Allen Jackson - The Display of Good and Evil - Part 1
We have been doing a study from the Gospel of Luke and it has been a blessing in my life. That's really why I shared it with you. I had the opportunity to spend a disproportionate amount of time reading through the Gospel of Luke. And there was just a life in it that brought a new hope to me, and I pray that, in some ways, it's brought that to you. I've invited you over the past several weeks to join me in reading through that Gospel. It's just 24 chapters. It can be read in a single sitting in less time than it would take to watch a movie or a ball game. So it isn't beyond us. I know it's not the customary way. We read our Bibles. We tend to read in a more intermittent way, but there is a benefit from reading a book in its context, particularly if you can do it repeatedly. We'll get to that in a moment.
I want to start with a couple of passages that are not from Luke. We've done 14 sessions from Luke. I've got to wander just a little bit now. You know, there's so much, our nation is so polarized and there's so much, we're at the end of an election cycle and all the angst from that and all the positioning and the advertisements they will end. And sometimes I think it's overwhelming and I was reminded of a verse. It's a familiar verse to many of you. It's Romans 12 and verse 21 says, "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good". And it's one of those verses, if I could choose, I would probably just remove it because it's an awkward verse to me. I would rather not deal with evil. I would rather the Lord said, "I have banished evil, go forth and enjoy good". That'd be the AJ version, but that would be heresy. It wouldn't be helpful.
The instruction we're given is not to be overcome by evil, which means evil will make repeated attempts to overcome us. It will do it in almost every venue of our person. Our thoughts, our emotions, physically. It is unrelenting, it's unfair. It will take advantage of any perceived opportunity to distract us, to diminish our faith, to interrupt our momentum with the Lord. It's why it's evil. It doesn't play fair. If it played fair, it wouldn't be evil. It would just be competitive. Evil exists and the instruction we are given is to overcome evil, not with anger, or violence, or hate, or revenge, that we overcome evil with good. Now, if we're given the instruction, it's a possibility in the same way when Jesus said, "Do not worry". If he said it, it's possible to overcome worry. And if he's said to overcome evil with good, it is an achievable assignment.
Now, I've taken a moment with it because I would submit to you that, for quite a season now, for far more than a decade, my perspective on contemporary American Christianity is rather than overcome evil, we've tried to overlook evil. We've bargained with evil. We've negotiated with evil. We've redefined evil. We've tried to reposition ourselves at the table with evil. We had no imagination of overcoming it, of seeing it diminished, of seeing it step back, of offering an alternative perspective and not yielding a biblical world view. We've simply negotiated. And so I would remind you of the Biblical assignment because when we look to the Gospel of Luke, we're in the portion of that gospel now where Jesus is facing horrific suffering and what required the suffering, the passion of the Lord, was evil. We needed deliverance, we needed authority over evil.
So Jesus came, put on an earth-suit, ultimately endured the cross, so that we could have authority over evil. But the assignment we've been given is to overcome it, not to negotiate with it. And I believe we will be held accountable if we reject the assignment. That's not really just my opinion, Revelation 21 is very near the end, not only of the New Testament, but it's a picture at the end of this age, there's a new heaven and a new earth and there's many changes coming to this present world order. It's gonna be swept aside, but we're given an outline there of how our journey through time will be evaluated by the King of all kings and the Lord of all lords. That means it supersedes any election, anything the United Nations, any order they might issue.
Revelation 21:7 says, "He who overcomes will inherit all of this, and I will be his God and he will be my son". Now, I don't know about you, but that has my attention. Who's going to be included in the eternal Kingdom of God and counted as one of God's children? The one who overcomes. So if there's an assignment to overcome, if there's a challenge to be overcome, if there's... whatever it may be, I'm gonna go get in the line to be an overcomer because that's the outcome I want. And in case there wasn't enough clarity in that, the next sentence gives us the alternative, the people who will have a different outcome. It says, "The cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars, their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. It's the second death".
I think it's worth noting some of that list I think seems apparent to us. We would imagine that the murderers, or the sexually immoral, or those who practice the occult, or idolatry, or liars, we can imagine that God's judgment might fall on them. I'm not sure we've imagined that the cowardly and the unbelieving would be included. The cowardly and the unbelieving. You can't be an overcomer if you're filled with cowardice and unbelief. So when you recognize the challenge of those things, and we all do, we all face difficult places, challenging things. We don't wanna give place to cowardice and unbelief.
We wanna ask the help of the Spirit of God to enable us to be overcomers, not because we feel like it or we imagine that we can do it in ourselves or of our own strength or even from the force of our own emotions or our own determination or our own, you know, whatever, I mean, and I'm all for all the effort that we can muster, but we need something beyond ourselves and God will meet us. In the midst of his passion, Jesus said, "Father into your hands, I commit my spirit". He didn't say, "I'm tough enough to overcome these people. I'm holy enough, righteous enough, good enough..." "Father into your hands". And I believe sometimes our ability to overcome is totally dependent on our willingness to say to the Lord, "Lord, I need your help". I feel like I arrive at that place frequently.
