Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript
## Luke 24:33-49

Okay, back to Luke 24 this morning for the sermon text. The third of four narratives, at least as I understand the text, found in Luke 24 beginning at verse 33-49. And if you have a copy of the handout today, you can just follow along on the front page. The second page is my attempt to get with the stimulus program by adding another page to the outline that repeats the same thing as the first page, but structured so you can see the match up in the center of the thing.

Okay. So, please stand for the reading of God’s word. Luke 24:33-49.

So, they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem and found the 11 and those who were with them gathered together, saying, “The Lord is risen indeed and has appeared to Simon, and they told about the things that had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of bread. Now, as they said these things, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them and said to them, “Peace to you.” But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit.

And he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. But while they still did not believe for joy and marveled, he said to them, “Have you any food here?” So they gave him a piece of broiled fish and some honeycomb.

And he took it and ate it in their presence. Then he said to them, “These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning me.” And he opened their understanding that they might comprehend the scriptures. Then he said to them, “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day.

And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, and you are witnesses of these things. Behold, I send the promise of my father upon you, but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for this wonderful, stirring story. We thank you for this Easter season in which we continue to sing these songs of our great joy for the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ and his victory over sin and death. Thank you for this account, Lord God, reminding us that as our savior opened the scriptures to the disciples on the road to Emmaus, here he opens their understanding to those scriptures as well. Bless us then, father. Open the scriptures to us, open our understanding in our hearts that we might be transformed, that we might rejoice in the reality of the risen savior in his peace, and then might be moved to respond to that joy and peace and wonderful news by reasserting our desire to serve him, to take this news to all the world.

In Jesus’ name we ask it, and for the sake of his kingdom which shall never end. Amen.

Please be seated.

Well, this is really excellent news right in the text and all his gospel. But this is such a wonderful account, this third account in Luke 24 of a resurrection Sunday. We’ve seen him meet with the women in the morning—well, not him actually, the angel. We know from another account that he actually did meet with Mary and commissioned the women.

We tried to respond to that in obedience by the way, in this church by recognizing once more this year as we went through these narratives the importance of women in the ministry of the church. And so we’ve changed our ushers and now added women to that function. And that’s one reason why I put that on the handout as well is to remind us that when we hear the word of God and when we understand it, we really need to respond to it.

We need to move in obedience. I think that was a major part of what RCC began in doing: when we saw the scriptures move us in a direction and command us, we tried to respond and we didn’t try to avoid some of these things. So, no big deal. But we’ve also changed the name of usher to greeter because that’s really what it more is in our particular setting in this small church. But so that’s why that job description, the existing draft is there for you, is to remind us that Luke 24a—so to speak—when the women are sent with mission from the angel to the 11.

And then we looked at the road to Emmaus account of course, and now Jesus in the evening of that first resurrection Lord’s day comes to the disciples and brings them this wonderful news and they’re frightened and all that stuff. It’s just a great story and it’s one that brings us great hope. And it’s not like they were at that time in the cultural setting they had. Really difficult times they were actually, of course, occupied by the Roman army. There were, you know, physical abuses going on that would go far beyond the discussions of so-called torture this last week or two in our country.

It’s astonishing how the standards change over the years and in the setting. But they had very difficult times and they had the religious establishment completely against them. They had tremendous unemployment, much worse than what we see—no comparison. They were people starving in the streets. The times at which the Savior appears to the disciples here were quite desperate and dark. So before we sort of make fun of their fear and stuff, understand the setting they were in and how they really didn’t understand what was going to happen with the death and resurrection of Christ. They kind of still, I think, thought that the redemption of Israel would involve, you know, a tea party that led to a revolution and that led to throwing off the Roman government. And Jesus says, “No, it’s not like that.” So, you know, you have to understand where they were and their context. You get a sense of the joy that they’re moved to eventually by the end of Luke 24.

And while our circumstances are nowhere near as dark, you know, storm clouds are threatening. What I’m going to do today is talk about the structure a little bit, then go back over the text linearly, and then make some application in terms of passing the baton—generational succession. This is Luke’s version of the great commission that we’re at today. It’s kind of neat that, you know, we have these wonderful songs that Joseph Forester put together for us for this liturgy next generation.

I think that was Rose playing, wasn’t it? Yeah. Thought so. Very great commission kind of playing today on the piano. Another young person—next generation. So, you know, I saw downstairs earlier Mike Meyer and Michael Arts talking about Sunday school, and you know, Michael Arts is getting more involved in that as he is in other things here. And so, this idea of generational succession and passing the baton.

We’re a church that’s over 20 years old—well over 20 years old—and passing the baton is a big deal. And we’ve talked about this in other ways in the last few weeks. So, I want to make some application about that at the end of the sermon. But think about that as we go through this. This is what’s happening, right? The big picture is the disciples are being commissioned. By the end of this, the angel’s oversight is kind of going away. Man is coming to maturity in Christ.

Psalm 8 says, “God made us a little lower than the angels, but then he exalts us above all creation.” Jesus has a name much better than angels. Galatians says that we’re kept under tutors in the Old Testament. So when Jesus comes, he leads humanity into maturation. We matriculate. And so there’s a movement from angels to us. And there’s even a movement from Jesus to us.

Of course, this narrative today in the last three or four verses of Luke 24 prepares us for Acts—the acts of the apostles, or a better way to put it, maybe the acts of Jesus through his church and apostles. So there is this movement: passing the baton from angels to man, and then also from the man—the angels pass it to Jesus and Jesus passes it to us—is kind of the way to think about it. And that’s what’s going on here.

And it’s wonderful news. We need good news. We have strange news. I’ve almost thought about just not watching the news anymore. Fortunately, I have pretty good blood pressure, so I don’t have to avoid it totally. But I mean, you have to understand what’s happening. The gospel brings liberty and what we have going on in our country is a potential loss of great liberty. You think about this or not, but you know, the world is changing radically.

