Our Prophet, Priest, and King

Luke 4

Main Idea: Jesus meets our greatest needs when we recognize him as the Son of God and our Savior.

1. Our High Priest Overcomes Satan’s Temptations for Us (4:1-13).
2. Our Great Prophet Brings Good News of God’s Salvation to Us (4:14-27).
   1. One dramatic reading of Scripture (4:16-20)
   2. Two dramatic revelations from Scripture (4:21-27)
3. Our King Uses His Authority to Bless Us (4:28-44).
   1. Authority in his teaching (4:31-32)
   2. Authority over demons (4:33-37)
   3. Authority over physical existence (4:38-40)

We get to know Jesus best by examining the Bible. And if we wish to know what God is like, we must look at his Son.

The greatest question about Jesus asked in the Bible is “Who is Jesus?” It’s a good, basic question to ask. In the last chapter we saw that Jesus our Savior is the Son of God. That identity—Son of God—carries with it three offices. The Lord Jesus is priest, prophet, and king for the benefit of his people.

Our High Priest Overcomes Satan’s Temptations

Luke 4:1-13

Luke 4 includes two very well-known passages of Scripture often appealed to by various sections of the Christian church. The first is the wilderness temptation of the Lord in verses 1-13. The Lord was baptized in chapter 3. That chapter concludes with our Lord’s genealogy, in which the last words are “son of God” (v. 38).

Now we see the Holy Spirit lead Christ into the wilderness for forty days where he will be tempted by Satan himself. The main issue at stake in this temptation is the identity of Jesus, whether he truly is the Son of God. In verse 3 Satan comes to Jesus and says, “If you are the Son of God . . .” Again in verse 9 the serpent says, “If you are the Son of God . . .” The pressing issue in the passage is the question “Who is Jesus? Is he really the Son of God?”

The immediate context of this temptation harks back to others who were previously called “son of God.” Adam receives mention in Luke 3:38. You will recall Satan’s temptation of Adam in the garden, where Adam failed the test. Now Jesus is presented to us as the second Adam.

The passage also harks back to Hosea 11:1 where God calls Israel his “child” and declares, “out of Egypt I called my son,” referring to Israel. In Hosea 11:2, once God had delivered his people from bondage, they entered the wilderness where they worshiped the Baals and idols rather than God. Israel, too, failed to be God’s perfect son, and their wilderness temptation lurks in the background of Luke 4 as well. But here we are finally presented with God’s true Son and the true Israel, which is Christ.

Just as Adam had his garden of temptation, Jesus has his wilderness of temptation. Everything God has affirmed, Satan tries to negate. God calls Jesus his Son and produces the paternity test to prove it (ch. 3). Satan shows up to doubt and dispute it.

Satan seizes upon our Lord’s human weakness. Verse 2 says that Jesus “ate nothing during those days, and when they were over, he was hungry.” Satan hates humanity. He loves (if Satan can love anything) to attack at our points of weakness. Three times over these forty days he attacks the Lord.

First, the devil tempts Jesus with provision. verse 3: “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” But Jesus quotes from Israel’s wilderness wanderings in Deuteronomy 8:3: “It is written: ‘Man must not live on bread alone’” (v. 4). Matthew adds, “but on every word that comes from the mouth of God” (4:4).

Then Satan tempts Jesus with power. Verses 5-7: “I will give you their splendor and all this authority, because it has been given over to me, and I can give it to anyone I want. If you, then, will worship me, all will be yours.” Sometimes Christians debate whether Satan could really do this. I think that debate indicates we are not Jesus. The moment we begin to entertain whether Satan can deliver on a promise, we’re already losing the spiritual battle. The Savior answers by quoting Deuteronomy 6:13: “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only’” (v. 8). Satan thrusts himself into the place of God, willing to bargain worship for power. But Christ reserves worship for God alone.

