SPEAKER_00: Welcome to an audio teaching from Windsor Park Baptist Church in Auckland, New Zealand.
SPEAKER_00: If you would like to look at the message notes or see some questions for reflection that take their lead from today's teaching, head to our website windsapark.org.nz and head to the online tab where you'll see services and series and you can download different resources from there.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us and we hope you're encouraged by today's teaching.
SPEAKER_00: Korea everybody, it's great to be with you again.
SPEAKER_00: And like many of you, I've spent a lot of time waiting for people to come out of the arrival's door at Auckland Airport.
SPEAKER_00: And whenever I'm waiting there, there are always different levels of anticipation or expectation.
SPEAKER_00: When I've been waiting sometimes for my luggage, my expectations can be low.
SPEAKER_00: There have been times when my luggage decided it needed a few more days at whatever location I was coming from.
SPEAKER_00: If I've been waiting for someone I haven't seen for ages, there's the expectation of good times to come with them.
SPEAKER_00: And if I'm waiting for one of my grandkids from Sydney, everyone else who comes through the arrival's door is just getting in my way.
SPEAKER_00: If you stand and observe, everyone is looking at the same door, but they're not all waiting for the same person.
SPEAKER_00: Every time those doors open, some people light up, some start waving, and some rush forward with arms outstretched as everyone else just carries on looking at their phone.
SPEAKER_00: The person arriving determines the response.
SPEAKER_00: As I've been thinking about Luke chapter 19, verses 11 to 44 over the last few weeks, it struck me that this whole passage is a little bit like that.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of this passage, Jesus arrives in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: Something significant is happening, but everybody responds differently.
SPEAKER_00: Some celebrate, some worship, some resist, and some reject.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus himself weeps.
SPEAKER_00: The same king arrives, and there is a huge diversity of responses.
SPEAKER_00: Today we come to the end of the third block of our Luke series that we've called King and Kingdom Come.
SPEAKER_00: We'll return to it at the beginning of 2027 as we move towards Easter.
SPEAKER_00: But today is worth pausing to notice where we've been in the last six weeks of the series.
SPEAKER_00: We've watched Jesus on the move, as he is told the parable of the shrewd manager and asked us what we should do with what isn't really ours.
SPEAKER_00: We've sat with the rich man and Lazarus and felt the weight of a reversal that no one saw coming.
SPEAKER_00: We've watched blind Bartimaeus see Jesus clearly from the roadside, while religious insiders with a front row seat missed him entirely.
SPEAKER_00: Different stories, same question.
SPEAKER_00: Do we recognize who is standing in front of us?
SPEAKER_00: In Luke chapter 19, as Jesus finally arrives at Jerusalem, the question hasn't changed.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, it becomes a little bit more urgent.
SPEAKER_00: When the king arrives, how will we respond?
SPEAKER_00: Because when the king does arrive and he will come again, our response matters.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things that we've seen throughout the gospel is that Luke refuses to let us keep Jesus at a safe distance.
SPEAKER_00: He won't let us reduce Jesus to just being a nice teacher, or just a miracle worker, or just a moral example, or just a religious figure.
SPEAKER_00: Again and again we've seen Jesus do things only the promised King and Savior could do.
SPEAKER_00: He forgives sins, he heals, he restores outsiders, he challenges the powerful, he shows authority over sickness, storms, demons, and even death.
SPEAKER_00: Luke has been quietly building this case the whole way through.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is king and not just a king, not just an influential leader, he is the promised king, the rightful king, the king whose kingdom has broken into our world.
SPEAKER_00: And Luke chapter 19 is where that reality becomes impossible to miss.
SPEAKER_00: Let's notice how the section begins.
SPEAKER_00: Luke tells us in verse 11 that Jesus told the parable he tells because the people thought the kingdom of God was going to appear before them.
SPEAKER_00: They're excited, they're expectant as they approach Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: They think something dramatic is about to happen right there and then.
SPEAKER_00: Bells and whistles, trumpets and fanfare, the overthrow of the government, a leadership coup, perhaps.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus says is that they've got the destination right, but they've got the timing wrong.
SPEAKER_00: And they've also got the nature of the kingdom of God wrong.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus tells a story.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 12, he says, A man of noble birth went to a distant country to have himself appointed king and then to return.
