Luke 8:1-3

Luke chapter 8, I’m going to read the first three verses for our text and study this morning. And it came to pass afterward that he went through out every city and village preaching and showing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God and the 12 were with him. And certain women which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils, and Joanna, the wife of Cusa, Herod’s Stuart, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance. May God bless to us, He is holy. holy and sacred word this morning. During a serious illness, a well-known minister and biblical scholar sent for a student from a nearby theological institution. When the young man arrived at this biblical scholar’s home, the minister being sick here for the serious illness was asking that he would give a word of consolation to it. And the young student was astonished. He said, well, you know, I’m just a pupil. I’m a mere disciple. He said, I don’t know what to say to someone like you. And the minister said, what? A divinity student who can’t even give a word of consolation to me? the young man was so ashamed he just blurted out one verse that he did know the blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanses us from all sin 1 John 1 7 and the sick minister was now satisfied he said that’s enough he said that’s all I wanted that’s that’ll take care of me he shook the students hand affectionately and dismissed it it seems that the simple message of the gospel is still needed by Christians no matter how mature that they are in the faith. When we look at Luke chapter 8 here, we have a really a general introduction or general statement about the ministry of Jesus Christ, before we get into some more detail about his work. His ministry in particular in Galilee is what we’re talking about. and it came to pass afterwards, meaning after the events of chapter 7, after he has healed the centurion servant at Copernium, as we saw in the first 10 verses of this chapter, after he restored to life the son of the widow of Nain in verses 11 to 17, after John’s disciples witnessed his miracle working and he talked about John the Baptist and what a tremendous witness that he was and how highly he was respected in God’s sight and in Christ’s sight. And he commends John the Baptist in verses 18 through 35 of Chapter 7. And after Christ has feasted with Simon at Simon the Pharisees’ house, and a woman who was a known sinner came and an anointed him and showed her great love for the Savior. And after his discourse on how there’s a correspondence between love and service, love to the Savior, and service to him as well. Our text here in verses 1 to 3 really speaks about the importance and support of preaching. And that’s what I’m going to look at this morning. Let me begin by saying this. You find the importance of preaching in the advancement of the kingdom of God from verse 1. And it came to pass afterward that he went throughout every city and village preaching and showing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God and the 12 were with him. The first thing that is emphasized here, if I could put the emphasis on one word in this first verse, it’s on preaching. We see the primacy of preaching here. When describing Christ ministry, you see the emphasis of scripture is always on this idea of preaching the gospel. Now you remember from chapter 4 of Luke in verse 16 through 19, when Jesus spoke, at Nazareth. He said this. And he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up. And as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for it to read. And it was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah’s. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written. The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he had anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, and set at liberty, them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. You know how many times the word preach comes through here in his commission. And so we see him fulfilling his commission here in Chapter 8. When you look at it, Christ’s preaching was the word, the great work that he was charged to do in his ministry. To this, even his great miracles must take a second place. His miracles were really to pave the door, that paved the way, if you were, to open the door for the preaching of the gossip. And so we see here that this is important. Preaching is always given a primary place, whether it’s Paul talk, or or there’s Christ speaking, preaching is always given in a primary place. And that is an important principle for us to always remember. It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them which believe. Or as we read in Romans chapter 10, how shall they call on Him on Christ, in whom they have not believed, and how should they believe in him of whom they have not heard, and how shall they hear without a preacher? preaching is God’s appointed means of saving people and edifying the body of Christ, the people who do believe. This is the way people are brought to faith. This is the way people are brought up in the faith. Why is it then that preaching is so despised, so discarded by many of our so-called churches today? Why is it given a