Now, with that background, we're gonna join Jesus near the end of the Gospel of Luke. I've had so much fun. Luke took us into the temple. In the very first chapter, we got to slip into Herod's temple, the second temple in Jerusalem while Zechariah was serving in the temple and he had a visit from Gabriel. And we got to listen in. In the second chapter, we got to go to Nazareth, the town where Mary and Joseph lived, and Gabriel made a house call with the most bizarre message. He fried the mind of a teenage Jewish girl. And then he fried all of our minds when that young woman said, "May it be to me as you have said". She took all of her life plans, all of her dreams, all of her reputation. She rolled it up in a ball, dropped it in a shredder and said, "Never mind, I'll go with you". And you've got a hint at this point.
By the time you get to the end of the second chapter of Luke, you understand something of his thesis. He said to Zechariah, "You and your wife who are bare and childless, you will conceive". And Zechariah said, "How can that be? I'm old and she's mature"? And the angel said to him, "Because you didn't believe me, you'll be mute for a while". And in the second chapter, when the angel brings the message to Mary, she says, "I'm all in. Let's go". And Luke has given us the essence of this gospel, this dialogue, this contrast between our willingness to believe and our stubborn refusal to do so.
That it's not just between Pharisees and teachers of the law and disciples, the struggle is in the midst of the people of God, the people of faith. Zechariah and Elizabeth are favored by God, the parents of John the Baptist. And they struggled to believe folks, you and I will struggle to say "yes" to the Lord. Because if you say "yes" to him on a regular basis, you'll be qualified for a "yes" that's bigger than you, and that's not easy. Moses at the burning bush going, "No, I'm good, really. I like sheep. I got a good deal going. I have a price fixed all of my sheep and goats at the local market". And God said, "No, I really, I need you to go talk to.". "I'm really good. I tried that Pharaoh thing. It didn't work for me". God was mad enough to kill him.
You see saying "yes" to the Lord, we live in this fantasy thing far too often as Christians, I'm a little bit over it. You know, I hear people say, "Well, you know, it's just whatever the Lord wants me to do, it's always a joy". You know when I hear that a lot I think, "Well, you haven't paid attention to very many invitations," because I can tell you that oftentimes the invitations the Lord puts in front of me, I think, "You got to be kidding"! I've had enough experience, I'm a bit more respectful, but that's what I'm thinking and he knows my thoughts. Like really? I used to make fun of TV preachers. Yeah. You know why you're laughing. You have too. Be careful, be really careful. You gotta, you really, I have learned something. I don't make fun of, I don't point fingers, I'm far more, because I don't know the whole story.
Zechariah and Elizabeth, that's where I was, chapter 2. We're never gonna get to chapter 23, are we? Luke takes us on an amazing journey. We could go to dinner with Jesus multiple times in the house of a Pharisee. We get to sit at the table and listen to Jesus engage with the religious leaders of the community. The Pharisees were the religious leaders in the local communities. They presided over the synagogues and, many times, Jesus goes to dinner and Luke lets us go with him. Luke takes us into the synagogues on Sabbath more than once and let us listen to Jesus read scripture portions, minister to the people. It gives us an idea. He takes us to temple with Jesus. In fact, the last chunk of the gospel, we spend days with Jesus around the temple. Teaching people, disrupting things, challenging leaders. It's a remarkable journey.
But as we get to the concluding chapters, it gets very, very personal and it's happening really quickly. The time is compressed. The last several chapters deal with a very brief period of time. I gave you an outline in a previous session. I'll touch it just quickly. Luke's gonna take us from the upper room, the Last Supper, to Gethsemane. We think of Gethsemane as the garden where Jesus went to pray, and that's true but "Gethsemane" means "olive press". The Mount of Olives was an olive grove. That's why we call it the Mount of Olives. The place, the field where the shepherds kept the sheep outside of Bethlehem.
What did we call that place? The shepherd's fields. And the Mount of Olives was a hill covered with olive trees. But they're connected and the connector is the temple and the Sadducees who are the power-brokers on the temple, they own the shepherd's fields and the sheep, and they control the amount of olives and the olive oil that they need for the service of the temple. It's a racket, but Jesus is in the habit of praying on the Mount of Olives in an olive grove. And after the Last Supper, he goes there that evening.
Now the Last Supper was on the upper part of Jerusalem. Some of you have been there in the Upper City. It's a pretty good hike through the city of Jerusalem across the Kidron Valley to Gethsemane. That's where he is when they come to arrest him. Late Thursday night, they take him from Gethsemane to the house of Annas, the the high priest of the previous year. And then from his house to Caiaphas, the current high priest. And as soon as the sun comes up, the priestly leaders and the temple guard take Jesus to Pilate in the Praetorium, which is a part of the Antonia Fortress. It's the fortress the Romans built just north of the temple to provide security. 100,000 people or more could gather on the Temple Mount, and so they built the security outpost just north of it higher than the Temple Mount so they could enforce security.
