PREACHING
James A.Gardiner
It is a wonderful moment, dear friends, when without any fear of contradiction on the basis of the Scriptures - what we find in this book, the Bible - I can say to every person here that God loves you. God loves everybody in this room. His heart is towards you, His favour is toward you, He is smiling upon you in the favour of His love and grace.
This gospel of Luke was written by a Gentile. I think he is the only Gentile to write any of the Scriptures. The whole of the books of the Bible apart from this one and the Acts, were written by Jews. Luke did not know the Lord Jesus in flesh and blood, but he was obviously so interested, so absorbed with Christ, that he made it his business to find out about the things that Jesus did when He was here in flesh and blood. He comes up with this remarkable gospel and he says, I am going to write it down "with method" (chap 1: 3), going to put everything in order, and show how Jesus was here as the Son of man in relation to men. Is that not fine, that this physician, Luke, writes like that, about Christ, the Son of man, in relation to humanity? As Son of David he was in relation to the Jews. As Son of God He is on God's side, representing God, gloriously and wondrously, and effecting things for God. As Son of man He is on man's side and sympathetic with man, and concerned that man should be blessed and come into the wondrous blessings that are in God 's heart for them. So Jesus moves among men, quite free from prejudice, social distinctions or anything like that, He is not racist, He comes in touch with every person who is concerned for healing and blessing, concerned that they may be made right in their links with God. He comes into this gospel, born into a manger as a babe: how wonderful that is! That should dispel fear and doubts from any heart. He identifies Himself with the race in that condition; He grows up a boy in the village of Nazareth, always doing the things that pleased His Father. What a person Jesus is! When He was born there was a great stir in heaven, "a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men", chap 2: 13,14. That is very wonderful. The poet says
'More just those acclamations,
Than when the glorious band
Chanted earth's deep foundations, -
Just laid by God's right hand.'
You can understand the depths of his feelings as he wrote that. God was coming into matters Himself in Christ, He was going to effect things for His own glory, justify His own righteousness and His own holiness, remove from before Himself any elements that might have embarrassed Him in His coming out in blessing for men. Jesus is the One who was going to do that. How wonderful that is!
He grew up before God. It says He grew up "before him as a tender sapling, and as a root out of dry ground", Isa 53: 2. In that chapter in Isaiah there are two things: Jesus is the arm of the Lord, and He has effected things for God. The question is, in this preaching, as to who is going to believe the report. Christ has effected all God's pleasure, all His will, so that we can say without reserve that God's heart is towards you, as it is towards me, as it is towards humanity, because Christ has removed everything that would have been a stigma or an affront to Him to take man back into His presence. So the matter comes up now - and how right it is that it should come up - as to your relations with God. Are you a sinner? Do you feel you are a sinner? If you are away from God, God misses you. He said to Adam in the garden, "Where art thou", Gen 3: 9. Where are you? He may be saying that today in this preaching, asking persons where they are. Where are you in your soul? Where am I in my soul? Where am I in my relations with God? It is a terrible thing when you miss people. There is anguish in the measure in which you miss them. Think of how God feels about persons, how He feels about souls, how He feels about humanity. Your family may go out at night, you say you have to be in at a certain time and the time comes and they do not show up. Then maybe fifteen minutes later, maybe half an hour later, they still do not show up. You begin to be concerned, do you not? You begin to get anxious. Give them another hour and you are really anxious. Then you start looking for them, initiating some sort of search to find out where they are; and your anxiety deepens and your concern increases.
I remember during the war, during the days at the time of Dunkirk, many local men and boys were missing; nobody knew where they were. I can recall the anguish of parents, anguish of relatives. Then some would come back in the boats from Dunkirk. The days went on, and they went into weeks, and there was still no word, and the anguish was awful to behold. Then months later they may have received a card from a prison camp saying So-and-so was a prisoner. I only say that to try to show you the depth of divine feelings in relation to men, in relation to your soul, how God feels about persons who are away from Him. He felt so much for man that He gave His only beloved Son, the best that He had, He gave Jesus up in death that you might be brought back to Him and live before His face and in His favour eternally. O, beloved, can I convey to you the depth of divine love for you? Are you impressed with the fact that God cares so much for you as an individual that He sets this preaching on that you might listen to His word and follow it because it is going to bring you back to God Himself, the living God with whom we have to do?
