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Hi, this is Pastor Tom and I welcome you to our look at Luke chapter 4. Let me
begin by reading Luke chapter 4 verse 1. "Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit,
returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the desert, and in verse
2, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil.

" This is the fourth preparation for ministry in the life of Jesus, the
temptation of Jesus. We begin with John's ministry, and then we have the baptism
of Jesus, then the genealogies, the plan of God, and the life in human history
leading to the life of Christ, and now we have the temptation of Christ. Listen
to what happens.

Last part of verse 2, the Bible says, "Jesus ate nothing during those days, and
at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him, 'If you're the Son of
God, tell this stone to become bread. ' Jesus answered, 'It is written, 'Man
does not live on bread alone.

' The devil led him to a high place and showed him in an instant all the
kingdoms of the world, and he said to him, 'I will give you all their authority
and splendor, for it's been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to.
So if you worship me, it will all be yours. ' Jesus answered, 'It is written,
'Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.

' The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the
temple. 'If you are the Son of God,' he said, 'throw yourself down from here,
for it is written. He will command his angels concerning you to guard you
carefully.

They will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot
against a stone. ' Jesus answered, 'It says, 'Do not put the Lord your God to
the test. ' When the devil had finished all his tempting, all this tempting, he
left him until an opportune time.

" This temptation of Jesus, there are deep truths in the temptations themselves.
The truth that you'll never outgrow temptation. If Jesus was tempted, I'm going
to be tempted.

The truth that temptation and sin are not the same thing. Jesus never sinned,
but he was tempted. You can be tempted and choose not to sin, and the fact that
you are tempted should not make you feel guilty.

It's just Satan's words trying to lead you the wrong direction. The truth that
Satan twists the truth, even tries to twist the truth of God, the truth of
scripture to tempt Jesus, and the truth, the powerful truth, that scripture is
the greatest weapon we have against temptation. Did you notice all three times
that Jesus was tempted, he answered with the word of God.

But although we could focus on all of those things, I'd like to focus on the
fact, we're taking a broad look as we walk through the book of Luke, I'd like to
focus on the fact that Jesus was tempted at this point in his life. The truth
that temptation is a part of preparation. If you see devastation as the only
possible result of temptation, you are missing the truth that even Jesus was
tempted.

In every temptation, there is the opportunity to say yes to Satan, no doubt
about it. But there's also the opportunity to say yes to God. The best way to
say no to a temptation is to say yes to God.

That's where the power is, saying yes to God. And that is what Jesus did three
times. In preparation for ministry, there is often temptation that we face in
ministry.

Every temptation is an opportunity to say yes to God, and oftentimes in your
life, as God is preparing you for some new thing he's going to do, he allows a
temptation from Satan to come. Why? So that you'll fall?

So that you'll fail? Absolutely not! So that you'll say yes to God.

As you say yes to God, you will take that faith and that dependence on God into
this new ministry that you have. The only way to resist temptation is by faith.
You can't resist temptation by your own human willpower.

Oh, you can resist some things, but not the ones that Satan cooks up, not his
best ones. You cannot do it. You can't.

You can only resist it by faith. And if you're going to start a new ministry,
God wants you to start with faith. That's why temptation often precedes, as it
did in the life of Jesus, this ministry.

Jesus is tempted, and after this temptation, his ministry begins. After he says
no to Satan, yes to God, his ministry begins with a sermon. In Luke chapter 4
verse 14, here's what Jesus preached.

Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread
throughout the whole countryside. He taught in their synagogues, and everyone
praised him. He went to Nazareth, where he'd been brought up, and on the Sabbath
day, he went to the synagogue, as was his custom, and he stood up to read.

The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the
place where it is written, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has
anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom
for the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

" And then he rolled up the scroll, he gave it back to the attendant, and he sat
down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began
by saying to them, "Today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.

" Jesus reads a scripture about the Messiah, the one who's to come, and he says,
"This scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. " In many synagogues, there was a
seat, a place where the Messiah was to sit when he came, when he returned. It's
very possible that when Jesus sat down, he sat in that very seat.

