Engage: Anybody
November 19, 2017
Summary and Goal
We don’t save anyone. The Spirit does that. We can only respond as the Spirit leads us to be part of the process. However, God is always working with people that we don’t think are “religious” enough. Are we sensitive enough to join the Spirit where He’s working? Can we get past outward appearances to the lost soul beneath?
Main Passages
Luke 5:27-32; Mark 7:24-30
Session Outline
1. Religious Outcasts Encounter Jesus (Luke 5:27-28; Mark 7:24-27)
2. Religious Outcasts Respond in Faith (Luke 5:29; Mark 7:28-29)
3. The Religious and Jesus (Luke 5:30-32)
Theological Theme
Jesus dealt with those considered as religious outcasts with grace and mercy. No one was “off-limits.”
Christ Connection
As Christ Himself was no respecter of persons with regard to offering grace and mercy, so His followers are to deal with all sectors of the world around them with gospel grace and mercy.
Missional Application
Because every person was created in the image of God and has value to Him, the Spirit can prompt us to engage anybody around us with the gospel. We must be spiritually alert.
Historical Context of Luke
Purpose
To present an accurate account of the life of Christ and to present Christ as the perfect human and Savior
Author
Luke—a doctor (Colossians 4:14), a Greek and Gentile Christian. He is the only known Gentile author in the New Testament. Luke was a close friend and companion of Paul. He also wrote Acts, and the two books go together.
To Whom Written
Theophilus (“one who loves God”) Gentiles, and people everywhere
Date Written
About A.D. 60
Setting
Luke wrote from Rome or possibly from Caesarea.
Key Verses
“Jesus said to him, ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.” –Luke 19:9-10
Key People
Jesus, Elizabeth, Zechariah, John the Baptist, Mary, the disciples, Herod the Great, Pilate, Mary Magdalene.
Key Places
Bethlehem, Galilee, Judea, Jerusalem
Special Features
This is the most comprehensive Gospel. The general vocabulary and diction show that the author was educated. He makes frequent references to illnesses and diagnoses. Luke stresses Jesus’ relationships with people; emphasizes prayer, miracles, and angels; records inspired hymns of praise; and gives a prominent place to women. Most of 9:51–18:35 is not found in any other Gospel.
Excerpted from the Life Application Study Bible (NIV). Tyndale House Publishes, 2003.
Introduction
Dr. Thom Rainer’s 2005 book, The Unexpected Journey, chronicles thirteen individual interviews of believers who came to Christ from other faith systems. The belief systems from which the interviewees came spanned the gamut of the spiritual landscape: Mormonism, Buddhism, Atheism, Wicca, Islam, and more. Each passing interview underscored the overwhelming reality of how important the loving, timely, personal investment of a Christian was in the journey toward Christ.
Perhaps the most unexpected of the interviews was the last one with a man named Jeff Harshbarger, who had been a satanist. Certainly, if there is someone among those thirteen interviews that the collective American Church would say was unreachable, it would have to be the person whose religious practices are the most polar opposite to the gospel, right? Yet even in this instance, the Holy Spirit prompted believers who crossed Jeff’s path at crucial moments to communicate Christlike compassion and love to him.
At the conclusion of the interview, when describing what made the difference in his conversion, Jeff responded, “I learned . . . that Christlike love can reach anyone. It sure reached me. It is how I reach people in satanism and the occult today.” At the writing of the book, Jeff led a ministry the sole focus of which was to reach those who are lost in darkness as he was. The Holy Spirit can draw someone to Christ from any background, any habit, any religious affiliation, or any other thing. Christ overcomes it all.
- What groups of people would you say have been written off as unredeemable by our culture? For moral reasons? Political reasons?
- Think of a time when you were surprised to find out that an individual was a believer in Jesus. What made it surprising? Why do you think your assumptions about that person were different?
- What is the most unusual thing God has led you to do for the sake of having a Jesus conversation with someone?
Session Summary
In this concluding lesson of our series, we will examine who God actively works in to bring them to salvation. The default in many cases is for believers to naturally assume that God, since He drew them, will draw others like them. While such a thought fosters a right burden for our neighbors, the same thought can also inadvertently make us blind to those not like us whom God is drawing to Himself. Truthfully, anybody at any time can be drawn by the Holy Spirit to a saving relationship with Jesus. The only question that remains is whether believers will be spiritually alert enough for God to use them in the process.
1. Religious Outcasts Encounter Jesus (Luke 5:27-28; Mark 7:24-27)
In looking at the two accounts covered in this week’s study, Luke and Mark present two individuals who would have been outside the circle of those considered religiously acceptable. In the prevailing religious thought of the day, there were those who were thought to have the inside track on being found in favorable standing with God—the Pharisees, Sadducees, scribes of the law, and other groups that said all the right things and did all the right things. The two individuals highlighted in the texts for this week do not fit those categories at all.