back-up? seat? Why has it been reduced in its importance? Years ago, the well-known Roman Catholic Clemens Brontano was a literary acquaintance with a doctor crumbacher, who was a biblical scholar. And once he said the crumbacher, he said, till you Protestants pull down the chatterbox, meaning the pulpit, or at least throw it into the corner where it ought to be, there’s no hope for you. To which Dr. Krummacher replied, It’s true indeed that our chatterbox stands greatly in the way of you Catholics. It was the source of the Reformation, was the preaching of the gospel by Luther and Calvin and so forth. Yes, I guess it did stand in the way of the Catholics. It seems to me we have to guard then against any effort to reduce, despise, or dismiss the place of preaching in Christ Church. It ought to always have a prominent place in the worship service. Let it clearly be understood. Preaching is the great and most important. important work of the preacher. He is studied to show himself approved unto God, rightly dividing the word of truth. That is his duty. That is his great responsibility. Listen to Paul’s charge to Timothy, which really every minister should take heed to. And that is this, I charge you, therefore, before God and the Lord Jesus Christ preach the word. Be instant in season. and out of season. In 2 Timothy 4, 1, and 2. Be ready at all times. Even when it’s not popular, even when it’s looked down upon, or when it’s well received, be ready at either occasion to preach the word. Don’t stop preaching. Anyone who doesn’t heed this charge is really unfit for the office of minister. So the promise of preaching stands out here immediately for us. The second thing, we see, is the proliferation of preaching. For we read he went through out every city and village. Evidently in Galilee, in particular, where he’s working here. You’ll notice that Jesus did not confine himself to one spot. He did the work of what we call an evangelist as he went about different places. preaching. Scripture used as the term evangelist described someone who brought the first news of the gospel to a particular area. A lot of times they were doing the initial work of bringing the gospel. You remember that Philip, Philip was called the evangelist in Scripture. He was the one who when under persecution of the church at Jerusalem, he went to Samaria. And was the first to preach the gospel there. And then he preached the gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch in the desert. And then he went to Azotas and then Cessaria in Acts chapter 8 in other places, preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. Evangelist sort of paved away for the more settled church elders that would come along and stay in one area and continue to teach and preach the gospel when they had ordained elders in every city that there was a gathering of the people of God. Well, Jesus wished to have his labors be as extensively spread as possible and refused to remain in one place very long. You remember at one point in Luke chapter 4 verses 42 to 44, the people of Copernium begged him stay with us he says no I got to preach to the other cities in Galilee I can’t just stay here now he spent a lot of time at Copernium he kept coming back to Copernium it was like the center of his operation but at the same time his duty he saw was to go proclaim the gospel throughout that area the chief cities of Galilee would attract certainly the most attention because they’d be large and there are a lot of people there but you’ll notice it says he didn’t neglect the villages didn’t neglect the little places either because they need the gospel too so he didn’t just confine himself to where he could get huge amounts of people large groups he went to little places sometimes smaller villages and preached the gospel he scattered the seed far and wide wherever he went his goal was to extensively spread the gospel so that everybody would know about it. Now Christ, of course, was fulfilling his office as the Messiah. But he certainly sets the example, I think, in this, for every true believer in Christ. Because you’ll remember that when Saul persecuted the early church at Jerusalem, that the Christians were scattered abroad. As they were scattered abroad in every direction, what did they do? What does the book of Acts tell us in Acts 8?4? They went everywhere preaching the word. They took the gospel with them. Let this general truth then be something that stays with us. Let us glean this from our text. while we may not all be called to preach, I think we’re all called to carry the gospel with us wherever we go. Don’t hide your light of the knowledge, of the way of salvation, under the bushel, so to speak. Let it shine so that when we meet other people and we get into conversations with it, we can bring the gospel to bear in their lives, as far and as wise, as God permits us. Spurgeon relates the story of a Christian businessman that he once knew, and this businessman confessed to him something was really bothering him. This business man frequently did business with a person who constantly came to his shop and he would purchase items from this man for resale. And for nine or ten years, This man came in, and he purchased goods