SPEAKER_00: So he called ten of his servants and gave them ten miners, value of currency, about three months of wages.
SPEAKER_00: The following words are the ones that we often miss.
SPEAKER_00: Put this money to work, he said, until I come back.
SPEAKER_00: Until I come back.
SPEAKER_00: These four words explain the age we live in.
SPEAKER_00: The king has gone away, but his kingdom purposes don't stop, because the king will return.
SPEAKER_00: In the meantime, his servants have work to do.
SPEAKER_00: They're not told to sit and wait for heaven or to stare into the sky.
SPEAKER_00: They're not told to speculate about dates and times.
SPEAKER_00: On the contrary, they're told, put this to work until I come back.
SPEAKER_00: Effectively, live for the king while you wait for his return.
SPEAKER_00: Because when the king returns, there's a reckoning.
SPEAKER_00: Two of the servants are commended for the work they achieved while the king was away, but one servant buries what he was given and does nothing with it and is rebuked for it.
SPEAKER_00: And the people who hated the king, well, it's not the greatest ending for them.
SPEAKER_00: Luke isn't just telling us to be busy, he's telling us that faithfulness while the king is away actually matters.
SPEAKER_00: And sadly, so does refusal.
SPEAKER_00: We aren't living today in a neutral waiting room.
SPEAKER_00: We're living in a kingdom with a king who is coming back to ask us what we did with what he left in our hands.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where we live.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has come, Jesus has risen, Jesus is king, and one day Jesus will return.
SPEAKER_00: Right now, we're living in the until I come back years.
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom is here, but not yet fully here.
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom reigns, but his reign hasn't yet been fully revealed.
SPEAKER_00: The question is, what are we doing with what the king has entrusted to us?
SPEAKER_00: Our time, our influence, our relationships, our resources, our gifts.
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps for us as a local church, there's a bigger question.
SPEAKER_00: What has the king entrusted to us together?
SPEAKER_00: A church community, buildings, a childcare center, a mental health organization, community ministries, and an online congregation, opportunities to serve thousands of people who live within a few kilometers of our physical buildings?
SPEAKER_00: The question isn't simply what God has entrusted to me, it's also what has God entrusted to us.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we imagine that faithfulness means doing something spectacular, but Jesus isn't asking us to be impressive, he's asking us to be faithful.
SPEAKER_00: And faithful happens in ordinary places.
SPEAKER_00: It's choosing integrity when nobody's watching, or loving someone who's difficult to love, or forgiving when you'd rather hold a grudge, or giving generously, or praying when you don't feel like it, or serving when nobody notices, or raising children and grandchildren to know Jesus, or being the same person on Monday that you are on Sunday, whatever it is, putting what the King has given us to work until he comes for his purposes.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus moves from the story to the reality.
SPEAKER_00: The king is arriving.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 28, we move from the parable to these words.
SPEAKER_00: After Jesus had said this, he went ahead, going up to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: Everything about his entry is deliberate.
SPEAKER_00: He arranges for the cult in verse 30.
SPEAKER_00: The disciples bring it.
SPEAKER_00: Cloaks are laid on the road in verse 36, and in verse 37, the crowd begins praising God, crying out in verse 38, Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven, glory in the highest.
SPEAKER_00: For once, the crowd has got it exactly right.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is king.
SPEAKER_00: The problem though is that while they've got the right king, they've got the wrong idea about the kind of king that he is.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted a king who will overthrow Rome.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus came to overthrow sin and death.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted political liberation.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus came to bring a deeper liberation.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted immediate victory, but Jesus is heading toward the cross.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted a crown, but Jesus is about to wear thorns.
SPEAKER_00: The crowd is looking for a throne, but Jesus is moving toward Calvary.
SPEAKER_00: This is one of the greatest challenges of discipleship.
SPEAKER_00: We don't just have to decide whether Jesus is king, we have to decide whether we're willing to have Jesus as king on his terms.
SPEAKER_00: I was thinking about this during the week, and it reminded me of how I use GPS navigation.
SPEAKER_00: When the GPS says on my phone, turn left.
SPEAKER_00: There are really only two options.
SPEAKER_00: Turn left or don't turn left.
