A Kingdom Role
Luke 24:44-53 ·February 2, 2025· Joel Passmore
Part of: Luke, Alive with Him
Pastor Joel Passmore continues with the final part of his four-part sermon miniseries titled 'Alive with Him' about how the resurrection of Jesus brings us into our Father’s redeeming mission
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Today, we have come to the last, very last sermon in our sermon series on Luke. We've been in and out of this since the church launched in October of 22. And we haven't been constantly in it, but we've been in and out. This is sermon number 80 of this sermon series, of this great, great book. And we are concluding today, not just the whole book, but the little four-week mini-series we're doing on the last chapter, Luke 24, we're calling this sermon series Alive with Him.
Because the chapter 24 of Luke is all about the resurrection. It's all about the implications of the resurrection for us, what that means for us, how it changes everything. So let's just recap this little four-week mini-series, not the whole sermon series, but just the little one. So through faith in Him, we are alive with Him. We have a new testimony of His resurrection and our allegiance to Him. We have a real assurance that God planned this salvation, that He told us it was going to happen, the Old Testament did, and He's going to keep His promise for the future about what's going to happen.
And we have a tangible promise. Jesus' glorified body tells us about our future. It shows us the future that we're headed for, in Him, through faith in Him. Today, it's all about, well, what do we do in the meantime? What do we do until we await His return? When I was a kid, my dad was always fixing things. Always fixing things. I'm sure repairmen came to the house sometimes, but I swear I never saw any. I thought there was nothing that he couldn't fix.
I saw him fixing hinges, pipes, wiring, lights, dishwashers, dryers, power equipment, even my toys. He would fix it all. When I ran my RC car into a curb and broke the fender on the front, he took it, brought it back to me, the fender was on there, stronger than it was originally. When a toy that I was playing with on Christmas morning, and I remember this distinctly, it was Megatron. The original metal Transformers, Megatron. I was playing with it on Christmas morning, and it broke in my hands.
I swear it wasn't my fault. On Christmas morning, how much of a bummer is that? But he took it, and I don't know what he did to it, but he brought it back and he fixed it. Now, that was great, but as I got older, he started to ask me to join him in these repair jobs that he was doing. And boy, did I feel special. I felt so privileged, so much joy, that he would ask me to join him in fixing something.
Of course, the things I were doing were really, really simple. Get me a Phillips head screwdriver. Hold this piece right here while I glue it together. Really simple stuff. But I wasn't really thinking so much about the size of my contribution. I wasn't even really thinking that I was technically working instead of playing video games or playing basketball. It just felt good. It just felt good to be asked by him, to do something with him. He gave me tasks that fit my abilities.
He didn't really need my help, but he wanted me to be there with him. He helped me to help him. And we were doing something restorative together. Now, that picture, whether or not you personally experienced it, that picture is how I want you to approach this passage today. Your father is asking you, calling you into his redemptive work, to join with him in it. He gives you tasks that fit your abilities. He helps you to help him. And together, you join up with him in his redemptive, restorative work.
That is what's happening in this final passage of Luke. So let's go there today. Let's go there right now. Let's see what the Lord has for us. Jesus is going to tell us, I'm going to help you help him.
This is Luke 24. Just like the rest of the book I'm holding, it's God's inspired word, his holy word. It's without error, and we can build our lives upon it. And we should build our lives upon it. There is no other firm foundation than this. Starting in verse 44. Then he said to them, My words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures and said to them, Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and that repentance for forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
You are witnesses to these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my father upon you, but stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high. And he left them out as far as Bethany and lifting up his hands, he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy and were continually in the temple. Blessing God. Pray with me.
Lord, will you open up our minds to understand this and open up our eyes to see you, your beauty, your glory. Help us to see that there is no one else worthy of our attention, of our worship, of our whole lives. I pray that we would find joy in being your disciples, that we would hear the call that you have for us today, that you would do good work in us, work of new life, for your glory and for our good. Jesus, we pray this in your name.
If we're alive with him, we have a kingdom role. The risen Jesus brings us into his father's redeeming mission. Now you may not know this, but Jesus spent 40 days in between his resurrection and his ascension. There were lots of appearances to lots of groups of disciples and he taught them and he trained them, he got them ready. He was preparing them for what comes next. The book of Matthew, it ends with a passage that's known as the Great Commission.
