Pictures From The Sermon On The Plain.

PICTURES FROM THE SERMON ON THE PLAIN.

Luke 6:39-49.

1. The Two Blind Men (Luke 6:39-42).

“Can the blind lead the blind?” asked Jesus. “Shall they not both fall into the ditch?” (LUKE 6:39). There is a certain arrogance about some would-be teachers of others. They boast that they can see, but are in fact blind (cf. John 9:41). They think of themselves as ‘a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness’ (cf. Romans 2:19); but ‘both shall fall into the ditch’ (cf. Matthew 15:14).

“The disciple is not above his ‘teacher:’ but everyone that “has been perfected” shall be as his “teacher” (LUKE 6:40). In practice, Jesus ‘judged not’ (cf. Luke 6:37; John 8:11; John 12:47; Luke 12:14). It was not time yet for Jesus to take on the office of a judge; neither is it time yet for His followers to take that role to themselves!

Jesus illustrates this with His almost humorous (were it not so serious!) picture of the man with a plank in His own eye trying to extract a speck from his brother’s eye (LUKE 6:41-42)! Why are we so busy “beholding” the minor faults of others without “considering” how great our own faults are? How dare we think to correct another when we are not right with God ourselves!

Again, it is evident that we should still be aware and help our erring brother, which is in some sense to exercise judgment or discernment. But if we try to operate on our brother’s eye while we are half blind ourselves then Jesus - according to His own judgment or discernment - has but one word for us: “hypocrite” or ‘play-actor’! First, we must operate on ourselves, seeking out the sin that hinders us and leaving it with the Lord; and then, and only then, are we in a fit state to help the other (LUKE 6:42).

2. The Two Trees (Luke 6:43-45).

Jesus warns us that there will be false prophets in the last days (cf. Matthew 24:11; Matthew 24:24). These are the days in which we live. These false teachers lurk around our doors, and the doors of our churches (cf. 2 John 1:10).

The false teachers are not always obvious: they may wear clerical collars - or not; or have strings of initials after their names - or pride themselves on the fact that they do not. They may seem to subscribe to the right creeds, carry their Bibles, be civil and polite and all. Jesus tells us that we will ‘know them by their fruits’ (LUKE 6:43-45; cf. Matthew 7:16; Matthew 7:20).

But what are these fruits? Elsewhere, Jesus equates fruitfulness with Christ-likeness (cf. John 15:5). The branch is attached to Jesus, the true Vine, and brings forth much fruit in the exercise of His grace and the performance of good works. A true minister must surely possess and demonstrate ‘the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance’ (cf. Galatians 5:22-23). A true minister, too, must be judged by his teaching. Jesus repeats the analogy in Matthew 12:33-34 and adds ‘by your words you shall be justified, and by your words you shall be condemned’ (cf. Matthew 12:37).

3. The Two Builders (Luke 6:46-49).

Mere profession of Jesus’ deity: “Lord, Lord” (LUKE 6:46) will not fit us for entry into ‘the kingdom of heaven’ (cf. Matthew 7:21). The person who will ‘enter into the kingdom of heaven,’ says Jesus, is the one who ‘does the will of my Father which in heaven;’ i.e. the one who, “HEARS these sayings of mine, and DOES THEM” (LUKE 6:47; cf. Matthew 7:24).

What we are looking at in the account of the wise builder who built his house upon a rock (LUKE 6:48; cf. Matthew 7:24-25) is one man’s relationship with Jesus. This man is not a hearer only, but a doer also (cf. James 1:25). That is what it is to build our house upon the Rock (cf. Joshua 24:15). We are not spared the rain, the floods, the winds: but when our lives are built upon Jesus, we are on solid ground (cf. Psalm 18:2).

Conversely, we have the man who was only a hearer of Jesus’ words, but not a doer of them (cf. James 1:22). Jesus likened this man to a foolish builder, who built his house upon the sand (LUKE 6:49; cf. Matthew 7:26-27). Faced with the same rain, floods and winds his work did not endure, but at last came tumbling to the ground: “and great was the fall of it,” Jesus punctuates!