Finally, Satan tempts Jesus with protection in verses 9-11. Satan himself now begins to use Scripture. He twists Psalm 91:11-12. He turns God’s word into an occasion not to trust God but to test God. Isn’t it striking that after Jesus twice quotes the Scriptures, Satan thinks himself subtle enough to quote the Bible to the Lord and deceive even the Son of God. But our Lord again answers with Scripture in verse 12: “It is said: Do not test the Lord your God” (Deut 6:16). God is to be trusted, served, and worshiped. But he is not to be tested. Then Satan left Jesus until a later time.

In his own time and in a way that glorified the Father, Jesus received everything Satan tempted him with. Jesus would miraculously produce bread for the hungry masses, obtain all authority and splendor in heaven and earth through the cross and resurrection (Matt 28:18-20), and receive the service and worship of heaven’s angels as he rules at the Father’s right hand. Beloved, the best way to fight temptation is to realize we may receive what tempts us in a holy way if we wait on God’s timing, trusting him.

In all of these temptations Jesus relies on God’s Word. Our Lord quotes and trusts the Scriptures. From that fact we can deduce Jesus’s view of the Bible. First, Jesus believes the Bible applies to our temptations. Second, Jesus believes the Bible to truly be the word of God. Third, our Lord believes in the inspiration and authority of the Scriptures. He does not equivocate or quibble but stands on God’s Word.

Now, typically at this point in the exposition, teachers encourage Christians to face their temptations by standing on God’s Word. Preachers tell us if we hide God’s Word in our hearts we will not sin against God (Deut 11:18; Ps 119:11). They tell us we are to live by every word that comes from the mouth of God (Deut 8:3; Matt 4:4). But no human boxing with Satan is likely to be as effective as Jesus in that fight. If Satan would try to twist Scripture and to twist the Lord’s heart and mind, then you know he will try it with us. So resisting temptation cannot be merely a matter of “take two Bible verses and call me in the morning.” We would need to know the word as well as Jesus knows it in order to do what Jesus does here. It is probably not best to think of this as primarily a pattern for resisting temptation.

The question is: “Why is this text given to us?” Is it so that we may trust God’s Word or trust God’s Son? “Trust God’s Word” is a secondary application. Jesus’s perfect interpretation and obedience to God’s word reveals he is God’s true Son. Satan is not so subtle that he can do with Jesus what he did with Adam and Eve in the Garden. Satan is not so effective that he can cause the Christ, the Son of God, to grumble against God because of hunger the way he caused Israel to do so.

Our primary application is “Jesus is God’s Son; trust him.” The Lord endured temptation in our place. So in our temptation, we must flee to Christ! He conquered our adversary. The Son stands in our place to defeat the temptation that often defeats us. He does not do this to say, “Okay, now, that’s how you do it.” As Jesus endures this temptation, he becomes our Great High Priest. That’s what Hebrews 4:15 teaches us. He “has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.” Right now Jesus reigns in the heavens as a priest who can “sympathize with our weaknesses” (v. 15) and who now makes it possible for us to “approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (v. 16). Our Lord didn’t endure this so we would have a model to follow. He did this so we would have mercy when falling. Christ delivers us. He stands in as priest for us, offering both a sacrifice and righteousness for us.

The ultimate issue here is whether Jesus is the Son of God. That’s why Satan keeps coming at him this way. Satan’s real aim is to destroy Jesus’s sonship so that he might destroy our salvation, for if Jesus were to fall in any of these temptations, he could not be the sinless sacrifice that takes away the sins of the world. So Satan unleashes the most relentless demonic assault in the history of creation, and Jesus remains faithful to his Father through it all. This is the second proof of Jesus’s divine nature. No natural man could withstand such a demonic assault. Only God could.

Here the God-man passes the test that Adam and Eve failed. He survives temptation in the wilderness when Israel failed in the exodus. He passes the test that we have all failed. In doing so he becomes our ever-present help in times of need and temptation.

This means that in our temptations our best strategy is to run to Jesus. He is our strength. He is our shield. He is our High Priest who prays and intercedes for us. He is our victory and our confidence. However well we know the word of God, let us not begin to think we know it so well that we don’t need to first flee to Jesus, our High Priest who has overcome the tempter on our behalf.

