew, who, because of his short stature, had climbed a tree, in order to get a better view of Jesus and His following. Jesus calls out to him by name and tells him that He's going to visit his home. Now the religious leaders grumble because Jesus would associate, even visit the home of a sinner and a tax collector. On the other hand, Zaccheus is grateful for Jesus's kindness, that he confesses and repents of his past improper conduct as a tax collector and he commits himself to giving to the poor and returning money to those who he may have defrauded. And, of course, the way the tax collectors defrauded, they overcharged. They had so much tax to collect, but they overcharged and kept the difference for themselves. So Jesus confirms that Zacchaeus is saved, but He points out that these are the people he has been sent to save - sinners who believe and repent. So look at the two people now that have been described by Luke, a blind man calling out and a tax collector, despised by his own people. So this event provides another contrast between those who believed and those who did not. Blind Bartimaeus versus the religious leaders; and those who repented and those who did not. Zacchaeus versus those who felt too self-righteous to even consider repenting. The next issue is, not issue, the next story is the parable of the 10 minas in Luke Chapter 19. Again, I'm not going to read all of that.
This is another parable contained in both Matthew and Mark. And if you remember, at the beginning of our series, I said, I'm going to try to focus on the things that are specifically in Luke. The parable is yet another reference to the religious leadership in Jerusalem. However, it deals with the quality of their stewardship, and not so much with their faith or their repentance. So let's, I did say we weren't going to read it right away, but we are going to read it now beginning in verse 11. It says, "While they were listening to these things, Jesus went on to tell a parable, because He was near Jerusalem." Now, that's important because He was near Jerusalem. Is that just geography? No, because He's near Jerusalem and about to encounter the Pharisees, the Jewish leaders, the scribes. That's what's significant about this. "And they supposed that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately. So He said, "A nobleman went to a distant country to receive a kingdom for himself and then returned and he called ten of his slaves and gave them ten minas and said to them, 'Do business with this until I come back.' But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him, saying, 'We do not want this man to reign over us.' When he returned after receiving the kingdom, he ordered that these slaves to whom he had given the money be called to him so he might know what business they had done. The first appeared, saying, 'Master, your mina has made ten minas more.' And he said to him, 'Well done, good slave. Because you have been faithful in a very little thing, you are to be in authority over ten cities.' The second came, saying, 'Your mina, master, has made five minas.' And he said to him, 'Also and you are to be over five cities.' Another came, saying, 'Master, here's your mina, which I kept put away in a handkerchief, for I was afraid of you, because you are an exacting man. You take up what you did not lay down and reap what you did not sow.' He said to him, 'By your own words I will judge you, you worthless slave. Did you know that I am an exacting man, taking up what I did not lay down and reaping what I did not sow? Then why did you not put my money in the bank and having to come I would have collected it with Interest. Then he said to the bystanders, 'Take the mina away from him and give it to the one who has ten minas. And they said to him, 'Master, he has ten minas already.' I tell you that to everyone who has more, shall we be given, but from the one who does not have even what he does have shall be taken away. But these enemies of mine,
who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them in my presence." So note the additional parallels Jesus adds to this parable to reflect His present and coming situation. The time frame for the action is over a long period of time. Meaning, the parable, the time frame for the parable. So the time frame for the action in the parable is over a long period of time. For those who are thinking like John the Baptist, that everything is going to be happening right away. These people thought that the coming of the kingdom and the judgment would appear exactly at the same time. So He's giving this parable to explain the time sequence, if you wish, the fulfillment of the kingdom. So Jesus describes four periods of time. First, when the nobleman assigns the responsibilities. Secondly, the undisclosed amount of time he is gone during which the true attitudes of the servants are seen. Three, when the nobleman returns to punish and to reward. And four, the destruction of his enemies. So, this order of events parallels the similar order of Jesus's ministry and its eventual outcome. Watch, first the nobleman assigns - well, Jesus will assign the great commission to His disciples in Matthew 28 and in Mark 16:16. The great commission is assigned. Here are your duties: go and preach the gospel to the world, baptize those in the name of the Father, Son, and of the Holy Spirit, right. Second, the nobleman is gone. Well, that corresponds to the idea that the church continues its ministry until Jesus returns. The nobleman is Jesus. He goes away, we don't know for how long, right Acts 2:37-47. We see Peter preaching the gospel, people being baptized, the church being established. The third period of time, the nobleman returns. Jesus will return to reward and to punish, First Thessalonians 4, Second Thessalonians 1,