Remember when in the book... of near the end of the book of Acts when Paul gets arrested, there's a riot that breaks out on the Temple Mount and the Roman guards are called because they can see the riot, and they drag him back into the Praetorium, into the Antonia fortress. So they take Jesus to the Praetorium, the place of judgment, and put him before Pilate and he faces Pilate for the first time. And when Pilate understands that he's from Galilee, he sends him to Herod and Antipas, who is the governor of Galilee. He "said, I don't want to deal with this. You deal with this," and he sends him to Herod. This is the same Herod that beheaded John, and Jesus won't say anything to Herod. We looked at that.
So after they mock him a bit, put a robe on him, a fancy robe on him, they send him back to Pilate except now he's bedazzled. He has on Herod's fancy robe and Pilate resumes his interrogation in the Praetorium. It'll end, you know the end of the story. So it's spoiler alert: it's going to end in Jesus condemnation. But the way Luke presents it, truly is a fascinating study. Luke 23 and verse 13, you have it. We're gonna watch Jesus overcome evil, but it's not necessarily the way I would have preferred. If I were the one in the center of the story. He will triumph over death before he's done. He will say to John in the book of Revelation, in the first chapter, "I'm the living one. I was alive and I was dead and I'm alive forevermore. And now I hold the keys of death and hell".
That's a very victorious Christ. But the pathway there was not a path I would wanna walk. Revelation... I'm sorry, it's Luke 23, "Pilate called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people. And he said to them, you brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to rebellion. I've examined him in your presence and I have found no basis for your charges against him. Neither has Herod for he sent him back to us. As you can see, he has done nothing to deserve death. Therefore, I will punish him and then release him".
Now, that's the Roman governor's opinion. "I've interrogated him in your presence. I find no support for the charges you have brought. And I sent him to Herod, the governor of the North and he found no basis. He sent him back to me. So I'll punish him a bit, but I'm gonna release him". "With one voice, they cried out, 'Away with this man! Released Barabbas to us'", and then Luke puts in parentheses an explanation, not a part of Her, Pilate's dialogue, Luke is giving us an explanation because we might not have known who Barabbas was. He said, "Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city, and for murder".
Now this isn't the first time, this is actually the second time in Luke's Gospel, Pilate says to the priest, to the rulers, and you will note if you look back at verse 13, and to the people, "I have found no basis for your charges against him". And then Luke says to us, "They cried with one voice, 'Away with this man.'" Same chapter, look at verse 20, "Wanting to release Jesus..." Again, Luke is wanting to release Jesus. Words have meanings, folks. You know, in political seasons, we lose sight of that, but we shouldn't. Luke says "Pilate wanted to release Jesus, so we appealed to them again. But they kept shouting, 'Crucify him! Crucify him!' For the third time he spoke to them: 'Why? What crime has this man committed? I found in him no grounds for the death penalty. Therefore, I will have him punished and then release him.' But with loud shouts, they insistently demanded that he be crucified, and their shouts prevailed".
You should circle that: The shouts of an angry mob prevailed over truth, over fact. "So Pilate decided to grant their demand. He released the man who had been thrown into prison for insurrection and murder, the one they asked for, and he surrendered Jesus to their will". Wow, this is the third time Pilate has appealed to the people with a desire to release Jesus, in Luke's Gospel. So, I have a question and it's worth a bit of reflection: Do you imagine that Pilate was guiltless? He tried to release Jesus. He wanted to release Jesus. Well, Luke tells us his intent, his objective was to release Jesus.
Was Pilate guiltless? I think a better description would be, he was gutless. By his own words, he had the power of life or "death. I can release you or crucify you my choice," he said. There really is no appeals court, "You'll live or die this day by my whim". Now, I will readily admit Pilate's under some pretty significant pressure, public pressure, political pressure. His job is to keep the peace and there's an angry group of people that wants this man he perceives to be innocent to be crucified. I'm always a bit intrigued, Christians tend to rally a bit around Pilate and go, "Well, you know, he was in a really hard place". Folks, Pilate could have been a participant in the eternal Kingdom of God. That would be a much better place to have stood than being the one that condemned him to death, when your earth-suit wears out, agreed?
Pilate surrendered Jesus to the murderous mob. We don't do that. We don't sit on the beam of the judgment seat, the Roman judgment seat. We don't occupy a Praetorium and have our own personal guard and a guard of people that we can command. We cave in other ways. We surrender children to abortionist. We stay silent while gender mutilators profit from our young people. We say "we don't talk about those things" while they're trafficking more children at our border than any time in the last 200 years. I mean, the pressure of the mob, if we said something, people would be unhappy with us, it would be awkward. "They've told me not to talk about it, so I don't talk about it. I mean, it would be awkward. That they would just, we're supposed to separate ourselves from that we're silent while they teach our children DEI in their schools. They should judge one another by how they look, not by the content of their character". It's evil.
Jesus was a living revelation of Almighty God. That's my prayer for us today, that we would have more than a religious experience or some experience of reciting a prayer, we need a revelation of Jesus. It'll change our lives. Let's pray:
Father, I thank you that you love us so much that you sent your son, that you sent him in a package that we could relate to, that we could understand, and that he could understand us. I ask you now by your Spirit to give us a living revelation of Jesus of Nazareth, not a historical figure or a religious leader, but the living person of Jesus. I thank you for it. It's in his name we ask, amen.