from him and resold them. And he said to himself one day, he said, you know, I’ve been dealing with a man for nine or ten years, and we scarcely have passed the time of day between us. Everything we talked about was business. He brought the goods in, and I, you know, paid for him over the counter to him. But I never tried to do his soul any spiritual good. He determined the next time the man come in, he was going to somehow rather get around to the gospel of Christ and try to bring it to bear in this man’s life and ask him at least if he was saved in Christ. Well, the next time the man came to the shop, the Christian businessman’s nerve failed him, and he didn’t do it. And it bothered him. he didn’t do it, but he was afraid to begin a religious conversation with the man. He never got another opportunity. The man died. His son brought in the goods next time and brought the sad news to the Christian businessman that his father had died. And the Christian businessman was beside himself. He said, I could never forgive myself that it didn’t take that opportunity to speak to him. He felt, you know, like the man’s blood was on his head because he didn’t speak to him as he should have. He’s too timid. My friends, let us not find ourselves in that state where we feel like we should have, but we didn’t. When God gives us opportunity, let’s make sure we take advantage of it and try to give out the gospel. Look, we may not be able to say a whole lot at once. Sometimes you just get the door cracked open. Sometimes you just get them, maybe. even reading their Bible or getting, you know, speak to them about something that has to do with Christ or or the Lord and their responsibility to them. Whatever God gives us, as far as we can go, we take it and see what the Lord does afterwards. Seek for the opportunity to tell others of Christ. We see the proliferation of preaching here, don’t we? The third thing we see here is the principal part. of preaching. And that is this. Preaching and showing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God. That sort of gives us the idea of what he was doing when he was preaching. Now, the long-expected and earnestly desired, kingdom of God, which was very clearly stated in Isaiah and Jeremiah, but in particular in Daniel, you recall. it was prophesied in the Old Testament that it would come. And Daniel relates that there would be four world kingdoms, before Christ would come and set up his kingdom, an everlasting kingdom. Avalon, Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, and Rome is in power right now. And so we find here, all those would be prior to the kingdom of God coming, and we’re right there at the end. where the kingdom of God should be coming. Daniel 24 says, In the days of these kings, shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. That’s the kingdom the people we’re looking for. Daniel reveals that this kingdom is associated with the Messiah. Messiah is here. Jesus Christ announced that the kingdom of God is at hand. So did John the Baptist, the forer of Christ. The kingdom of God is in hand. The kingdom of God here relates to the rule of Christ, or the kingdom of the son of man, or the kingdom of God’s beloved son, as the scripture calls it. The kingdom of God is not like these earthly carnal kingdoms, these kingdoms that preceded the coming of Christ. It’s spiritual in nature. It doesn’t come by observation. You can’t see it. It doesn’t have land or territory like these other nations. It is within you, Christ said. It is Christ ruling over your heart. It is redemptive. in nature. Entrance in the kingdom of Christ means deliverance from the power of darkness. See? And it means being translated in the kingdom of God’s son. And it involves a new birth, or what we call regeneration, as John 3 tells us. It brings a man righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost, as Romans 14 tells us in verse 17. So the kingdom of God involves Christ ruling over all things for the benefit of his church. The glad tidings of the kingdom of God. We know what the kingdom of God is. Now, the glad tidings of the kingdom is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. and the angels spoke to the shepherds. Fear not. For behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born in the city of David, a Savior who is Christ, the Lord. What is the glad tidings? We’re the good tidings. The Savior. The message about the Savior. It’s about Christ. as God’s Savior who’s been sent under the world’s, a world to preach the gospel to bring about the salvation of God’s people. Showing the glad tidings means to teach the doctrines related to Christ’s work bring about our salvation, such as, of course, the free and full remission of sins for Christ’s sake through His Atoment, through him being a substitute for us. It is the message of justification, being declared righteous in God’s sight on the basis of Christ imputed righteousness. It means acceptance before God in Jesus Christ, God’s beloved Son. It means a complete salvation by Jesus Christ, not only of the soul, but also of a redemption of the body. and a glorification of the body as well. What could be more welcome? What could be better tidings than the