First, there was Matthew. In Luke 5:27-28, Luke introduced Matthew in the context of Jesus’ noticing him and calling him. Matthew was a tax collector, which essentially meant he had no allies. As a Jewish man who had aligned himself with Roman authorities to extort egregiously high taxes from his own countrymen for the sake of lining his own pockets, Matthew was of the most despicable men in his culture. Even still, Jesus called him—not just to listen to Jesus, but to be one of His twelve disciples!
Second, there is the Syrophoenician woman who came to Jesus to seek healing for her daughter. Of the two instances, this woman’s encounter with Jesus was the most troubling because of Jesus’ response to her. Jesus’ encounter with the woman occurred on the heels of His teaching on the legalistic devotion of the religious leaders to the ritualistic laws on what is clean and unclean. The religious insiders rejected Jesus’ teaching and Jesus was in Tyre seeking privacy and rest. The woman had already noticed Jesus, however, and knew Him to be her only hope for delivering her daughter from demonic possession. Despite being not only a woman, but a Gentile woman at that, she also breached every Jewish social standard in following Jesus to the house and addressing Him.
- What differences can you think of between Matthew and the religious leaders of his day? With which of the two parties do you have the most in common?
- It’s remarkable how desperate for Jesus’ help the Syrophoenician woman was. What lengths have you gone to in seasons of desperation for Jesus’ help? What social boundaries or etiquettes were you willing to transgress?
The great similarity in these two figures is that they were firmly outside the religious elite. There is a great difference, however, in the manner in which they encountered Jesus. Jesus sought out Matthew at the tax collector’s booth. The woman hounded Jesus, even when He sought respite that had already been interrupted twice previously. What is more, Jesus’ response to the woman was to seemingly compare Gentiles to dogs. However, in a text that is frequently misunderstood, Jesus challenged the woman to verbalize her understanding of who Jesus was. Her faith response was incredible.
2. Religious Outcasts Respond in Faith (Luke 5:29; Mark 7:28-29)
Following their interactions with Jesus, each of the two figures responded to Jesus with evidence of transformation. The most easily observable transformation was in Matthew’s life. Where his life was previously predicated on defrauding his neighbor and accumulating corrupted wealth, Matthew hosted a tremendous banquet for Jesus and invited all of his disreputable friends! Isn’t that the perfect picture of “anybody” literally coming to Jesus?
The Syrophoenician woman demonstrated unshakable, resolute faith in the power of Jesus to confront and defeat the demonic. Doubtless, she had tried every other possibility she could think of. Where human ability failed, she believed that Jesus would prevail. Jesus replied that the faith evidenced by her statement led to her daughter being healed.
- Life transformations such as these are the fuel for the life of a disciple. In thinking through the last week, what were some of the ways you responded in faith to how Jesus was leading you?
- Matthew’s entire sense of priorities shifted after his encounter with Jesus. How have you seen your priorities change as a result of Jesus’ lordship in your life?
In both cases, something significant happened in the person as a result of their interaction with Jesus. The circumstances could not have been more different. Matthew was a Jewish man with whom Jesus initiated contact. The Syrophoenician mother was a Gentile woman who hunted Jesus down while He was searching for much needed solitude. Matthew was running his business like he did every day. The woman had a very real and urgent sense of how badly she needed Jesus. The unifier, however, was that when they were in the presence of Jesus, wholeness was the result. Healing was the result—both physical and spiritual. Their lives where changed from having been with Jesus.
3. The Religious and Jesus (Luke 5:30-32)
While the account in Mark of the Syrophoenician woman does not continue beyond Jesus’ encounter with the woman, Luke’s account of Matthew’s calling provides one additional scenario that is both disturbing and instructive for those who would not be considered religious outcasts. At the banquet that Matthew threw for all of his outcast friends to meet Jesus, Luke introduced the response of the religious insiders to the scene of transformation and redemption.
Even at the incredibly visible and generous evidence of life change in Matthew’s life, there were scoffers. Tragically, the scoffers were those that should have been the first to rejoice. Instead, the Pharisees and their scribes, those who knew the Scriptures the best, could only find fault with the celebration. When they levied their judgmental questions at the disciples, Jesus answered instead. Jesus, without hesitation, clarified His purpose. He did not come for those who were healthy in their own estimation—He came for those who recognized their need for a Savior.
- How would you explain what it means to be healthy in our own estimation? What about the Pharisees and scribes made them “healthy”? What would be a contemporary example?
- No one in their day knew more about or memorized more Scripture than the Pharisees and scribes. They were experts. Why is their response to Matthew’s banquet so jaded and critical? How do you guard your
heart from a similar response?
