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[0:00] to see you all from all sorts of different parts of the country and trust that together as we come to worship the Lord our God we come with a sense of his presence and with that joy in our hearts that sense of the wonder of his salvation to us. Today's Palm Sunday beginning of Easter week, Holy Week and of course when we remember the Lord Jesus as he rode into Jerusalem that final time approaching his death, approaching his suffering for us and we're told in Luke chapter 19 what happened. Let me just read briefly what happened on that day when Jesus came near the place where the crowd, sorry the road goes down to the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen. Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest. Well I hope that we are here because too in our hearts we want to joyfully praise our God and of course particularly as I said beginning of this Easter week we look to the end, the end on Friday when Christ suffered and again his resurrection too. So let's sing number 262. 262. We sing the praise of him who died, of him who died upon the cross.

[1:25] Let's continue in our worship as we come to God in prayer. Let us all pray.

[1:46] Oh Lord our God, our Heavenly Father, we come here this morning knowing that there is only one way by which we sinful men and women can enjoy the smile and the blessing of the Holy God. You are that Holy God and we are that sinful people and we know oh Lord that it is only because of the cross of our Lord Jesus, his death, his suffering, his atonement Lord for us only because he was willing to take upon himself our sin, the guilt, the blame, yes even the very punishment that we deserve and remove it from us completely to bring for us forgiveness and pardon, bring for us friendship and reconciliation with God.

[2:35] We come oh Lord at the very start of this Easter week, this Palm Sunday and our hearts and our minds and our thoughts already are centered upon that great climax of human history, the most eventful, the most dramatic, the most important day that the world has ever known when the very Son of God died, when the immortal Creator gave up his final breath, when the one who gives life to all beings was himself consumed in the power of death.

[3:09] Oh Lord we thank you, we don't fully understand everything that went on in that day, how can we comprehend the mystery, the marvel, the wonder, but oh Lord we thank you that we are here today because of that day, because Jesus rode into Jerusalem, because Jesus went there determined to bear our sin, because Jesus suffered and died. We are here, we are here to bring you our praises oh Lord, we're here to rejoice in the forgiveness of our sins, we're here to know that because of his death we need not fear death.

[3:41] Thank you that death has no sting for us, it has no pain for us, it has no sorrow for us because we know that our Lord Jesus Christ has conquered death on our behalf and so indeed we look through the cross and we look through to that Easter Sunday morning too when he rose again and all power and authority was his once more to give life to those that are dead, to give heaven to those who deserve hell, to give life to those who were lost and bound in chains. Lord we thank you that this morning we come as those resurrected people, those risen people, those living people and Lord we ask that indeed by your Holy Spirit you would revive and quicken us afresh. We confess oh Lord even in this week we've been forgetful of you, even in this week Lord we've forgotten just who we are in Christ, the wonders and the blessings that are ours, we've allowed ourselves to become tempted, we've allowed ourselves to become downhearted and discouraged, we've allowed ourselves to be deceived and lied to but oh Lord we thank you that you are the one who restores us, restore us again with the joy of your salvation, restore us again with the hope of heaven, cause us once more to lift our eyes heavenward and see that our Lord Jesus who suffered and died rose again is ascended to your right hand, he sat down in power and authority looking for that day, that day when he will come again not to suffer but to judge, when he will come again oh Lord not to be rejected but to reign, when every knee will bow and every tongue confess, he is Lord to the glory of

[5:21] God the Father. Oh Lord grant that even today we might sing his praises the one who died and the one who lives for we ask it all our heavenly Father in the name and for the praise of Jesus your Son. Amen.

[5:35] Let's turn in our Bibles now to Luke and chapter 9. Luke and chapter 9. Those of you who are here regularly on a Sunday morning know that we've been journeying through this wonderful record of the life of our Lord Jesus. Last week was the transfiguration. Jesus and three closest disciples are on that mountain when Jesus was gloriously revealed in his glory and majesty and we're going to pick up from verse 37. So Luke chapter 9 verse 37 reading down to verse 56. If you have one of the church red Bibles then you'll find that on page 1040. Page 1040. Luke 9 verse 37.