I mean, there was such strange things every week. There’s strange things, right? So, for instance, Geithner testified before the house that these banks that want to pay back the TARP, they don’t have the government controlling their banks anymore. They got enough money, they’re going to pay it back. He says, “No, you can’t pay it back. We’re going to keep control over you.” And the interesting part was, and people missed this, but what he actually said was not that we’re going to keep it so that you’re really sound and good before you give us the money back. He actually said, “No, no, we don’t care how sound and good each individual bank is,” or he implied this, said it really—until the whole thing’s better, we’re not going to let you pay us back.

So, Geithner is in charge. The government’s in charge of the banking system. Secondly, we found out this last week that they’re going to convert the preferred stocks that they own in these banks to common stocks. Well, who cares what sort of stocks? Well, it’s a big deal because common stocks are voting stocks. So, this means the government’s going to control the banks. Rather than just being a silent partner through preferred stocks, the government is taking active control of the bank through this thing. We really don’t have right now, at least, free banks.

Now, some people say, well, it’s just for a season till the crisis is over. Well, maybe, but usually it doesn’t work that way with the government. We are in a world I’ve been raised in the context of increasing centralization of power and authority in the federal government, in bureaucracy, state bureaucracies, whatever it is. What that means is we live in a time of decreasing liberty. Okay? Pretty soon we can’t use the sort of light bulbs we want. We got to use ones that have mercury in them. We can’t use the kind of gasoline we want. They’re not going to let us buy the kind of cars we want.

Now, it’s, you know, I’m not trying to compare this to what these disciples suffered under. But there is a sense, there should be a sense in our day and age, that we need a savior. We need to have the optimism for the future. The next generation—one of the things we pass the baton is we’re winning the race. The race has been won already, okay? There’s a confidence that must accompany the passing of the baton. And that’s what Jesus tells these people.

You think about it. You got I don’t know how many people gathered together. It’s not just the apostles. You got the disciples. You got the women there. That’s a group. It’s a small group. And he says they’re going to conquer the world. They’re going to bring the kingdom to the entire world, to all the nations. That’s what he says here. It’s ridiculous on the face of it. And yet, we know that’s exactly what’s happened through history. And we need to hear that same thing today.

We don’t have to be fearful. We don’t got to be sitting around huddled. “What are they going to take away next? What are they going to make us do next?” No. We need to have great hope in spite of all the weird things that happened.

Another weird thing happened this last week. They revealed that when they kind of pushed Bank of America to buy Merrill Lynch last September as Bank of America was considering the deal, the value of Merrill Lynch dropped 12 billion. And so the head of Bank of America wanted to get out of the deal. And Paulson, now this wasn’t Obama, this was Bush’s guy, right? This is same people. Geithner was working with Paulson then. And I mean, it’s the same people. But in any event, Bush’s guy Paulson told Bank of America, “Well, no, you can’t get out of it. If you try to get out of it, we will fire you and fire the board of Bank of America.”

And not only that, but Paulson also, according to the press reports—that I guess there’s no dispute about the factuality of this stuff—Paulson told him that if you tell the stockholders that the value of the firm they’re buying has dropped 12 billion, I’ll fire you. So, you know, that’s the sort of world we live in now.

And some people say, well, don’t worry about it. It’s just temporary, you know. Well, these things aren’t normally temporary. There’s a loss of liberty. And we should understand that in the kingdom, we’re to have liberty to make these sort of decisions. We don’t believe in centralized authority making every little thing. We don’t believe in technocrats running the banks. We believe in bankers running the banks.

And all, you know, don’t get sucked into this. Now the fact is the head of Bank of America gave in. So he didn’t have any courage either, from my perspective. So there’s—I’m not trying to say the government is bad and the banks were good. There’s kind of a collusion that can tend to go on amongst fallen men. But that’s what we’ve got is the implications of fallen men being worked out.

So let’s look at the structure now as we consider this great news: that the kingdom will prosper, that everything, world history is a positive movement.

Let’s look specifically at some of this structure. On page two, I’ve tried to make it a little easier to see. Page two, I’ve matched up the A sections and the B sections and the C sections. And just to sort of show you why I think this thing works this way, A and A prime on page two: At the top you’ll see that Jerusalem is bolded. So it begins and ends this account—in Jerusalem, right? And the next account in verse 50, he’s going to lead him away to some place when he departs.

But this little narrative begins and ends with direct references to Jerusalem. And they’re gathered together in Jerusalem in A, and then in A prime they’re told to tarry there. We’ll talk more about that in a few minutes. But you know, you sort of get jazzed up by what’s going on in the context of what he’s going to tell them here. They’re going to take over the world. But then the first command he really gives them is to wait, you know. Passing the baton. We’ll talk about that in a couple of minutes.

But waiting is important in the context of kingdom development, carrying. So in any event, the kind of the narrative begins and ends there. And you know, Jerusalem becomes now the center for an outward expansion of things rather than drawing nations to it as we read about so much from the Old Testament in the Psalms and stuff. We’re to go out to the world.

And so, you know, as we prepare, some of us do for mission, this is an idea to kind of help us think that way, that we move out in that way. And so, that’s why the A sections sort of give us a little pericope marker, a section marker, a narrative marker: Here is Jerusalem. And then we look at the B sections.

And in the B section, it says, “Behold, the Lord has risen indeed and has appeared to Simon.” So the two disciples come back and they’re talking and the first thing they get back is the Lord has risen indeed and he’s also appeared to Simon. So the Lord is risen. And matching that B prime section, Jesus when he explains to them the scriptures he says it was written, it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name to all nations beginning at Jerusalem, and you are witnesses of these things.