SPEAKER_00: But apparently I've developed a third option, so I'm told.
SPEAKER_00: I explain to the GPS why it's wrong.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: I know a better way.
SPEAKER_00: Trust me.
SPEAKER_00: Five minutes later the GPS is politely saying, recalculating.
SPEAKER_00: And ten minutes later it's still recalculating, and 20 minutes later, Joe is wondering why we're now in a completely different suburb from where we were supposed to be.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is that I didn't think the GPS was wrong.
SPEAKER_00: The problem was that I thought I knew better.
SPEAKER_00: And if I'm honest, there have been seasons in my life where I've done exactly that with God.
SPEAKER_00: Not walked away from him, not stopped believing in him, not stopped listening to him.
SPEAKER_00: But just quietly, I've told him that I know better about the direction that my life should take.
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if that's sometimes how we approach Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We don't necessarily reject him, we just keep suggesting alternative routes.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, I know what you're saying, but you know what?
SPEAKER_00: My plan is better.
SPEAKER_00: The crowd wanted a king who would follow their route.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus arrived and said, actually, we're gonna go this way.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't arrive asking for our approval, he arrives as king.
SPEAKER_00: The question isn't, would we like Jesus to be our king?
SPEAKER_00: The question is, will we what will we do now that we know he's king?
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees say to Jesus in verse 39, Teacher, rebuke your disciples.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Jesus, this is getting a little out of hand.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus replies in verse 40, I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.
SPEAKER_00: It's a strange and almost unsettling line, and it's worth sitting in it for a moment.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus isn't being poetic for effect, he's saying that this moment is so significant that if every human voice fell silent, creation itself would testify.
SPEAKER_00: History is reaching its climax.
SPEAKER_00: The promised Messiah is entering Jerusalem, and the truth of who he is doesn't depend on anyone's willingness to say it out loud.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the wonderful thing underneath that.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't become king because we acknowledge him.
SPEAKER_00: He is king whether we acknowledge him or not.
SPEAKER_00: But when we truly see him for who he is, worship becomes the natural response.
SPEAKER_00: When we really see Jesus, praise makes sense.
SPEAKER_00: And then in verse 41, Luke gives us one of the most extraordinary scenes in the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus weeps.
SPEAKER_00: One of only three times where Jesus is recorded as weeping.
SPEAKER_00: At a moment when the crowd is celebrating, the disciples are worshiping, the Pharisees are complaining, we find Jesus crying.
SPEAKER_00: Not because he's surprised.
SPEAKER_00: But now it is hidden from your eyes.
SPEAKER_00: Can you hear the heartbreak in that?
SPEAKER_00: For generations Jerusalem had been waiting for God to act, praying for it, longing for it, reading promises about it, singing songs about it, telling their children about it.
SPEAKER_00: And when God does act in his son Jesus, most of the people discovered that they wanted a different kind of Messiah than the one who had been sent.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus doesn't just weep in general sorrow.
SPEAKER_00: He tells them exactly what's coming in verses 43 to 44.
SPEAKER_00: The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side.
SPEAKER_00: They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls.
SPEAKER_00: They will not leave one stone on another because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you.
SPEAKER_00: Those words were not a metaphor, because within a generation, that's precisely what happened.
SPEAKER_00: The tragedy Jesus weeps over isn't only personal rejection.
SPEAKER_00: It's a whole city walking with its own eyes wide open toward a devastation it could have avoided if only they had seen who was standing in front of them.
SPEAKER_00: I think Jesus' words, you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you, are some of the most sobering words in Luke's gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Because the issue wasn't a lack of information.
SPEAKER_00: They'd seen the miracles, they'd heard the teaching, they knew the scriptures, they knew the promises, they were surrounded by evidence, and still they missed the king.
SPEAKER_00: Throughout Luke, the kingdom of God had been right in front of people.
SPEAKER_00: The blind man saw it, Zacchaeus saw it, tax collectors saw it, sinners saw it, yet many religious people couldn't.
SPEAKER_00: The tragedy of Jerusalem wasn't that God was absent, the tragedy was that God was present and they didn't see him.
SPEAKER_00: And if I'm honest, that's what I find most unsettling about this passage.
