Jesus Is the Man

Hi to those of you uh today in downtown SuffK and St. Louis, Missouri Western Branch campus. I want to say hi as well to the men at our God Behind Bars campus. So good to see you today. And maybe you're watching online today. I want to encourage you if you're watching this service online this morning and you still have time to get to a service, whether that be in Southeast Virginia or in St. Louis, uh Missouri, make sure and get to church. You know, there's just something about being in the room. I'm so grateful for technology. I'm grateful that we're able to to stream our services and able to watch and to learn maybe when we're traveling or sick or something like that. But but the community of believers, uh the church is the called out ones, meaning called out together. Community of believers. It is a gathering. We're not the church by ourselves. We're the church together. And so that's why it really matters to gather when we are able to. And so [snorts] it's so good to see you in the house today. If you are newer with us, my name is Michael. And uh my wife Megan and I are the senior pastors uh here of our church. And we have a great team. We have uh pastors and staff and volunteer leaders and and serve team members that make alive church happen. And uh you might not know this, but I mean there's over 500 people who serve every single week to make church happen. Could we just honor them today? It's so I'm so grateful for our teams that serve and kids and our our hospitality teams, worship and production teams that get here when you're still sleeping and uh and facilities teams. It's amazing. Uh, [snorts] one thing before we get into the Bible today, I want to make sure that that you're aware of as we are getting ready uh to to end our 21 days of prayer and fasting. So, I said it's day eight, but so we're almost done. If you just always think like that, I'm almost done. It'll just help you in the fasting aspect of it. Um, but on February 1st, Sunday, February 1st, uh, we'll launch into a new season of live groups. And so if you're not connected in an alive group, that's a small group of people that meet monthly, bi-weekly, or weekly. And we study and we talk about uh the scripture that's preached on the weekend. But not only that, we also get to know each other better. We pray for each other. We hold each other accountable. We we develop relationships. We eat together and we build life together. It's so important that your closest relationships in life are going the same direction as you. If you want to go after the things of God in your life, your closest relationships must be with people who are also going after the things of God. And so that's one of the reasons we think being connected in community in a small group of people is so important for your life. And so I want to encourage you uh to be thinking about that. On our website, you can see all those options and uh find a night or a location that works for you and get connected. Well, this weekend, uh, we're continuing our message series, Authentic. We're studying through the Gospel of Luke, learning the unfiltered story of Jesus. And I said last year, we talking about vision of I of jumping into this. My original plan was that we would uh preach through the Gospel of Luke up until Easter and then we would start the book of Acts after that. I want you to know that we are going to be in the Gospel of Luke much longer than that. Um, so some of you, I think, will be excited of that. Some of you need to get excited about that. Um, so today we're going to be in Luke chapter 4. So if you brought your Bibles, you can turn to Luke chapter 4. We're going to begin in verse 14. Today we'll study through verse 30. Next week, I'll go ahead and even let you know, next week we will still be in Luke chapter 4, and it's going to be incredible. But, um, the Bible is just loaded with what we need for our life. And when we're learning about Jesus and what it means for all aspects, it's so important. And uh I'm really excited for what I believe God wants to teach us today. Before I start reading the scriptures, I want to I want to set it up a bit different today and and maybe help you think about the perspective all of us, I believe, look at our life, look at the lens of life through, especially when it comes to Jesus. But I think it can be in other things as well. And so as you take notes today, I want you to write down uh these they're kind of going to be three headings maybe. And as we go through this message today, maybe some things you'll put under each one. I think that we choose to live our life in one of three ways. The first is the familiar life. Now, I'm saying this from from a perspective of Jesus to a large degree, but we choose to treat Jesus familiar. We've heard the stories. He's he's God. He's my savior. I grew up in school. Oh, he's for me, not against me. All all true things. So, I treat Jesus with a level of familiarity, the familiar life. There's some of us that go through our life and we live the offended life. We hear the things that Jesus says, but we don't like the things that Jesus says. We want the blessing of Jesus on our lives. You're at church today, so I believe that you want the blessing of Jesus on your life. But there's a