Luke 8 vs 19-25

Luke Chapter 8 Verses 19 – 20
•The scriptures make is very clear that Jesus had brothers which means that Mary had more sons than just Jesus. I bring that up because the perpetual virginity of Mary is one of the four Marian Dogmas of the Catholic Church and is also held by the Eastern Orthodox Churches, and by some Lutherans and Anglicans. To deny the perpetual virginity of Mary is considered heresy in those churches but to accept that doctrine, you have to contradict what the Bible says. That’s a problem. Please, if in your life and thinking and manner in which you conduct yourself, if you have to allow a contradiction of God’s Word… that is not a good thing. One of you has to change, and the Word of God does not change…
•Just for information purposes, the Four Dogmas (divinely revealed) of Mariology are 1) The Mother of God, 2) Immaculate Conception (Mary, at her conception, was preserved immaculate from Original Sin), 3) Perpetual Virginity, and 4) Assumption (Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory). Obviously per scripture, we cannot agree nor ascribe to Immaculate Conception, Perpetual Virginity, or Assumption.
Luke Chapter 8 Verse 21
•Jesus comments here that His closest family are those that hear and obey the Word of God. I want you to know this because obedience heard through the frame of our fallen nature, our default system, sounds like oppression. To obey someone else, we must forfeit something of ourselves…it’s not that at all with God. There is nothing better for me than to draw ever closer to the Lord. To the One who has given Himself for me. The One who loves me unconditionally and intensely. The One who is all wisdom and who is all good…I want you to know that we draw close to Jesus by hearing Him and trusting Him. By obeying Him. [Key Point #1]
•It’s like a pathway to Him personally. Yes, its obedience to what we read, hear or learn but think of it like this, the truth is the way to life. John 14:6, remember the words of Jesus, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Recast that into this thought. The truth…is the way…to life. [Key Point #2] And Jesus is life Himself. The author of it, the giver of it, the blesser of it…the answer to it…and by obeying His Word, we draw close to Him personally. Even to the point, and this is surprising, to the point of being closer to Jesus than even we are or ever could be to our closest earthly family member.
•Pray all day. Sing to God all day. Read the Bible all day. Teach the Bible all day. Understand the Word and will of God all day. Do good deeds and things all day. If you do not hear and obey the Word of God then you are not drawing near to the Lord. And proximity is everything…it’s the way… 1 John 1:6-7, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. (Notice the connection of walking, proximity, and the practice of truth.) But if we walk in the light as He is in the light (proximity), we have fellowship with one another (vertical connection is online, horizontal connection will be good and amazingly joyful), and the blood of Jesus Christ His son cleanses us from all sin.
•Proximity is everything. Being forgiven of your sin is amazing and in accordance with grace, but day to day we, you and I need a continual cleansing…spiritual weight loss…so that we don’t get bogged down, guilt-ridden, depressed and overwhelmed by the world. All of those scriptures…greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world…keep oneself unspotted from the world…lay aside the sin that so easily ensnares us and run with endurance…all of those scriptures are for Christians! Why? Because even forgiven of all sin, sin is still what keeps us from joy. [Key Point #3] And man, joy is strength to the redeemed heart.
•So, proximity is everything. The truth is the way to the life. Jesus said in John 15:3-4, “You are already clean because of the Word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.” Grow near to the Lord. As close as His personal family. Hear the Word of God and when your flesh flares, obey the Word and will of God. Hear the Word, Jesus says, and do it.
•The word for “do” is “poieo,” (poy-eh-o) Where we get words like poise…don’t keep walking away from things wishing you were able to be different…you are able. You don’t change and then do…it doesn’t happen that way…you actually change by doing. [Key Point #4] Doing differently. Obeying God and His will…and then you break through. And through that poise in the moment, you will get much closer to the Lord. You become close to Him personally…trusting in Him…gaining so very much…winning so very much…achieving so very much…all through obedience.
Luke Chapter 8 Verses 22 – 25
•I taught a topical sermon on this scripture set recently called, “The Might of God,” and in that sermon I made the point that in this scene there are actually three storms. There is the storm itself, there is a theological storm, and there is an emotional storm.
•All of us encounter stormy seasons, some worse than others and perhaps even many of you are in a stormy season tonight. When the storm rages, you have to remember who Jesus is…that’s the theological storm in this scene. They say there in verse 25, “Who can this be?”
