[0:00] The Greatness of the Lord In God my Savior Shall my heart rejoice Tell out my song The greatness of His name Thank God this night The deep days of the Lord His mercy sure From age to age the same
[1:00] His holy name The Lord the mighty one Tell out my song The greatness of His might A sound of all beings May their glory One A house and star And will come forth to flight The hungry The humble Lifted high Tell out my song The glories of His word The peace His promise And His mercy sure Tell out my song The greatness of the Lord
[2:02] To children Children And forevermore Turn in the word of God As it's found In the gospel of Luke In chapter 5 Luke chapter 5 And we're going to Commence reading From verse 12 So it's Luke chapter 5 And verse 12 Let's share the word of God While Jesus was in one of the towns A man came along Who was covered with leprosy When he saw Jesus He fell with his face to the ground And begged him Lord If you are willing You can make me clean Jesus reached out his hand
[3:04] And touched the man I am willing He said Be clean And immediately The leprosy left him Then Jesus ordered him Don't tell anyone But go show yourself To the priest And offer the sacrifices That Moses commanded For your cleansing As a testimony to them Yet the news about him Spread all the more So that crowds of people Came to hear him And to be healed Of their sicknesses But Jesus often withdrew To lonely places And prayed One day as he was teaching Pharisees and teachers Of the law Who had come from Every village of Galilee And from Judea And Jerusalem Were sitting there And the power of the Lord Was present For him to heal the sick Some men Came carrying a paralytic On a mat And tried to take him Into the house To lay him before Jesus When they could not Find a way To do this Because of the crowd
[4:05] They went up on the roof And lowered him On his mat Through the tiles Into the middle Of the crowd Right in front of Jesus When Jesus saw their faith He said Friend Your sins are forgiven The Pharisees And the teachers Of the law Began thinking to themselves Who is this fellow Who speaks blasphemy Who can forgive sin But God alone Jesus knew What they were thinking And asked Why are you thinking These things In your hearts Which is easier To say Your sins are forgiven Or to say Get up and walk But that you may know That the Son of Man Has authority on earth To forgive sins He said to the paralyzed man I tell you Get up Take your mat And go home Immediately He stood up In front of them Took what he'd been Lying on And went home Praising God Everyone was amazed
[5:07] And gave praise to God They were filled with awe And said We have seen Remarkable things today Amen May God Again let's pray Again our God And our Father We thank you That we come Before your open word Father we thank you It tells us This is the word of truth And we thank you For the Holy Spirit The spirit of truth Who will lead us Into all truth Father again We pray for openness To receive those things Yourself That we might live To glorify you Amen Well it's lovely To be here Among you this morning To have the opportunity To preach the word of God So I do thank you For your very warm welcome And the invitation again To preach The word of God It's always a joy To be here In Whitby But this morning I want us to turn our attention To that portion of scripture We read earlier
[6:08] From Luke chapter 5 And really to think Upon what we're here for What we're doing here A congregation is made up of people People from all sorts of backgrounds All shapes and sizes And when the congregation Is a bigger congregation Then you know The variety of people Also is larger So we ask the question What brings This variation Or the various people Where there are different backgrounds And different views What brings us together In the church context We are here To worship God But again I ask the question Is this The real reason That we're here This morning Because in this passage Of scripture We read that the Lord Jesus Was preaching In a house We read that
[7:09] You know The fame of his Exploits Gone abroad People knew about the Lord Jesus They knew the things he did The things he said And so here he is In Capernaum And the crowd Have gathered around And they want to see Jesus They want to hear what he says They want to see what he's going to do And while he's there Teaching in the house A paralyzed man Is brought by For his friends They can't get in They can't get in through the door They can't get to the windows And so what they do Is they go to the side of the house They climb up the steps And they make a hole in the roof And they lower this man Before the Lord Jesus And the words of Jesus To this man is Son Your sins Are forgiven you But this morning I don't want us to Particularly think upon The healing of The paralyzed man I want to think about
[8:11] As it were The congregation The people who were there In the house Listening To what Jesus Had to say And maybe to think of the reason Why They were there Today In this congregation We have Those who have been Christians For many years They used to be Found in the house of God They're used to Listening to sermons There may be those Who have been Christians For fewer years And they're They're fresh And they're excited And again They're hungry For the word of God There may be those Who are not Christians And they come here Because they are Genuinely interested To find out More about God There may be those Here this morning Who I don't know For whatever reason You're here Maybe you're skeptical And in that place Where Jesus was
