Good morning. It's good to have you all with
us. If you are new especial, welcome
to you. My name is Grant and I'm one of
the pastors here at the church. If you've got kiddos with you
who are looking to go to Sunday school, now is your opportunity
to escape. Actually, there are plenty of
opportunities. It's OK.
But we want you to escape through that specific doorway
and then through another specific doorway just beyond.
And that's going to get you to our kids ministry area and you
can hang out there for for a while.
Thank you. We are continuing in the Gospel
of Luke. And so if again, if you're just
kind of flying in, we are looking at the life of Jesus
through this lens of Luke's biography.
So we're at Chapter 11 and we've been making our way steadily
through this book. And So what we're going to do
this morning is continue to do that.
We're going to continue to make our way through 11.
And what we are going to almost do is make it.
We're almost through. We're almost through God this
weekend took 11. We've got next week in Luke 11,
and then we're done. We're through to 12.
But what I want to do this morning is pray and then read
for us together. Yeah.
Thanks for your love and thanks for your grace and thanks that
you're with us and continue to speak to us.
And so, God, as we open up these words in front of us and read
together, God, I pray that you would do what you promised to
do. And that is to be here and
present in a way that causes and allows us to be aware of you.
So, yeah, do whatever you need to do in our hearts and in our
minds. Would you quiet the stuff that's
going on deep in our beings, in our minds and our bodies and our
souls that kind of rattle around and all of that?
Could you just kind of speak into stillness so that we can
hear from you? So as we read out, I, I do pray
speak to us in Jesus name, Amen. Alright, so we are starting in
Luke 11 versus 29. We're going to read 29 to 36.
So if you're looking for a Bible, we've got Bibles at the
back of the sanctuary over here. Also feel free to pull it up on
your phone. We're going to have it on the
screens in a minute. But this really is a
continuation of what has been going on.
Jesus has healed a man who's been possessed by a demon.
This man was mute, he couldn't speak, he didn't speak and then
he's healed, he begins to speak. There's a crowd that has kind of
grown up around this happening. More people arrive as the crowds
growing and that's the moment that we're hopping into right
now in 29. So it says this as the crowds
increased, Jesus said this is a wicked generation.
It asks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign
of Jonah. For as Jonah was assigned to the
Ninevites, so also will be the OR will the Son of Man be to
this generation. The Queen of the South will rise
at the judgment with the people of this generation and condemn
them. For she came from the ends of
the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom.
And now something greater than Solomon is here.
The men of Nineveh Ninova will stand up at the judgment with
this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the
preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is
here. No one lights a lamp and puts it
in a place where it will be hidden or under a bowl.
Instead, they put it on its stand so that those who come in
may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your
body. When your eyes are healthy, your
whole body also is full of light, but when they are
unhealthy, your body also is full of darkness.
See to it then that the light within you is not darkness.
Therefore, if your whole body is full of light and no part of it
dark, it will be just as full of light as when a lamp shines its
light on you. So if you've ever wondered why I
stubbornly believe in the practice of preaching through
like a single book like we're doing through Luke, this passage
is exactly why. This is one that reminds me why
I believe in this practice of slowing down and working our way
through a book line by line, verse by verse, section by
section, section and not skipping anything, right?
Because when we commit to reading every word of the book
of a book like this, there's no getting around the difficult
parts. There's no getting around the
hard parts for us to understand. There's no pares, no way around
the hard parts for us to put into practice or the things that
we'd rather forget and think aren't part of it.
Like we just leave those over here because they're a little
bit. We just don't want to deal with
them. When you commit to reading
through the entire thing, you have to face the verses as they
come. And verses like this, I think
passages, sections like this, at least initially, seem like there
may be difficult to understand. And they might make us scratch
our heads and it might make us kind of step back and think
like, whoa, like, what is this about?
What does this mean? How does it relate to life
today? What is the take away for me?
Like how am I supposed to live my life differently because of
what I'm reading through? How am I to make sense of my
life in relationship to this passage into the Kingdom, into
what's going on anyways? Like how do I make?
How do we make sense of it? And so like I said, and there's
something good about committing to the difficulty of moving
slowly as we just simply read the book.