[6:30] The next day when they came down from the mountain a large crowd met him. A man in the crowd called out teacher I beg you to look at my son for he is my only child. A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams. It throws him into convulsion so he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him and is destroying him. I begged your disciples to drive it out but they could not. You unbelieving and perverse generation. Jesus replied how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring your son here. Even while the boy was coming the demon threw him to the ground in a convulsion but Jesus rebuked the impure spirit. Healed the boy and gave him back to his father. They were all amazed at the greatness of God. While everyone was marveling at all that Jesus did he said to his disciples listen carefully to what

[7:32] I'm going to tell you. The son of man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. But they did not understand what this meant. It was hidden from them. So they did not grasp it and they were afraid to ask him about it. An argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest.

[7:53] Jesus knowing their thoughts took a little child and made him stand beside them. Then he said to them whoever welcomes this little child in my name welcomes me. Whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. It is the one who is least among you who is the greatest.

[8:10] Master said John we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him because he is not one of us. Do not stop him Jesus said. Whoever is not against you is for you. As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem and he sent messengers on ahead who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him. But the people there did not welcome him because he was heading for Jerusalem. When the disciples James and John saw this they asked Lord do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them? Jesus turned and rebuked them.

[8:52] Then he and his disciples went to another village. It would be good if you have a Bible to hand and you turn to Luke 9 because we are going to look at these events that we read from verse 37 and following. I don't know whether you still have a hobby or whether that is something that you had when you were a young person or a child. It is good to have a hobby, good to have an interest in various things. When I was a young lad like many other boys of that age I used to like making airfix models and you still buy them nowadays. They are not quite as maybe as popular as they once were. Especially I like making airfix models of aircraft and in fact if you had visited my bedroom when I was around about 10 or 11 you would see hanging from the ceiling on pieces of thread, aeroplanes, so forth camels and spitfires and hurricanes and bits and pieces like that gathering dust. I would ask for an airfix model for my birthday for Christmas or I would ask for money to go buy one from the model shop that was in town. If I bought one as soon as I got home I couldn't wait. I would have to start making it straight away. I would open up the box and I would get all the bits and pieces off the model cut away you know because it would come in this sort of frame and I lay them all out getting ready to stick them together and I would just keep on doing my model unless of course I was called for my meal or something by my mum until I completed it. Gluing every part together until it was finished at least in my view it was anyway. Unfortunately if you ever do airfix models in the instructions it tells you very clearly there are things you are to glue and leave to set before you glue other pieces to it but I was never that patient. I still am not that patient and so usually by the time I'd finished my planes had sort of drooping wings and wonky propellers and crooked wheels but it was finished as far as I was concerned and none of my models ever painted to make like the box you know with a fantastic picture. Determination to see something through to the end is good but it can't be rushed. It's got to be in the right time. It's got to be done in the right way.

[11:17] Now when we get to Luke in chapter 9 I want us particularly to think about verse 51. So in verse 51 we're told of Jesus that he resolutely set out for Jerusalem.

[11:31] He resolutely set out. He was determined to get to Jerusalem. Now today's Palm Sunday. We know that. The day we remember Lord Jesus riding on a donkey into Jerusalem where the people cheered and crowded around and put down palm leaves on the road and waved them and all sorts of things shouting as we saw at the very beginning. Blessed is the king comes in the name of the Lord.

[11:58] And we know because we have the record of Jesus' week what happened through that week particularly within six days many of those people who shouted praise to him were shouting crucify him.

[12:15] Crucify him. Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. He knew what was ahead of him. He knew what he would face.

[12:31] Just last week we looked at how he spoke with Moses and Elijah on the mount and how there they had discussed and talked about his exodus, his departure. Then we're told even here about how he says to them, how long shall I stay with you? He tells them about verse 44, the son of man is going to be delivered into the hands of men.

[12:53] And then we read in verse 51, he resolutely set out for Jerusalem. Jesus knew the suffering that was awaiting him in Jerusalem. He knew the grief. He knew the pain. He knew the end.

[13:09] He knew what his destination would be. It would be the cross. But he was determined to go. The God that we worship, the God that we trust is a determined God.

[13:20] He's a God who never starts what he will not finish but always finishes what he begins. He always completes perfectly and in keeping with his plan, his eternal plan, all his promises.

[13:35] That's why we can trust him. That's why we can put our faith in him. That's why we can know that when we have put our faith and trust in the living God that we need not fear reaching heaven.

[13:46] We need not fear what the future may bring because we have a God who always finishes what he starts. The determination of Jesus here in verse 51 to go to Jerusalem reveals to us that he is God's Messiah.

[14:00] It again shows us that he is the one who came to fulfill the very plan of God for the rescue and salvation of men and women. For once again we realize that here he is fulfilling God's promises, God's prophecies of long ago.