[9:11] No doubt There was a mixture Of such folk And we read In verse 17 Of one group of people They're described As the Pharisees The teachers Of the law And we read These people They come from Every village of Galilee And from Judea And Jerusalem And they were Sitting there That's all the Distribution we have Of them They were Sitting there For whatever reason They'd come To Jesus They were sitting there What was he going to say What was he going to do And Particularly not there To worship God They're not there To repent of their sins They're there Simply sitting by And it's strange
[10:11] That some people Can come And they're not Particularly interested In things of God But they're there To see well What's going to happen Capernaum Capernaum was Blessed From many of the cities In Judea At that time Many of the cities In Israel Because Again the Lord Jesus So many of his miracles In that place And it says In Matthew chapter 11 Of the city Capernaum You who are Exalted into heaven You will be brought Down to hell For the mighty works Which have been done If these had been done In Sodom It would have Remained until this day But I say to you It will be more tolerable For the land of Sodom In the day of judgment Than for you This place Which knew much Of the blessing of God It seemed that they
[11:12] Almost began to take Things for granted And there are those Who hear God's word And they don't Receive it And it takes more Than a powerful Preaching of the gospel To convert these men It takes Something very special Because of the Hardness Because of the Sinfulness Because of the Depravity Which exists Within us It takes the Grace of God It takes the Power of God To change us To make us What we ought to be And so this morning I want to Consider As we go through This passage About those men Those women Who were just Simply sitting there To ask the question Who were they?
[12:08] Secondly What were they doing? Thirdly What were the Consequences? And fourthly What was the Cause?
[12:20] And so firstly We say Well Who were those Who were sitting by? Who were those Who were just Sitting there? And we read In verse 17 That they were The Pharisees And the teachers Of the law The Pharisees Were as it were A group of people Who had separated Themselves They came about In the period Between the Old And the New Testaments And this sect As it were They They wanted to be Pure unto God They wanted to be Holy They had good Aspirations If you like And so what they did They made so many Laws To help themselves To keep God's commandments That over the time They became more Concerned by the laws That they made Than actually Their love And devotion To God They loved their laws They loved their Traditions More than they did The Lord God
[13:21] Who had made them And then we read Of these teachers Of the law They were those Who studied And taught And interpreted And transmitted The law of Moses And again That law Was explained By their tradition And indeed The real law Of God Was in danger Of being buried Under the tradition Of these people The Lord Jesus said Thus you have made The commandment Of God Of nil effect By your Tradition And such men Well if you read The New Testament The Pharisees And the teachers Of the law They don't get A very good press They're often viewed As self-righteous Holier than thou Superior in attitude And these were the people
[14:24] Who we read Were just sitting there Listening Hearing What Jesus would do What were they doing there Well Again Very simply They were sitting They weren't Involved In anything special They were there Indulging maybe Their curiosity There was Deliberate action As we read That they'd come From every part Of Galilee From Judea And Jerusalem Some of the people Wanted to hear What Jesus would say To them They came Some came To catch him out And we see Later on In the scriptures How Some of the Disciples These Pharisees And they would Come to just Literally They wanted to Catch Jesus out To trip him up In what he was saying What he was doing They wanted to Find fault with him Because they were jealous But the thing is
[15:24] They refused To respond To the teaching Of the saviour We think perhaps Of those Who can be described As perhaps Spoiled brats You know They come They They are determined Beforehand That If they Don't want To do something They're not Going to do it And nothing Is going to Change their mind They are determined That this is A waste of time It's fruitless It's empty And whatever happens They are not Going to enjoy Themselves They're not Going to take Advantage of it They're there Literally just To criticise These men Went to sit by To hear What they might hear And so the question is Why are we here?
[16:23] Why are we here This morning? You may come in Sunday by Sunday Believing You are worshipping God But if That's all you do Is talk Or daydream Or look around And see what's Happening somewhere Else Well What is the benefit?
[16:52] You may as well Go and see a show Of some type And maybe some people Treat the service Of God like that Of a show Or a spectacle But really We're here To worship God We're here To praise The almighty For all he has Done And you know There may be Others who come Because well It's a respectable Thing to do Isn't it?