This is basically like Luke's version of the Great Commission. He's giving us a different account of a different part of his teaching during those 40 days. And this passage tells us three things. Here's the three ways we're going to look at this today. We are entrusted by him, we are empowered by him, and we are encouraged by him. We're entrusted by him, empowered by him, and encouraged by him. Let's start with this. We are entrusted by him. When someone that you love, that you look up to, says to you, hey, there's something I'd like your help with.
You're probably inclined to listen to them, right? You may even say, sure, before you even know what it is. Just based on the relationship, based on your love for them, your respect for them. That's the disciples in this passage when Jesus speaks to them. He says, thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead. Now that part's happened. He's just finished it. His atonement for sin is complete. A new and living way to God has been opened up by his blood.
It was fulfilled just as scripture said. Thus it is written, he did it all by himself. But scripture says something else happens next, and it involves them. Thus it is written, that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. His disciples are part of the story. They have a role to play in God's mission, his redemptive mission. Imagine reading a great book, a really compelling book, with one of the most beautiful stories you've ever read, with a really amazing hero at the center of it.
And then imagine you've just finished reading it and the author knocks on your door. The author of that book comes in and sits you down and says, hey, I want to show you something. You see right here? That's you. I've written you into my story. You've got a part to play in this beautiful story that was so compelling to you. That is what is happening to the disciples at this moment. And that is the call that God continues to bring forth to his people.
I've given you a part in my story. I've written you into it. Isn't that amazing? This amazing story, we get to be a part of it. But what is that mission?
It is a mission of word. It is a mission of declaration, first and foremost. This is not primarily and centrally a mission to build houses, to cure diseases, to pass laws or to serve food. Those are all good things that can and should be done by God's people in his name. Those are all good things that can and should be done by God's people in God's name. But the mission that Jesus is entrusting to his apostles, to his church, is a mission of proclamation.
That is the center of the mission. How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news. And what is proclaimed? Repentance. That's a hard word. We hear that word and we cringe. But listen, repentance is a call to admit that each of us has a deadly problem that we cannot solve. A heart in rebellion against God. A heart that puts me as the ruler of my life instead of him and a heart that loves other things instead of him. To repent is to believe that God is telling the truth.
That's it. To repent is to believe that God is telling the truth that the wages of sin is death and that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Repentance means accepting his diagnosis, his prognosis, and his treatment.
Only a fool would listen to a doctor give a diagnosis and a prognosis of death and say no thank you to that treatment. Repentance is listening to him, his diagnosis, his prognosis, and his treatment. Repentance is turning away from sin and saying to God help me. I need your help. I cannot help myself. There is no other hope for me except for you. And you know what comes right after that? The good news. This is repentance for what? For the forgiveness of sins.
Few things are sweeter than being forgiven right by someone that has a righteous grievance against you. Few things are sweeter than that forgiveness, than that reconciliation. When I was in college I had several roommates and one of them that I lived with the longest well basically I was a jerk but I didn't see it at first. It was little things, little ways of being mean, of just being unkind to him.
Of dismissing him, demanding things of him that piled up over time. To the point that I could tell that our relationship was different. And I asked him what was going on. And he told me, you're really hard to live with, you're really unkind. He told me the truth that I had not been treating him like a brother.
And I listened to him and God helped me repent to him. And admit what I had done. But the relationship still wasn't back the way that it used to be. And I asked him, I said, what's going on? I repented, I meant it. Why do I still feel this distance between us? And he goes, I know you have. It's just taken me some time. Which that's the way it is sometimes between people, right?
I resolved, at first I was kind of frustrated, right? Hey, I've done my part, you do your part, let's get back to normal. It doesn't always work like that. I'd resolve to myself, well, I've just got to keep treating him the way that I should. I should have all along, and just wait and hope that our relationship will be restored. So I did. And it was a lot of months that went by. And suddenly we were in our living room one day and we were talking and laughing and just out of the blue he looked up at me and he said, Joel, I forgive you.
And oh, it felt so good. I remember that moment of receiving his forgiveness, of knowing that it was real, that it had happened. that the wounds had been patched up and had been healed, and we were now in a new place in our relationship.
Do you know that sweetness of being forgiven? If that's what happens between us, if we feel that sweetness of being forgiven, how much more? How much more to receive that forgiveness from the Lord of Lords, from the one who made you repentance for the forgiveness of sins, that is the proclamation. Our sins, they are many, but his mercy is more. His mercy is wide and it's deep. He has grace greater than our sin. And he's calling us, come to me, come to me in repentance.
