You are listening to Heed the Word with our pastor and teacher Ken Davis. Pastor Ken is the senior pastor at Calvary Chapel Southwest Metro in Burleson, Texas. Please join us as we study the Gospel of Luke, verse by verse.

Had Jesus not undergone the lash, had Jesus not been beaten by the Romans, then he would not have fulfilled the scripture. Had Jesus died by any means other than crucifixion, he would not have fulfilled the scripture of Psalm 22. Had he been executed by the Jewish peoples as opposed to the Romans, again, he would not have fulfilled the prophecies. Everything that was happening to Jesus at that time was happening for a purpose that the Word of God might be fulfilled.

The Gospel of Luke is the third account in the Gospels of the life and teachings of our Savior, Jesus Christ. As believers, there are few studies that will benefit us more spiritually than studying the life and teachings of the Master. The Bible tells us that God loved the world so much that He said it's only stuck that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life. Just as the prophets foretold, Jesus came to this earth was nailed to a cross as the ultimate sacrifice for our sin. It's because of him that we have hope. It's because of him we can receive gift. Don't forget to stay with us after today's message to hear more information about He the Word, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, please open your Bibles to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 18, verse 31. As we join Pastor Kent.

John Corson in his New Testament commentary says this about the following verses. He says, As Christopher Columbus sailed west, he actually kept two logbooks. One contained false information that showed them closer to land than they actually were. This was the book made available to the crew in hopes that they wouldn't lose hope in ever seeing land again. The other book showed their true location, and that was the one Columbus used. Columbus evidently decided that the morale of the crew was more important than the integrity of the captain. Not so Jesus. You see, the disciples and Jesus were on their way to Jerusalem, and all of these miraculous things were happening as they went, and it would have been very easy for Jesus to fill the disciples with dreams of grandeur. In fact, it was all he could do to keep them from thinking that way. They were certain and sure that the kingdom was about to appear in an earthly sense, and that they would have positions of great power and authority in that kingdom. And when Jesus makes a statement like this that, hey, if you know, you've given up all these things for me, you're going to receive many times more in this life and in the life to come eternal life, that starts their minds rolling about, hey, you know, think of all of the wealth and the power and the privilege that we're going to have as his right hand men, so to speak. And so Jesus then follows that statement with this very sobering look at their immediate future. Verse 31. Then he took the twelve aside. I love that. He didn't just lay it all out there for all to see. He didn't put his disciples on the spot. He didn't, you know, put them into a situation where they might, you know, not know how to react openly before the people, but he pulls them aside in a very private manner, and he says, Guys, I've got something I need to tell you, something that you need to be aware of. And he said to them, Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished, for he will be delivered to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. They will scourge him and kill him, and the third day he will rise again. But they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were spoken. Now Jesus on two other occasions in Luke had already spoken of this event that they were leading up towards, but never in so much detail as he does here. He tells them several things. He says, Listen, guys, you need to understand something. Yes, we're going to Jerusalem, but we're not going to conquer it. We're not going to set it free from Rome. We're going to accomplish a much greater purpose. We're going up there, and what's going to happen is that all of the Old Testament prophecies concerning me are about to be fulfilled in regards to my suffering. He spells it out in no uncertain terms. He says, He will be delivered to the Gentiles. He will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. You know, the one whom the crowds were pressing about, the one whom women in pain just wanted to touch the hem of his garment so that they could be healed. The one who leaders of synagogues would come to and would say, Would you come and please heal my daughter? The one who centurions would send for and say, Could you please heal my servant? The one who would feed thousands with just a few loaves and a few fish. That one was about to be mocked, spit upon, rejected by his own people, and turned over to the Gentiles. You know it was necessary that Jesus be turned over to the Gentiles and that he not be executed by the Jewish people themselves in order that Scripture would be fulfilled? Because you see, the Jewish method of execution was death by stoning. And had Jesus been stoned to death, that would not have fulfilled the prophecies. But Jesus makes it clear that all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished. Now, that phrase there, written by the prophets, I really don't like the way that it says that, because it sounds as though the credit to the writing actually goes to the prophets. But a better translation, those of you who have the NSB will see it in yours that way, says, all things that were written through the prophets. You see, the idea is that it wasn't the prophets that were doing the writing themselves. Oh, sure, their hand was moving the pen, but there was something greater that was moving them, and that was the Spirit of God. Those things that were written were inspired. So often people question the veracity of the Bible. They say, oh, well, that's just a collection of stories written by men, and it doesn't hold any real authority, and it's not really that different from many of the other ancient writings. And you know, they couldn't be further from the truth. There are so many things that we could list today that bear witness to the fact that the scriptures are true, not the least of which is the fact that it validates itself. You