Some of you will know that we have teaching team that meets
and Pastor Justin and Allison are involved in that.
We meet every week to read through the verses as we are
preaching and preparing for what is coming up ahead.
And so this past week, as we sat down on Monday, we did what we
always did with this passage. And so that is we sat down and
we prayed and then we took turns reading it and we just kind of
went around until we had read it through.
It was passes these two sections that I had said, this is what
we're preaching on. And I think collectively we got
to the end and looked up and all three of us paused and then just
simply said, what? Like there are some passages
where we read and you get to the end of it and you're like, OK,
ABC D like the IT preaches itself.
And we are excited and we know exactly where we're headed.
And sometimes there's a little bit of surprise as you get
there. This was not that kind of
passage because we read the whole thing through and each
one, it wasn't like, hey, I one of us, like I got it and the
other two every all three of us at the same time, like, what is
going on? What's this about?
And I say that because I think it's important for you to know
and to hear. Like I don't write in a vacuum.
None of our preachers preach in a vacuum.
None of us go away and spend an entire week like walled off and
you're just kind of like, God, please do something inside of me
so that I know what to say. Like none of us, none of this
happens in a complete isolated vacuum apart from community.
It takes community to work our way through and to fully
understand. And so we collectively got to
the end of reading this one and we're scratching our heads a
little bit. And I think you may know that
feeling, right? You know the feeling when you
sit down to read something and maybe it takes like you're like
I think I've read the same line like 3 or 4 times maybe had that
happen like it's late at night, you're just trying to get
through something for school the next day and you're like I know
I gotta show up with something to say and you're trying to and
you just can't seem to get past the one paragraph.
Like I said, some passages feel like they preached themselves
and others don't, and so you can decide which one this falls
into. We've got Jesus, so Jesus and a
growing crowd, right? Jonah pops up, so he's like long
dead now. He's here some Ninevites, he's
being mentioned. Solomon, a queen from the South.
Who's she? There's signs, there's judgment,
there's lamps, there's eyes, there's light, there's darkness.
What's going on? And the whole thing starts
really with Jesus calling the people of his day a wicked
generation. Now I don't know how you might
read that, but I read that and I start thinking, what does that
mean for our generation? Like what does that mean for my
generation? If Jesus is calling his
generation wicked, those in the crowds gathering like what would
he say about our generation? Because I look around and I see
our generation where there is war and humanitarian crises in
Ukraine and Gaza, to name only two, where 14 million people
have been displaced by war and famine.
In Sudan. I see violence and killing in
Nigeria. I see in our own backyard
unemployment and the cost of living skyrocketing and with it,
house lessness. I have friends and family like,
do they need to know Jesus? How do I navigate that?
And what's my role and responsibility in their life
anyway? Like there's this increasing
rate of depression and loneliness and anxiety and it's
getting darker sooner and earlier.
And how do I figure that piece out?
And that's not forget AI. Like should I be worrying about
AI and what's real in the end anyways?
What would Jesus say to the crowds today?
Like what would he call our generation?
How is the Kingdom of God still coming today in a way that
matters and am I supposed to be part of it?
Am I supposed to be a part of God's Kingdom in its arrival?
Like, what is there for me to do?
And so I don't know about you, but sometimes I open up
Scripture and that's the kind of, when I get right down to it,
that's what rattles around in my heart and in my mind, in my
soul. How am I to Live Today, not
today in this like sort of metaphorical big, like in the
midst of everything, Like how am I to Live Today when tomorrow,
How am I to Live Today in light of everything that's going on
and in light of what Jesus says? So I think the thing, one thing
that I want you to hear, if you tune out the rest of it, hear
this to you and to me in that question, I think Jesus's
invitation is this slow down, take a breath so that you don't
miss what God is doing right in front of you.
Because again, I think we can get worried about everything
that's going on and we can get focused on all of the things and
all of the ways and everything we see out there and miss what
God is doing right here. And Jesus gives us 2 lessons to
make his point. So first lesson is from Jonah.
So the crowds are increasing. Jesus said this is a wicked
generation. It asks for a sign.
We're going to come back to that.
