October 15 Sermon: Blessed Are Those Who Hear and Keep

Consider these questions from this week’s message from Luke 11:14-28:

1. How does Jesus address the accusation that he is casting out demons by invoking the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons?

2. What is the significance of Jesus' analogy of a divided kingdom in relation to Satan's power and authority?

3. What does Jesus teach about the importance of not leaving a void in one's life after removing sin, and how can this be applied practically in our pursuit of holiness?

Five days of devotions on this message

Transcript:

‌Over and over we have been coming back to the idea of the authority that Jesus has. Remember the gospels aren’t a list of everything Jesus did. John’s gospel tells us this when John expresses that if every thing that Jesus did was written down the world couldn’t contain the books that would be written. This is the last statement in the book of John.

‌As I’ve mentioned many times, Luke takes the events of Jesus life and he is putting them together to tell us the story of salvation in Christ with a particular emphasis. One idea that continually comes through in “The Story Luke Tells” is the idea of the authority that Jesus has. We see this coming through in many ways in Luke’s gospel. Jesus is shown to have authority to teach because of the way he speaks about scripture. He has authority over sickness and disease when he heals the sick. Jesus even has authority over death when he brings the dead to life. Theme of the authority of Jesus flows all the way through Luke’s gospel and into the book of Acts which is also written by Luke. Why do I say that? How does Luke’s gospel end and the book of Acts begin? With the ascension. Jesus is in authority over everything from the position of being ascended to the right hand of the Father.

‌You may have noticed that I left out an important type of story that shows the authority of Jesus, the authority over evil spirits. I think we get the majority of stories that Luke has selected really well because they resonate with us down to our modern day. We get the need for a teacher who speaks with authority. We understand the power of someone who can heal the sick and we greatly resonate the need to have a messiah who has authority even over death because in our lives there is no greater sting we feel from the curse than the loss of a loved one. We even resonate deeply with the idea of Jesus have the authority as our ascended King because we see the brokenness of the world and the problems in the civil sphere and desire a perfectly righteous ruler but a recurring story that is tough for us is the authority that Jesus had over evil spirits. As Bible believing Christians we acknowledge the existence of these evil powers but in our time it isn’t a significant part of how we view the world. In the time of Jesus evil spirits were a big part of how they viewed the world and in the way the stories are presented in the gospels that these evil spirits were, for a lack of a better way of saying it, flushed out by the presence of the Messiah, God the Son in human flesh, in their midst.

‌And another one of these stories about Jesus casting out a demon is where we have landed this morning.

‌‌We have just one verse here but there is a lot to consider here in these 24 words. We are being told about a mute man being healed but notice that Luke is deliberate to tell us that this man’s infirmity has more to do with a problem he has with his voice box, tongue, or something else that might make him incapable of speech. We are informed by Luke that this is because the demon that was possessing this man was mute and when the demon comes out of him the man can speak.

‌Let’s go back to what I said about the way Luke tells the story of Jesus. What is significant about this story here in the way the story is unfolding. Well, the previous section of Luke had Jesus speaking about prayer and speaking and calling out to God for help and how God will answer.

‌‌It not only contains Luke’s account of the Lord’s prayer but has those famous words: ask and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. When we see miracles in scripture they are to give us a deeper understanding of what Jesus does for his people. Most assuredly, Jesus healed every kind of ailment we could think of. But, what kinds of miracles are we told about. We get the deaf made to hear to let us know that God opens our ears to his word. We see the lame walk because only God can cause us to walk in newness of life. We see the blind being made to see because God opens our eyes to his truth. We see the dead brought to life because only God can bring the spiritually dead to life. And hear, we hear of the mute man made to talk because only God can cause us to be able to speak these words Jesus was talking about before. Jesus has authority over all things and he opens mouths to call out to him.

‌This is what we see in this miracle as we understand God’s saving power for his people but as we continue through the passage and on to the next focus we are going to look at we see that the people experiencing Jesus doing these things have lots of questions and are trying to make sense of it and honestly, they go to the least logical place I can think of.