And this mercy, this grace, this forgiveness, it comes through Jesus. Repentance for the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed in his name. Not in my name, not in your name, in Jesus' name. The work of Christ is the center of the gospel message. Without him, there is no good news. There is just an impossible chasm that we cannot overcome with no matter how much good behavior we have, no matter how much self improvement we undertake. There is just that chasm.
But in his name, because of what Jesus has done, he has bridged that for us. Only Jesus the Redeemer can bring us to God. Through faith in him, our sins are forgiven. This, this is what we proclaim. This is the message that we proclaim. And it will be proclaimed, Jesus says, to all nations. Everyone. the good news is not a secret to be held on to, that you keep from other people. It is to be spread out far and wide. I have this image of a playground and a merry-go-round.
Think about playing on a merry-go-round when you're a kid. No one sits on a merry-go-round and says, I just want to sit here. No, you get on it and you tell your friend, hey, spin me. Spin me. And they spin you as hard as they can and you try hard and hard to hold on but eventually your muscles give out and you get flung off into the mulch laughing. That is God himself spinning that merry-go-round and flinging out the gospel message far and wide to every tribe and tongue and nation.
It's propelled by his people to all nations. It started in Jerusalem but it goes out to everyone. Just like he told Abraham in Genesis 22 through your offspring all nations will be blessed. God is keeping his word. If you want to read Luke's sequel to his gospel, it's the book of Acts. Luke wrote that too. And it's all about how what Jesus says here is coming to pass. The proclamation of the gospel to all nations by his sent people. Jesus tells them you are witnesses of these things.
They're sent not with a philosophy but with a testimony. Do you see the difference between those two things? It's not just a world view or way of thinking. It's a testimony about things they have seen and experienced. About real life, real history, about God's work. That's what they are telling people about. The church is built on the foundation of the prophets of the Old Testament and the apostles of the New Testament. And the church standing on that foundation is still entrusted with this message.
The gospel proclamation. Each of us individually and us corporately collectively together. We are entrusted with this mission. The father has written us into the story. He's invited us to join him in his redemptive work. You have a proclamation. We have the apostles testimony of what they saw and heard and we have our own testimony of what we have experienced of God. What he's done for us. Has he healed you? He forgiven you? Has he reconciled you?
You've got a testimony to share. Now you might be thinking at this point but pastor I'm just not ready. Maybe somebody else. Maybe this is somebody else's job. I'll just cheer him on from the sidelines. Listen. Pay attention to this next section because we are not just entrusted by him but we are empowered by him. Earlier in this chapter two disciples were walking to Emmaus. They met the risen Jesus and their hearts burned as Jesus opened up the scriptures to them.
And now it's the other's turn. Jesus says everything written down about me and the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. Now we dove into this two Sundays ago. I'm not going to repeat that. I'll just summarize.
is God's story of redemption with Jesus as the main character. That's how Jesus understands the scriptures. It is held together by one story, the story of God's redemption accomplished through Christ. Jesus refers here to the three sections of the Hebrew scriptures. The law or the Torah, the prophets or the Nevaim, and the writings called Kevituim, which begin with the Psalms. Jesus is referring to all three traditional sections of the Old Testament.
And he says the whole Old Testament speaks with one voice of God's saving plan in me. But then he doesn't he shows it to them. He opened their minds to understand the scriptures and he said to them thus it is written. This is the first way that Jesus empowers us. He gives us illumination. to understand to understand the plans of God we need the wisdom of God. Our own wisdom is not enough. We heard that earlier in the scripture reading. We need spiritual illumination.
Imagine yourself being led into a darkened room. A pitch black room. You could fumble around in that room. You could figure out where the furniture is, where to sit down. You could figure out maybe the size of it a little bit. But you're never going to fully know that room until the lights come on. And when the lights come on, you see all this other detail that you could never see before. And everything that you've already gathered, all the information you've gathered has now been set in a total context of that room.
You know what that room is for. You know what that room looks like. You know your purpose in that room. That is what Jesus does for us. He turns on the lights so that we can understand scripture. God gives us minds that can reason and discern. We need those minds. It's part of bearing his image. But God's wisdom is higher than man's wisdom. And on account of sin our minds aren't always reliable. Has anyone here ever made a decision that they really thought out really carefully and it just went completely sideways?