So you can just kind of highlight, sign, highlight asks
for a sign says, but none will be given except the sign of
Jonah. For as Jonah was assigned to the
Ninevites, so also the Son of Man will be assigned to this
generation. And so Jonah was and one of them
probably maybe one of the most well known Old Testament
stories. Jonah was a prophet and this
prophet Jonah was commanded told by God.
God shows up and says Jonah prophet go to Ninevah and
proclaim the guy essentially proclaim judgment to them so
that they will repent. Like this is what this is what
God says Jonah go to Nineveh and proclaim judgment says their
wickedness has reached my ears. Like I'm kind of hearing about
what's going on over there. So I need you to go.
And Donna says absolutely no way will I be doing that.
And the whole book is kind of written like this comedy because
Jonah, prophet Jonah, go this way.
He says absolutely not. I'm gonna turn and I'm gonna go
in the exact opposite direction. And not only that, I'm gonna
flee. I'm gonna try to run as absolute
far away as possible as I can get.
Says I'm not going to go over here to Ninevah.
I'm going to go all the way, like to the ends of the earth,
to a place called Tarshish. And Jonah, instead of going to
Nova, this is what happens. He goes, he goes to Japan, he
gets on a boat and he's headed in the complete opposite
direction and in a storm rises. So Jonah completely fleeing from
God amidst the storm, sailors are kind of going, hey, like
what's going on here? They fearing for their own
lives, not sure what is happening.
They're afraid the boat's going to be swamped and Jonah is
asleep in the bottom of the boat.
So they wake Jonah and they're like, hey, Jonah, like maybe you
can ask your God what's happening and ask for him to
save us and deliver us. And there's a whole lot of back
and forth in the short of it is Jonah gets tossed in the ocean.
You get swallowed by a big fish, and he's in the fish for three
days. And there he kind of comes to
his senses and he wrestles with God and he prays and the the
fish vomits him up again. It's the whole thing's written
to be funny so it's OK. Fish vomits Jonah up and Jonah
at that moment like 3 days in the belly of a fish, God shows
up again and says Jonah go to Nineveh.
And John at this time says, OK, like he's like, I guess I
learned a little bit of my lesson.
And so Jonah this time he goes to Ninevah and Jesus says Jonah
was a sign to the people of Nineveh.
Jonah was a sign in part. There are usually 2 reasons why
people consider Jonah to have been assigned to those people of
that time in the city, a town called Nineveh.
Jonah was assigned because of his miraculous delivery outs of
the belly of the fish, right? So sometimes whale, sometimes
big fish. Jonah was assigned because he
showed up to these guys like half eaten, puked up by fish,
and then proclaims to them the judgment of God.
He shows up as one who who's been rescued by God to declare,
hey, guys, we got some stuff to figure out if you also by
implication want to be rescued by God.
And so he's there, He's standing right in front of them.
He's been in the belly for three days.
And Jesus says this is the only sign that you're gonna get.
It will be the sign of Jonah, as Jonah was a sign of the people
of Nineveh. So the Son of man will be future
tense assigned to this generation.
And what people talk about, what scholars point us toward, is
Jonah being in the belly of that big fish for three days is a
sign pointing us to say, hey, pay attention when Jesus is in
the tomb for three days because he will be rescued out of that
tomb. And that rescue after three days
will be a sign to not only a small group of people, but to
everyone. So that's one way that Jonah is
a sign. But I don't think that's all
because this other way, the second way that Jonah is a sign
is just simply, I think, walking it out further.
And that is that Jonah preached essentially repentance to these
people in Ninevah preach God's judgment in a way that causes
them to turn and to ultimately repent.
They turned their lives around toward God because of what he
proclaims. And it's like the windiest
little sermon. It's like one line.
He say, hey, guys, like we know you're doing some bad things,
probably should stop that. And it works and they repent and
they believe and God shows them mercy and and the turn in Jonah.
And one day we're gonna do Jonah all the way through, like one
day line by word by word, we'll spend who knows how long.
And Jonah, it's not very long, but the turn in this whole book
is that Jonah is angry with God. Jonah is angry by the end, not
because they've, they've been, you know, given a judgment, but
because they've been given forgiveness and grace and mercy.