message of Christ and the salvation that is in you? Let me ask you, are these tidings glad tidings to you? Have you found these to be glad tidings? Have they brought joy and peace to you? Now, in your dealings with others, your chief aim is to lay. before them the gospel that involves these doctrines that are associated with Christ’s work. These truths are the ones which are able to make men wise under salvation. The first missionaries that Greenland thought that the natives were too ignorant, maybe too backward, to understand it wants the doctrine of the atonement. And so they began to tell the people of Greenland about the existence of God as the creator of all things. But no effect was produced by this teaching. No one was saved by it. But when they were translating the New Testament and they were translating the Gospel of John 3, they came to verse 16, where when they translated it, we find that the people of Greenland first heard the gospel. and that is for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but should have everlasting life. A Greenlander said, is that true? And the missionary affirmed that it was. And the native asked, well, why then didn’t you tell this at first? This is good news indeed. Remember, friends, what people need to hear. Yes, they need to hear that God is the creator. But what they need to hear, as about Christ not only as the Creator, but as the Redeemer, as the Savior. And they need to hear the doctrines associated with it. Remember, what people need is to hear that the Savior has come. And he has provided a redemption through faith in his blood. The principal part of preaching, fourthly, here, the pupils learning from the preaching. We really, read here, and the 12 were with him. Now, these are the men that Christ had selected out. Do you remember to be apostles? To be trained by him in the work of the ministry. So they were with him almost all the time. They were hearing his teaching, observing how he went about doing things. And this was all part of their training for when Christ would leave and they would be on their own. In fact, he’s going to send him out later on their own to preach. So this is part of their study, if you would, to learn how to do it. Follow his example. So wherever he went, they went with him. They were witnesses of the miracles. They were learning his doctor. And thus they became well qualified to go forth to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. be witnesses for him. And you think about it, being under Christ’s training would be make them more acceptable to others who have heard Christ or believed in Christ that they would receive the apostles because they were going to teach the same way and the same thing to Christ taught. It behooves the church to train men in the work of the ministry. to follow Christ’s example here. To take young men who feel the call of God and work with them to equip them as much as possible to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. As Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 2.2, and the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. That’s what we should do. So you find here the importance of preaching in the advancement here of the kingdom of God. We see the primacy of preaching, the proliferation of preaching, the principal part of preaching, and the pupils’ learning from the preaching. Secondly, my second major point is this. You find how the preaching was supported. And that’s finally verse 2 and 3. Let’s look at that. And certain women which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, excuse me, and certain women which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils, and Joanna the wife of Cusa, Herod Stewart, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him, of their substance. Now you learn that those who frequented the ministry were the ones who supported the work of the ministry. Besides the 12, there were many other people who frequented Christ ministry. Some of them were cured of demonic possession. Some of them were cured of other diseases. It’s also certain that they’ve been healed of the disease of sin. It’s not that they were just cured bodily, but these people were believers. They had trusted in the Savior. They had spiritual health and peace with God. Now, all of these, there were female followers of Christ that are mentioned in particular here. Mary called Magdalene, out of whom he cast seven devils. Now, this is not Mary of Bethany. This is not Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus. This is a different Mary. She is from Magdalah, which was a town in Galilee beyond the Jordan River. According to Matthew 1539. Christ cast out of her seven demons, which we will see you can have more than one at a time that would infest you, if you would. Terrible thing to have this many cast out of one person. We don’t know exactly how these demons affected her. Sometimes the demons caused physical ailment, made them deaf and dumb, made them lame. Sometimes they caused them to engage in all kinds of sinful activities. That’s why they were sometimes called unclean spirits because they would lead to unclean sexual sins and so forth. But it certainly had to be an unspeakable