What a moment it is! What blessings are available! How available Jesus is to meet your case at this moment! Here are these leprous men, ten of them; this is just a picture of what Jesus will do for you, what He has done for me. What He has done for others He can do for you. You feel the awfulness of this situation. What is leprosy? You say, I am quite well, I have no leprosy, I have no ailment about me. Are you sure? Have you not a moral ailment? Are you not morally ailing under this awful disease of leprosy, which is a type of selfwill? Do you carry on doing your own thing, in the face of the revealed will of God, manifesting that you are going your own way? That is what sin is, that is what lawlessness is. God follows you, He wants to bring you back to Himself, because the end of that way is death (see Rom 6: 21), and after death there is judgment (see Heb 9: 27). The judgment will be seen to be executed righteously, and the judge who will pass the sentence and carry out the execution is Jesus Himself. Righteously and holily He will do it, because He Himself has borne that judgment of sin in His own body on the tree (see 1 Pet 2: 24).
What a moment it is, yet how solemn it is that we might go on in this line of self-will, of sin, in the presence of the appeals of divine love, appealing to us to come to God for forgiveness, have to do with Him in repentance, get rid of this awful burden, this governing element in our lives. We would like to do it, we would like to be right, we would like to get to God but there is this force that keeps us from it; and that is the devil acting through our own wills. How do I get clear of it? Cry to Jesus, ask Him for help. Do not be afraid, do not think you cannot say the right thing. "Lord, save me", Peter says, Matt 14: 30. That is all you need to do. You have this problem, many have it, you may even be breaking bread, you have this problem and you need deliverance, you need to be free from it. He is able to deliver you, He is the mighty Deliverer. Here are these leprous men, ten of them. Jesus is going up to Jerusalem to die, and He is so considering for humanity that, as He is dying on the cross, there is a man who says, "Remember me, Lord, when thou comest in thy kingdom", Luke 23: 42. Does He say, I am too occupied with myself? O no, that is not Jesus, that is not the Saviour, beloved. In these circumstances of extreme straightening, Jesus says to him, "Today shalt thou be with me in paradise". He does not put it off until the future, He says right today you will be with me in paradise. Is that not wonderful?
Now here are ten leprous men who stood afar off. So they should, they felt their position, they are concerned about it. If you are concerned about your state, there is no question but what you will get blessing right now from Christ. He is a great dispenser of blessing. "They lifted up their voice saying, Jesus, Master, have compassion on us". Are you going to do that? Anybody here in this room who lifts up their voice to Christ and says, Jesus, Master, have compassion on me, will surely be blessed. He will certainly manifest to you that He has compassion on you, He is caring for you, indeed He Himself has prompted that cry from your heart, Jesus, Master, have compassion on me. He says to them, "Go, shew yourselves to the priests. And it came to pass as they were going they were cleansed". What power that is! They were cleansed, the leprosy was healed. Go to the priest: what did Jesus mean by that? He wanted the priest to see that there was a person here who could heal leprosy. God Himself was here in Christ, healing the leper. The priest would know about the law of leprosy, he would know what to do next. Here is the leper cleansed, the priests have to take up the case and to act in such a way that this man finds his place in the community, in the society, according to God, finds his place spiritually and rightly in the community from which he was cast out. He had to get outside the camp and shout out that he was unclean. The priest sets him up in the blessedness and in the holiness and in the rightness, you might say, of Christian fellowship. And as they were going they are cleansed. Well, is that not wonderful?
There is something more. "One of them, seeing that he was cured, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, and fell on his face at his feet giving him thanks". That is fine! How Jesus appreciated that! You may have been cleansed. You may be clear of your leprosy but have you come back to Jesus with a loud voice glorifying God? What testimony there was in that, far more testimony in that than going to the priest and showing him - with a loud voice, glorifying God, falling at His feet and giving Him thanks. Are you appreciative? Are you as appreciative as this? Do you just go to the priest and stay there and you are clean, or are you going to come back to Christ where He is and identify yourself with Him, happily and joyfully, knowing that your salvation, your life, your whole future, your whole well-being is bound up with your being linked with Him where He is? David says to a man: "Abide with me ... for with me thou art in safe keeping", 1 Sam 22: 23. If you go away you will fall into the hands of Saul. But he says to Abiathar, you stay with me and where I am you will be in safe keeping.