see, the prophecies that Jesus is referring to here were written literally hundreds, if not thousands, of years prior to what actually transpired in Jerusalem. We're gonna look at just a few of those today. The first thing Jesus said here was that he would be delivered to the Gentiles and would be mocked and insulted and spit upon. One of the prophecies that refers to this event is in Micah chapter 5, verse 1, where the prophet writes, Now gather yourself in troops, O daughter of troops. He has laid siege against us. They will strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek. Isaiah 56 also says, I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who plucked out my beard. I did not hide my face from shame and spitting. Now Jesus alludes to the fact that these very scriptures will be fulfilled in the coming days, and we see them fulfilled as we read in Matthew 27, verses 29 through 31. When they had twisted a crown of thorns, it's speaking of the Roman soldiers here, they put it on his head, and a reed in his right hand, and they bowed the knee before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. Then they spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they took the robe off him, put his own clothes on him, and led him away to be crucified. In Luke 18, Jesus also said, They will scourge him and kill him, and the third day he will rise again. Two chapters of the Old Testament speak very specifically of these things. Let's look at the first one as we turn to Psalm chapter 22. This Psalm was written by David, and without going into too much analysis, I'm going to let it speak primarily for itself as we read. Reading on in Psalm 22, why are you so far from helping me and from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry in the daytime, but you do not hear, and in the night season and am not silent, but you are holy, enthroned in the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in you, they trusted and you delivered them. They cried to you and were delivered, they trusted in you and were not ashamed. But I am a worm and no man, a reproach of men, and despised by the people. All those who see me ridicule me. They shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted in the Lord, let him rescue him, let him deliver him, since he delights in him. The very thing that the Pharisees and the scribes would later say as Jesus hung upon the cross, they said, Oh, look, he saved others, but he can't save himself. He believed in the Lord. Let the Lord save him, right? Not even realizing that with their very words they were fulfilling the Scriptures. Verse 9 But you are He who took me out of the womb. You made me trust while on my mother's breasts. I was cast upon you from birth. From my mother's womb, you have been my God. Be not far from me, for trouble is near, for there is none to help. Many bulls have surrounded me, strong bulls of Bashan have encircled me, they gape at me with their mouths. Like a raging and roaring lion, I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is melted within me, my strength is dried up like a pot shirt, and my tongue clings to my jaws. You have brought me to the dust of death, for dogs have surrounded me. The congregation of the wicked has enclosed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They look and stare at me, they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots, but you, O Lord, do not be far from me. O my strength, hasten to help me. Deliver me from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion's mouth and from the horns of the wild oxen. You have answered me. I will declare your name to my brethren. In the midst of the assembly I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him, all you descendants of Jacob, glorify him, and fear him, all you offspring of Israel. For he has not despised, nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, nor has he hidden his face from him, but when he cried to him, he heard. Let your heart live forever, all the ends of the world shall remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations shall worship before you, for the kingdom is the Lord's, and he rules over the nations. All the prosperous of the earth shall eat and worship, and those who go down to the dust shall bow before him, even he who cannot keep himself alive. A posterity shall serve him. It will be recounted of the Lord to the next generation. They will come and declare his righteousness to a people who will be born that he has done this. Not only does the psalmist David here prophesy of what will happen to the Lord, but he prophesies of what will happen even beyond, even to our day, that it would be accounted to us, that we would be told of what he had done, and that it would be a remembrance to him. What more exact picture of crucifixion could we find? And there's more, Isaiah 53. Let's turn there. Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness. And when we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and we hid, as it were, our faces from him. He was despised and we did not esteem him. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted, but he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we are healed. Had Jesus not undergone the lash, had Jesus not been beaten by the Romans, then he would not have fulfilled this scripture. Had Jesus died by any means other than crucifixion, he would not have fulfilled the scripture of Psalm 22. Had he been executed by the Jewish peoples as opposed to the Romans, again, he would not have fulfilled the prophecies. Everything that was happening to Jesus at that time was happening for a purpose that the word of God might be fulfilled. And Jesus knew it. He knew what was going to happen to him because it was his very spirit that had inspired the prophets to write these things. And in keeping them, he is attested to the truth not only of himself, but of his word. Those prophecies, as we read, were fulfilled as well in Matthew 27, which we read earlier. Now, regarding his rising again the third day, we find several prophecies of great interest, and even some that might not seem to be prophetic, and yet, in retrospect, are quite interesting. Psalm 16, 10 says, For ye shall not leave my soul in shale, nor will you allow your holy one to see corruption. Now this psalm was written by David, and yet we know that David is dead, and that David has seen