So Jonah, he shouts at God. He's got this like, see, like
This is why I left and I went to Tarshish, or at least tried to
was because I knew you were gracious and I knew you were
merciful and I knew if I came that you would forgive these
guys. And I don't really want you to
forgive them anyway. That's why Jonah gets angry with
God. He was angry because the people
he hated we're forgiven. John is angry because God does
not destroy the Ninevites. And so I think Jonah ultimately
becomes a sign and a symbol of God's mercy and his favor and
his grace and his love and his forgiveness falling on people
who you wouldn't expect to be deserving of it.
Jonah was a sign of God's love and God's forgiveness shown to
outsiders, shown to people who were the least expectant and
deserving of it. Jonah brings them good news, and
they respond to it by turning their lives around.
And so Jonah, Jesus says, will be the sign as he was assigned
to Ninevah, so the Son of Man will be assigned to this
generation, one of love and of mercy and of forgiveness and of
repentance, one that calls you to turn your life around.
Jesus, though, continues. So second history lesson.
He says the queen of the South will rise also right at the
judgment with the people of this generation and condemn them, for
she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's
wisdom. This one shorter.
So the queen of the South is the queen of Sheba from First Kings.
You can go there and read about it if you'd like to, But
essentially this queen from the South hears about Solomon's
wisdom, is intrigued enough by it and Solomon's relationship to
quote to her his God that she pursues, she goes, she travels
from far away to arrive and to ask Solomon about his wisdom and
about his God. And that interaction ends with
her declaring praise be to the Lord your God.
She's like, hey, the rumors were true, everything we heard about
you and so much more. All of the wisdom that you've
been given by God, all of this true praise be to the Lord your
God. The Queen of Sheba again was an
outsider. It says from the ends of the
earth she came to listen to Solomon's wisdom.
She was not Jewish. She was socially, culturally and
religiously an outsider. But because she chose to seek
him out and search for Solomon ends up declaring praise be to
the Lord your God. So we have the people of
Ninevah, Outsiders, we've got the Queen of Sheba and Outsider,
and we've got both of them ending up experiencing God's
mercy and God's favor. And then Jesus turns, so he
says, you know these stories, you know these things like this
is our collective history together, he says.
And now something greater than Solomon is here.
The men of Nineveh will will stand up at the judgment with
this generation and condemn it, for they repented.
OK, so we get this. They repented at the preaching
of Jonah and now something greater then Jonah is here.
Jesus is saying, hey, something greater than Jonah, something
greater than Solomon is right in front of your face and you're
still asking for a sign. Someone greater is here doing
the things of the Kingdom and you are still asking for a sign.
Something is happening in front of your eyes, but you, he says
are missing it. Jesus calls them wicked because
they ask for a sign. So the man is healed.
This demon possessed man is healed.
But some says some they claim Jesus is working under the power
of Satan. And then it says others continue
to demand a sign from heaven that this is from God.
And Jesus ends up, he says, calling them wicked because they
ask for a sign while at the same time ignoring what's happening
right in front of their face. So Jesus, by this point in his
life, he has spoken and taught about what the Kingdom of heaven
is like. He's demonstrated how it ought
to and does change the way you live.
He's begun to reveal who he is. He's shown how to pray and how
to have access to God. And they are, he says, missing
it. Jesus has healed.
He's cured a man with leprosy. He's healed A paralyzed man who
was lowered down through a hole in a roof by his buddies.
He's healed a Roman centurion's kid who was dying.
He's done more and he says they are still missing it.
He's cast out demons literally minutes ago in this story in
front of their eyes and they are missing it.
And all the while, here's the comedic part.
All the while they are demanding a sign from heaven.
It's like asking for scientific proof.
Here's what's like asking for scientific proof that the polio
vaccine actually works, and looking at all the research done
since 1955, Meeting with the doctors, interviewing real
people, having face to face conversations, and then
dismissing all of it in favour of your friend's Facebook post.
Jesus says if you are still asking for a sign, then you've
already missed the very thing you're looking for.
Now here's the reality that I need to face you and I I think
we demand signs all the time. I think it's natural.