verses 6 to 10 talks about when Jesus will return and then the destruction of enemies, the end of the present world, and the appearing of the new heavens and earth will also accompany his return,
Second Peter chapter 3:11-13. So this parable may not have meant much more to the apostles than the lesson on good stewardship, but once His ministry was completed they would then be able to recall this parable in the new light of fulfilled prophecy and connect the dots, if you wish. Just like we're connecting the dots. If we had heard this parable before He died and resurrected, and all the rest of it, I think we'd have a hard time understanding the inner meaning of it. But from our perspective, it's fairly clear that the nobleman is Jesus and He goes away and He's going to come back and He's going to reward those who were faithful and punish those who were not. So Luke then moves on to the triumphal entry, Luke chapter 19. This is yet another event described by both Matthew and Mark, except the passages describing Jesus's personal reaction upon reaching the city. Luke says that Jesus sent disciples ahead to secure a donkey to ride on. Matthew writes that they brought back two donkeys, a young colt that had never been ridden on and its mother, probably the female, the adult donkey probably to stabilize the young animal, as it carried its first mount through a noisy crowd. Just a commercial here, I've also written a book about this, a children's book about these two animals, called Arion. You can check that out for the kiddos. A good teaching, as well, for them. So Jesus Arrived at Jerusalem from Bethany, where Mary and Martha and Lazarus lived, and where He often stayed when traveling back and forth from His home in Capernaum, to the capital of Jerusalem. Here's a little map. Or a, not a map, actually, but a photograph. It gives you a little bit of an idea. So Bethany was about a mile and a half from Jerusalem. And the Mount of Olives and the garden of Gethsemane were the last stops before going down the valley from the garden and up the valley to the city of Jerusalem, on the opposite side. So if you're in Jerusalem and you're looking towards Gethsemane on your left, it says, The Grotto. And then the second line there, it says, Traditional Garden of Gethsemane, which Is still there. The garden is still there. There's a church building there now. And then, if you can see it, just between those two lines, there's like a road that goes, that's the road to Bethany. It's still there. It's paved now, but it's still there. And the garden is still where it was located. Now, imagine if you're in the garden and you're looking across the valley, this is what you would see. You would see the city of Jerusalem, obviously no skyscrapers in the first century, but this is what you would see if you were standing at the corner there, on the road to Bethany, next to the garden, and you're looking across at it, because you go down Into the valley and then back up again. You see, this is a little difficult, if you see where the dome is, if you go to your right a little bit you'll notice that there's like a, in the wall, there's a door there, with two arches, that's been bricked in. That was the eastern gate. That's where Jesus and His apostles would come in, in order to go into the holy city. That bricking up of the eastern gate and a cemetery was planted there in front of that gate, which in the Jewish religion made that ground - you couldn't walk through it. You would be unclean. It despoiled that ground. And so, the graveyard in front of the eastern gate, which was the gate that Jesus entered, was shut and bricked over by Muslims in 1530 AD, in their attempt to prevent the Messiah to return. They understood Christianity. They understood that Jesus would return. And in their mind, well, when He returned, He'd return to Jerusalem. He was a Jew. And He would enter in the eastern gate, where He did, originally, enter in on His triumphal entry. So they bricked up the gate and they planted a cemetery there, which would desecrate that area. No Jew would ever walk through that piece of ground. So that gives, that situates you a little bit as to where they were geographically. And so, Luke writes in verse 36, as he was going they were spreading their coats on the road. As soon as he was approaching near the descent of the Mount of Olives the whole crowd of disciples began to praise God joyfully, with a loud voice, for all the miracles they had seen, shouting, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in Heaven and glory in the highest." Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Him, "Teacher, rebuke your disciples." But Jesus answered, "I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out." Now, Matthew quotes the Old Testament prophecy that describes the manner that the Messiah would enter the city, when He would come in humility, riding on a donkey, not a horse or a chariot, as an earthly king would enter, Matthew 21:5. Luke continues to contrast the attitude of ordinary people who believed and thus rejoiced, to that of the religious leaders, who did not believe.