[14:19] In Isaiah in chapter 50 we're told about the Lord's servant, the Messiah. Just listen to what we read about him there and we shall see that this speaks only of one person, of Jesus Christ.

[14:34] The sovereign Lord has opened my ears. I've not been rebellious. I've not turned away. I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard.

[14:46] I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting. Because the sovereign Lord helps me I will not be disgraced. Therefore I have set my face like flint.

[15:00] That phrase which is translated for us in Luke 9 as resolutely set out is in the original. Set his face. It's an idiom, it's a saying of those days.

[15:14] Set his face. We talk about people being set upon a course, don't we? Meaning that they're determined to see it through to the end. We think of that phrase as well. But here it is, Isaiah 50.

[15:26] Jesus is that very servant, isn't he? Because everything that's spoken about him there took place in his life when he got to Jerusalem. His back was beaten, wasn't it?

[15:39] Those soldiers who took him, Pilate ordered for him to be flogged in the most horrendous way. We know that he was mocked as well and ridiculed by the soldiers.

[15:49] But not just by them but by the others as well. If you're a king, come down from that cross and we'll put our trust in you. They mocked him and ridiculed him. Putting a crown of thorns on his head and a purple gown on his back.

[16:03] And bowing down to him and saying, oh, hail, king of the Jews. And of course they spat upon him, didn't they? Spat in his face again and again.

[16:14] And though even in the Gospels we're not told there that physically they pulled out his beard, we can little doubt that they did that as well, as that prophecy tells us.

[16:27] What was his attitude to this torture? What was his attitude to this pain and suffering that the servant of the Lord would go through? He says, therefore, I have set my face like flint.

[16:39] I have not turned back. I have not been rebellious. The Lord Jesus, knowing all that was ahead, set his face, resolutely set out for Jerusalem.

[16:52] He was going to the place of his death and execution fully aware, fully to fulfill God's purposes. Set his face as flint.

[17:03] We should know what flint's like. It's probably one of the hardest stones, isn't it? You can't sort of chisel it away, in one sense, and mold it. They don't use it for sculptures or for anything like that.

[17:14] The only thing that's as hard as flint is flint itself. Jesus is always the one who finishes what he starts.

[17:26] If you put your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, you can be sure that he is determined to save you. And that nothing will stop him from accomplishing that.

[17:39] He will not flinch. He will not turn back from the path of suffering. Rather, he dug deep, fixed his mind and heart on keeping on going to the very bitter end, whatever the cost.

[17:54] But why? Why here in Luke and chapter 9 do we have this declaration, this statement about Jesus setting his face, resolutely determined to go to Jerusalem?

[18:07] Why, as Luke put it there, he's still many months away from Palm Sunday. Possibly, we may even say, more than a year away from going to the cross and his suffering.

[18:20] Why here do we find that we're given this insight into the heart of Jesus to be determined not to flinch but to go to Jerusalem, to suffer and to die?

[18:32] Are there clues here in these events that we've read surrounding this statement of Jesus? I think there are. I think that the reason Luke has put these things together, not only because they are true and real and happened, but also they tell us something of Jesus' mind, of what motivated him, what moved him, what stirred him, what, as it were, made him determined.

[18:54] There's two forces that are powerfully at work in the lives of the people around about Jesus at this time.

[19:05] Two forces that he was going to Jerusalem to defeat and to overthrow. And we see them firstly in verses 37 and following. We see the power of Satan.

[19:17] Satan. Crowds of people are crowding around Jesus as he comes down. Wherever he went, they were there, weren't they? Wanting healing, wanting to see a miracle, wanting to hear some words from him.

[19:30] And out of the crowd, a man, a desperate man, a distraught man, a father, cries, teacher. I beg you, look at my son. He's distraught because his son, his only son, is being attacked by an evil spirit.

[19:46] A spirit seizes him and throws him to the ground, causing him to have convulsions and foam at the mouth. And this man had heard about Jesus, and while Jesus was up the mountain, he'd gone to the crowd of disciples, and he'd said to them, Please, will you help me?

[20:02] And perhaps they'd tried. Perhaps they thought that in themselves they had the power to be able to set this man's boy free. But they failed. I begged your disciples to drive it out, but they couldn't.

[20:16] The failure of the disciples, disappointment of the man, the crowds around him provoke Jesus to cry out, You unbelieving and perverse generation.

[20:27] There's a cry, isn't there, from his heart, frustration. Of what he sees around about him, Satan at work, twisting, perverting, and of course, destroying.