Everyone's eyes fastened on him. What does that mean? This is his hometown.

So what is the response of the people in his hometown as Jesus preaches this?
From the very beginning, shepherds and prophets and all who've seen Jesus have
recognized who he is. What about those who grew up with him?

The Bible in verse 22 says, "All spoke well of him, and were amazed at the
gracious words that came from his lips. " "Isn't this Joseph's son? " they
asked.

You know what's happening here? We discovered it by what Jesus says next. They
tried to make Jesus their hometown mascot.

Instead of being transformed by his words, they wanted to keep Jesus to
themselves as a kind of a town trophy. They wanted to make Jesus their size.
They wanted to put Jesus on a shelf, on a mantle, so they could look at him and
enjoy him but not be changed by him.

They wanted to be proud of Jesus, they didn't want to follow Jesus. Jesus
recognized this. And so he says in verse 24, "I tell you the truth, no prophet
is accepted in his hometown.

I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah's time, when the
sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout
the land, yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in
the region of Sodom. " When Jesus says this, when he won't allow them to put him
on that shelf, on that mantle, make him a mantle piece, their response
immediately changes. It shows their heart.

In verse 28, "All of the people of the synagogue were furious when they heard
this. They got up, they drove him out of town, they took him to the brow of the
hill on which the town was built in order to throw him down off the cliff. But
he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.

" Wow, what a change of response. In the rest of this chapter, Jesus is going to
move on to Capernaum to the next town because of the response that they had. And
we're going to see a different kind of response in Capernaum, but we're also
going to see something in the life of Jesus, something in the heart of Jesus in
the way that it responds to these two towns.

Nazareth, where they rejected him, then he goes on to Capernaum. And what
happens there? In verse 31, "He went on to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and on
the Sabbath began to teach the people.

He teaches all day long, he heals some people that day, he actually goes to
Peter's house where his mother-in-law is sick, he heals Peter's mother-in-law.
And then in verse 40, "When the sun was setting, the people brought to Jesus all
who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed
them. " Verse 42, "At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place, and the
people were looking for him.

And when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them.
But he said, 'I must preach the good news of the kingdom to God to other towns
also, because that's why I was sent. ' And he kept on preaching in the
synagogues of Judea.

" As you look at the beginning of the ministry of Jesus Christ, what's the first
thing that Jesus does? He preaches a sermon telling about his purpose. What's
the second thing that Jesus does?

He refuses to let people put him in their box, both in Nazareth and now in
Capernaum. In Nazareth, they rejected him. He spoke the truth to them, and they
rejected him.

They ran him out of town. In Capernaum, they accepted him. He healed them all,
and they begged him to stay.

One place they ran him out of town, another place they begged him to stay.
Neither those who rejected or those who hungrily accepted kept Jesus from the
call that God had for his life. His purpose was determined by God, not the
acceptance or the rejection of others.

If you want to live a weary, a tired life, let your purpose be determined by
other people. By making up for some rejection that you faced in your life, or by
seeking the approval, the applause of others. That is the road to a weary, tired
life.

The abundant life is found in living out God's purpose. Now, God's purpose will
have you serving others, but it won't have you living for the purpose of others.
The strength to serve isn't found in the people you serve, it's found in God's
purpose.

He's the one who gives us the strength to serve. That's the example of Jesus as
he begins his ministry. That's the example of Jesus to me and for you.

Let's pray together. Jesus, forgive me. Forgive me for those times when I serve
motivated by trying to make up for some rejection, or motivated by trying to
seek for some applause.

Lord, remind me. Remind me that the power, the strength to serve, it's found in
you. It's found in your love for me.

It's found in your purpose for my life. Oh God, although I want to serve others,
I want to learn to serve others. I want to do it based on your purpose and plan
for my life.

I want to follow the example of Jesus. So I pray that today, maybe even today,
would be the beginning of a new, refreshing kind of life, not under the
oppression of other people's opinions and directions, but under the freedom of
your direction, your guidance for my life. I ask that you lead me in your life.

In your name I pray. Amen. Well, tomorrow, we're going to meet Jesus' closest
followers and his greatest enemies.