Warnings for Today & Tomorrow

When we started the grow class back in January of 2010, two years ago, it was my intention to do two Bible studies a year to do a doctrinal study and then do a Bible survey study. In the first Bible survey I wanted to do, we did pretty good on the doctrinal study. We went about a little over half a year on that, but I always feel after Wednesday nights that I'm taking too long on the Gospels. We should have done more of a survey. And then I listened to a taped interview today on my way to Bluefield, the funeral, and back with John MacArthur. Those of you who do not know the name or don't know John MacArthur, he's been a pastor of the same church in Los Angeles area since he was 27 years old, he's now 70, he's been there 43 years. And he's had a stellar ministry of teaching the Word of God. He's one of the most clear, expository preachers in the nation. And I've benefited greatly from his ministry, I've heard him a number of times in person. But he was committed to just preaching through books of the Bible. But 43 years ago, and determined he would preach through the entire New Testament, didn't go straight from Matthew to Revelation, he took different books at different times. Last summer, I have a friend who is a mentor to the ABC graduate of the ABC, and now it masters seminary, and he attends John MacArthur's church. He was telling me that last summer, John MacArthur finished in July, the last chapter of Mark, which was the last part of the New Testament. He had preached through the whole New Testament, Mark was the last gospel, he preached, took him 43 years, 43 years, preached verse by verse through the New Testament. And I was listening to the interview today, and he was talking about, he loves the gospels. And I could really resonate with that, the life of Christ, and he was talking about the fact that it took him eight years to preach through Matthew. And I don't know how many years to preach through Luke and then John and Mark also, but a total in the gospels of 22 years, in the gospels. And so it made me feel a lot better, a lot better. So there's just something about the life of Christ that you can't survey. You just can't do it. I can survey other parts of the Bible, and we may get back to that at some point, but I just can't do that with the life of Christ. There's just too much there by way of not only doctrine, but just example for living, and what we should be. You just can't skim over the life of Christ. And so I felt a little better after hearing John MacArthur say it took him 22 years to teach through the gospels. I don't think we'll be that long, but it'll take us a little while longer. We are actually, as far as time period is concerned, toward the end of his ministry, we're within about three or four months of the end of Jesus' life. But Luke gives so much attention to this part of our Lord's life, and then there is a lot of attention in the gospels to the final week of our Lord. So we've still got a good bit of ground to cover as far as material in the gospels. We find ourselves tonight in Luke chapter 12, and we're at a time when Jesus is warning his disciples as he is ministering and they are ministering in and around Jerusalem. He's warning them about various things that they will encounter in ministry as he prepares them for a time. They still do not understand that they're going to be charged with a ministry after the Lord leaves. They still don't grasp that. They really have not grasped yet the cross and that Jesus is going to be leaving them up until the night before he died. Up until the day he was arrested, they still did not grasp all that. And so he is trying to prepare them and teaching them and building into them the things that they will need to know. So he's warning them about a lot of things. Last time we saw in Luke 12 that he was warning them about worry. He had warned them about greed, but now he's warning them about worry. And we saw last week what worry is, if you're in Luke 12 verses 22 and 29, Jesus uses two different words for worry and we saw that one of them has to do with being divided or distracted. That has to do with the present. Just being torn, divided, distracted about what's going on right now. The other word for worry in verse 29 has to do with being in doubt. So it has to do with our view of the future. So those two things really define what worry is. Being distracted about what's happening now, being in doubt about what's going to happen in the future. That's worry. We also looked last week at what we worry about. In verse 22 we worry about material provision, about your life, what you will eat, about your body, what you will wear. We were about material provision, whether or not our needs are going to be met. And then the second thing Jesus said we worry about in verses 25 and 26 is the future. Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life or we saw that it can probably be better translated as single cube at 18 inches to the end of your life. You can't even add 18 inches to the end of your life if your life were measured in inches. You can't even add 18 inches to the end of your life. And so Jesus is saying we worry about the future. We worry about what's going to happen to us physically and materially and in other ways in the future. Those are the things we worry about. We saw what Jesus said about how we can conquer worry. And we saw that Jesus says first of all take God's perspective, verse 23, for life is more than food and the body more than clothes. That's God's perspective on things. Remember when he was talking about greed he had just taught his disciples life does not consist in the abundance of man's possessions. So do we really believe that? Do we really believe that? Life is more than material things. Life is more Jesus says than food and clothing than the stuff we have to have. Life is more than that. Life is much more than that. So that's taking God's perspective. Then we see that we should trust God's provision. Jesus talks about the birds of the air and the flower of the field and how God takes care of them. And remember we talk about they God provides for them. And he's saying that we don't have faith if we're not trusting God to provide for us. And remember we talked about last time that does not mean that we simply wait for God to drop everything in our lap that we don't do anything. We're not industrious and diligent about the work that God's given us to do. It doesn't mean that because birds do something to get their food, right? God provides for them but they're still active in getting their food. The early bird gets the... Where, right? So they're active and getting out and getting their food. But God uses that to provide for them. God has built into flowers the ability through photosynthesis and other means, the root system and so forth to get their nourishment. It's not like they're just lying their dormant. But God uses that. And so God will use whatever we have, whatever strength we have, abilities we have, mental capacities we have and so forth. God will use all that. It's not that we just do nothing and wait for God to drop everything into our lap. That's not how we trust God for His provision. We trust Him to enable us to use what He's given us to provide for us. And so that's trusting God's provision. Now that's where we left off last time. So let's pick up there. And the third way that we conquer worry is to focus on God's kingdom. Jesus says this in verses 31 to 34. Focus on God's kingdom. Look at what He says, verse 31. But seek His kingdom and these things will be given to you as well. In other words, the focus of life should not be on these things that He's just talked about. What we're going to eat, what we're going to wear, the things we have to have, the future, how we're going to provide for ourselves, what's going to happen to us, all that. Don't focus on those things. Not that we don't think about them and do what we can to provide those things. We do, but we don't focus on that. We focus, seek, we seek, our ambition is His kingdom. Now what is God's kingdom? What is God's kingdom? Okay, it is internal. And what is internal about God's kingdom? And what does God's kingdom internally look like? What does that mean? Principle of love, okay? Okay, are we living out that kind of principle, the love of Christ? All right? Living out the principles that Jesus has taught us as part of His kingdom. In order to have a kingdom, you have to have a ruler, a king, right? Okay? So certainly God's kingdom means that Christ is ruling. And to whatever degree His kingdom is internal, and that is a feature of His kingdom. That's not all, but that is a feature of His kingdom. It does mean that Jesus is ruling over my heart, my life. He's on the throne. So I'm going to be obedient to Him. I'm going to be submissive to Him, yielded to Him, all of those things have to do with living out God's kingdom. And then of course, yes, the principles of God's kingdom, what He has taught us to do, is commands, the principle of love, as Sarah said, is very important in living out His kingdom. Seek His kingdom, seek spiritual things for Him to be in control, for Him to be ruling in our lives. That's the idea here. And you can take that really deep, I mean, you can find all kinds of applications to that. Your personal life, your social life, your work life, your family life, your church life, your relationship to others around you, even spreading out to the whole world and your responsibility to the world. I mean, all of that is a part of living out God's kingdom, living out His rule in your life. Now, I don't want to neglect this, my belief in the future and prophecy and all of that and strange me to mention at least that there is a literal physical form of God's kingdom that will still come on this earth, where He will literally rule from the throne of David on this earth for a thousand years, we call it the millennium, and the Bible does talk about that. So there is a literal physical kingdom on this earth, but right now the kingdom takes a different form. And when Jesus says, seek His kingdom, He's not just saying, well, pray that the millennium will come. Now, He's saying, you live out Christ's rule in your life right now, internally as Sarah indicated. Okay? So seek His kingdom, put His kingdom, kingdom concerns first. Notice what all that means in the following three verses, He says in verse 32, do not be afraid little flock for your father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. I find it interesting that Jesus does not ridicule our fear and worry is closely tied to fear, isn't it? We worry and are distracted about what's happening now because we're afraid something's going to go wrong. We are worried about being provided for in the future because we fear something will happen that we can't control. So when Jesus says, do not be afraid, He's not ridiculing our worry or fear, but notice how He assures