So they’re witnesses of the things that have happened, and they’ve already in the B section—they’re witnesses to the fact that Jesus is risen indeed. And that risen indeed has these implications. That’s what the fact that Jesus is risen indeed and that they’re witnesses to these things is what drives them then to the fulfillment of Luke’s version of the great commission that’s given to him here in the matching B prime section.

Notice here again that there’s suffering to glory, right? So, you know, our lives move that same way, suffering to glory. We’ll talk a little bit more in a couple of minutes about repentance and remission of sins. That’s a very important thing that’s added here to what is going on at the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And they’re to testify. Now, they’re to testify. It’s another important thing to kind of touch on here as we just go through here quickly.

There be witnesses of these things. They’re not to be witnesses of their own, you know, what Jesus did for me. There’s times that’s proper, but they’re testifying to the reality of Christ’s resurrection. It’s an objective truth of something that is going on with Jesus that they’re testifying to, not a subjective realization in their hearts. Now, you know, it sounds kind of small and minor, but it is important.

What we’re about is declaring—is not trying to move people emotionally. What we’re about is speaking the truth that Jesus Christ has died and raised up and he’s commanding all people to repent of their sins. That’s our testimony. Our testimony is Jesus has risen from the dead. So, it’s important to understand that’s what this text tells them. This is what your testimony is supposed to be like.

You know, it’s interesting, by the way, how did he say that he’s explaining how the scriptures say this, right? “It’s written.” “It’s necessary for the Christ to suffer,” and it’s necessary. He’s expounding the scriptures to them. Jesus—that this gospel will be preached to all the nations. So the fact that the gospel is to be preached to all the nations is not some New Testament deal. Once more, Jesus is rooting the mission of the church in the Old Testament. He’s opening up what we call the Old Testament. And he says the Old Testament tells us that the gospels be preached to all nations.

There’s some text that might he might have been opening up to them: Isaiah 42:6, “I the Lord have called you in righteousness will hold your hand. I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles.” So, Old Testament text—this was what was going to happen. This is what the Old Testament predicted. Isaiah 49:6, “God says, ‘It’s too small a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel. I will also give you as a light to the Gentiles that you should be my salvation to the ends of the earth.’”

So the salvation of the ends of the earth is predicted when Jesus comes. And that’s what Jesus is now expounding. He tells them, well, this is what you’re supposed to preach and the whole world will be saved. That’s what it says: “You’ll be my salvation to the ends of the earth.” Amos 9:11, “On that day, I will raise up the tabernacle of David.”

We’ve talked a lot about this. That was that little picture of New Testament worship in the Old Testament, right? Between the tabernacle and the temple—what we think of as the temple—there was the tabernacle of David. Worship apparently, right, in the direct presence of God. Worship that was musical and not sacrificial. The animals were being sacrificed outside of Jerusalem, a ways out for a while. David set up this tabernacle. Worship is going on there that’s musical, not bloody. There was once for all bloody establishment of the thing. There were animal sacrifices except the tabernacle. Once that’s established, it turns into musical praise stuff in the direct presence of the ark of the covenant and with, apparently, gentile worship team leaders as well. So it’s a little picture of New Testament worship.

And here we’re specifically told—and this is by the way cited in the book of Acts, this verse from Amos—”But on that day, on the day that Jesus has done what he’s going to do, which is now, I will raise up the tabernacle of David which has fallen down and repair its damages and will raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old.” So, see, this is why New Testament worship is tethered back to the tabernacle of David, why the Psalms are important, why the Old Testament system was important for worship, because that’s what we’ve got in the New Covenant. We’ve got the resurrection of the tabernacle of David.

But verse 12 says this: “That they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord, who does this thing.” So, the tabernacle of David, our worship community is raised up. We come to worship for the specific end that the Gentiles, the world, will be saved. That’s why we get together. That’s why he raises the tabernacle of David up. Not to make you feel better and have a nice quiet life this week—that too, right? There’s a lot of that there. But he’s raised it up so that his gospel will be preached to all the nations, that the world would be saved.

And as this text unfolds, you know, don’t push it off on the pastors. This is not the apostles that are gathered together only. It says specifically these are the disciples. These are the two coming back from Emmaus. The disciples are gathered together that evening—everybody, men and women, the women are there, right? So, they’re all given this commission.

Now, there’s, you know, certain functions that happen and I’m not trying to put a guilt trip on you, but I am saying that you’re just as much called to come together to hear the gospel—that the tabernacle of David has been raised up—to the end that you might also pray for and as opportunity provides, witness to the truth of the resurrection of Christ from the dead and command people to repentance and speak about the remission of sins.

You know, repentance means turning away, right? A change of heart, a change of mind, a change of actions. That’s what repentance is. And remission means that we are untied from the shackles. I always like that image in the cartoon with Frodo and whoever, and you know that big spider has those guys wrapped up in all these strings of this cobweb and he takes that great elven sword out and just slices right through the stuff. Well, that’s remission. We’re kind of bound by sin and he cuts that away and we can then exercise liberty. You see?

So, this is what’s supposed to be preached to the nations. They’re supposed to turn from their idols to serve the living God, Jesus. So, eyes on the prize as we pass the baton off. Eyes on the prize. We’ll talk about that later.

All right. Then looking at the C sections, and as they told about the things that had happened on the road. Well, what things happened on the road? He gave this message to them. He says, “These the words I spoke to you when I was still with you that all these things must be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms.” Now, there’s a little bit of difference here from on the road.

On the road, he explained to them that Moses and the prophets. Now, he includes the psalms—that was implied earlier. But here it’s explicitly laid out. This is the three-fold designation meaning all of the Old Testament. And so in this third account, he uses the three-fold designation. But this is what happened to them on the road as he explained those things concerning him.