corruption, and that he is decayed, right? And so we see that David was not writing of himself, but that he was writing of the Messiah. Hosea 6.2 says, After two days he will revive us. On the third day, he will raise us up, that we may live in his sight. Now there's something very interesting here that I want to share with you. And I don't know that I would be dogmatic about the fact that this was a prophecy. And yet it's quite interesting to me. Turn to um Genesis chapter 1. Starting in verse 9, we'll read. Now, this of course is the story of creation. Then God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear, and it was so. And God called the dry land earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called seas, and God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself on the earth. And it was so And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind, and God saw that it was good. So evening and morning were the third day. Now you say, Where are you going with that, Ken? Well, this is where I'm going with it. Turn to First Corinthians chapter 15. Paul writes here, moreover, brethren, starting in verse one, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also ye received, and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day, according to the Scriptures, and that he was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that he was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, whom the greater part remained to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that he was seen by James, then by all the apostles, then last of all he was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believed. Now if Christ is preached that he has been raised from the dead, how does some among you say there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty, and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up, if in fact the dead do not rise. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen, and if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins. Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive, but each one in his own order, Christ the first fruits, afterward those who are Christ at his coming. Now I want to skip ahead here to verse 35. But some will say, How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come? Foolish one. What you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain, perhaps wheat or some other grain. But God gives it a body as he pleases, and to each seed its own body. Now, here's the point that I want to make with this Jesus had to die in order for us to have life. And when his body was buried in that tomb, it was as though a seed were being planted. And that seed on the third day sprang up into eternal life. And it's through his eternal life that we ourselves have life. And as Paul points out, without that resurrection of Christ, there's no resurrection for us, and we're still lost in our sins. And so isn't it interesting? And again, I'm not saying that it was prophetic, I don't know, but isn't it interesting that Christ, that seed of the woman that was prophesied, was buried in the ground and on the third day sprang up into eternal life, and it was on the third day of creation that God ordained that those seeds that were planted would spring up into life. The words of Jesus ring true. Jesus had said in Luke 18 that all things written by the prophets would be fulfilled, and there are many illustrations of this that we see in Scripture. Here are just a few more. In Genesis 3.15, I spoke of this a moment ago, God spoke to the serpent, and he said, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. This is fulfilled in the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. And we read in Hebrews 2.14, Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared in the same, that through death Jesus might destroy him who had the power of death, that is the devil. In Psalm 34, 20 we find that he guards all his bones, not one of them is broken. Psalm 69, 21 said, They also gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. In Isaiah 53, 8 and 9, he was taken from prison and from judgment, and who will declare his generation? For he was cut off from the land of the living, for the transgression of my people he was stricken, and they made his grave with the wicked, but with the rich at his death, because he had done no violence, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. These three prophecies and more are found answered in John 19. Let's turn there. And he, bearing his cross, went out to a place called the place of the skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha, where they crucified him and two others with him, one on either side and Jesus in the center. Now Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross. And the writing was Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

Unfortunately, that's all the time we have for today. You've been listening to Heed the Word, the teaching ministry of Pastor Ken Davis, Calvary Chapel in Burleson, Texas. We are currently making our way through the Gospel of Luke here on Heed the Word. The Gospel of Luke is packed full of insights about Jesus, our Savior. So we encourage you to join us again, same time, same place, for the next study through Luke with Pastor Ken. As we mentioned at the beginning of today's broadcast, this teaching, as well as many others, are available from the Heed the Word Media Player. You can listen to today's teaching, download today's teaching, subscribe to the Heed the Word podcast, or even get a copy on your mobile phone. Everything's right there. There's even a Bible available for you to follow along in the scriptures as Pastor Kent teaches. So log on to HeedTheWord.org and continue studying with us today. If today's teaching has blessed you, perhaps you'd like to visit us for worship. Calvary Chapel Southwest Metro meets each Sunday morning at 10.30 a.m. and Wednesday evening at 7 p.m. We'd love to have you stop by and join us. For more information and driving directions, log on to www.heedtheword.org. This has been another edition of Heed the Word, the verse by verse, chapter by chapter, and book-by-book teaching ministry of Ken Davis, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel, Southwest Metro. Place a marker in your Bibles and join us next time for our continuing study through the Gospel of Luke right here on Heed the Word.