us, He assures us to calm our fear and worry in two ways. He says, do not be afraid little flock for your father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. What is there about that wording that would ease your fear and worry? Yes, He addresses them as a little flock speaking to His disciples primarily, little flock. He reminds them that they are sheep who have a shepherd and the shepherd is responsible to take care of the sheep, right? So He's reminding us of our relationship with Him. What else in that verse would calm your fear and worry? He's pleased to take care of His pleased to give us His kingdom, okay? The pence of the verb has been pleased. Okay, all right? Okay, all right, very good. There's another word that I'm thinking about and then I want to jump back to the things you've mentioned, but another word I'm thinking about there that gives us assurance and should calm our father. Not only does Jesus remind us that we're His flock and He's our shepherd, the shepherd cares for the sheep, but we're also His children and He's our father. Now you take a three or four or five-year-old child, it would be very abnormal if that little child is constantly worried about how the bills are going to be paid or about where the food's going to come from or about whether or not everything will be okay tomorrow. Now certainly there are some children that have been scarred by life's events and neglect and so forth that do have those kind of concerns and that's always a tragedy, but a child that has been taken care of well by His Her parents doesn't worry about those things. They don't even think about those things because that's father's responsibility. That's mama's responsibility. They don't even know how to verbalize that or articulate that, but they just know that's true. Now Jesus is reminding us of is we have a father who's responsible to take care of us. He's pleased, he's been pleased to give you the kingdom. And I think that statement is very similar to what Paul said in Romans chapter 8 when he said, if he has been willing to give us his life, Romans 8.32, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? I mean he's given us the big gift, the kingdom is given a salvation. How will he not also with that and give us all things? Now does that mean you're going to have everything you want? No, no, that's the health and wealth gospel. It does mean that he will meet your needs and sometimes catch this, sometimes our greatest need is to grow spiritually and the way that we grow spiritually best is through suffering. So, you know, we need to define needs biblically as well. Okay, so part of focusing on his kingdom is realizing that he's our father, he's our shepherd, he's going to take care of us. He's already given us the kingdom. And like Steve said, that's past tense. It's already hours, we just need to take advantage of living in that kingdom and living it out. He's already given it to us. So he will take care of our other needs. Notice what else this focusing on the kingdom means in verse 33, sell your possessions and give to the poor, provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. Jesus is saying, part of his kingdom and focusing on the kingdom is learning to live unselfishly. Now, I want to be very careful here to strike, I think, a proper balance, hopefully a proper balance. When Jesus says, sell your possessions and give to the poor, what does that sound like to you? Socialism? Socialism? Okay. Yeah. Just equal the playing field. Yeah. Okay. Living a commune. Living a commune? All right. This can sound very radical. I mean, it can sound like, sell everything you have, divest yourself of all of your possessions and give them away. Well, what I want to be careful about here is not shying away from that too much because I think our tendency in the Western world, particularly, where we have so much, is to try to explain that in some other way. So I want to be careful not to shy away from it too much, but also recognize there are other biblical principles that do serve to balance this out and some of those have to do with providing for our families, first Timothy 5.8, if a man does not provide for his own, especially those of his own household, he's worse than an infidel, Paul says. And so there is, and a lot of verses and proverbs talk about storing up, you know, go to the aunt you slugger, consider her ways and be wise. The aunt stores up in the summer, what it needs for the winter. I mean, there are all kinds of other biblical principles here that we have to take into account. So what Jesus is saying, sometimes in order to pull people away from self-centeredness and materialism, you state something with, we call it in the English language, hyperbole. It's an intended exaggeration to make a point. It's not that Jesus was exaggerating in the sense he was not telling the truth, but sometimes Jesus will say things so starkly, startlingly, that it's designed to kind of, what did you say? It's designed to kind of shake you up and wake you up and pull you back to more of a biblical mindset. And I think that's the kind of saying this is. Now obviously, I think we need to be open to the more extreme evidence of this, the early church did this, didn't they? The early church people were selling possessions and making sure those who were suffering had enough to take care of themselves. And that was not a socialistic kind of thing. It was not demanded of anybody, but it was just people who had things