Our Great Prophet Brings Good News of Salvation to Us

Luke 4:14-30

Verses 14-15 tell us that Jesus was really popular. However, this isn’t the praise that goes along with true worship. This is worldly popularity. Jesus is a celebrity. On a popular level, Jesus is the man. But they don’t yet know him.

Jesus comes to Nazareth in verse 16. Nazareth is his hometown—“where he had been brought up.” When he gets home he immediately gets into his regular routine: “He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day.”

As an aside: Jesus went to synagogue regularly. It was his usual custom. We live in a day when a lot of Christian leaders and many ordinary Christians are telling us that we don’t need to be a part of the church or attend regularly. They tell us that the church has too many problems and that their faith is more genuine because they’re not part of the institutional church. Now if Jesus went to synagogue every Sabbath, shouldn’t the Christian go to church every Sunday? How are we going to be like Jesus if we’re customarily avoiding the things Jesus customarily attended? The synagogue of Jesus’s day was in worse shape than the churches of our day, and our Lord still attended.

Jesus is in the community where he grew up. He is in the synagogue among the religious. He is where he should have been known best.

One Dramatic Reading of Scripture (4:16-20)

This is where Jesus preaches his first recorded public sermon in Luke’s Gospel. It’s a dramatic scene. He stands to read. They hand him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Jesus keeps unrolling it slowly, respectfully, until he gets down near the end of the scroll, what we would call Isaiah 61:1-2. Once Jesus reads this passage, he sits down, and everyone watches him. Can you feel the drama here? People lean in wondering, What will he say?

Isaiah 61 prophesies the coming Messiah who brings the salvation of God. Isaiah says that the Messiah is anointed to do one thing primarily: to preach. That’s what a prophet does: he preaches the very words and the promises of God. See the three mentions of preaching:

• “to preach good news to the poor” (v. 18; emphasis added),
• “to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed” (v. 18; emphasis added), and
• “to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (v. 19; emphasis added).

Our Lord’s use of the Isaiah passages provokes wide differences of opinion on how to interpret who he is and his mission. Sometimes people interpret this quotation as a political statement. They view Jesus as a social and political revolutionary because of the reference to liberating the poor and oppressed. They understand this passage to have implications for the mission of the church in alleviating the suffering of people who are actually poor and imprisoned.

Some other Christians view the quotation in spiritual terms. They view the passage as a picture of the coming spiritual salvation from the Lord. In this view, the “poor,” “blind,” and “oppressed” are so because of sin. Isaiah 61 certainly has in mind this salvific meaning (see Isa 61:2,4,7-8). This salvation anticipates a time when all the people’s spiritual brokenness, spiritual poverty, spiritual imprisonment, spiritual blindness, and spiritual oppression because of sin will be restored and reversed by God’s “favor” or grace through preaching.

While Isaiah 61 foresees a salvific fulfillment, it is also certain that this text cannot mean less than the gospel going to poor people, the imprisoned, and the oppressed. I think we’re best helped to understand this text if we first remember it’s about Jesus and not about us. This is Jesus saying to us that the prophecy in Isaiah refers to his own life and ministry. Whatever the text means, the prophecy was fulfilled on that day when Jesus preached this sermon. He says, “Today as you listen, this Scripture has been fulfilled” (Luke 4:21; emphasis added). Christ is the Messiah, the prophet who brings the announcement of God’s kingdom breaking into the world.

The “poor” here are certainly the poor who are impoverished by their sin. But it’s not less than the poor who are impoverished in the world. Throughout Luke’s Gospel, the people who respond most fervently and quickly to the message of Jesus are the materially poor, the destitute, and the beggars. The “blind” are certainly those who are spiritually blinded by the god of this age (2 Cor 4:4), but the reference includes blind Bartimaeus, who though he couldn’t see physically, could see spiritually. Bartimaeus knew that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of David. Despite his physical limitations Baritmaeus recognized the spiritual reality that Christ is the great prophet who brings the messianic kingdom of God.