And notice as I prayed earlier, verse 45, he opened their understanding. So on the road, described in the summary fashion, the things that happened on the road—God opened the scriptures. It says, but here he opens their understanding. So you see again we have this idea: rationality, reasoning is good, but ultimately hopeless unless God opens our heart to understand these scriptures that he opens to us and teaches to us. So he opens the scriptures, he teaches them on the road to Emmaus. Here he does that too. But it reminds us that really the only way to be transformed is to have our hearts opened, our understanding opened as well—not just intellectually, but now ourselves are open and transformed by that word.

And this is what we pray for, you know: the spirit illumines the text, our understanding so we understand what it says, we understand how it’s written, the things in it, how it speaks to Jesus, but also that the spirit would write those things in our heart, that he’d transform us by opening our understanding, our hearts as well as opening the word.

All right, sections moving in: “he was known to them in the breaking of bread,” and matching that in the D prime section, he said to them, “Have you any food here?” So they gave him a piece of broiled fish and some honeycomb and he took it and ate it in their presence.

Now this is not the only place. Me last week I mentioned that in the overall structure of Luke 24—on last week’s outline I said that, you know, we have a little structure for the whole chapter. We’re moving in from the book ends: the angel announcing Christ not being there among the living, and then Jesus’ departure (we’ll get to in a couple of weeks). Moving in from that, he instructs the two on the road to Emmaus, and then here he instructs the 11 as we just read. And moving in from that, after he instructs the two, then he has the bread. He breaks the bread with him, and this is where they understand him. Matching that is he has a meal here with the disciples as well.

So you understand how: on the road to Emmaus he explains the scriptures, then he breaks bread with them. Here he has—he eats fish himself with them and then he explains the scriptures. So it’s a structure that’s leading us into something as well as showing transformation. These structures don’t just center us, they show us how that center transforms us. So there’s a transformation.

There’s this liturgical sharing of bread with the savior on the road actually. This isn’t like that, is it? This is different. They don’t eat. He eats the broiled fish and the honeycomb. And you remember how on the road to Emmaus—we talked about this last week—there was a very deliberate liturgical description of what he did: how he took the bread, he broke it and gave it to them.

So it kind of, you know, there’s a transition, I think, from an emphasis on the liturgical action of the Lord’s supper to a meal, just a meal in the evening. And you could think about it here: you know, here we have bread with Christ at the Lord’s supper and then afterwards he’s eating a meal with us at the agape. That’s a way to think about it.

So the description of him eating bread with honey or a fish with honeycomb isn’t liturgically structured and the disciples aren’t eating it. You know, another thing we can think about is he’s eating us—we were eating him in the bread. Now he’s eaten us. There’s communion and fellowship.

Somehow we don’t like that. Somehow we sort of—we’re okay with eating Christ. But when we think about him eating us—now the commission of course that he’s going to give them here based on this eating, or after the eating, the instruction is to take the gospel to all the nations. And so fish of course has already been set up for us in earlier accounts. He’s going to make them fishers of men, right? Instead of fishers of fish.

So the fish are absolutely the disciples—representative of the disciple. The early church took this on. You know, fish was the sign of whether we were a Christian or not. We still use that symbol. So you know, Jesus with us is the idea. Plus the fish represent the gentile nations, right? Because in the Old Testament you’ve got this land stuff and sea stuff, and Israel’s on the land and the Gentiles are out there past the sea somewhere. And so these things are brought together in the church. And so this matching of bread and fish sort of gives us that too—that you know what John the Baptist has done in Israel now is what they’re being called to do after their empowerment to all the world.

So bread, you know, Israel; fish, the gentile nations. So there’s a picture of incorporation—the explanation that they’re going to take the gospel to all the nations, commanding them to repent and preaching remission of sins. This is given by way of illustration as he eats the fish. I think that’s one reason why it’s here.

I think another reason why it’s here is to remind us of the great miracle of the feeding of the 5,000. Feeding of the 5,000—what do you have? You have bread and fish. So these narratives matched—as they are twice, right? I mean, in the overall structure of 24, they’re matched up in structure: meal down here in Jerusalem, instruction. So they’re matched there. And here in this text, I think if I’ve got the structure right, they’re matched again. So the double matching of them draws our attention to that. What’s the deal?

And part of it is this evangelism of the nations. Part of it is that was kind of prefigured also in the feeding of the 5,000, right? Because there they have bread and fish. And it’s interesting that here he eats a piece of fish. And of course in the feeding of the 5,000 there are pieces of fish left over. So, you know, a literary tie back to the feeding of the 5,000. That’s important.

By the way, let me just tell you, I was going to do this later, but let me just mention it now. It’s important to help us keep our eyes on the prize. If we’re having a big long relay race—which we’re going to have, we’re going to have to pass the baton off to the next generation or get to do that—we got to remember where we’re headed. And the feeding of the 5,000 and our savior’s exposition of the eating of the fish here reminds us. And it’s not about feeding the world. I mean, it’s not about social gospel welfare programs to make sure there are no hungry people in the world. That’s not what it’s about.

The feeding of the 5,000—I’ve preached before on it once and I titled the sermon “The Starving of the 5,000.” That’s what he did. I mean, he fed the 5,000, right? Before you, you know, start a petition to remove the pastor, he fed the 5,000. Clearly. But do you remember what happened next in the narrative? They come back and they want more food. And he says, “No, it’s not about the food. It’s about repentance of sins.” And that’s what he’s telling them here. It’s not ultimately about feeding a bunch of people.

We’re commanded by God that if a guy won’t work, he’s not supposed to eat. No. Do we believe that commandment or do we not? It’s odd to me that we’re so anxious to feed every last person now in the world. I mean, people in other countries, I can understand that, but people here—the food ministries of the church have created sloth. That’s what it’s done. You ask anybody that works a lot with the poor in America and they’ll tell you that these homeless people have no end of food because there’s churches lined up to give them food.