experience when you had this kind of cleansing and you were freed from the power of darkness here. It translated into God’s kingdom in such a way as this. What a difference that would make in your life. So she’s very grateful to Christ and she frequently attended his preaching. The second person we read about here is Joanna, the wife of Cusa, Herod’s steward. This woman has mentioned only one other time in Luke chapter 24. Herod is mentioned here and this is Herod in Tippas. This is the Herod that beheaded John the Baptist. Cusa was either a steward or he was some type of chief household officer of Herod. It was a very strong, powerful position and she, no doubt, was a woman of note in society, and they probably had a good income from this position that they had. But divine grace had touched her. And just as Paul writes about those in Caesar’s household who have come to know the Lord, yes, even in Herod’s household, there are some who have come to know the Lord. You recall that John the Baptist often spoke before Herod. Perhaps she heard him. We don’t know. But maybe that’s how she was brought to faith in Christ. Susanna here is never mentioned anywhere else. We don’t know anything more about her, but we do know. She was a woman, certainly, who had faith Christ, love Christ, and frequented his ministry. Then it mentions many others, and I take this to be many other women also followed him and supported his ministry, but they are unnamed here. So you learn those who frequented the ministry supported it financially. Now, you ought to follow the example of these people who benefited from the preaching of the Word of God. let him that is taught in the word communicate with, or we might say today, share with him that teacheth in all good things. Galatians 6.6. Those who preach the gospel ought to live of the gospel. Now, Paul sometimes suspended this idea when he went to a new place because he didn’t want them to think that he was in it for the money. But he would have other churches support him while he was doing the work. But normally a church is provided for by the voluntary, notice that there’s no tax here, you know, the leadership doesn’t go around and say, you must give X number of dollars to the church, by the voluntary contributions of the people who come to hear the Word of God taught. And sometimes it would come in the sense of money or food or maybe of service of some sort, but somehow rather they would compensate the minister, maybe bringing in, you know, potatoes or something. Maybe I’ll give them a lamb or something. They would do something to provide for the minister. I was reading Galatian 6-6 from Luther’s commentary, and I found it interesting. He had a little antidote that he put in there under Galatian 6-6, but the minister being supported. He, preaching in 15, 1331, 14 years after he nailed the 95 theses on the door of the castle church at Wittenberg, Luther said he finally understood Galatian 6-6. I didn’t think it was that hard to understand, but if you keep reading, you’ll see what he says. He said, while he was working for the Roman Catholic Church, which was a heretical religion, he said, money poured in. He saw how rich and covetous the teachers were who were, you know, in this position in the church. And he thought to himself, well, this Paul’s command to give the church teachers money and support is unnecessary. It’s superfluous. Look all the money that’s coming in. However, he soon found out differently when began to preach the gospel, and he realized the money didn’t come in the same. way. Then he realized, you know, what Paul had to say was actually necessary. And he said this, he said, I do greatly marvel, and I am ashamed that so great an apostles should be constrained to use so many words for the obtaining of this benefit from congregations, that he would have to plead for them to do this. It’s a shame. It shames me to think that that that’s the case. Christ’s method of supporting the work of the preaching, I think is instructed to us. By allowing his followers to minister to him, Christ would test their love and how they regarded him. And it’s still true today when think about it. This matter of ministering to those who preach the word reveals who truly love God, who truly are rich in grace. It also reveals who are covetous and unbelieving who will not minister to Christ in the work of the ministry. So that you have a sense before you here of how Christ operates. In some sense, it’s sort of a carryover from this woman who was the great sinner, how much love she had for the Savior and what she did for him. same thing when it comes to our giving and support of the work of the ministry. From the least Christian to the greatest Christian, we all need the simple message of the gospel. Even when we get up in age, even when, you know, we’re on our sickbed and we think, you know, we’ve been supporting, working for Christ all our life as a minister, perhaps, we still need a word of comfort that the gospel brings. You find here the important. importance of preaching and the advancement of the gospel when you find here the preaching being supported by those who heard the gospel and were constant listeners to what Christ taught. Let us close.