And they were offended by the faith and the praise coming from the crowd. Keep on reading, "When He approached Jerusalem He saw the city and wept over it, saying, 'If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace, but now they have been hidden from your eyes. But the days will come upon you when your enemies will throw up a barricade against you and surround you and hem you in on every side and they will level you to the ground and your children within you and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation." So this section right here is particularly Luke, and in it he describes Jesus's great sorrow for two things in particular. First, what the Jews would miss seeing because of their spiritual blindness, caused by their disbelief. He weeps because the joy and gladness expressed by His disciples could have been shared by everybody in the city if
they had known and accepted what God required in order to have peace with sinful man, sinful Jewish man. And that was, faith. Belief in His son. As it was, they would be denied the peace and joy that faith could bring them. So Jesus wept over what they could have had.
And He also wept in sorrow for what the Jews would suffer as a consequence of their disbelief. Jesus makes it very clear, the reason for their punishment that was to come, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation, 44c.
If anybody ever says to you, oh no. I mean, that punishment had nothing to do with disbelief. That was just a political thing. Anybody who says that, has never actually read the New Testament. Anybody who says, well, that's just a historical thing. The Romans were against them, the Jews were rebelling, that it's not connected, has not read the book of Luke. Luke quotes Jesus saying, "Not a stone will be left upon another." He even describes, there'll be a siege. They'll kill you. They'll destroy the city. That's what He says. And that's exactly what happened in 70 AD. Why? If You have a discussion with a Jewish person, a devout Jewish person. You have only one question to ask them. Say, is it true that God punished the Jewish people when they disobeyed Him, or when they were unfaithful? And he'll say, well, yes. There are many instances of this throughout the Old Testament. Then your question is, well then, what did they do in the first century that caused God to send the Roman army to destroy the city, the temple, and to kill everybody there? What exactly did they do to deserve that punishment? And if they're not sure, you can always read to them Luke 19, or the book of Luke. So up until this time, His teaching and preaching, Jesus uses parables to describe the
attitude of disbelief and hostility expressed by the Jewish religious leadership, but in this passage however, He states, in no uncertain terms or hidden meaning, the sin of the Jews. And the sin of the Jews, their rejection of Him as their messiah and the punishment that they will suffer. And that is the destruction of their city and death to its citizens. So we move on, Luke moves on now to the traitors that are driven from the Temple. In Luke Chapter 19 he says, "Jesus entered the temple, began to drive out those who were selling, saying to them, "It Is written, 'And My house shall be a house of prayer.' But you have made it a robber's den.' And He was teaching daily in the temple, but the chief priests and the scribes and the leading men among the people were trying to destroy Him and they could not find anything that they might do, for all the people were hanging on to every word He said." So Matthew and Mark make this the high point of the section on Jesus's entry into Jerusalem. In other words, they described Him throwing out the traitors, and with the whip and all this, that's the high point. Luke's high point is Jesus' pronouncement on the Jewish nation, which for Luke's audience of one person, remember, Luke Is writing to just one person, Theophilus. Theophilus is not a Jew, okay. So Luke's high point is Jesus' pronouncement on the Jewish nation, which for Luke's audience of one will go a long way in explaining the hostility of the Jews towards Christianity and the offer of the gospel to the gentiles, from Jewish apostles and teachers, because he was a - Theophilus, the one being written to, he was a greek. One of the questions in his mind might have been, why is it that this religion is so persecuted by the Jews? I mean, after all, a Jew, Jesus was a Jew. Why all the persecution? Why the hatred? Why the aggression? Well, in Luke's description here, he gives the reason why. Because Jesus condemned the nation. Jesus said, this nation will be destroyed. One of the reasons why there was such antipathy between the Jews and, well, not between them, but for the Jews towards the Christians. So Luke finishes the section by describing the battle lines as far as Jesus was concerned. So on one side you had the chief priests and the scribes, who were the Pharisees. Most of them were Pharisees. You had the leading men of the nation, the elders, the wealthy ones, the political class and the teachers. On the other side you had the people. That's how it broke down. That's how it was, who was for who, as far as Jesus was concerned. And if you notice that as Luke tells the story, who are the ones that believe? Well, the blind guy, he believed. The beggars, they believed. The people with leprosy, they believed. The tax collectors, they believed. The children, they believed. The ones who didn't believe were the leaders, the religious elite. They didn't believe. So Luke describes the final interactions, miracles, and teachings by Jesus as He approaches and enters the city of Jerusalem. These events and teachings are such that they describe the situation and the divide among the people with disbelief and rejection of the religious and political elite, contrasted by the faith and enthusiasm and joy of the ordinary people and the outsiders. I mean, just imagine it. The people who are in charge, the people who set the laws, the people who have been made the leaders, none of them believe, but they're in charge of all the people. And the people that they're in charge of,