The second thing to recognize is that Jesus did, in fact, go to these very kinds of people and proclaim, preach, and teach the kingdom of God. The primary means of setting people free in whatever their social or political circumstance is the proclamation of the gospel. But that means the gospel has to be so real a gospel that it addresses people in their social and political position. The gospel cannot be abstracted from the real conditions of the people it addresses. Israel was under Roman occupation. Israel was oppressed. Israel was crushed beneath the heel of the Caesars. And Christ came to them preaching the gospel of the kingdom—not the kingdom of Caesar but of another world. He gave hope to a people broken by the rule of men.

The gospel we preach cannot be an escapist, pie-in-the-sky gospel; it must be a gospel acquainted with pain, roughened by grit, and smelling like marginalized people. The gospel must enter the world as it is and proclaim to broken people a healing Savior.

So our challenge is not to be Jesus—either in our temptation, as though we are as clever and capable with the word as Christ, or in our evangelism, as if we are messiahs entering a neighborhood to set people free. Our challenge is to point to the one who does set free, the one who enters temptation to purchase our victory, the one who has come into our broken world with the promise of rescue and deliverance. His promise comes to people while they are in their misery. That’s why it’s good news. That’s why the angels shout, “Joy to the world!” That’s why the gospel gives life: it reaches people in their barrenness.

Our task is not to form a holy huddle or celebrate sublime things about Christ. Our task is not to swell our heads with theology and Bible knowledge. Our task is to, yes, feed on Christ, but also to find beggars and tell them where there is bread. We must find fellow lepers and tell them where there is cleansing. We must remember we were the lepers who woke up to find the enemy camp already abandoned. We needed the victory, but we didn’t earn it. Like people glad to have found what they most desperately needed, our task is to go to our neighbors and tell them there is a Savior who supplies all their needs, too.

Will we embrace this calling really, practically, daily? We could put a church anywhere, on any block or in any neighborhood. New churches are springing up all over our city, most of them in already redeveloped sections where “urban” has come to mean “chic.” Urban now means gentrified, redeveloped, and renewed. May the Lord prosper those churches. But we must be convinced that God very much means to insert a colony of heaven in the neighborhoods that are not redeveloped, in sections of the city where windows are broken, bottles are strewn across streets, and neighbors are using PCP, selling their bodies, and exhibiting their brokenness in all manner of sin. The Lord means that colony to announce to those neighborhoods and neighbors there is a Savior tempted like you who gave his life for your salvation. His name is Jesus, the Son of God, crucified for our sins, buried, and raised three days later for our justification.

We are meant to announce to the blind that, if they believe in this Jesus, they may never see with their physical eyes in this life but they will see glories they cannot imagine. We are meant to announce to prisoners that they may still be required to serve lifelong sentences, but they will be free inside that jail if they believe. We must tell the poor they may not receive riches and may have to serve the Lord the rest of their lives in poverty, but in glory they will receive riches they cannot imagine. Christ Jesus intends for us to go to our neighborhood and neighbors to make this known. This is why God put your church where it is, and why you should also plant more churches in other neighborhoods across your city.

Two Dramatic Revelations from Scripture (4:21-27)

First, Jesus explains the text. It’s a one-sentence sermon that explodes in your ear every couple of words. I imagine he said verse 21 very slowly, clearly, and loudly.

• “Today”—not in Isaiah’s day but in their day, on that very day
• “as you listen”—right in front of you, with my words, in person, not by secondhand hearsay
• “this Scripture”—the announcement of God’s salvation promised long ago
• “has been fulfilled”—completed, brought to pass, come true

In this one sentence Jesus proclaims that he is the Messiah who brings this great salvation that was promised to Israel.

The people enjoy the sermon, but they don’t see the Savior! They think Jesus is a nice preacher, but they are too familiar with him. All they see is “Joseph’s son” (v. 22). They miss the very fulfillment of the Scripture and only see a hometown boy who has made good.

Sometimes the truth is hidden in plain sight. Sometimes the familiar hides the fantastic. That’s why most automobile accidents happen within a few blocks of the driver’s home. They get close to home and they assume everything is as it’s always been so they don’t see the unusual thing going on with the other driver. Familiarity is why most household accidents happen in the bathroom. We’re so comfortable and familiar that we don’t see the wet floor.