reality that we don't like some of what he says. And so if we're honest, we wish it was different. And we get a little mad at him and and we get a little upset about what does it look like? Or why did you do that for those people? So just hear this. Maybe this is what it is. Why did you do that for those people and not do that for me? >> Why does it seem like you bless those people and don't bless me? >> The offended life. And then the third life that I believe we'll see in the scriptures today is the one that ultimately God desires us to live, that we're invited to live, that might might not sound as great, but it is the best. It's what we would call the surrendered life. When I actually choose to surrender to the lordship of Jesus, meaning as we sang today, Jesus is my king, then I no longer treat him as familiar. I refuse to allow myself to be offended based on what he does or doesn't do. I surrender to his way. and as a result, I can walk in the things that he has for my life. Here we go. Luke chapter 4. I'm going to read this today and uh talk a little bit as we go through it. It's interesting. I love this passage. So, let me get us to verse 18 quickly. Verse 14 I touched on last week. Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the spirit and news about him spread through the whole countryside. He was teaching in their synagogues and everyone praised him. He went to Nazareth where he had been brought up and on a Sabbath day he went into the synagogue as was his custom. He stood up to read and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found this place. Before I read this, here's the way it worked. Old Testament. Okay, so the synagogue, the temple, this is Jewish culture. What would happen is when they would have the gathering in Jewish culture is that not not the not not the leader, not not the the main rabbi, what we would think of it, just go with me, the senior pastor, different terminology that what they would do is there would be uh one of the elders, meaning just men of the community that was considered to be a leader in the community or a leader in the temple or the synagogue would be someone who would read a passage of scripture for that day when they would come in. And so Jesus, normal leader at this moment, it's very early in his ministry, but Luke, by the way, picks this up. Um, sometimes as we walk through this, you might have to slow it down when you watch it back on the replay on YouTube because I'm trying to make sure we learn what's happening through it all. Uh, so Luke is teaching kind of chronologically, but sometimes he's making sure we see more thematically what Jesus is doing in his earthly ministry. So he's talking right here real quick about what's happening in Nazareth. But he's already done some stuff in Capernaum because the people in this synagogue that in this temple um in Nazareth, they already have heard about what Jesus was doing in his miracles in Capernaum. But Luke is trying to help us set up to see thematically how Jesus is working in his earthly ministry. So he goes into the Senate. He goes into the temple and he stands up. He's like, "I'm going to be the reader today." And so then the attendant hands him a scroll of Isaiah the prophet. And he begins to read it. And here's what it says. This is taken from Isaiah chapter 61. A direct This is a messianic prophecy that the prophet Isaiah had spoken. Recorded in Isaiah chapter 61. Jesus begins to read it from the scroll a couple thousand years ago in a temple. It says this, "The spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Okay. Then Jesus rolls up the scroll. He hands it back to the attendant. And then he goes, now before I tell you this, custom customs is you would stand to read in in the temple. You would stand to read the reading and then you would sit down and it's like it would be like a I don't know. I just imagine I don't know what your church growing up life was, but I've seen some of those churches. They have like these thrones on stages. You know what I'm saying? It's like that's where the that's where the bishop sits, you And I'm like, that's that's great. This is not the way we do church, but this is what I imagine in this moment, right? So, you would teach though seated in the chair. Okay. So, Jesus rolls it up, hands it back to the attendant, and goes and sits down in the chair. They're ready now for this person who just read this to teach the understanding and the explanation of what he just read in the prophet. And this is what happened. It says he rolled it up. He gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone are staring at Jesus who has just read this scripture and now is sitting down and they're ready for him to tell them what it means. And he says this today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. I don't know if you want to understand what a mic drop moment is, but Jesus reads the messianic prophecy from the Old Testament that thousands of years of Jewish history are longing for the Messiah, longing for their savior to come to the earth. They believe that there will one day be a Messiah come to save them. One day be a Messiah to enter into the earth to set them free from all of their struggles, to set them free from all of their oppression. This scripture