they believe in Jesus. So this is the setup here. This is what's causing the problem. At this point the only thing restraining the Jewish leadership from arresting Jesus is the fear of a backlash of the common people. He is the people's hero at this point. Now, in the next section, however, we're going to see closer infighting as Jesus is confronted by various leaders, who now have easy access to Him as He ministers to people in the temple area. In other words, before He was in the north. He was far away from the city. And so, there were Pharisees up there and there were leaders up there too, but not as many. Now He's going into the hornet's nest. Now He's going into enemy territory, if you wish, in the city. So here are a couple of lessons we can draw from the material that we have covered today. Some basic things I think that we can learn. Lesson one, believe the book. The great sin of the Jews was that they refused to believe their own prophets. Jesus kept saying, as the prophet says, as it is written. All the things that the prophets said about Him, He was just knocking them down, one after another. Maybe the leaders didn't like the way He moved or they didn't like the sound of His voice. That was neither here nor there. They didn't believe the prophets that spoke of Him. It's not that Jesus didn't perfectly fulfill all that was said about the Messiah to come in the prophets. It's that He didn't look or sound like the image of the Messiah that they had created in their own minds - someone powerful probably, with some military power. A political miracle worker. Not only a political person, but a political leader, military political leader who could do miracles. Wow. Wouldn't we like one of those guys to be our president? Wouldn't it be wonderful if our president, for example. And I'm not getting into politics, I'm just saying, wouldn't it be wonderful if we had a president who saw a hurricane coming towards the Gulf Coast and said, "Be still. Stop." And the hurricane would stop. And if they're having a drought, in the farmland. If we had a President who could do miracles and say, "Let there be rain." Who wouldn't want a president like that? That's what they wanted. That's what they were anticipating. So who do they get? Well, they get an itinerant preacher from the north, from the sticks, without political, military, social, economic power at all. Not even trained in one of their schools. That's who they get. They didn't want that guy. They failed because they didn't believe their own book. We risk the same error if our Jesus is the Jesus of popular movies and ideas, movements. Our Lord, His will, His word, His church, are all clearly presented and explained in His book, the Bible. So let's make sure that our lives and opinions and our practices are based on The Book. So important. Lesson number two, we will all be visited one day. Luke writes that the Jews did not recognize the time of their visitation, and they were lost because of it. The idea is, we are all visited by Christ at one time or another. The visit comes in one form or another, but it always comes. It comes as an invitation to study the Bible, or attend worship service. It comes as a temptation to do or to leave undone something or other. It comes as an illness an accident, an offense, or a challenge that measures both our faith and our love. As death, sometimes it comes as death; signaling that there is no longer any time left to choose to believe or not. You remain as you are, eternally for good or for bad. In my experience, not the be-all and end-all of all experience, but in my experience as a minister, closing in on 40 years worth of ministry, I have rarely seen deathbed conversions. I've rarely seen them. And I've seen a lot of death beds. I've watched a lot of people, very sick and die. And what I have noted is, the ones who were faithful, well, they were faithful as they died. They died faithfully. I've never seen any Christian reject Christ at the moment of their death. I've never had the experience of seeing someone who had been a faithful Christian, they're in the throes of death, at the very end, say, you know what, forget it, I don't believe in Jesus anymore. I just wanted to say that before I died. I never saw that. It's the other way around. It's the other way around. it said, oh it's Oh Lord, please come now. Come take me. I'm ready for You now. That's usually what I hear. And on the other hand, I've rarely heard someone who is a disbeliever all their lives on their death bed, you know what? I think I'm going to change. They were unfaithful and hardened their hearts their whole lives and they die that way. Now, it happens. It happens. A thief on the cross, sure. But the rule is, if you're unfaithful while you live, you stay that way until you die. So, not all visitations are the same in nature or length of time. But the common denominator is
that everyone gets a visit. And the visit is always about whether we believe in Christ or not, you have a choice to make that challenges your ideals, challenges your purity, challenges your honesty. That's a visit. The Lord and His Spirit are saying to you, okay, do you still believe now? Now that you have to choose to do what is right and in so doing, it'll hurt you, are you still with Me now? That's a visit. The visit, as I say, is always about, do we still believe? Are we still there? Are we still disciples? Okay, so we're going to stop right there. Reading assignment, Luke 20, verse 1 to 21, verse 38, for next week, if the Lord is willing, we'll continue on. Thank you very much for your attention.