Familiarity is why a lot of people don’t recognize Jesus as their Messiah. They’ve had just enough Bible to make them think they know, so they’re not looking any deeper. They’re familiar with Sunday School Bible stories. They’ve come to church at Easter and Christmas. They’ve heard a little bit on TV or in the barbershop. So they’ve become familiar, and they don’t see. Don’t be too familiar with Jesus. Look hard. Listen long. Be certain you recognize him for who he is. He is someone who gets deeper the deeper you look.

Jesus goes on to anticipate what they people are thinking (v. 23). Jesus sees them even though they don’t see him. Jesus says there’s coming a day when they will say to him, “Doctor, heal yourself!” We can’t help but think of the religious leaders at Jesus’s crucifixion when they mockingly say, “He saved others; let him save himself if this is God’s Messiah” (23:35). That day is coming, but right now they want him to do in Nazareth, his hometown, what he did in Capernaum. They want him to put Nazareth first and minister there. They want him to prove himself by working miracles and putting Israel first. It’s the response of pride and unbelief. It’s self-importance and entitlement.

Jesus finds no honor in their response (v. 24). They’re not going to honor him here. Familiarity breeds contempt. To them he is always going to be “Joseph’s son.”

You see, beloved, it’s dishonoring Jesus to call him something less than he really is. Muslims say they honor Jesus as a great prophet, but they dishonor him by denying he is the Son of God. Hindus say they honor Jesus by worshiping him as one of thousands of gods, but they dishonor him by not seeing that he is the only true God and all others are idols. Some people think they honor Jesus by saying, “He is a good moral teacher,” but they dishonor him by refusing to see he is the Savior of the world.

To honor Jesus, you have to receive him as he really is: the Messiah and Son of God who alone rescues sinners from God’s wrath and makes those same sinners righteous in God’s sight.

Then comes the second dramatic revelation. Not only does the audience in the synagogue not accept him as Messiah, but the Gentiles will be brought in while Israel is cut off. He gives them two analogies from their history.

• He reminds them of the widows in Elijah’s day (vv. 25-26). Though there were many widows in Israel, God sent Elijah to the widow of Zarapheth in Sidon.
• Jesus reminds them of Elisha, Elijah’s successor (v. 27). There were many lepers in Israel in Elisha’s day, but God sent Elisha to heal Naaman, a Syrian.

Sidon and Syria were Gentile lands and people. Jesus is saying God’s salvation passed over Israel and went to the “unclean” Gentiles. Israel rejected their prophets, but the Gentiles received them and were saved. Now we remember the last words of Isaiah 61: “For as the earth produces its growth, and as a garden enables what is sown to spring up, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations” (v. 11). God always intended to save people from every nation and ethnic group and language group, not just from Israel. As Paul explains in Romans, the Gentiles have been grafted into God’s salvation because the Israelites have been broken off (Rom 11:17). That is what Jesus preaches here: Israel will be cut off and the Gentiles brought in.

God’s salvation is for all nations. It’s for everyone who will receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and God.

I think Luke 4 compels us to consider if we’re like the people in the synagogue who miss Jesus. Perhaps we’ve been brought up in church the way they were raised in synagogue. We know the language of the church. We know the culture and the rituals. We know the routine, but we don’t know Jesus. I think Jesus’s sermon is aimed at nominal believers, at people who assume they are God’s people but have no living, saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. And the Lord’s application to them and to us is you can miss God’s salvation if you fail to recognize Jesus. Perhaps you have not thought of Jesus as necessary to your salvation and forgiveness with God. You have not thought of him as the one who provides you righteousness and pays the penalty for your sin. Today is the day of salvation. Today this salvation is preached in your hearing, just as it was then. Believe on Jesus. Trust him. Repent of sin, come to him in faith, and you will be saved. Do not miss the salvation he brings.

Our King Exercises His Authority for Our Blessing

Luke 4:28-41

The Israelites reject him (vv. 28-29). Ironically, the people try to put Jesus in the same position that Satan tried to tempt him with—to throw the Lord down from a height. Then the people get a miracle, but not like the ones in Capernaum—like they want him to do (v. 23). Jesus passes right through them unharmed. I wonder what they thought when that happened? Come here! Grab him! Hold him! Jesus never said a word.