There are two especially significant turns of phrase in this interchange that clue the reader in to Luke’s intent. First, it is the Pharisees that introduce the classification of “sinners” and then apply it to those attending Matthew’s banquet. Luke initially called them “others who were guests.” The religious elite’s referring to others as “sinners” meant that the Pharisees identified them as people who were “less than” the Pharisees were. This type of response is a troublesome sign that those who are religious have no connection with the heart of God.
Second, Jesus’ use of the healthy/sick dynamic set Himself in the position of Healer. This was an incredible claim for Jesus to make, particularly this early in His ministry. The idea that the Pharisees were “healthy” referred to their perception of themselves. The Pharisees perceived themselves as healthy because they were self-righteous. They obeyed the right laws, knew the right facts, ate the right things, and were pillars of the community. Therefore, in comparison to everyone else, they were righteous. The sick, however, do not view themselves in light of everyone else; they view themselves in light of God. When that happens, their realization of their sin brings them to repentance.
Conclusion
The truth in this week’s passages is an uncomfortable truth because, by its nature, it forces believers beyond the group with which they are comfortable. If anybody is a candidate for the Holy Spirit to woo toward Christ according to God’s redemptive plan, then believers must be vigilant in breaking down any barrier that would create a “most likely” conversion candidate or a “least likely” conversion candidate.
In seeking to apply this week’s truth, there are two ideas to keep in mind. First, the outcasts and those that are not holy enough are precisely the people that Jesus came for. Jesus said this Himself when He told the Pharisees that He came for the sick, not those who (declared themselves) healthy. Declaring ourselves as healthy as believers is an extremely subtle and dangerous temptation. The more the believer allows himself or herself to gauge righteousness in comparison to others instead of in comparison to Jesus, the more likely the believer allows a classification of “people like that” to exist in their hearts. For believers, it is critical to remember that we were all outcasts at one point, until Jesus drew us near.
Second, how the believer responds to those whom culture would deem as being “far off from God” says a lot about the condition of the believer’s heart. As believers grow in Christ, their hearts grow increasingly like His. Therefore, if there arises a season in which a believer is more likely to criticize the type or depth of another’s sin instead of rejoicing over the forgiveness of that sin, that response is indicative of spiritual sickness. It is something to be repented of and addressed in prayer.
- What are some ways that you can gauge your spiritual health over time? Why is it important to do that as it pertains to evangelism?
- Are there groups that you might classify as unreachable? How does remembering your own testimony eradicate such prejudice? Why is it important to do so?
- How ready are you to share the gospel with someone much different than you? Would it flow out of you naturally? How easily can you share your own story?
Commentary
Luke 5:27-32
5:27-28. One day Jesus encountered Levi. The rebel with a cause against religious power structures met the man who represented foreign power structure at its worse—a man whose profession was to collect money for the Romans. Luke took up the Markan call narrative refrain: Follow me (Mark 1:17). Levi showed how to join the proper power structure. He left everything he had—his profession, his profits, and his personal identity. He followed Jesus.
5:29-30. Following meant more than just wandering the countryside listening to Jesus teach and preach. Following meant using your influence and skills for Jesus. Levi left the tax table to invite people to the supper table. Following Jesus meant telling others what Jesus had done for him. The others were friends Levi had known for a long time—not new acquaintances formed for convenience and prosperity.
5:31-32. In typical Jewish teacher fashion, Jesus cited a proverb to emphasize his message. Wellness did not drive people to the doctor. Illness did. Jesus was the spiritual doctor. He came with a message of repentance. That message seemed misdirected. It did not save Israel and the Middle East, where political confusion reigned. It saved those religious leaders considered unworthy of God’s attention. Power began to reveal true positions in life. Who was sick? The tax collector’s friends, people willing to work for the Roman government and thus against Israel?Or religious leaders who knew more about God than God did? The title Righteous One given them by humans was the only title they would ever receive. Jesus picked out the lowest social positions as the positions through which he would work.
Mark 7:24-30
7:24. Note that this encounter of Jesus with the Syrophoenician woman came on the heels of a major conflict with the religious leaders about ceremonial uncleanness. Jews normally did not have any contact with Gentiles because this made them ceremonially “unclean” according to Jewish tradition. Jesus showed by example that “it’s what’s in the heart” that matters. He showed the absurdity of the tradition of the elders by making contact with this Gentile woman. Mark also wanted to emphasize the mission and inclusion of the Gentiles in God’s plan of salvation. The gospel of God’s love and his kingdom are not limited to Israel, even though Jesus showed that Israel must have the first opportunity. By using the example of the Syrophoenician woman, Mark wanted his Roman (Gentile) readers to realize that the good news was also for them.