[20:41] The very power and the work of Satan is to destroy men and women and boys and girls. It scarcely ever leaves him and ends destroying him. The man knew that if this wasn't stopped, if this boy wasn't healed, if the Lord Jesus didn't do something, that ultimately this demon, this spirit, would kill the boy.

[21:01] The devil is at work in this world and he is at work to bring destruction. We see it all around about us.

[21:11] We put it down to gang culture. We put it down to lack of education. We put it down to unemployment. We put it down to religious fanaticism. We put it down to all sorts of things.

[21:21] But the Bible is very, very clear that behind all the evil and the wickedness that we see in this world, all the destruction and the loss of life, there is an enemy of humanity, an enemy of God who is Satan himself.

[21:34] This boy didn't just have, if I can put it that way, an epilepsy. He had a spirit, spiritual. He was a demon. There was the devil at work.

[21:46] Surely one of the very reasons that Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem was because in his heart he longed to destroy the work of the devil.

[21:57] He longed to set men and women free from Satan and the work that he does in destroying human life. In fact, that's exactly what we're told later in John's first letter, chapter 3.

[22:10] The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. Don't be conned, dear friends. Don't be conned into thinking that the devil is some cuddly toy, some figure of comic with a pitchfork and horns and red.

[22:28] The devil is real. Satan is the most awful enemy of all people and of you. And he deceives and he lies and he tells people, if you do what you want, if you please yourself, if you give yourself over to all the wrong things of life, then somehow you will be rewarded.

[22:50] But all he does is destroy. Don't we see it again and again? How many famous celebrities who've sought glory and honor and wealth and all sorts of things that go with it, how many have taken their lives just in the last few months or years?

[23:08] The devil destroys. Christ brings life. One of the ways that Satan leads people into destruction is by darkening people's minds. He destroys by darkening the mind.

[23:20] Even as the boy and the father begin to rejoice and to celebrate being reunited, Jesus turns to his disciples and speaks to them.

[23:33] He speaks to them clearly. What he's spoken before. I'm going to be betrayed into the hands of sinful men and women. I'm going to die. I'm going to be handed over.

[23:44] And what do we find? These disciples who've been with Jesus for months, whom Jesus has explained his death and his suffering to again and again, they did not understand what he meant.

[23:56] It was hidden from them. And they didn't grasp it. Not for the last time did Jesus' disciples respond to his words with bewilderment, respond to his words with confusion, just that, you know, that blank look on their faces.

[24:15] I don't know what you mean. I don't know what you're talking about. It's an ignorance and confusion that continues to pervade the mind of people today. When you speak with people about the Lord Jesus Christ, there's an indifference.

[24:28] There's a darkness that's over their minds. They cannot comprehend that God should come into this world or even that God exists or that they have a soul that needs saving or that there is a heaven and a hell.

[24:41] And why is this the case? Why are men and women unable to comprehend the gospel? Is it because they're stupid? No. Is it because they're unintelligent? No. It's because there is a Satan at work, a devil.

[24:53] 2 Corinthians chapter 4, the God of this age, one of the titles given by the Bible to Satan, the God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel.

[25:06] Cannot see. Men and women are in complete darkness to Jesus, to the gospel, to the good news. That's why Jesus was resolutely set to go to Jerusalem because he knew to break the power of Satan over people's lives, to bring them into the knowledge of the gospel.

[25:25] He had to himself, as it were, engage in battle with Satan upon the cross and defeat him and triumph over him so that we might see what terrible danger we are in, that the scales of our eyes may be taken off to see that we are sinners before a holy God, to see that there is a Savior who has come to rescue us and to turn and put our faith in him.

[25:49] Here Jesus said himself in John chapter 12, I have come into the world as light so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness. Here we are in an age, dear friends, the 21st century, where the most enlightened people who have ever lived on the planet we understand more about the biology and the DNA of our bodies and the gene codes than we've ever understood before.

[26:16] We understand more of the universe and the planets and the stars than we've ever understood before, but we are more in darkness than we've ever been before because we do not know the God who created us and who put the stars in place and we deny him his rightful place in our lives.

[26:34] So Jesus sees and is moved by the power of Satan in the lives of those around about him, even his own disciples.

[26:47] There's another powerful force as well, isn't there? Powerful force, sadly, which seems to reveal itself, especially in the disciples. Not just the power of Satan that Christ came to rescue us from, but the power of sin.