of Isaiah chapter 61 is a promise they would hold on to in in dark moments and in struggle moments. They would have hope because one day Messiah will come and save us. And in this moment, in this little place in Nazareth, Jesus Christ, who we know now as our king, says to this small group of people, "Yo, I'm that guy." I mean, you want to know the unfiltered Jesus. You want to learn how Jesus talks and how Jesus acts. We we see a lot about his ideas. [snorts] He's making this really big statement that it's not going to be one day that Jesus or a Messiah will come. That it's not going to be, oh, someday things will turn around and get better. He says today. You don't have to wait any longer. today. It's not let oh maybe in a thousand years today. It's not a reminder to them that this is what we long for. Our hope is that one day Messiah will come. He doesn't say I'm kind of like him and if you watch me you'll Nope. Today is the day. This is all changing today. In verse 22, it says, "All spoke well of him, and they were amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips." Which makes me think that he must have said something else that's not recorded in the scripture. [snorts] But then in verse 22, it says they ask this question. Isn't this Joseph's son? I mean, he can't be the Messiah. Like, it it sounds good. It feels like we've seen him do some pretty cool things, but isn't this isn't this Joseph's kid? Could Jesus really be all that? They were struck with familiarity. How could I actually view Jesus as the savior because he's too familiar to me? How could I actually believe that this man could be the savior because he's too familiar to me? And what would happen to the people in this group and in this moment is they will, and we'll see this throughout the gospels, they miss what Jesus would have for them because they treat him too casually. I want you to know it's true for them, it's true for us today. If I treat Jesus casually, I'll miss what he has for me. If I treat Jesus casually, if I treat him familiar, I'll miss what he has for me. I I remember that uh that I think it was a t-shirt or a commercial or something like that, I don't know. [snorts] And uh it says like Jesus is my co-pilot. I'm like, that's stupid. That's right. >> You know, you Jesus doesn't need to be your co-pilot. You need to get in the back seat and let Jesus fly. >> Jesus isn't meant to just be the one working hand in hand. It's not 50% Jesus, 50% me. It's 100% Jesus and I follow what he says. Like, this is the plan. This is the plan that he has. But this is a danger in our culture. just to meddle in not Jewish culture from 2,000 years ago, our culture in 2026, certainly in a western nation, is we think we're so smart. We think we're so sophisticated. We think we just know more than so many other people. We have the knowledge. We have the wisdom. We have the technology. And we don't have that same perspective necessarily in the natural where we would go, "No, I really just need to surrender to Jesus." But unfortunately, if I don't surrender 100% to Jesus, I keep 50% me. And just hear this today in all love and I'm included in this group of people. 50% me and 50% Jesus is not good. >> That's right. >> It's the all-in life. >> It's the surrendered life that he invites us to. In fact, we see in a couple of the other gospel writers that there's a real problem with familiarity with Jesus that will keep you from experiencing what he has for you. It says in Mark chapter 6 verse 5 and 6 that he could do no miracles there in Nazareth except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. He was amazed at their lack of faith. In Matthew chapter 13, another one of the gospels speaking of what's happening as a result of treating Jesus familiar. Isn't this Joseph's son is that he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith? I know that a lot of us [snorts] might want to explain away certain scriptures because it hasn't matched our experience in our day-to-day life. But we do not have the authority to explain away. The scriptures clearly throughout the gospels say Jesus responds to faith. And when there's a lack of faith, it limits what Jesus can do. It limits what he can do. And the this part, the thing that so often keeps us is we treat Jesus just like something or someone else that might be able to help our life a little bit. You can go to the bookstore. And by the way, Pastor Megan and I were at Barnes & Noble last night. I found out on a Saturday night the Barnes & Noble crowd at 9:00 p.m. Interesting. But anyway, that's neither here nor there. My thought. My thought. I mean, we were there. So, what are you, you know what I mean? I say that out of my mouth and I'm like, "Yeah, people are probably like, "Look at those two weirdos. Couldn't find something better to do." Anyway, [snorts] there's whole shelves, right? If you've ever been to a bookstore that say self-help >> and there's whole there's a whole shelf that says Bible. >> So we're like, "Well, maybe I'll grab some of this and then I'll grab some of this and then I'll grab some of this and then I'll just go put it all together and and see how I can create a life. I'll have a little bit of faith in what this guy said and a little bit of faith in what this lady