The Lord Jesus is thinking about these others. That is why I read this section. "Jesus answering said, Were not the ten cleansed? but the nine, where are they?" The nine, where are they? Maybe you are one of the nine. Are you one of the nine? Are you away out there looking for the priest? The Priest was there right before them. It was the Priest who had cleansed them, and this man realises it. Why should I go and show myself to the priest when the Priest was there and had effected the cleansing in my soul? The power of Christ had dispelled the leprosy. Are you thankful, like this Samaritan stranger who came back, or are you amongst the nine? There is no condemnation, He does not condemn the nine, He does not write them down. He merely asks, Where are the nine? He misses them, He would have loved to have the whole ten come back and show that they really appreciated the tremendous work, the tremendous healing that had taken place in their souls. But we are so selfish, we take the blessing, we forget about the Blesser. As long as we are all right, that is fine, that is the relief side, we go for that in a big way. But then to become a priest ourselves and to come back to Christ and to glorify God with a loud voice, fall at His feet, do Him homage, commit your all to Him: are you going to do that or are you still somewhere amongst the nine? Why should He say that: "but the nine, where are they?" Where are the nine in Toronto? Why all the empty seats? Where are the nine? Ask yourself, are you amongst the nine? Am I amongst the nine, or am I like this man, this Samaritan stranger, who has returned, "turned back", it says, "seeing that He was cured, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, and fell on his face at His feet giving him thanks: and he was a Samaritan". He is not concerned about reputation or what people will think about him, he is not a Jew, he is delivered from that, he is delivered from the religiousness of the Jews. There are many secret disciples. It says of that disciple in John's gospel that he was a secret disciple, "through fear of the Jews", chap 19: 38. Here is a Samaritan who has no reputation; neither had they, they were lepers. Why should the Spirit of God record that he was a Samaritan? But he comes back and he falls at the feet of Jesus, glorifying God with a loud voice, giving Him thanks. "Jesus answering said, Were not the ten cleansed? but the nine, where are they?" What a telling question! True, they were all cleansed, they were all healed. One came back, nine are somewhere around; we do not know where they are. This one came back and the Spirit of God highlights the fact that he came back.
Jesus says to him, "Rise up and go thy way: thy faith has made thee well". He gets something additional. What a commendation he gets from Christ: "Rise up and go thy way", you can be trusted. Such a one can be trusted, ''thy faith", He says, "has made thee well".
Well, beloved, all this is available to every soul in this room today. If you are a leper, you feel the pressure of it, the awfulness that there is a force directing you above what you would like to do. That is the force of self-will, and the devil is in it. You would like to do something, you feel you should do it, and you do not do it. Something else happens. You want to do good and you cannot do it because there is a greater power, there is a war going on in your members, there is a struggle. Who is going to be the victor? Is the devil going to be the winner, or is it Christ? He is the Deliverer. You come to this; you say "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord", Rom 7: 25. Then you find, as this man found, that the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus had set him free from the law of sin and death, (see Rom 8: 2). How wonderful that is! So he comes back and falls at His feet and glorifies God. He is outwardly committed, totally engaged with Christ. Beloved, this is the way to blessing. I just leave that word with all of us, whether we have returned, like the Samaritan, or whether we are still amongst the nine. Jesus is missing the nine, He would have liked to have them all back, but He says to this Samaritan, Rise up and go thy way. He may say that to you. What a thing it would be, when we finish this preaching, if Jesus says to you, Rise up and go your way, you go out that door and on you go, your faith has made you well. It can happen to every single soul here, you can go out with the consciousness that you have been well, you have had to do with Christ, you can rise up and walk out there in newness of life, begin to serve in newness of spirit, because you have had to do with Christ and you have been made well. May it be so of all of us. Let us see that we are not lost amongst the nine but are with this man who has come back and glorifies God with a loud voice, giving Christ thanks for the wonderful work which He has wrought in us, setting us free in wonderful power from the law of sin and death. For His Name's sake.
TORONTO
13 October 1991