FOLLOWING CHRIST – A MATTER OF OBEDIENCE, NOT QUALIFICATION
By Kay Arthur
Luke 4-5
There is a lot of Truth in these two chapters. We could also spend a week on each chapter. Don’t be frustrated if you are unable to cover everything from both chapters in your discussion. Hopefully our folks have been studying these two chapters on their own and so we bring the fruit of that study to the discussion.
Luke 4-5 in one sentence:
· In chapters 4 and 5, Luke shows us Jesus’ preparation, proclamation, purpose, and power in ministry.
Some initial questions:
· Which part of the study impacted you the most this week?
· What is something that you learned for the first time this week from the study?
· Are you living any differently this week because of something you learned?
· What’s one thing you learned about Jesus?
· What’s one thing you learned about the devil?
· What’s one thing you learned about the disciples?
Talking points:
· What should we notice about Christ:
o His relationship with the Spirit:
§ He was full of the Spirit (v.1)
§ He was led by the Spirit (v. 1)
§ He returned in the power of the Spirit (v. 14)
§ He was anointed by the Spirit (v. 18)
· Why was He anointed?
o To proclaim good news to the poor
o To proclaim liberty to the captives
o To recover the sight of the blind
o To set at liberty those who are oppressed
o To proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor
· Notice that one of the key purposes of the anointing was not just healing but proclamation of the Gospel.
o His use of the Word
§ It is written – v. 4
§ It is written – v. 8
§ It is said – v. 12
o His purpose in ministry
§ To proclaim good news to the poor and liberty to the captives (4:18)
§ To proclaim good news in many places (4:43)
§ To proclaim good news to wretched, sick sinners (5:31-32)
o His power over demons (4:31-37, 41)
o His power over disease
§ He healed Simon’s mother-in-law (4:39)
§ He healed those with various diseases (4:40)
§ He healed a leper (5:13)
§ He healed a paralyzed man (5:24)
o His power to forgive sin (5:24)
§ Physical disease is not our biggest problem – sin is.
§ Our greatest need is to have our sin forgiven. Jesus has the power to forgive, because Jesus is going to be the One who atones for the sin.
· What should we notice about Satan:
o What were Satan’s tactics in the Garden of Eden – Genesis 2?
§ Distorts God’s word
§ Challenges God’s Word (you will not surely die)
§ Casts doubt on God’s goodness and trustworthiness
· Goldsworthy: The possibility of discussing God and the truth of his word had not occurred to the woman up to this point. The humans existed in God’s creation and depended on God’s word for the true interpretation of reality.
· Goldsworthy: It is important to recognize that if God is the creator of everything, he is also the source of all truth. There is no truth apart from his truth, which he communicates to us by his Word. God is the final and absolute authority and, since he has chosen to communicate by his Word, his Word has absolute and final authority.
· G: The temptation: Satan’s suggestion that God’s word could not be relied upon as the absolute authority and source of truth for mankind.
· G: The final effect was the same as if they had installed Satan as Lord, but it is achieved without the humans realizing it.
o Did Satan use these on Christ? Yes. Matthew 4 and Luke 4
o Does Satan use them on us? Yes.
o Satan always promises what he can’t provide
· What should we notice about the Disciples:
o Sometimes what Jesus asks us to do may not make sense to us, but we are to obey immediately anyway (5:5)
o Simon, James, John, and Levi left everything and followed Jesus (5:11, 28)
o Immediate obedience does not require seminary education
o Are we willing to have our vocations changed by Jesus? (5:10)
· What should we notice about the crowd:
o Read 4:22
o Now read 4:28
o The crowd is fickle. The same crowd that marveled at Him was the same crowd that tried to kill Him for telling them the Truth.
o The crowd is powerless to preempt Jesus’ plans (4:30)
Application questions (besides what Kay Arthur provides)
- Are we led by, filled by, and empowered by the Spirit in our proclaiming of the Gospel?
- Are we relying on the Spirit and Word in our battles with temptation?
- Do we have an intentional plan for Scripture memory?
- Are our children growing up in homes where we have an intentional Scripture memory plan?
- Do we understand the importance of context in a passage when we see how Satan twisted Scripture?
- Are we expecting the crowd to treat us just like Jesus or different than Jesus (see 4:22, 28)?
- How often do we do what Jesus did in 5:16?
- Do we hang out with the same crowd that Jesus did (5:27-32)?
- Do we find hope in the fact that the Gospel is for sick, unrighteous sinners (5:32)?
- I recently heard someone say:
- Jesus commanded the leper not to tell anyone and he told everyone. We’ve been commanded to tell everyone and we tell no one.
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