As far as we know, the Lord never returned to Nazareth. The Gospels do not record him entering his hometown again. Some rejections are final.

My non-Christian friend, don’t look to Jesus to do parlor tricks to satisfy your unbelief. You’re called to take him at his word, to believe his teaching. It’s in his word that the Lord reveals himself. When he tells you he brings God’s salvation to the nations, believe him. Trust him. Don’t reject him, or he may reject you in the end. That’s why we plead with you: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ so you may be saved!

Following the people’s rejection in Nazareth, Jesus moves down to Capernaum. Capernaum was Jesus’s ministry headquarters. It’s where Peter lived with his family. At Capernaum Jesus reveals something more about what it means for him to be the Son of God. Jesus repeatedly demonstrates that as the unique Son of God he has authority over all things.

In our text the Son of God is a King with authority in three domains.

Authority in His Teaching (4:31-32)

Matthew 7:29 says Jesus’s teaching was not like the scribes and Pharisees, who taught a lot of speculation and doubt. Jesus’s teaching came with exclamation marks and with power. He taught as if he had the ability and the right to define and proclaim the very words of God. And he did!

There is certainty and confidence in his message. Our Lord taught the Old Testament like it was his autobiography. There is power in his words—so much so that outwardly religious people are amazed! Do you know how difficult it is to amaze outwardly religious people? They have heard and seen it all. But as Jesus thunders in preaching their hearts respond. They had never seen or heard a teacher like Jesus with such authority in his teaching.

Authority Over Demons (4:33-37)

Do not pass verse 33 too fast. There is a sad irony here. You run into the devil in the most surprising places, don’t you? You do not expect to find demon-possessed people in a synagogue or church. Hollywood has us thinking we find demons in graveyards or dark forests. Satan makes us look at the dead while he takes over the living. Satan took over a man and took him to church! We do not have to go farther than the assembly of God’s people to find evidence of the enemy’s work. Satan loves to oppose Christ’s work right where the Lord is meant to be worshiped.

Here this man is in the synagogue screaming. The religious people had no answer But with a command the Lord Jesus Christ ruled over this evil spirit (v. 35). He has the power and the right to control even the forces of darkness, to command Satan and his minions.

That is why, in verse 36, “Amazement came over them all.” When you think about what a demon is, this really is amazing. A demon is a fallen angel who rebelled with Satan against God and was cast from heaven. They are committed to opposing God’s rule and everything God does. They hate God and hate God’s people. Their entire mission is to resist God. But when Jesus speaks, demons tremble!

Dualism is the idea that good and evil are locked in a struggle and the battle is almost equal. But the Christian worldview does not allow any such thinking. There is Jesus—King of kings and Lord of lords with all authority in heaven and on earth. He always wins! He rules over even the demonic powers!

Authority Over Physical Existence (4:38-40)

Jesus shows this authority primarily through his healing ministry. The Lord heals Simon Peter’s mother-in-law (vv. 38-39). When Luke refers to a “high fever” (v. 38) he speaks with a physician’s concern and insight. This is no common cold or flu bug. This woman is down and out. The fever must have been desperate because “they asked him about her” (v. 38). They’re asking for a miracle. “So he stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her” (v. 39). Fevers do not have ears or minds. Fevers are not sentient beings. But the Son of God speaks to this virus or whatever causes the fever, and this unhearing, unthinking thing obeys him! What power!

This was no fluke or fraud. The Lord healed “various diseases” (v. 40). He is not healing those vague, unverifiable kinds of sicknesses. This is not a tent revival featuring a fake healer planting people in the audience. The Lord healed “each one” (v. 40). He did not turn anybody away. He did not sell tickets or ask for an offering. He sat there well into sunset, and he personally laid hands on every person who came to him, and they were healed.

Every disease, every person . . . healed. I often wonder why people who claim to have healing powers and gifts do not simply go to hospitals and heal the sick. Why must they rent stadiums, sell tickets, and have cameras filming them? There is something demonic about that. If you have the ability to heal but you use it as a means of building a name for yourself or lining your pockets with money, then you are not doing the Lord’s work.