SPEAKER_00: Not that people rejected Jesus, we expect that.
SPEAKER_00: What's unsettling is that many of the people who missed him were the people who knew the scriptures best, who attended worship most faithfully, and who thought they understood exactly what God was doing.
SPEAKER_00: Which means this passage isn't really about those people out there.
SPEAKER_00: As much as it's about us, it's about whether we can become so familiar with the things of God that we stop recognizing the voice of the Spirit of God in us.
SPEAKER_00: There is truth to the notion that we can become too familiar with obvious beauty.
SPEAKER_00: Joe and I live in Long Bay Beach, and we walk the beach regularly.
SPEAKER_00: We live by the beach.
SPEAKER_00: And if we get bored with that beach, we can go to Tor Bay or Browns Bay or Rothesay Bay or Murray's Bay or Mirangi Bay or Campbell's Bay or Castor Bay or Milford Beach and on it goes all the way down to Devonport.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they only realize how incredibly beautiful our area is when one of our friends or family comes for a visit from Palmerston North, a place without much beauty, and on our walk they say, Wow, this place is incredible.
SPEAKER_00: It is right.
SPEAKER_00: But we can walk the same beach every day and stop noticing what's right in front of us.
SPEAKER_00: We become familiar, and familiarity can blind us.
SPEAKER_00: The same thing can happen spiritually.
SPEAKER_00: We can know the songs, we can know the stories, we can talk Christianese, we can quote the Bible, and we can know when to stand and when to sit.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you even know what the preacher's gonna say before they say it.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, we can still miss the king.
SPEAKER_00: We can know about Jesus without knowing Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We can admire Jesus without obeying Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We can worship Jesus without surrendering to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And we can sit in church every week and still miss the King standing in front of us.
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps that's why Jesus weeps.
SPEAKER_00: Because he isn't looking for religious spectators, he's looking for people who recognize the king, who trust the king, and who follow the king.
SPEAKER_00: People who put what he's entrusted to them to work until he comes and for his purposes.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'd suggest that the warning of this passage isn't simply for Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: I wonder whether it's for churches like ours.
SPEAKER_00: Could God be at work among us and we fail to notice him?
SPEAKER_00: Could God be inviting us into something deeper, but we've become too familiar to recognize his voice?
SPEAKER_00: Could Jesus be standing closer than we realize?
SPEAKER_00: In these events in Luke chapter 19, the tragedy wasn't that God failed to show up, the tragedy was that God showed up.
SPEAKER_00: And yet the people wanted a different kind of king.
SPEAKER_00: May that never be true of us.
SPEAKER_00: I think the three movements of this passage that I've talked about belong together.
SPEAKER_00: The parable asks, what will we do while the king is away?
SPEAKER_00: The triumphal entry asks, Will we recognize Jesus for who he really is?
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus' tears asks, What happens when we fail to recognize him?
SPEAKER_00: And all three come back to the same point.
SPEAKER_00: When the king arrives, our response matters.
SPEAKER_00: Because every person at the arrival's gate has to decide how they'll respond when the doors open and Jesus walks through.
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, the response may be faith.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps you've been around church or Christianity for years.
SPEAKER_00: You know about Jesus, you respect Jesus, you admire Jesus, but you've never actually surrendered your life to him.
SPEAKER_00: Today the invitation is simple.
SPEAKER_00: Recognize him.
SPEAKER_00: The king has come.
SPEAKER_00: Will you follow him?
SPEAKER_00: And if that's you, I pray that you would open your heart to receive the beauty of the kingdom of God by the infilling of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: For others, the response may be repentance.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps there are parts of your life where you've welcomed Jesus as Savior, but you've resisted him as king.
SPEAKER_00: You want his forgiveness, but not his.
SPEAKER_00: Leadership.
SPEAKER_00: You want his grace, but not his authority.
SPEAKER_00: Or perhaps you want his blessing, but not his direction.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus gently but firmly says to you, I am your King.
SPEAKER_00: So what's the area of life where Jesus is Savior, but not quite King?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe your finances or a relationship or your future, a decision you're trying to control, a hurt you're holding on to, a dream you're afraid to surrender?
SPEAKER_00: What would it look like this week to place that one thing back under the rule of the king?