It’s odd because the Bible says if people won’t work. Now, some of those people aren’t trying to work and they can’t. I’m not saying you shouldn’t feed them. You should. But if people won’t work, they’re not supposed to eat, folks. Jesus fed them once. You know, it’s weird to me how things kind of turn.

R.J. Rushdoony, who really his theology was what drove our church at its inception, do you know how he got published and everything? He was primarily funded by people who were trying to combat the social gospel that took Jesus and repentance and remission of sins out of the gospel and replaced it with feeding everybody in the world. And Rushdoony was hired and motivated to write against that and how horrible that is.

Now, that’s—if we’re passing the baton, that’s on the baton—is an understanding of where we’re going. We’re not going to let people sin indiscriminately. Flynn A.’s Sunday school class this morning, really good, by the way. I encourage you to attend it. But he was saying how, you know, what we have is consequences of sin. And AIDS for instance. And our response to that is not to prohibit the actions that lead to the consequence. Our answer to that in the secularist world today is to take care of the consequences. Put all the money into research. Interesting.

When cigarettes—when we have that subject, it’s a different story. There they are trying to prohibit the activity. So you got an activity that God’s law absolutely doesn’t forbid—cigarette smoking—and an activity—homosexuality—that’s driven the AIDS crisis and fornication and adultery that is prohibited by God’s law. And the state that we live in now positively induces people to homosexuality and rampant promiscuity and then tries to fix the cure. And on the other hand tries to prohibit something that the Bible says you should have liberty to do.

We’re all messed up. We’re like those times when Jason—middle name of my one of my sons, my oldest son. I named him Jason because it was in Jason’s house where they declared the gospel and they were saying that someone else besides Caesar is in charge, Jesus, and they’re turning the world upside down. Well, the world’s kind of floated back around upside down in our day and age. And we’re not going to right it if we don’t remember what Jesus says the purpose of this is.

And it’s not to make everybody with a full belly. “People won’t work. They shouldn’t eat.” I don’t like these food pantry stuff where anybody can walk in and get food and you don’t know if he’s working. Jesus fed the 5,000. That was it. Because it wasn’t about that ultimately.

Now, you know, I’m preaching over here, but please don’t get coldhearted toward people that can’t, don’t have enough money to eat. We want to help feed them, but we don’t want to subsidize sloth, which is sin. So, eyes on the prize. We’re running a race. We’re moving toward victory. We want the next generation to, as they’re doing at this church in increasing numbers, to pick up, to get that baton from us. But we got to know where we’re going.

And where we’re going is not primarily a food program in the literal sense of the term. Where we’re going is cutting off the shackles of centralized control, which will only get worse if we think that indiscriminate feeding of everybody is what it’s all about. We want to cut off the shackles of centralization. We want to give people liberty. We want to restore free economic transactions using the sort of money that you think you ought to be able to use, not some monopolistic state-created dollars. You know, we can talk about the wisdom of that, but look, it’s a monopoly system. And if you try to use gold and silver as your medium of exchange, as I understand it, that’s illegal.

That’s odd. I understand the need to have a common currency and all that stuff. But you see, we’re in a period of rapid centralization and increasingly loss of liberty. And Jesus says that the gospel we’re supposed to preach frees people. It’s the remission of sins and it calls people to repentance, not to enablement for their sins. So bread and fish, bread and fish, feeding of the 5,000—that narrative sort of underlies a lot of things going on in Luke 24, I think.

So we’ve talked about that a little bit in the D section. Honeycomb, too. I don’t know, you know, why honeycomb? Well, we’re not sure, but boy, it’s a nice reminder that Jesus brings us into the greater land flowing with milk and honey, right? Life is good in the kingdom. You get to eat honeycomb, too. There’s all kinds of other—there’s lots of neat biblical stuff we could bring in about honey, but no time and we don’t want to lose our focus.

But it is interesting that he—this fish, some people think is kind of cooked in the honey, but whatever it is—is eating with Jesus is a neat thing. Now remember, this is not a liturgical action anymore like it was with the Emmaus disciples. This is Jesus eating. The emphasis is upon, you know, renewed humanity delighting in eating.

Now of course he’s proving to them that he’s got a physical body. But you know, even there it’s not much of a proof. When angels appear in the Old Testament they eat too, right? And the guys come and they’re going to go judge Sodom and Gomorrah—they eat a big meal. So, you know, it is certainly true that Jesus is trying to assure them that it really is him, but the physical act of eating in and of itself doesn’t necessarily—I don’t think—that’s the evidence that he’s trying to give them.

I think the evidence has to do with the meal setting, with him and his troop being all about getting together and, even in the midst of difficult Roman oppression and Jewish leader oppression stuff, enjoying good food together and eating some honey with some fish. I think that’s a big part of it—is the food setting, not the specific act that he can eat, although that’s there too, of course.

So, in any event, now the purpose of this is to move them to faith. The E sections: As Jesus stands in the midst of them in verse 36, the first thing he says is “Peace to you.” That’s the goal. That’s the beginning and that’s the end of what Jesus tells them. He tells them that peace is upon them. And then he tells them that peace—God’s order—is what his plan and vision is for the whole world. That’s the prize: peace, conversion of the nations.

But he kind of appears—the text wants us to understand—and the end result of that is they’re terrified. They’re frightened. They suppose they’ve seen a spirit. And he says, “Why are you troubled? While doubts arise in your mind?” There’s a full, four-fold description of their consternation. Terrified. That’s the same word that Luke uses to talk about terrified of wars. So, bad things are happening. But no, it’s not a bad thing.