that saw others in need that wanted to help them. So I think what Jesus is saying here basically to boil us all down is, be careful about greed. Jesus just talked about greed. Make sure that you understand living in my kingdom is not about selfishness. It's not about a focus on yourself. It is about having the kind of purse, laying up, storing up treasures in heaven, investing in others and eternal things so that nothing can take that away from you. I remember a story that I heard many years ago about a man that had invested heavily in Word of Life, Bible Institute up in New York and had given a lot of money to them to build some of their buildings up there. And then I forget what happened, but through some financial reverse he lost pretty much everything. And the leader of Word of Life at that time, Jack, works in, Jack works in a Harry ballback. Yes, Jack works and said to him, sir, I feel terrible that you invested all this money and we have all this here and now you're suffering. And the guy said, please don't feel bad about that at all. What I've invested here is going to count for eternity. That's the only thing I have left is eternal riches. And so he was glad to see the school use it to do what the school needed to do to expand their ministry. That's the kind of thing Jesus is talking about. Have that kind of mindset, unselfish, that's part of being in his kingdom. And then one other thing, there in verse 34, if you're going to focus on Christ's kingdom, it means we've got to keep our hearts in the right place. Verse 34 says, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. That's a sobering reminder. Wherever I am stockpiling my treasure, then that's where my heart's going to be. And Jesus basically is saying, make sure that you're putting some away in a purse that will not wear out, treasure in heaven that will never fail where no thief comes near no mouth destroys. Make sure you're putting some away. It doesn't mean to divest yourself of everything, but make sure you've got some eternal treasure. Because wherever your treasure is, that's where your heart's going to be. So I think we all need to ask ourselves, where is our heart? Is our heart buried in a bank vault somewhere? Is our heart wrapped around a house and everything we have in it? Is that where our heart is? Because that's really where we've invested everything. That's where we've put everything. Is our heart defined in a business ledger? Where is our heart? Where is our heart in God's kingdom? And that's where our focus is. Okay, that's what Jesus says. As an antidote to worry, focus on the kingdom. Remember, that's the most important thing. And if you go through rough times, if you have the kingdom which has already been given to you, you've got the most important thing anyway. You've got the most eternal thing you can have. So that's an antidote to worry. Let's move on. Any comment or question before we close out this section of Luke 12? Okay, the next section which really goes through the end of the chapter has to do with a warning about preparedness. Jesus is, again, warning is disciples. He's talking to them about things they need to hear and need to know about as he's getting toward the end of his ministry. And in this section, he warns them about being prepared for the second coming, for Christ's return. It's quite clear as we move through this passage that this whole rest of this chapter is talking about being ready for him to come back. Now he hasn't left yet, but he's only going to be with them about three more months. And one of the last things he will tell them in John 14 is I'm going away, but I'm going to come back when I'm going to come back and receive you to myself to take you to those homes that I've prepared for you in heaven. So he's already dealing with that here. How to be prepared? How to be ready when Jesus comes back? He's instructing his disciples. And this preparedness, he says, will happen in at least five different ways. The first one is be ready. Jesus 35 to 40. Jesus is going to tell them to be ready. Now here's what it means to be ready for Jesus to come back. Look at what he says. Very first thing. Be dressed ready for service. That's interesting. You would think maybe Jesus would say, get yourself ready for the second coming for me to come back. Now he's going to talk about that, but he's going to talk about it in word pictures first. And one of the ways he talks about being ready for the second coming is to be dressed ready for service. Now think about that. What would it mean in Jesus' day to be dressed ready to work? What would that look like? How do people dress then? Robes? Okay? Probably both men and women were long flowing garments. It was typical in that day. Do you know what they would do when they got ready to work? Talk them up. How would they do that? I mean, you don't need to demonstrate. Exactly John, they would pull up the long flowing into those garments and would tuck them into their belt. It's called in the Bible in Good Old King James language, girding up the loins. Okay? Basically it meant to pick up those long flowing that would maybe entangle you if you're trying to do something. Get that off of your knees, your legs, and tuck that in to where you have more freedom to work. And so you can do what you need to work. That's what he's talking about. Be dressed ready for service. Those who heard him would know exactly what he was talking about. It's a bit rid of any impediments that keep you