‌They accuse Jesus of using the authority of Beelzebul, a pagan god, to cast out evil spirits. The power of Jesus is displayed for the purpose of showing the authority he has but the people can’t believe that this authority comes from God and instead think these evil and oppressive spirits are being cast out by an evil power.

‌This doesn’t make any sense to me. I guess the people must have thought Jesus was channeling the power of this pagan god to cast out evil spirits to give the impression that he isn’t on the side Beelzebul. We’ll get to the answer of Jesus here in a minute but we can’t jump over the last statement and think about the absurdity of it as well.

‌We have some people thinking Jesus is channeling a pagan god and after seeing Jesus doing miracles they want a sign from heaven. It seems illogical to us but at the same time when I stop and think about it I am confident that most of us would likely do the same thing. We would see Jesus performing the miracles but we would want another one and another one to confirm it. We would ask for a sign that would do something for us and be the proof that we need for our particular case. I draw this out because the end of our passage seems to address this mindset but we will focus on that in our last point.

‌Anyway, in considering this statement about Jesus being a double agent or something we get one these really fun moments where we are told that Jesus knows what they are thinking and instead of rolling his eyes and walking away, Jesus instead addresses it head on and while the story we are in probably isn’t that well known, this principle in this statement by Jesus is something many people are familiar with.

‌The idea of a divided house falling has been used in many different contexts over time but most famously Abraham Lincoln alluded to this during a speech on the in 1958 in the Illinois state house when he was nominated as a candidate for the senate. He was obviously talking about the divisions in the nation over slavery. This imagery of a divided house and kingdom falling is well-known because we see it to be true at every level of life right. Divisions between friend and divisions between families will ultimately lead to conflict and downfall. Jesus calls upon this truth to point out that Satan is not divided against himself. Why would Satan get rid of the ground he has gained?

‌We understand this imagery and get the point Jesus is making. At the end of the day, what it comes down to is a hardness of heart in the people. As I said before, they are getting sign after sign that Jesus is the messiah and that he acts with authority but they are denying it. Either by claiming it is done by an authority that isn’t from God or by continually asking for just another sign.

‌And we see Jesus making this point with this last sentence we have here in verse 20. If it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, which is obviously the obvious answer, well, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Jesus is saying that what he is doing is the work of God and if that’s true, then the kingdom of God is here. Jesus is putting out who he is and what he is doing plainly. Throughout the gospels we get the idea that the people are wondering if Jesus is the messiah and he doesn’t overtly say it but we get teh idea that it is obvious by what he is doing. That’s the message here: I’m the messiah you’e been waiting for. The kingdom of God has come near and Jesus points out the ramifications of this.

‌This part of the passage requires us to slow down for a second and identify who is being talked about. The strong man that Jesus is talking about is Satan. He’s fully armed he’s guarding his kingdom. Again, an allusion to the fact that he would not give up ground he has already gained because he feels it is safe and he can keep it. But Jesus speaks of one stronger than the strong man. Jesus is the stronger man and he has come to attack the strong man and take away his defenses and pillage his kingdom.

‌So, what we have here is Jesus expanding even more fully on the authority he has. It seems as though the kingdom of darkness is impenetrable but the Kingdom of God is near. Those who can’t make a decision on whether Jesus is the messiah need to decide. Are they with the stronger man or are they going to foolishly align themselves with the kingdom that Jesus has come to destroy.

‌He calls the people to make this decision with those famous works. If you are not with me, you are against me and whoever does not gather with me scatters. Neutrality in this struggle against the kingdom of darkness is not possible. There is no middle way. A decision must be made.

‌And continuing to point the importance of standing strong with the kingdom of God. Jesus tells of a spirit going out and returning in fuller force to attack the person it was sent out from.