Frightened. This ties us back to the women at the beginning of Luke 24 because it’s the same word about them. They’re frightened. So, these people are pretty much in the same state as the women. There aren’t any great strong disciples here who aren’t frightened—from women to the whole group. They’re all frightened. And he says they’re troubled as well. They’re troubled. So this means kind of a consternation. Zacharias actually is troubled when the angel appears to him at the beginning of Luke’s gospel. So Zacharias is kind of doubtful, and as a result he’s troubled.

And this links this back to Zacharias. Remember the movement is muteness in the temple toward, in verses 50-53, rejoicing, continual joy in the temple. They’re troubled, and doubts are arising in their mind. So they’re starting to have internal conversations that are of a bad sort. Doubts are arising in their mind. So he’s going to move them away from all these implications of their unbelief. That’s what it is all about.

And in the E prime section of verse 47, it says they still did not believe for joy and they marveled. Now, marvel is the word that was Peter earlier in Luke 24. He was marveling at what was going on. Now, they’ve progressed, though. The point is that his demonstration in the middle of who he is and his instruction does bring them to this point: they’re not terrified and all that stuff. Now, they still don’t believe, but they’re not believing for joy. They can’t believe this good news. This is good news. It’s so good, they just can’t believe it. You see?

Now by the end of the narrative, by the last couple of verses of Luke 24, they’re moved to great joy. But they’re still progressing in that joy. They’re still realizing what’s happening. It’s not to the end of the day in terms of the narrative. It’s to Jesus at the end of Luke 24 that they’re moved to great joy with his ascension. So, you know, they’re in progression. This tells us that’s okay. That’s the way we are, right? You know, he sort of chides them for their unbelief. We should do that. We should chide ourselves for unbelief. Right? We should tell ourselves, “Stop that. Don’t be terrified. Don’t be troubled. Don’t let doubts arise in your mind. Right? Don’t be fearful.”

Jesus rebukes the disciples for that. In the parallel account of this in Mark’s gospel, it says he met with them and the first thing it says there is he rebuked them for their unbelief. Well, that’s what we should do. We should rebuke ourselves for our fear and our terror and “Oh what’s Geithner going to do next? What’s Obama going to do?”—oh, calm down. This is the day that reminds us that Jesus has conquered all that stuff. His plan is good, right? So, you know, we want to rebuke ourselves for that kind of fear and terror and we want to—gently, but—we also want to rebuke each other, right? Jesus comes to them and when they’re feeling that way he says, “Hey, stop.” Now he doesn’t just rebuke them. He tries to help them.

“Oh, look at my hands. Let me eat some stuff here with you. Let me talk to you again about the scriptures.” That’s how he moves them away from fear and trepidation. And so, it reminds us, this is how we’re to move ourselves and others away from the kind of fear that might easily start to spring up in our minds—whether it’s political stuff or fear of our kids, you know, and what’s going to happen to them, or fear of our parents and what’s going to happen to them. No matter what it is, you see, this is the way we’re supposed to do it. We’re supposed to say, “No, that’s not right. Let’s be calm about this and let’s do the right thing, which is to believe and have expectation for the future.”

And then he shows them on either matching end of the center of the narrative his hands and his feet. So he shows them hands and feet. And so at the very center it seems like is “Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.” He has stability. He’s got rigidity. His bones are his structure and he’s got materiality. He’s got flesh. You see, it’s really him.

So, we saw, you know, at the road to Emmaus, the kind of the center is he needs to be raised up on the third day. Here, it’s evidence that he’s been raised up—that it’s really him. It’s not some sort of phantom. It’s not some sort of moving around corpse. It’s a transformed Jesus, but it’s flesh and blood. He’s new humanity.

So, the thing that’s going to move us from fear and trepidation about whatever it is to more joy and then eventually to great joy is the belief of what we say every Lord’s day here: Jesus has been raised from the dead. This is the day of resurrection. He has really been. He’s not an idea. He’s not a concept. Christianity isn’t based upon philosophy. It flows out of something else—the incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ and his physical resurrection from the dead. That’s at the center of the narrative.

Okay. So, let’s talk a little bit about passing the baton, right? So, you know, I don’t know—our kids, they don’t go to public school, so they probably don’t do this much—but when I was in public school, probably a lot of you gals, too, you’re at relay races in PE class, right? Physical ed class. I did at least, even if you didn’t go out for track, you had to run a relay race. And the idea is that, you know, you got four laps and one runner for each lap.

You’ve seen this, I suppose. And the guy completes the first lap and he passes the baton to the next guy. So you got succession. And Luke 24 is all about passing the baton from angels to men, from Jesus to men, that the disciples will now carry the message. So I think the analogy is a fairly decent one. And as I said here at RCC, we’ve been around a long time. We’ve been around the lap a few times, done a number of laps, and it’s time to pass the baton, right? We’re already doing it. But I think that’s kind of maybe a good application of this text to who we are.

Passing the baton can be tricky in PE class. You know, usually it didn’t come off too well the first few times you tried it. The first 20, 30 times you try it, it’s not easy. It isn’t natural. There’s stuff that has to go on.

Number one, you need people willing to take the baton and people willing to give the baton, right? I mean, you come around after your lap and you think, “I’m faster than that guy,” and you pull it back. Or the other guy says, “I don’t know if I can do it.” So, you need people that are willing to pass the baton and people that are willing to take the baton, first of all. And it’s not as easy as it sounds.

I mean, we’ve been around some 20 years, but there’s a lot of traditions that have been built up that aren’t necessarily what we wanted to do or planned to do. And there’s kind of, you know, the old guys here sort of run things. And, you know, sometimes that means it’s hard to be willing to pass the baton. Right now, some people don’t want the baton passed. They just want you to drop it and let the young people pick it up. No, that’s not going to work either. It’s a passing thing, okay? But we have to be willing. The vested interests, you know, the power structures never are willing to share power. At least the temptation is not to.