[17:18] Going to church It helps us In our righteousness Helps us to feel Good about ourselves But again That's not the point We need to come With the right Attitude We need to come With that Readiness to hear The word of God And sometimes That word will come And it's A great encouragement And it builds us up And it helps us In our faith And sometimes It comes as a rebuke And just shakes it up And says Catches it And shakes it And says Well wake up As Christians You have a responsibility To live for God As unbelievers You have a responsibility To turn to God And repent of your sins And so we We see that But we must come With the Attitude It's not a show
[18:19] It's not Seeing what The preacher's wearing Or how he Gesticulates And whatever It's What does God Have to say To me And if we're Here for any Other reason Then we need To question Ourselves These Pharisees These scribes And teachers Of the law If they were there Just to find fault They're just like A hungry man Going into a restaurant And he orders The food And it's set Before him But he's too busy Looking around And disagreeing With the decor Or criticizing The service He's receiving Or Looking at the plate And saying Well you know I would have Done this Different And he goes
[19:20] Out without Touching the food And it's been Of no use Whatsoever We Have been Brought here This morning To hear What God Says to us Because if we Come In other Any other means Any other way There are Consequences And There are Serious Consequences Firstly If we Come to God And we're Not saved And we Come in Sunday By Sunday Week By week Month By month Even year By year Then we Are Incurring The Responsibility Of hearing The word Of God And to Ourselves These men
[20:23] Were in Front of The Lord Jesus Christ He was Teaching In the Way of Salvation He was Teaching How to Be Right With God They Were Hearing Him And they Had no Excuse If they Would not Accept the Invitation To come And trust In him They Couldn't Say a Turn Around Later And say I didn't Know I didn't Hear I didn't Understand Because they Had heard it From the Voice of The Saviour Himself And if You Come along To the Church Sunday After Sunday And you Go out Unmoved And unchanged Still In your Sin On the Day of Judgment You cannot Say Well Lord I did This And I Did That Or I Didn't Understand I Didn't Hear Is it Nonsense You were There Sunday By Sunday You heard The gospel Time and Time again You have
[21:24] No excuse The thing Is You were There Immediately To sit By To sit There And listen And you Didn't Allow My word To penetrate In times Past We Paul Was speaking To the People Of Athens And he Says In times That The times Of ignorance God Winked At He As it Were Turned A blind Eye But Now He Commands All men Everywhere To repent Before the Lord Jesus Came Before He died Upon that Cross of Calvary People Were Less Accountable But Since The Lord Jesus Died And rose Again And the
[22:26] Many times We have Heard the Gospel We are More Accountable We cannot Plead Ignorance And so If we Continue to Come and Continue to be Hardened Of heart Then we Have no Excuse And secondly If we Come There is The consequence Of gathering As it were That hardness Of heart You know The more We hear The gospel The more We hear Of the Love And the Grace And the Mercy Of God We can Become Desensitized You know When The first Time For example We're Confronted By You know You are A sinner Before a Holy God That may Hit us Hard We may Be shocked
[23:27] We may Be challenged We may Think to Ourselves Well Yeah I've Got to Do Something About This But then We come The next Time And we Present it With the Same Truth Of our Need of God For Salvation And if We keep On coming And we Keep on Coming And we Keep on Hearing That message We can Become Desensitized To it It just Goes Over Head It Fails To make The impact And our Hearts Become Hardened There was A man Called Felix He He He heard Paul Preach He was A Roman Governor And when He heard Paul Preach We read That his Knees Knocked Together He trembled He was Convicted Of his Sin But he Didn't do Anything About it But he Called for Paul To appear
[24:27] Before him Again and Again He was Hoping to Receive a Bride To let Paul Go Paul Was in Prison But the More he Heard Again the Harder His heart Became And that's A real Consequence Of just Sitting by We can Become Desensitized And do you Know it's Even possible For Christians To become Desensitized When we Hear Again of The love And the Mercy of God And what The Lord Jesus Christ Has done For us You know We fail To acknowledge And we Fail to Praise him As we Ought Or that We might Know that Freshness Again Of when We first Believed And love Him more And then
[25:29] The third Thing The third Consequence Is that They obstructed The work Of the Saviour Their Attitude When You know This Man was Healed Of his Paralysis Jesus said Son your Sins are Forgiving you And immediately The Pharisees They latched On Who is this Man that He says That he Forgives Sin Only God Can forgive Sin And as it Were they They doubted The Lord Jesus And they Cast aspersions Upon him And they Can spoil The work And I Know as A preacher Sometimes you Come into a Church And you See And you See that the Folk there And they're Behind you And there's that