SPEAKER_00: And for many of us, the response could be renewed faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: We're living in the until he comes years.
SPEAKER_00: The king has entrusted something to us and we need to put it to work for his purposes.
SPEAKER_00: Let's not waste the until he comes years.
SPEAKER_00: So let's ask ourselves honestly this question.
SPEAKER_00: What has he put in our hands right now?
SPEAKER_00: Is it a relationship or a skill or a season or a role?
SPEAKER_00: Something that's sitting buried rather than working.
SPEAKER_00: What's one step you could take this week to put what has been given to you back to work?
SPEAKER_00: As we pause our journey through Luke and return to it next year, Luke leaves us standing at the gates of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: Let's remind ourselves of the picture.
SPEAKER_00: The crowd is shouting, the disciples are worshiping, the Pharisees are objecting, the king is arriving, and Jesus is weeping.
SPEAKER_00: The king who has every right to judge the city first weeps for the city.
SPEAKER_00: The king who knows he will be rejected still loves the people of the city.
SPEAKER_00: And the king who knows the cross is coming, keeps walking toward it.
SPEAKER_00: The king who knows many will miss him keeps moving toward them.
SPEAKER_00: I sometimes wonder what Jesus weeps over today.
SPEAKER_00: Does he weep over cities that have forgotten him, over broken families, over young people searching for meaning, over loneliness, over churches that have become too comfortable?
SPEAKER_00: Over people who are so close to him yet still miss him?
SPEAKER_00: If Jesus wept over Jerusalem, perhaps his tears tell us something about his heart for our world today.
SPEAKER_00: Before he would wear a crown of glory, Jesus would wear a crown of thorns.
SPEAKER_00: Before he would be exalted, Jesus would be crucified.
SPEAKER_00: And before he would reign visibly, Jesus would give his life for the very people who rejected him.
SPEAKER_00: That is the heart of a king.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine standing at the arrival's gate, the doors open, and the king walks through.
SPEAKER_00: Not the king we've designed, not the king who simply agrees with us, the king who comes on his terms, the king who entrusted something to us while he was away, the king who weeps over those who miss him, the king who one day will come again in glory.
SPEAKER_00: The question Luke leaves with us is simple.
SPEAKER_00: Will we recognize him?
SPEAKER_00: And having recognized him, will we follow him?
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, as we round out this section of the Gospel of Luke, it's continues to be very confronting.
SPEAKER_00: We confess that we get these things wrong sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: We might see Jesus, but we don't always recognize him for being the king that he is.
SPEAKER_00: We might acknowledge that Jesus is the Son of God, but we might not let that flow through to allowing him to have reign in our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: We confess we live in a world that orientates us around living for ourselves, not for the purposes of the king and the kingdom of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: So we repent, we're sorry.
SPEAKER_00: And as we read these scriptures today, might we not just read them, might we allow them to dwell in our hearts?
SPEAKER_00: And might we allow your spirit to come and enlighten us of the significance of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the one who has come, the one who has died on a cross for us, the one who has ascended to the right hand of the Father, and the one who will return one day and will hold us accountable for the way in which we live.
SPEAKER_00: And so, Father, help us to assess our lives today, to take stock of the responsibilities that we have with the gifts that we've been given?
SPEAKER_00: Might we put them to work for the sake of the kingdom of God that Luke has so comprehensively been talking to us about?
SPEAKER_00: Might we allow your spirit to come and lead us this week, to live our life in a way that stewards who we are?
SPEAKER_00: Might our eyes be open to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the beauty and the glory of what it is to be in the presence of our Savior.
SPEAKER_00: And might that continue to change us day by day, step by step, in the way that we see the world and the way that we see people, and the way that we put our faith into action.
SPEAKER_00: So, as difficult as these passages are, Father, thank you for them.
SPEAKER_00: Might they shape us today and tomorrow and in the weeks and months ahead as we resume the journey toward the cross at the beginning of next year.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for Luke and his gospel.
SPEAKER_00: We pray in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for joining our audio teaching today.
SPEAKER_00: If there are ways that we can continue to support you or help you in your journey, please reach out to us.
SPEAKER_00: Head to our website, windsapark.org.nz, and you'll find various ways to contact us.
SPEAKER_00: God bless.