It's like the human inclination is to ask for and long for and
look for and wonder. And sometimes we ask for signs
or we demand them explicitly. And sometimes it's implicitly
and sometimes it's willfully and sometimes it's accidentally.
I've told you this story before, but when I was trying to discern
whether or not to move here to Guelph and to become your next
lead pastor, like I remember praying for clarity and I
remember asking God for direction.
And I remember thinking to myself, hey, God, like this
would be great if you just gave me a very clear, bold, crystal
clear sign in front of my eyes for me to see.
And so I want to tell you one of the stories.
Like I was driving and I, you know, had to commute from one
side of Hamilton to the other side of Hamilton when we were
living there. And on this commute, I was
praying and I was wrestling with God and I was wrestling with
traffic. And I was wondering this to
myself, like God, hey, it would be great if you gave me a sign.
And I remember bumper to bumper looking up and there was like
sign on the side of the highway. Hwy. 6 N Guelph.
But that wasn't the sign. Like I didn't go home and say to
Connie, like, that's it. That's God gave me a sign that
that sign's been there for years.
Like, that's not the sign. You've seen that every day for
the last five years. That's not the sign, and it
wasn't, but I think we still wrestle with this.
I think we asked for signs all the time.
We want what is spectacular instead of what is slowed down
and steady. And when we want what is
spectacular, we end up missing the ways that God is present in
everyday, ordinary life. We want clarity before we want
commitment, right? And we demand that God give us a
clear picture of where our life is headed and how we're gonna
get there and every step in between, rather than simply
focusing on taking that first and next step in obedience.
We want proof of God's involvement in our lives and
proof that looks very specific. So often the way it looks is
like our own success or God. If you're real, then this We
fail to see the ways that God is leading and blessing us every
single day. We want public validation, but
maybe not personal transformation.
We want the sign, but we want the sign without the surrender.
See, I, I think human beings, we still say prove it.
Like prove yourself, Jesus, show up in a dramatic way.
If you would, if you could, if you're real, do this thing and
then I will believe. Give me a sign and then I'll
take a step. And you know what?
Maybe he will, but more than likely he already has.
And it's a sign that looks like a cross to sign that is of his
death and resurrection. It's in the gift of the Holy
Spirit. It's in the community that you
are given and called into and challenged by and who annoys
you, but who you love and who loves you.
Sometimes what we really need is simply to slow down and ask God
to help us see where He's already at work.
So for me and for my family, when it came time to decide
whether to move, wasn't that big sign on the side of the highway
that said go north to Guelph, been taking that road for five
years. It was the slowed down ways in
which God had already been speaking to my heart and to
Connie's heart for years. It was the way God directed our
lives every single day to pray for you and and it was how gang
God's wisdom. He surrounded us with people who
prayed for us and who cared enough to ask us really
difficult questions, and then who ultimately encouraged and
challenged and supported us as we took our next step.
That's why Dallas Willard writes this and, and I love this line.
He says the best way to hear God's voice is to cultivate the
quiet inward space of constant listening.
And he says that constant listening, instead of always or
only approaching God for very specific direction on only
specific things, says the real challenge is to cultivate daily
these practices and habits that call us or encourage or
challenge lead us into these places where we are listening
every day to how God is speaking and where he is leading and
where he is present and where we get to see what He's doing.
The people in the crowd, they want signs from heaven in this
dramatic fashion, but what Jesus wants for them is simply to
embrace life inside the Kingdom of God.
And that's why I think that Jesus says to us, also, stop
looking for signs and start looking inward at your heart.
Stop looking for what is big and bold and it's gonna like hit you
in the back of the head and push you in a direction and start
looking at whether you are embracing daily life inside the
Kingdom. What does it look like as you
live this day by day by day? He says.
Embrace the Kingdom of heaven and you will become like a lamp
in the darkness. So next part, he says no one
likes the lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be
hidden. OK or under a bowl.
You're like, that just makes common sense.
Instead, they put it on its stand so that those who come in
may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your
body. When your eyes are healthy, your
whole body also is full of light.
But when they are unhealthy, your body also is full of
darkness. See to it that then that the
light within you is not darkness, so see to it.