from doing what you need to be doing in serving the Lord. So one way to be ready for Christ to come is to be working. Be working. Jesus never encouraged anyone to just sit and wait and look at the skies waiting for him to come. One of the ways that we are to be ready for him to come is to be working. Get dressed ready for service. Be involved. Be doing something. Be serving the Lord. And that get to work attitude is what Jesus says prepares us for his coming. That's how we get ready. You remember Jesus would say in another time, occupy till I come. Occupy till I come. It's like that's a military type thing. Get in there and take some territory. Get something done before I get back. So Jesus is saying first of all, being ready means working. Secondly, being ready means welcoming. Welcoming. Look at the second part of the verse. Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning. What does that make you think about? Where the light of the world. So we should be shining that light. When you're expecting someone to come, when you're expecting someone to return home to your house at night, what do you do? You leave light on, don't you? Turn porch light on. Like motel six, we'll leave the light on for you. We're expecting you to come. That's what they're saying. We're expecting you to come. We're going to leave light on for you. That expression means we are expecting you to come. And when you come, we're going to be welcoming you. And what basically that's talking about is that we are expectant. Being ready for Jesus to come means we're expecting him to come any time. So we're letting our light shine. We're going to welcome him. We're going to be ready for Jesus doesn't want to come back. He must be stumbling out of bed trying to find the light switch and shuffling toward the door. He wants us to be ready. The light on, the front porch light on saying, you're welcome here. We're expecting you. We're ready for you. That's the idea. So be dressed ready for service. Be working, but also be welcoming. In other words, have the attitude that I'm expecting you to come. I'm ready for you to come. And I'm ready. I'm welcoming you. Nothing in my life that I would be embarrassed about if you showed up at my front door right now. That's the idea. Welcome. Okay. Being ready also means that we are waiting. Working, welcoming, waiting. Look at verse 36. Like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet so that when he comes and knocks, they can immediately open the door for him. It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve and have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even if he comes in the middle of the night or toward daybreak. The idea here, servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet. Most weddings were held in the evening in Jewish culture. And the wedding banquet, the wedding feast that would take place after the wedding was a big deal. Jews knew how to party. And the wedding banquet would go anywhere from one to seven days. It just depended on the resources of the person getting married and their family. But it could go from one to seven days. So what the picture you have here is the servants of the bridegroom, the one who's gotten married. And of course in that culture, when you got married, you went to the bride's home, got married there and brought her back to the home you had prepared for her, which was usually in addition to your parents' home. That's why Jesus says, I'm going to prepare a place for you. I'm going to come back and get you to take you to myself. It's that wedding picture, Jewish wedding picture. So what you've got here is a picture of the servants of the groom who are waiting for the bridegroom to return with his bride. I mean, that's a beautiful picture of the second coming. Jesus is coming to get his bride, okay? Or the rapture is certainly coming to get the bride. So these servants don't know exactly when he's coming back because the wedding feast could go a day, could go two days, three days. Well, they don't know exactly when he's coming back. So that's why they have to be waiting for him to come back. And if they are waiting, as he says, that when he knocks, they immediately open the door. I mean, they're waiting for him. They're not stuck in the back somewhere and don't hear the door. They're waiting. They're ready. They're waiting for him. And he says, it will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching. And notice what will happen in verse 37, truly, he will dress himself to serve. We'll have them recline at the table. We'll come and wait on them. Isn't that a beautiful picture? You've got the bridegroom coming home. The servants are waiting for him. And you would think, okay, the servants are supposed to be the ones. Oh, he's home with his bride. Now, come in, sit down. We've got the table ready for you. We will serve you. Isn't it a beautiful picture here that it's the bridegroom who, when he comes home, says, no, no, no, you servants. You'll be seated. I'm going to serve you. Isn't that exactly what the Bible says Jesus will do at the second coming? At the second coming, he will come to this earth. And Revelation 19 says there will be a wedding feast, a wedding banquet that Jesus has prepared for his bride, and he will serve us. He will serve us. So that's the reward for waiting. That's the reward for being ready is that he turns around, serves us. We're an amazing picture that is. So if you're going to be ready for Jesus