said and then oh, I read this in the Bible and Jesus said that. So maybe I can put it all together and come up with something I believe that will work for my life. Isn't this Joseph's son? I mean, he's not really. You don't have to really go allin for Jesus. You don't have to really change your life completely to follow Jesus. You can just add him on a little bit. Just try to cuss a little bit less and then you'll get everything. Jesus continues and you know I I've been studying I've been studying the Bible where I would be able to I I I feel confidently say to you as your pastor I have been not just reading but studying the Bible very consistently for 15 years and I feel like this passion of Luke chapter 4 reveals so much about the personality of Jesus. Um, I love it. So, if you don't want this to be Jesus personality, you might not. So, he gets to the heart of the matter after this moment, right? So he hears what they're saying and then in verse 23 Jesus says to them this verse 23 uh surely you will quote this proverb to me physician heal yourself and you will tell me do here in your hometown what we've heard that you did in Capernium which interlude that's the part back again where he couldn't do many miracles in his hometown because they're like yeah whatever just show us. They didn't believe he could do it. You ever prayed a prayer before and you just really don't believe Jesus is going to answer it, but you're just doing it anyway? It's a It's a danger. We're susceptible. They're like, "Yeah, just do here. Go ahead, Jesus." He says, "Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah's time. Again, just he's referencing back to things they would understand. Old Testament. Elijah is an Old Testament prophet. There were many widows 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 Zerapath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet. Yet not a one of them was cleansed. Only Non the Syrian. Now you can read that just like I can and even if you've studied the Bible for a while your reaction will be like, "All right, not 100% sure what that means. Something about Elijah, something about Elisha. There's some leprosy. Dude named Non. Somebody gets healed. somebody doesn't get healed. Okay, let's move on. But what Jesus is saying to them right here is massive in his explanation of why he is on the earth and what it means that he fulfills the promise of Isaiah chapter 61. He's referencing them back to two Old Testament moments when the people of God expected God to ignore the Gentiles. >> Yeah. >> And only take care of Jewish people. >> Yeah. He's referencing back to a moment when the people of God as God's chosen people, the Jewish people, believed that God would treat everybody else poorly and ignore their needs and that it would be only the Jewish people who would receive from him. It's the same perspective right now that they have about Jesus and this temple moment when they're saying to him, you know, like, "Show yourself, do these things." And he's saying, I want to reference you back to things that you know that God doesn't work the way you expect him to. I want to reference this back to you that Jesus who he talking he would be referencing himself but like that Jesus the Messiah coming is not coming for people with a label based on who they have identified with that he's coming back for humanity. Jesus cares about humans. And what was true for this small group of people in the Middle East 2,000 years ago that we have to be honest about in our life today as well is our tendency is to believe we're the special ones. >> Right? >> So for us it would be like I'm a Christian so therefore I'm better than people who aren't Christians. Now, I'll just meddle in your life because I have a pretty big conviction. And this next statement I'm about to make is not a political statement, but I'm going to say it because as your pastor, I want you to hear me say this to you. And if it offends you, then I would just say you need to deal with that with God very honestly. But Americans are not better than people from any other nation. There's not a higher value. There's not a higher value of our humanity. And we must be certain, this is part of what Jesus is showing in Luke chapter 4. We must be certain that the language of our mouths does not dehumanize people. It doesn't matter the worst crimes they may have committed. We must not dehumanize them. The Apostle Paul who wrote so many of the of the New Testament books of the Bible, he was murdering Christians. >> And then he was saved. >> No one is too far >> from the saving power of Jesus Christ. And in Luke chapter 4, Jesus is getting to the heart of humanity. We believe we're better than others. We believe that our status gives us something that other people shouldn't be able to receive. And I want you to know today that is not the way of Jesus. That is not the way of Christianity. No matter what we see in any social media feed or what we hear anywhere else, the way of Jesus is for the human to experience the saving power of the Messiah that Jesus is introducing in Luke chapter 4. But this group of people he's talking to, they want miracles. They want him to do the miracles, but they don't want to surrender. They want to see the power without faith. Nazareth