Look inside and see whether the light inside you is really light
or whether it is darkness. Therefore, if your whole body is
full of light and no part of it dark, it will be just as full of
light as when a lamp shines its light on you.
In Jesus's day, the light was viewed less like an input
device. Alright, we like to read these
verses and think it's exclusively about OK, what am I
putting in? What am I consuming?
What am I reading? What am I watching?
What am I inputting into my heart, into my mind, into my
being? In Jesus day, eyes weren't seen
as input devices, they were seen as output devices.
Think of them more like lamps or projectors, because eyes in
Jesus's day, they would project what was already true about your
heart and your mind, your soul, your being inside of you.
And so he's doing this this for us.
What takes a little bit, I think a reverse of the way we think
about it, because what Jesus is saying is what's going on inside
of your heart, inside of your mind, inside of your soul, in
your being will be projected, exuded, will shine through your
eyes. This closer to this idea that
the eyes are a window to your soul kind of thinking.
He says eyes like lamps, They are going to shine whatever
light or darkness is inside of that person.
The people, here's the connection, The people in the
crowd who are demanding a sign are missing Jesus right in front
of them. And so their actions, they're
demanding a sign, reveals something about themselves,
reveals what's going on inside their heart.
And I think you and I, we need to ask ourselves whether our
actions reveal Jesus around us or not, whether what is being
revealed by our actions is light or dark.
And to your right puts it like this, he says of us.
Are we any better at embracing the Kingdom for ourselves than
Jesus's contemporaries and these guys running around in the
crowd? For that matter, are we shining
this light to the world so that they can see the one who is
greater than Solomon and greater than Jonah?
Are we shining Jesus? Are we showing Jesus?
Are we living Jesus to those around us or not?
So Jesus says it like this. He says no one lights a lamp and
puts it in a place where it will be hidden or under a bull.
Instead, they put it on its stand so that those who come in
may see the light. Here's the reality.
When the light or a lamp is lit, it shines and pushes out into
the darkness. A lamp that's lit and put on a
stand and shines pushes against the places of darkness around
it. In John 1 Jesus is called the
light of the world. John 1 talks about Jesus like
this says in him was life, and that life was the light of all
humanity, of all human kind. The light shines in the
darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Jesus is the light that brings real light and fullness of life
into the darkest places of our world.
And, and Jesus says of you, You are also a lamp.
You are also alight and knowing Jesus and embracing the Kingdom.
It fills you with Jesus's light and with his life.
This is what the crowds were missing Jesus in front of them
in a very real way that changes not just their lives for
themselves, but the way in which they begin to push against the
darkness around them and carry the Kingdom with them into the
world. And so Jesus says to you, slow
down. Embrace the Kingdom because
there is light and there is life on offer for you, but not just
for you, also through you to the world.
And so as you go literally from this place, you carry the light
and the life of Jesus with you and and the life and the light
of Jesus that you carry with you does push against the darkest
places in this world. And the promise of Scripture is
that the darkness has not overcome it.
Let me pray God thinks that in you there is life and there is
light. And thank you that we have it in
front of our faces. Yeah, we do.
We admit we struggle with some of these ways of being.
Like we ask for signs or we want to see what you're gonna do
before we move. God, I pray that you would help
to make us people who are obedient and who choose to
trust. And I pray that you would make
us people who move in step with your Kingdom.
Yeah, I pray for the little pieces of death and darkness in
each of us that still need to be pushed out.
Thanks that what your spirit does is fill us up to fullest
measure pushes out these pieces of death and darkness.
So God would you do that in us? We need you to.
Yeah, for the pieces of sin and death and darkness that are
rattling around in each of us that we may be wrestling with
today. God, would you push?
Would you bring your light? Would you bring your life and
when you drive those things out and got through us, not just as
individuals, but through us as a community and a church, Like
would you make us into a people who carry your Kingdom and your
light and your life in a way that pushes against the little
places of darkness in our world? So I got things that you knew
there is life and in you there is light.
Would we? You'd be filled to the fullest
measure because of you and your love and your grace and your
spirit with that life in Jesus name, Amen.