to come back, be working, be welcoming, be waiting, and then obviously, verses 39 and 40, be watching. Be watching, verse 39. But understand this, if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, now Jesus is changing word pictures here to give you different pictures of what it means to be ready. Here it's the owner of a house who has someone breaking in. If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have a lady's house be broken into. You also must be ready because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him. So the word picture here is a thief, and there's a sense in which Jesus is coming as like a thief because it's not announced ahead of time. He comes at a time when it's not expected. So in order to be ready, when he's coming at a time when it's not expected, like a thief Jesus is breaking into this world suddenly, unexpectedly, in order to be ready for that, we have to be watching. We have to have our defenses watching ready for any time he may come. So Jesus is warning his disciples, and the warning certainly applies to us. Be ready. Be ready for me to come. And by that, he means be working, be welcoming, leave the light on, welcome me, welcome me there. And that way, be waiting for me and be watching for me. And you'll be ready. Okay. Second thing Jesus says about preparedness is be responsible versus 41-48. Peter asked, Lord, are you telling this parable to us or to everyone? They realize he's speaking in word pictures now, parables. Are you telling this to everyone? Is this for the whole crowd? Or is this for us? The Lord answered, and basically his answer is going to be both, for both, because what he's going to do in the next few verses is he's going to distinguish and draw contrast between responsible managers and irresponsible managers, or stewards is another word. Notice, in verses 41 to 44, he talks about a responsible steward or manager. Who then is the faithful and wise manager? By the way, a manager or a steward is the older word for that. In the New Testament was a household servant who was responsible when the master was away to run the household. Take care of the provisions, make sure the other servants had what they needed to get everything done. That was the manager of the household. That was a person who oversaw the household for the owner. He didn't own it, but he was responsible to oversee it on behalf of the owner. In the picture now, Jesus is the owner. He's gone though. He's away from us, and we've been given responsibilities to manage his goods, if you will, until he comes back. There are responsible and irresponsible managers. He's talking about the responsible and first. Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time. It will be good for that servant, whom the master finds doing so when he returns. In other words, he's taken that responsibility seriously. He's done exactly what God told him to do. Usually I tell you, verse 44, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. The idea here is when Jesus returns, those who have been responsible, those who have taken the responsibility God gave them, and used it wisely, will be rewarded for that. But notice what he says about the irresponsible stewards in verses 45 to 48. But suppose the servant says to himself, my master is taking a long time in coming, and he then begins to beat the other servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk. The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him, and at an hour he is not aware of, he will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers. Now it'd be very easy for us to think in terms of, okay, the church and stewards and managers, they're all believers, and so some believers are going to be rewarded, and some believers are going to be cast out with unbelievers. But that's not who Jesus is talking to. He's not talking about the church. Church hasn't been instituted yet. He's talking about Israel, okay? And remember, remember the conflict he's having with the religious leaders? They're the ones responsible for managing God's work. We've seen that over and over again. They were the ones. In John 10, we talked about when Jesus was talking about, he was the good shepherd. The Old Testament said the religious leaders were supposed to be the shepherds over the flock of Israel. In the same way, those religious leaders were supposed to be the wise managers of God's work, God's nation, God's people, and they have been unfaithful in their duties. In fact, they themselves don't even have a knowledge of God. They twisted everything out of the Old Testament scriptures. And so these unwise stewards are not Christians who've been unfaithful, and then they get kicked out when Jesus comes back. Now, he's talking to the leaders of Israel here, or about the leaders of Israel, because that's who he's been sparring with, that's who he's been accusing and saying, woe to you, woe to you. So he's talking about religious leaders who have led the people astray and who they themselves don't even know God. So they've been, they have completely squandered the responsibility that God gave them. They've been irresponsible managers. It is those people who will be judged severely, harshly at the second coming. Now notice the judgment in verses 47 and 48. The servant who knows his master's will and does not get ready, or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. Now Jesus is using a picture here now of a household manager, a servant, but he's