[27:04] The evidence is revealed in his disciples in three very simple ways. First of all, we see in the pride of the disciples. Verse 46, Jesus has just told them he's going to go to Jerusalem, he's going to be handed into the hands of men.

[27:17] What happens? An argument starts amongst the disciples as to which then would be the greatest. You can imagine the scene, can't you? We know a little bit of what Peter and James and John are like. They're bolshie.

[27:29] You can imagine how they'd be going. I think I know what Jesus is saying. I think he's saying this. No, no, no. He means this. No, you're wrong.

[27:40] You always get it wrong. He means that. And there's an argument. I'm the greatest. I understand what Jesus' words mean more than you do. Their pride comes to the fore, doesn't it?

[27:52] Their egos begin to war against one another. They're not content with just being confused. They get into this, well, almost fisticuffs. An argument started among them which then would be the greatest.

[28:10] Pride. I know best. Pride. I know and understand these things better than you. I'm better than you.

[28:21] I'm cleverer than you. Here are the cream of humanity. Here are the disciples, the ones who've been with Jesus all these months, the people that Jesus handpicked out of the world to be his trainees, his apostles, those who would take the gospel into the world and change and transform the world.

[28:38] Here they are, they've been giving unprecedented access into Jesus and to his words and teaching. And at the slightest opportunity, they're as proud and full of ego as ever before.

[28:51] Don't ever put your hope in men and women that they're going to solve the problems of this world. Don't ever put your hope in men and women that somehow they're going to resolve all the problems, all the grievances, all the wars, all the atrocities, all the fallout, all the...

[29:12] They aren't because this is always the case. Within the human heart there is sin and that sin produces pride. So what does Jesus do?

[29:23] He calls a little child amongst them. I'm sure you've heard sermons on this before and I'm not going to spend much time upon it, but he simply calls a child. The child comes. The child hasn't got pride.

[29:36] It hasn't got a sense in that sense as they did. He says if anybody wants to be great, they've got to become the least. You want to be great? Then become the least.

[29:46] If you want to be wonderful, then become the least. When we think about this, of course, it's not actually the little child who's the least, is it?

[29:57] It's Jesus who was the greatest, who made himself the least. At the cross, our Lord Jesus Christ revealed what the antidote to human pride is.

[30:12] If we read in Philippians 2 of the right attitude of Jesus, being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on the cross.

[30:25] He was the great God of the universe. He was the creator, the ruler, the sovereign of all things. And what does he find? As he goes to Jerusalem, he knows he's going to humble himself.

[30:35] He's going to put aside all his glory and all his splendor. He's going to be willing to be obedient to die. To die even on a cross. How can we take pride in ourselves?

[30:48] How can we think well of ourselves? How can we esteem ourselves when the greatest became the least? The power of sin, sin in pride.

[31:00] But we see as well, it doesn't just stop there. Jesus just begins by telling them about the least and the greatest and almost immediately, John butts in. Master, he says, we saw someone driving out demons in your name.

[31:13] We try to stop him because he is not one of us. The power of sin shows itself in pride and a partisan spirit.

[31:25] Couldn't think of a P really. Partisan spirit. It means sectarian. It means to think of yourself better than others. To separate yourself from others. They're not as good as us. They're not one with us.

[31:37] Partisan spirit. He's not one of us, Lord. Yeah, he's using your name and he's driving out demons and he's doing good and he obviously has faith in you but he's not of our ilk.

[31:51] He's not from Yorkshire, you know. Sorry, that's naughty, isn't it? He's not from Whitby. It can't be any good if he's not from Whitby.

[32:04] But don't we do that? Don't we do that in all sorts of ways? Not just poking fun at you and for myself. Isn't a big problem in our world this same problem because somebody hasn't got the same label as us because they don't wear the same football shirt as us and support their team we're going to punch their heads in.

[32:24] Because they're not for Brexit but against Brexit we're going to ridicule them and call them traitors and swear at them and spit at them because they don't have the same colour of skin that we have. They weren't born in the same country as we were born in.

[32:37] They weren't from the same town. And it goes on and on, isn't it? This partisan spirit this sectarianism it's not just Northern Ireland it's not just in Iraq it's here it's everywhere.

[32:54] This man was a bad man because he wasn't one of us. How divided humanity is.

[33:08] Isn't that the very reason Jesus came? Isn't the very reason Jesus went to the cross? Wasn't it that he might bring a unity where there is division that he might overthrow the power of sin?

[33:23] Isn't the most wonderful thing when we read of churches in Palestine where there are Jews Palestinians worshipping together because in Christ they've come to faith in him?