‌This is kind of a tough portion of this passage but Jesus says this for a reason. What is being said here? In essence it’s a parable about putting sin out of your life. You try decide to get rid of the action and straighten up. But if you just leave that space in your thought and life empty there is a vacuum. Jesus is saying that if you want to pursue holiness you can’t just leave a void there. You need to be filled. You need the word and Spirit to stay strong in the face of the attack of the enemy. If you don’t do this you open yourself up stronger attacks of temptation.

‌And you likely really get what Jesus is saying here, right? You can’t just stop doing something. You need to replace your thoughts and behavior with something else. If we are going to stand strong in the face of temptation against the kingdom of darkness, we need to be filled up with the things of God and pursue those things but we’ll get to those after we quickly connect our third point in this final section we read from this morning.

‌These two verses are an interesting addition to the story. They stand alone relatively well and I actually considered detaching this passage and having it stand on its own or connect it to the next section but Luke is pretty deliberate that this is a reaction to the teaching above and so I think it’s important that we make sure we consider these words in light of the statements about his casting out demons by Beelzebul.

‌This woman is clearly impressed with what Jesus has to say. I’m guessing this was probably a pretty common occurrence when Jesus was teaching that people would have comments and here Luke uses the response of Jesus to bring us deeper into what Jesus is saying.

‌She says that the womb that bore him and the breasts that nursed him are blessed. Essentially she’s saying hey, you’re awesome and so your mom is awesome too because she gave birth to you. Essentially your mother is great for having not only brought you into the world but for having nurtured you.

‌Notice the answer of Jesus here. He doesn’t disregard what she is saying, in fact, Luke has made clear to us at the beginning of his gospel that Mary was blessed to have been the one who carried, delivered, and raised the chosen one but Jesus, like any good teacher turns the statement of a student back to them for their benefit. Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it. There is the big point of this passage. There is a great battle going on. The kingdom of darkness seems strong and well defended but the kingdom of God is at hand. The messiah has the authority to plunder the kingdom of darkness and he is going to do so. You have a choice to make as those who have heard the message that the kingdom is at hand. There is no neutral ground. There is no Switzerland in the battle between the forces of darkness and the messiah. You can’t be divided within yourself about this battle either. The people here have not only heard but they have seen the truth that the kingdom is at hand. If they desire to be blessed they must turn from their doubt and their indecision about who Jesus is and not only hear the word but keep it. It is true blessedness to be with the stronger man when he destroys the house of forces of darkness.

‌And as we wrap up today I think two very clear points of application come out of this passage for us today.

‌The first is this last statement we read from the mouth of the Lord Jesus today. Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it. We are a blessed people. Not only do we have the word of God and we are able to hear it but we have the gift of the Holy Spirit and so we are truly able to hear it and believe. As we read in the past few weeks from the book of Isaiah God’s word does not return to him void and we are blessed to have the word but we are blessed to have been give the gift of faith and we believe that word that we have been blessed to hear. But we must always remember that it is one thing to hear the word and believe it and it is a much harder thing to do to keep it. The people saw the work of Jesus and it was as thought they didn’t want to acknowledge what it meant that Jesus was who he was proving himself to be. They didn’t want to commit to the reality of what they were hearing and seeing. And so, may we daily strive for holiness and keep the word of God. May we understand that in this battle between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of God there is no middle ground. We are called to keep God’s word and so may the Spirit be at work in us convicting us of areas of sin in our lives and calling us to repentance that we might here and keep the word of God.

‌And with that goal in mind, I call us to what Jesus said about the house that was cleaned and empty and the evil spirits came and attacked in droves.

‌As we desire to keep God’s word it is absolutely imperative that we remember that there is no neutrality. If we desire to amend our lives we can’t just move to a point of neutrality. We can’t just empty our lives of certain behavior and thoughts. We need to be filled with the things of God. We need to fill ourselves with the word of God, prayer, fellowship of the saints, and acts of service. In the battle against the evil one this is how you and I take ground and keep ground. When we are filled with the things of God the space for attack is limited. We are the blessed people of God. May we hear the word and keep it that the Lord Jesus Christ might be glorified in our lives and others might hear and see that the kingdom of God has come near to us.