may have rejected Jesus, but others will see through the gospel receive him with joy, with faith, with expectancy. One writer, Robert Stein, says that for Luke, these two examples show that the Jewish people had no exclusive claim on Jesus. That ultimately since they rejected him, he was going to offer himself and the gospel to the Gentiles, to all of humanity. And just as Elijah and Elisha were better received outside of Israel, so the gospel message would receive a better hearing among the Gentiles. The Jewish people rejected Jesus. We see in the Old Testament multiple prophets who were rejected by the people of God but rece considered the people of God but received by those outside. God always I mean Jesus changed the game but God has always moved towards faith not status. God always moves towards faith not what you claim an allegiance to. And history in Luke chapter 4 is literally repeating itself in real time to this people. [snorts] Jesus came as a man, fully human, so that he could save humans. In verse 29, all the people in the synagogue were furious. So, first he tells them, "Yo, I'm the dude." And then he just basically tells him, "You're not getting it. I love Jesus. I love seeing him say this to other people. >> Come on. Nobody's like, "Jesus, come over to the house later. Tell me what you think about me." No, no, no. I just read what you're saying to other people. That to me feels way better. Way better. So it says in verse 28, "All the people in the synagogue were furious at what they had heard. So they got up and they drove him out of town and they took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built in order to throw him off the cliff. Hey, just think about this. This is what I think is fun. And can we I I pray as I preach this text that you would help like we could you could see this as I'm seeing it. This is Old Testament, meaning like this is this is a Jewish gathering of people. But humanity, we we tend to just think like 2,000 years later, okay, the church people are now together. And we're like, yeah, we're good. We're all the holy ones. All the holy ones were gathered in that synagogue. And then this guy stands up, Joseph's kid, >> and he says some stuff and they're like, "Yo, Joseph's kid crazy." >> And you know what their answer to do is, "Let's kill him." What hasn't changed about humanity is that offense will make you do some crazy things. Offense will make you do some crazy things. They're offended at this guy who has come into their religious gathering and said some things they don't agree with. He got to the heart of them. This is Jesus. [snorts] The word of God which is Jesus. He is the word become flesh according to John chapter 1. The word of God has the power to pierce soul and marrow like to get into your very being. Jesus got in and they're like this is I don't like this. And then the people who were considered religious, considered leaders, we would have called them, come on, good people. They're like, "Let's go. Let's go kill him." And in verse 30, it says, "But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way." Why? Because no one has control over Jesus. No one has control over Jesus. From the moment he came to the earth, he starts his earthly ministry as we know it in Luke chapter 4. And he's like, "You don't have control over me. You can take me up to kill me. You can be really mad about what I said. You can live the offended life, but you will not control me." And then he walked away. So, here's the thing. That's a great I mean, I was so excited to preach this today because I'm just like, I love this. But here's the thing that I want to close on. So what does that mean for us? What does that actually mean for my life and for your life in 2026? I mean, some of us have a different perspective of Jesus. Some of us are like, man, Jesus is the man. Like, but what is that? How is this? What do I do? What does this mean for us today? Well, it starts with what Jesus started reading from Isaiah chapter 61. Jesus said that Isaiah chapter 61 is fulfilled in their hearing. That when he came to the earth, the messianic prophecy is fulfilled. So here's what that means. That means [snorts] the good news for the poor has come. that for you and me today when we are steeped in what we would call poverty, when we are steeped in struggle, that there is good news for the poor. Yes, poor financially, but poor emotionally, poor spiritually. That the socially marginalized have good news now. That the good news of the gospel has come. And by the way, I think this language that was used in the Old Testament that Jesus brings forth from Isaiah chapter 61 and speaking that it's good news for the poor. One of the things that I believe is so important for us and I hope that we would hear this right now. If it's not good news for the poor, it's not good news. The reason Jesus was born into a poor family was because Jesus wanted to demonstrate what he is bringing is for all. No exclusivity. But if you treat him familiar and if you treat him offended, you'll miss it. But if you'll surrender, there's good news for the poor. The second thing that's for us today is freedom. True freedom. He said, "What's happening right now is there's going to be freedom from the for the prisoners and the