[33:34] Isn't the most wonderful thing in Northern Ireland where we read of people who were once Roman Catholics and Protestants loving one another and worshipping together? Isn't the very gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ a gospel of reconciliation a gospel of healing a gospel that takes away division?

[33:52] His Paul as he writes the Ephesians telling us the very purpose of God for he himself the Lord Jesus is our peace who has made the two groups one he's talking about Jews and Gentiles but it means the same he's destroyed the barrier the dividing wall of hostility his purpose was to create in himself one new humanity thus making peace and listen and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross Jesus was keen to go to Jerusalem and to the cross because it was the only way that that proud and partisan spirit could be defeated so instead of saying he's not one of us he could say we are all one in Christ Jesus neither Jew nor Gentile slave nor free male nor female that's the gospel the gospel is not that which separates but the gospel is that which brings together and it comes together through Jesus Christ on the cross but even then this doesn't end we think the disciples should be people now surely they

[35:09] Jesus has told them off don't stop him whoever is not against you is for you but then as we go into the next episode what happens again yes Jesus is resolutely set for Jerusalem and because he's in the north he's in Galilee he has to pass through Samaria which is sort of in the middle to get to Jerusalem a lot of really religious Jews wouldn't do that they'd go all the way around sort of the circular route to get there rather than go through Jerusalem because Jews and Samaritans just didn't like one another the Samaritans thought they were okay and the Jews thought they weren't and looked down upon them and so Jesus determines to go into a village as he did before and look for hospitality for food which he'd pay for and so on and what do we read the people verse 53 they did not welcome him because he was heading for Jerusalem we don't want anything to do they have that same spirit that same partisan spirit and sectarian spirit what does James and John do they're furious how dare these people reject our master how dare they

[36:15] Lord let's call down fire from heaven and burn them all up what it's a bit rough isn't it I've used the word punitive punitive that's a word for you to take back it means to punish unnecessarily it's a bit of a new jerk reaction here's these brothers elsewhere we're told they had the nickname sons of thunder who did they think they were they were going to call down fire from heaven like God did in the Old Testament against really wicked people we're going to show them we're just going to destroy them all terrible though isn't it terrible they're filled with hate yes the Samaritans were wrong yes they should have welcomed Jesus yes they should have loved him and received him and delighted in him but to call for their death but isn't that really what's in the heart of men and women of ourselves someone upsets us someone is rude to us someone is uncaring towards us and in our hearts we wish them harm we may not say it we may not pray it but in our hearts we'd quite like for them to trip over and break their leg don't we rejoice sometimes when people who've been nasty to us bad things happen to them oh what a what a corrupt heart what a horrible thing that's James and John they've just seen the transfiguration they've been with Jesus let's destroy them

[38:04] Lord no wonder Jesus wanted to go to Jerusalem to overcome and defeat the power of Satan and the power of sin the power of sin in the human heart which is proud partisan and punitive which is always seeking wow seeking harm instead of good dividing rejecting hating loathing judging on these things in your heart and mind dear friends even can't we say horror of horrors that those of us who are disciples of the Lord Jesus don't we find them creeping in like ivy into our lives yet Jesus came to deliver us from the power of sin and what a difference there is between us and God when we talk about God's holiness we also talk about the fact that he is a God of grace think of Jesus the very one who is going to Jerusalem when he was himself tortured and beaten and hung upon a cross as he looked down upon those who mocked him and spat upon him and beaten him and what does he speak to them does he spit out words of venom against them and wish them ill no from the very cross himself he prays father forgive them oh thank God he's different to us thank God he's different to me thank God he's gracious and merciful and tender and forgiving thank God that Jesus went to the cross to save us from Satan and from sin to break its power in our lives to set us free from its evil to bring us into the wonderful grace and love and mercy of God he set his face like flint and he's done it that's the amazing thing he's done it sin needs no longer have power and dominion over me and you

[40:17] Satan has not any grip over our lives if we are Christ then we are set free we are delivered from these things we are changed and transformed we are new creations for that great cost to him the righteous for the unrighteous to bring us to God dear friends have you been brought to God the God of grace the God who is determined to save you to keep you and bring you into all the blessings and the goodness that Christ paid for at Calvary to him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glory without faults and with great joy to the only wise God be glory majesty power and authority through

[41:21]  Jesus Christ our Lord both now and forever more amen dreaming to hurry to everybody wantное to go to love another people inам be