•Jesus had restored sight to the blind, healed the sick and the lame, raised the dead back to life…, who can this be? Outside looking in we would say, how could you forget…forget all those things and all that you have seen and witnessed? But that’s the test and temptation danger and power of the storm.
•Hold fast to your confession of faith and all that God is and has been in your life! Don’t pull back! Don’t withdraw. Don’t ease up! With all that you can do, continue to press forward in your faith! That’s what happens…we get lazy…the storm, it’s violent, hard, seems relentless…and so we ease up out of discouragement or anger or just exhaustion…and that’s when the boat begins to fill with water. Take a note from the disciples…even in the midst of their theological crisis here, they still call out to the Lord and they still put forth effort…to wake Him.
•Don’t forget who God is…He is the God that moves mountains with a mustard seed of faith. He is the God that has made promises that He cannot break…that if you don’t fail and grow weary in doing good that you will reap in due time…that if you lean on Him, do and believe and say and react and serve and love how He would have you to do rather than leaning on your own mind, thoughts, habits, character traits…but lean on Him rather than your own understanding that He WILL make your pathway straight.
•Sometimes the storms come to show me just how small my strength of faith is and to grow me up in it…to trust the God whom I espouse to know so well…and sometimes the storms are the curse of the enemy to tempt me to deny God and just be myself…fight the theological storm. It is real. And many give up and ease up and the boat is taking on water!
•The second is the emotional storm taking place in this scene. The storm comes upon them and their immediate reaction is to panic. I’m not faulting them for this at all…because this is what happens and I get it…that influx of emotion, fight or flight natural response…its important to see the whole picture…not just the storm. This will help…
•What’s the whole picture? The Words of Jesus haven’t been proven untrue! What did He say? “Let us cross over to the other side of the lake.” That has yet to be proven false…my panic doesn’t tell me that…my faith does…AND…its logical and true. That helps in the emotional onslaught.
•What else is in the picture? Jesus is there! You are not forsaken! You are not defeated! God has never and will never lose any battle! Doesn’t matter what the score is…in the end…holding fast to the Lord…you will be ahead! Let the Spirit of God lead you, comfort you, console you, reassure you, settle you, man let the Holy Spirit CONTROL YOU! (Here we go, back to obedience!)
•Chaos management is a life lived under advisement of God. Strength, joy and victory is a life lived under the control of God. Even if you’re the only one…storm raging, water in the boat…you’re still going to be ahead in the end…you’re still going to the other side of the lake. Sometimes the ride feels like a roller coaster…I get it…but trust the Lord. Maybe your faith and peace and love and hope and kindness and gentleness and self-control will not only lead to you weathering your own theological and emotional storms but it will also lead others that need an example! (And we all do)
•Jesus says here, “Where is your faith?” I hate that question. Because Lord, look what I have for you…I have logic, reason, over-thinking, risk management, creative criticism, rightness…I can tell right from wrong…I have needs, wants, desires, dreams, grit, heart and all sorts of character traits developed from my past and my life…I can show you all of those things…how about we use one of those…? And He responds, how about you trust Me? SO MUCH HARDER…but this is true worship, this is true religion…that we would make a personal decision to set ourselves aside…that He may increase in our hearts, lives and minds and that we would decrease…
•That really is Christianity. That really is what it is to love and follow the Lord. This is proximity…and take heart, there are resources to help. Good fellowship, prayer, time alone in the Word of God…folks out there that are loving and gentle and serving…and putting others first…super encouragement…so there are resources to help with our faith and perhaps we so often fall short because we eat at the world’s buffet every day rather than taking in the meals that God has for us…prayer, Bible study, worship, obedience…
•But through those resources and making that decision in the moment to do differently…that changes you, transforms you so that even the winds and waters in your life obey the voice of God instead of being fed and made even more destructively strong by the voice of panic, or emotions, or the flesh…I’m after that!
•It’s important…we have to make this decision ourselves…why? There’s a story about a family that is on a boat. And it goes like this…one of the family members, the mom…the dad…one of the children…decides to dig through the floor of her or his own cabin. Water flows in. The other passengers get angry, scared, begin to panic…and yet the argument is made, what’s the big deal? Why should this matter…it’s my cabin? Personal choice is something completely different when we’re all on the same boat…that’s your family, your marriage, your ministry, your church, your job…what you do, your personal decision matters…and it matters the most.