When Jesus heals, there is no fakery. Satan always has counterfeits, but Jesus is the real deal. He is the Son of God, the King of kings, and he has authority in his teaching, authority over demons, and authority over physical existence.

In this text of Scripture, between the people and the demons, who understands the truth about Jesus? It was the demons! The demon cried out, “I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” (v. 34). Luke tells us, “Demons were coming out of many, shouting and saying, ‘You are the Son of God!’ But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew he was the Christ” (v. 41). The evil spirits get it right. They know Jesus is “the Holy One of God”—another way of referring to Jesus as the Messiah, the Chosen Savior of the world. Demons know this.

Beloved, do not let demons that cannot be saved acknowledge more about Jesus than you whom he came to save. Demons have sense enough to ask, “Have you come to destroy us?” (v. 34). The demons knew he would; their only concern was when. They did not assume they had unlimited time to carry on their wickedness. They knew their days were numbered.

The days of sinful man’s rebellion are numbered too. You will either end your rebellion by repenting now of your sin, confessing it to God, and asking for his forgiveness through Jesus Christ, or Jesus will end your rebellion by demonstrating his holiness in condemnation. My friend, don’t sit here in your sins and fail to ask the Lord, “Will you destroy me because of my sin?” The wise man repents. The wise man turns to Jesus. The wise man recognizes that Jesus is the Son of God, the chosen one of God. Be wise. Recognize Jesus. Come to him while you may be saved. I plead with you, before it’s too late, before you die in your sin and face the Lord’s judgment, repent and believe. Do not allow an evil spirit to respond more honestly to Jesus than you.

Christian, the response of these demons has much to teach us, too. Look how loudly they proclaim that Jesus is the Holy One of God and the Son of God: “with a loud voice” (v. 33); “shouting” (v. 41). That’s how demons acknowledge Jesus. Do we acknowledge Jesus as loudly? Or are we in some measure ashamed to proclaim his name? We must not allow demons to proclaim Christ more boldly than we do. If we are ashamed of Jesus before men, he will be ashamed of us before his Father in heaven (Mark 8:38; Luke 9:26).

And, Christian, consider how the demons obey Jesus. Are we quicker and more joyful in our obedience to Jesus than demons are? They obey him because he exercises raw authority toward them. Toward us he shows love. How much more should we who have been loved by God through Jesus his Son show our love toward him in a quick, glad, full obedience?

Beloved, let us resolve not to allow demons to acknowledge and obey Jesus more loudly and more quickly than we acknowledge and obey the Lord who loves us and gave his life for us.

Conclusion

In Luke 4 Jesus came preaching the good news of the kingdom throughout the region of Galilee. That same gospel is preached in our day. We still live in “the year of God’s favor” (v. 19). This is a day not to be wasted but treasured. Drink in the realization that Christ is for us Prophet, Priest, and King. He has endured every temptation that all humanity would have failed. He has brought the good news of salvation that all humanity needed. He has exercised his kingship for the blessing of all who have been broken by the fall. Christ is for us the sufficient and only Savior. And this Jesus, who is your Messiah and who has authority over all things, loves you. Hope in him and trust his love.

Reflect and Discuss

1. Do you believe Jesus is the Son of God? Why or why not?
2. What temptations commonly attack you? How are you fighting those temptations?
3. How might fleeing to Christ help you in times of temptation? How would fleeing to Christ differ from fighting those battles in your own strength?
4. Jesus came preaching the good news of the kingdom of heaven. What does our Lord’s emphasis teach us about the importance of preaching and evangelism?
5. Do you think all Christians have a responsibility to preach the gospel to persons who are poor, blind, imprisoned, etc.? Why or why not?
6. How might you take part in seeing the gospel reach persons who are poor, are captive, or have disabilities?
7. Why do you think demons recognized Jesus’s true identity before the people did?
8. In this chapter we see Jesus as Prophet, Priest, and King. Which of those mediatorial offices seems most dear to you right now? Why?