oppressed will be free right now." 2,000 years ago, Jesus stood up in Nazareth and said, "This is fulfilled right now. Freedom for prisoners, freedom from oppression. Practically that means in Jesus it is possible. It is permissible. It is what he's into to set us free from addictions right now. To set us free from the cycles of sin, to break shame off of our life. To break the fear of man, the fear of not doing enough. The fear that keeps us in a prison that right now, boom, that can break completely because Jesus and the spirit of God declared this is what has come. The lies that keep so many of us stuck, broken, oppression doesn't get the final word. Trauma, abuse, injustice, the heaviness, the weight that so many of us feel, we're carrying like a ton of bricks on our chest. Jesus says, "I came to fulfill that now." which today means we can walk in that freedom. >> We can walk. We are not waiting for the return of Jesus to get to tap into this. He said sight. You get freedom. You get sight for the blind. Recovery of sight. Yes. Practically. And Jesus shows multiple healings of people having their eyes healed. But spiritual clarity, vision. Proverbs chapter 29 says, "When you don't have prophetic vision," meaning when you can't see a vision for the future, you cast off restraint. You act like a person with no idea what's going on. You act like a person with no morals, with no purpose. Jesus came to give sight to the blind. That our life wouldn't just be if I can just get through today, everything will be okay. Well, we can get through today. And I will say some days we're walking through hell and we keep walking through hell and it might feel like a day at a time, but Jesus still gives sight to know you don't stay in this. There's somewhere greater I'm leading you to. >> That's right. >> And then the last thing he said as he brought forth that prophecy from Isaiah chapter 61 when he he said but which he said before he sat down and [snorts] said, "Yo, that's fulfilled." is he said it's the year of the Lord's favor. He was bringing forth another Old Testament perspective and also introducing a new new covenant perspective that what's known in this Old Testament festival of the year of Jubilee when all debts are completely removed there's a reset there's restoration there's release and at the same time the year of the Lord's favor was the promise that the kingdom of God has come. The kingdom of God is here. the kingdom of God is here. So he said all that 2,000 years ago and that small group of people in that moment rejected him. And the same question that they were faced with, we're faced with the same question that they were faced with 2,000 years ago. What will we do with Jesus? What will we do with these words? What will we believe about Jesus? Because here's the thing, church. What we believe about Jesus determines what we experience from Jesus. What we believe about Jesus determines what we experience from Jesus. And my hope for every one of us in the room right now is that we would believe Jesus is our savior. But I can't make you believe that. My hope for every one of us is that we would believe because Jesus is our savior, the Messiah, that that means he has the power to help us be less critical. That he has the power to help us see the best in people. That he has the power to set us free from addictions. That he has the power to restore our marriages. That he has the power to help us endure through difficult seasons. because what's on the other side is going to be good. Even if there's another difficult season, he'll help us endure through that. That we believe he really is for us. And so I want to pray for us today. I want to pray and believe with as much faith as any of us can possibly have that we would not treat Jesus familiar. that we would not be offended by the things that we read in scripture, but that we would surrender to the life that Jesus invites us to so that we could experience the life that Jesus has for us. Would you close your eyes with me at all locations? Lord, I pray right now in Jesus name that Holy Spirit as you stir in our hearts that you would help us give you our best yes, our complete yes. As I pray just in your own words, as you would agree with some of what I'm praying, it's part of how we pray together. Jesus, we're sorry. We're sorry that we've looked at you like a self-help tool. We're sorry that we thought you would try to keep us from things that would be fun. We're sorry that we believed that your way might not be the best way. And we thank you that you are a God of forgiveness. We receive your forgiveness right now, Jesus. We receive it completely. And God, I pray across the house today in St. Louis and in downtown Suffach and in Western Branch, Lord, I pray that you would help us, Lord, even if it's just one step more, grow in our faith to believe, Jesus, that you truly do have better for us. Help us surrender our life completely to we surrender our lives today completely to the way of Jesus. You are our king. You're our leader. We thank you that you saved us. We thank you that you gave us your spirit, Holy Spirit. And Holy Spirit, I thank you that you're with us right now that we might fulfill the purpose, the plan, and the life you have for us in Jesus name. Amen.