making the application to those in Israel who are not ready for Christ to come. These are the religious leaders. Okay, if you knew the master's will, you knew what you were supposed to do. You had the Old Testament scriptures. You had plenty of light, and you didn't live up to it. You're going to be beaten with many blows. Verse 48, but the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded, and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. All right, help me out here. What is Jesus saying about judgment here? It will be degrees of judgment. Okay, all right. Any other thoughts? It will be just, yes. I mean, the judge is the one who knows exactly what people have done, and he also knows how much light they've had to use that term, how much they knew, to those who knew a lot. They had the Bible. They had the light. They had clearly defined truth, and then blew it. They have much more responsibility. They've been given much, so much will be required for them, and they will be beaten with many blows. People who did not know, but still have done things worthy of punishment. They'll be punished, but with fewer blows. I think Al's right is talking about different degrees of judgment or punishment. Now there is another passage that talks about this same thing when Jesus said it would be more tolerable in the day of judgment for Sodom and Gomorrah than for Capernaum and Chorus in the cities that saw Jesus works, because those who actually had the Messiah and their presence have much more light, much more knowledge, much more responsibility, I don't completely understand this. It's really quite a mystery. He's talking about unbelievers. He's not talking about Christians here. He's talking about unbelievers. He's talking about that segment of the Nation of Israel that has turned their back on Jesus and is not ready spiritually at all. He's talking about unbelievers. But there's a distinction, even among unbelievers, depending on how much knowledge you had of the Bible, how much light you had, how much opportunity you had. So I think Jesus is talking about different degrees of punishment, but I don't have a clue how that works. I don't understand how that works in eternity, in hell. If someone has a great explanation, let me know. You'd be the first theologian I've ever read that explained this very well. It's a mystery. I don't know how it works. Hell is hell, but there are different degrees of punishment. I can't imagine it making a difference. I don't understand what difference there would be. There have been some suggestions made that I don't think square with the rest of Scripture, like the length of time. Like some people will only have three days of punishment in hell and then they'll be exterminated. Others will suffer longer. I don't think that leads you to universalism. That leads you either to universalism that everybody's going to end up being saved or extinction, that there is no eternity of the soul. And Jesus paints hell quite clearly as being eternal in his descriptions of it in the gospels. So I don't fully understand this. I accept it. I believe that some people are going to have worse time in judgment. I mean, Revelation 20, yeah, Revelation 20 verses 11 through 15, the great white throne judgment also teaches this. The unsaved dead will be judged out of the books that record their works. They'll be judged by their works. So some will have lived worse than others and they'll be judged by their works. So the punishment will be according to their works. Again, I can't explain all that. We know we believe in justice and all that. That's the key, Margaret. We have to understand that God who is the just judge will do what is right. And although we may not understand all that he's telling us here, we know that like Abraham said in Genesis 18, when God was going to judge Sodom and Gomorrah, and Abraham says, Lord, if there's 50 righteous there, will you spare it? God says, yeah, well, what about 40? And he works him all the way down to 10. And then he ends up saying the judge of all the earth will do what is right. And that's where we have to leave judgment. Any teaching on judgment has to eventually come to that point. The judge of all the earth will do what is right. And we trust him with that. And that's where I have to leave that. Okay. People and the company they set up think of every day is God makes no mistake. Yes. And that has been my approach to all of them. It is a solid foundation to lean back on. That God never makes a mistake. He always does what is right. Okay. Jesus is saying that in order to be prepared for my coming, you've got to be ready, but you've also got to be responsible. Be a responsible steward. Use the light you've been given. Be ready for me to come back. And we'll see some more of what he says about his coming and being prepared for that next time. Let's pray. To help us to take very seriously what Jesus has taught us about worry and about being prepared. Lord help us to be ready for you to come back. Lord, whenever I look at scriptures like this, I realize how little I think about your coming and that today could still be the last day we live on this earth. It could happen at any time and so Lord help us to be ready. Help us to be responsible stewards. Whatever you've given us, help us to do it well and to respond well to the light you've given us. Be ready for you to come. And Lord help us to do all we can to reach others who do not yet know you. We ask in Jesus' name, amen.