[26:30] Warmth and you know They've been praying for you And there's an interest And the word of God Is making an impact And it's so encouraging But there's been churches You go to And you know You look at the people And they're They're looking around And their eyes Are dropping And you know There's Sometimes That That sneer And it's It brings A coldness And It can disrupt The word We thank God For the Holy Spirit Who is responsible For taking this word And applying it To the hearts And minds Of individuals But these These men These Pharisees These scribes
[27:30] They They just Criticized They As it were They abused The Lord Jesus Again As the one Who had authority To forgive sins For them He was just A blasphemer These men They would say They were jealous For God But more so They were jealous For themselves For their own Reputation They were not Flocking to Jesus And so They wanted To keep Others From going To him But the Lord Knows their hearts We read That you know They said In their hearts Who is this man But Jesus He is the one Who reads The heart Out of the heart Of men Proceed evil Thoughts And adulteries And fornications And murders Theft Coverageness Wickedness Deceit Lascivishness An evil eye Blasphemy Pride Foolishness All these things Come out from within And defile a man
[28:31] And the Lord Knows us He knows Every thought That we have Every word Before it comes On our tongues And so we Can't fool him There are consequences For our actions And then finally Just briefly I want to look at What was the cause Of their Just sitting there They sat by Without Contribution Because of their own Selfish Conceit They were divided From others By their sense Of superiority We are not Sinners We are righteous We are Pharisees We are teachers Of the law We know The things of God We don't Need any Itinerant preacher
[29:32] Come and tell us What to do How many Have been Annoyed When the preacher Dares to refer To them As sinners As those In need As those Who are Hell deserving Sinners That's That's quite a Statement isn't it That we are Hell deserving Sinners And that's what we are Myself included But we need To know Those things So that we allow The work of God To deal with us And to draw him Unto himself You know The Lord Jesus Spoke at such Many Says There are those You know It's not those Who are whole That need A doctor But those Who are sick And these
[30:33] These men They didn't Consider themselves As needing A doctor They felt They were okay As they were They had no Sense of their Spiritual hunger No sense Of unworthiness Before God They were only Full of prejudice Full of their Traditions Full Again of their Own self Righteousness And you know We can think Of these Pharisees And these Teachers of the law And we think Oh do you know I'm so glad I'm not like them I'm so glad You know These men Whom Jesus Criticizes Who calls Woes Down upon them So glad I'm not like them And yet We need to look At our own Hearts And say
[31:35] Are we like Them It may not Be Every week But sometimes We come With that Same attitude We're okay We're here For fellowship We're here To receive Love And share Love One with Another And we're Happy here And I don't Want to be Challenged I don't want To be Criticized I'm good Enough As I am You know Talking the The other Day I said That I had To go to Church Because I Was preaching And I Think well Is that The only Reason you're Going No of Course not Even Preachers Go Not because It's a Duty But because They love God And they
[32:36] Appreciate what God has Done for Them Otherwise We wouldn't Be here Doing the Job we Do God knows Our hearts And minds He knew What the Scribes Were thinking And he Confronted Them There's not A word On my Tongue But oh Lord you Know us It all Together And this Should just Wake us Up To see And to Question And to Challenge Ourselves Why are We here What Preparation Do we Make Before we Come to The house Of God That's a Good Challenge Isn't It Do we Just grab Our coats On the way Past the Door Or do We prepare Ourselves Do we Sit down And pray And seek God's Blessing
[33:36] Upon the Service to Which we're Going If you Feel that The service Is hard And laborious Do you Pray for The preacher Do you Pray for Yourselves That in Spite of Everything God may Warm Your Hearts Well We've Talked About The scribes And the Pharisees And perhaps The negative Aspect to Their Sitting By But I Want us To think Before we Close Of the Other folk Who were There Sitting By Those Who were There Because Yes They wanted To see What Jesus Was Say Not Because They wanted To Criticize Not Because They wanted To find Fault But because They wanted To see Jesus And we Read at The very End of This passage Everyone Was amazed And gave
[34:37] Praise To God They were Filled with Awe And said We have Seen Remarkable Things Today You know That should Be guitar�� make sure that when I go along to the house of God I'm there for the right reasons because I know what God has done for me and I want to give him the glory or I know the needs
[35:40] I have in my own heart that I'm a sinner before God and I need his forgiveness may God meet us in all our needs to his praise and his glory Amen Well now to him who is able to keep him from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy to the only God our Saviour be glory and majesty power and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord before all ages now and forever Amen