So, there has to be willing parties to this passing of the baton. And Jesus is the model for that. Here he is. He can do it a lot better than the disciples. That’s not the plan. The plan is to empower, you know, the next runners of the relay and then to have them empower people after them. You know, “Timothy, you know, commit these things to other good men.” So, this is the way Jesus has established it—is a willingness to pass the baton.

And this means, you know, accepting new styles of running, right? This means the next guy, the next man or woman, isn’t going to run quite the way you did, right? So part of the difficulty of that willingness to pass the baton on is a distrust of the next person, the way they’re going to run their particular style. But again, if we look at the scriptures, there’s a diversity of disciples represented here, a diversity of styles. There’s a central message, but there’s all kinds of different ways that’s going to be accomplished.

And so, you know, willingness to pass the baton includes a willingness to accept new styles—not new doctrine, not new, you know, applications of doctrine, but the way that stuff happened—well, actually some new applications, too. But, you know, things aren’t tethered right to the Bible. We should be willing to let them change and move ahead and pass the baton on.

Passing the baton involves, in the person receiving the baton, he has to wait. Just—I said we talked about this again. Jesus says, “Now, I’m getting ready to pass the baton, but wait. You know, if you’re going to—if you’re the second guy in the relay race, if you start running too soon, you mess the whole passing thing up and your team loses the race, right? So, you can’t run too soon. You have to wait for the guy to hit a particular place on that track and then start running like crazy. And then he hands it to you as you put your hand back. That’s how it works. For that to happen, you have to wait to start your running, right?

And this is the hardest thing for young people, you know, is to wait. But sometimes that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do. Can you imagine what these disciples felt like? They were much more, you know, I mean, I got Roseanne playing that music this morning. The guy is pretty jazzed up. Well, you can imagine meeting with Jesus, being told how these scriptures all work, and you’re going to conquer the world. They’re pretty jazzed up. They want to start running. And Jesus says, “No, not yet. Wait.”

First command. Just wait. Sit down. Think things through. I’ve told you this story before, but Judge Beers, early on his deathbed, was a young guy at our church and said to the judge, “What should I do? What should I be doing with my life?” “Nothing,” he said. “Don’t do anything. Read. Read broadly. Read deeply. Understand what you’re supposed to do before you start doing it.” Right?

So, sometimes waiting. Now, it’s not just waiting as Judge Beers kind of gave this person direction. There’s some study involved. And we know that this narrative completes itself in Acts, right? And we know what they were doing when they waited. What were they doing? They were praying. Imagine that. So to receive the baton means you have to have patience. And it means that patience that waiting isn’t lost. It’s not—it’s part of the preparation. The very fact of waiting is all he tells them here. That’s part of their preparation for ministry: to do nothing. That’s the way it is sometimes.

And secondly, we can know that their preparation involved them—probably they had a renewed desire to study those scriptures because now he’s opened it up to them. He’s taught them how to study. He’s taught them the whole unity of the scriptures. And a number of people here, they come to RCC and they’re excited because they see the unity of the Bible. They see this stuff open up and they see that it’s one word. Well, that’s the way these guys were. So, you can imagine as they’re waiting for the commission, for the baton to be handed to them, you know, they’re preparing. They’re studying those scriptures. They’re praying.

So, young people here that want to do stuff, start a Portland plant, whatever it is—some of them are starting Bible studies. That’s great. You’re waiting for the baton. And while you wait, you study the scriptures. And I would say also very importantly, and I’m going to preach on this during Pentecost specifically, prayer. Prayer is part of your gig. It’s the hardest thing. We haven’t done that well here, I don’t think, at RCC with prayer. It’s the hardest thing.

So waiting—you got to be able to wait if you’re going to have that baton tossed.

And you know what happens next is you actually run together with the other guy for a while, right? I mean, you don’t just sit there and you’re standing still, and then take the baton and start to run. You’ll lose. You start to run in your lane, and then the guy enters your lane and you’re both up to speed running right behind each other for a while. And then you pick up the back, and he gives you the baton, and then you go. See? So that means that—you know, this is rather obvious—but generational succession in a church or any organization, but certainly in the church, involves both people running together doing the same basic thing.

So part of passing the baton is what Jesus is doing here. He’s with them. This is the beginning of 40 days, right? Remember, he’s got 40 days till his ascension. And that’s 40 days of graduate studies with the disciples—the master who’s given them three years of, you know, having their baccalaureate degree, or whatever it is. Now it’s graduate studies for 40 days with the master. And sometimes he’s not there and sometimes he is there. We don’t know how often he was with them. Doesn’t really tell us how often he was there. But we know that what he was doing was preparing them. And then as they waited, they were prepared even more.

So Jesus and them were kind of running together for a while. And in fact, they’ve run together for three years with the Savior, right? This is their life. Their life is Jesus. They give up everything for him. You know, don’t cut these disciples too short and see it as an example to you if you’re looking for ministry. These guys, you know, it wasn’t like, “Well, maybe it’ll work out, maybe it won’t.” This is all they had. They gave it all up for him, right?

That kind of commitment is given us as an example. Doubting, terrified, you know, all that stuff that Jesus forgives—that’s all there. But hey, they were terrified and they had difficulties because of their commitment to Christ, okay? So, he’s prepared them. He’s ran with them for three years. He’s going to run with them for another 40 days. And in a way, he continues to run with them through the spirit.

So if you’re going to pass the baton, generations have to run alongside each other for a while. You got to kind of come along with the guy that has the baton, get in his rhythm, start to move with him before you can receive the baton. And then take off with your own style, whatever it is. You got to run together. And then there has to be the pass, right?

If you run together too long outside of the box, you can’t do it. There’s a legal limit to how long you can run together for. Then the baton has to be passed. And Jesus is telling them, “The baton’s going to be passed. We’ve run together. Wait for a while longer and the pass will happen.” And then, as I said earlier, you got to keep your eyes on the prize, right? You got to know what you’re running to accomplish.

Just have fun. No, this not. You’ll find fun as you take your goal, your prize, what you’re running toward from the master. And what he tells them here—the goal is the discipling of the nations. That’s the way it was put in Matthew 28. And here we see that the emphasis from Christ on how that discipling going to occur. The goal is bringing men to repentance.

The goal is telling the American people, “Stop relying upon the government for everything that you know you need in your life. Government can be useful to do certain things. Church can be useful to do certain things. But if you’re reliant upon the church, relying upon the government, you’re wrong. That’s idolatrous.” The message is one of repentance. That means that the prize we’re seeking is transforming, changing people by getting them to recognize their sin. Sin has to be part of the message of transforming Portland, right? Sin, hell, death, and slavery—not stuff people want to hear about.

But if we don’t talk about that stuff, we can’t accomplish what he says we’re supposed to accomplish, right? We got to get people to repent, to turn away from idolatrous, collectivist mentalities in our particular day and age. The biggest god out there is the god of collectivism in the state. He’s one that provides health, education, and welfare. Still does, even though they don’t have those bureaucracies. What is everybody looking for? Yeah, we’re on the right track in America now because the government’s going to run the banks. The government’s going to run our medical care. Government’s going to take control over the schools at the federal level. Yeah, we’re on the right track. That’s what Americans are saying now.

That is sin that needs to be repented of, okay? So, we need to have—if we’re going to pass the baton, the people receiving the baton have to understand what the prize is, what the goal is, what the mission is all about. The mission is not about making sure everybody has enough food. The mission is what Jesus did—he used food ministry to call people to repentance. That’s what we need to do. There’s no repentance. We’ve completely missed the whole point.

We’ve kind of cycled back to what our forefathers, the ones who passed the baton off to us, what they were all about. Don’t go back to the social gospel. Have a heart of compassion. But if you understand the horrific results of long-term homosexual relationships, it is not love to those people to say just keep going, right? So, we need to keep in mind that if we’re trying to help people, the long-term effects of sloth—refusing to work—is not good for somebody. We got to call them to repentance.

And then remission of sins—we got to call them to be free of the bondage of sin. That means they have to work for societal change. You know, again, Flynn A. this morning was talking on the strange woman and how she’s everywhere today, right? You can’t look anywhere practically today without being tempted to sexual sin, our young men. And that’s kind of a picture of the whole of our culture. We have to be freed from that kind of bondage, right? Bondage to those kind of things.

And so, keep our eyes on the prize. And then finally, in passing the baton, there’s something that’s needed. It’s spirit empowerment. They’re waiting for the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. Jesus, by the way, sends the spirit. So, the spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. And here he’s saying, “The spirit will proceed from me.” Maybe we’ll talk more about that in a couple of weeks and the implications.

But Jesus is going to send the spirit to them and that spirit will be their empowerment to accomplish the task. So, as we pass the baton, everybody has to be aware of the fact that there’s empowerment for mission that comes through the work of the Holy Spirit. And what that means is that if you’re getting ready to receive the baton, get your act together. Work on your responsiveness to the Holy Spirit. The spirit speaks through the word and through convicting us of sin and encouraging us to righteousness. Be sensitive to the work of the Holy Spirit. That’s the empowerment you need to carry out what this church has started.

So spirit empowerment that comes through transmission. And you know, there’s something to that, by the way. You know, Jesus is going to send the spirit. He doesn’t say just go wait and the spirit will just kind of pop upon you. He says, “I’m sending the spirit.” You know, by way of imagery, Timothy has hands laid upon him by other ministers. The spirit’s being conferred for him taking the baton and running his particular race that he has to run.

And so succession, passing the baton means you’re part of a team, not just popping up here and there and doing your own thing. You’re part of a team. You get the baton from somebody else. The empowerment happens through representatives of Jesus Christ to those that pick the baton up.

So this text is timely for us. It’s timely. We want to transform the culture. We don’t want to just have a nice church where our family is sort of well protected and safe and all that sort of stuff. We want that. But that’s not the prize. The prize is discipling the nations. The prize is changing the culture of Oregon that is centralist, collectivist, perverse, sexually destroying people’s lives through sexual sin. We want to change all that culture, right? We want to disciple our little nation here.

And the way we do that is by among other things looking to starting at our Jerusalem and work outward to the rest of the state. Start where the culture proceeds from. Start with having the baton, you know, passed on, running together with those that are already running, being patient for the waiting of the baton, for the older ones to remember that we’re passing the baton. We’re not just dropping it and saying, “Let the young people run.” Uh-uh. No, no, no. We run together for a while, right?

It also means when you’re running together, you don’t just say, “I’m not going to give them the baton,” but you’re not throwing it down either. We pass that baton on. We move this church in a mature direction toward what we’ve always sought, which is the fulfillment of the great commission as articulated here in Luke: that repentance and remission—people would turn from their sins and move away from slavery to sin. That’s what remission is all about: is freedom and liberty. That’s the message. That’s the goal. That’s the prize to which we’re working. And that’s the prize to which the Lord God promises the spirit’s empowerment to accomplish.

Let’s pray. Lord God, we do thank you for the wonderful gospel that’s here. The good news that somehow in that tiny little group meeting together, this was the beginning of the end for the old world and the beginning of the beginning and growth of the new one. We thank you, Father, for history. We can look back and see so much work done by your church.

Help us not to be discouraged in our day and age. Help us, Father, to think about applications for generational succession here and apply ourselves to the task. We thank you, Father, for the gospel in this text. We thank you for calling us to respond to it. And we thank you for the promise that you’ll empower us to respond in obedience.

In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.