Our minds are affected by sin too. Here's how Paul describes it. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God for they are folly to him. And he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord the veil is removed. This is what happened to the disciples in that moment. The veil is lifted. Jesus removed it so they can understand the Scriptures.
But don't feel left out. He does the same thing for us through his spirit. He turns on the lights. Now listen, I know the Bible can seem like a big intimidating book. It's okay, you can admit that. It can feel like a big intimidating book. But I want to tell you the truth, with his help, you can understand it. You can. But that will never happen if it stays up on your shelf or sitting on your nightstand. The illumination of the spirit is not just a download into our brains like Neo and the matrix learning kung fu.
It is not like that. We do actually have to open it up. So friends, church, Christian, open up your Bible, demonstrate your faith in God that he will help you by opening up the word. Read it. Study it. Discuss it. Debate it. Read commentaries. Have other people help you. And he opened up the scriptures to the disciples.
Now after that lesson, Jesus says, I've got even more help to give you. You need more help than this. Behold, I am sending the promise of my father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high. Have you ever had a delivery that was so valuable they won't just leave on the front I can't just leave it. I remember one time I was expecting a delivery and I was like I'll just go to the store real quick. I came back and I saw that dreaded tag on the front door.
But it had just been written moments ago so I got in my car driving around the neighborhood trying to find that I really wanted that delivery. But I left the house I shouldn't have left. Jesus says stay home it's coming it's coming for you the promise of the father the promise the power from on high he's talking about the Holy Spirit he told them at the last supper I will ask the father and he will give you another helper to be with you forever even the spirit of truth God said this through his prophet Joel it shall pour out my spirit on all flesh just like I was pouring out that water on Mallory and Tyler God promised I will pour out my spirit and this was coming in just a few weeks at Pentecost Jesus empowers his people the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is the power residing in God's people do you know that the same spirit that got Jesus up lives in you the spirit helps us pray the spirit gives us understanding of scripture the spirit reveals Christ to us and applies salvation to us and sanctifies us making us look like Jesus the spirit makes us a new creation and bears fruit in us the spirit helps us abide in him and convicts us of sin of proclaiming the good news the spirit tells us what to say and when now I didn't put all those scriptures up there but everything I just said came directly from scripture those are God's words about what the spirit does for you he has entrusted us with a message but we can't act independently how often do we try to obey him and
fail because we are trying on our power how silly when we have power from on high in us we need to rely on God's power instead of our own Stephen was saying this as he was introducing the time of prayer we do feel weak I feel weak every time I walk in here that's how we're supposed to feel we have this treasure in jars of clay that we and everyone will know that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us it is a good thing to admit your weakness to admit your frailty to admit and live within your limitations this is honesty we must rely on God's power because it belongs to him and he has given it to us now there's one more way Jesus empowers the disciples for the mission he led them out as far as Bethany and lifting up his hands he blessed them he doesn't just tell them what to do he blesses them in the ancient near east a blessing from a superior was highly sought after it was more valuable than the inheritance was to receive that blessing a little over 24 years ago I didn't know much I knew I somehow by the grace of God I knew that it was important to get her dad's blessing to go and talk to him and ask him to make sure that we were walking a path that our elders saw and approved of and said that's good I sought the blessing I wanted to know I wanted to walk forward in our future knowing that I had that a blessing that affirmation these disciples were ordinary people they were just like you and me they didn't have much education they weren't elite but Jesus gives them
his blessing don't skip over that part it is really important that means he affirms them in this role and in this mission I am with you you belong to interrogated by the council of Jewish religious leaders men with pedigrees learning and status men with jobs they had it all going on they were important people and guess what happened when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived that they were uneducated common men they were astonished and they recognized that they had been with Jesus if your faith is in Jesus then you have the blessing of God for this mission it rests on you don't look at yourself the way the world looks at you I'm going to say that again don't look at yourself the way the world looks at walk forward forward in that blessing you belong to him you have been sent God wants to use you you have a role and what's the result of this this entrusting of this empowerment I'm going to close with this we are encouraged by him you can really tell the quality of a leader by what kind of impact they have on those who follow them so what kind of impact does all this have on these apostles these disciples while Jesus was blessing them he parted from them and was carried up into heaven the disciples know that this is different this is final this is his ascension his physical departure from the earth his return to the father just like he told them he would do how are they going to respond to this they witnessed his work they seen his and my friends they worship him
once they just merely admired him but now their devotion has blossomed into something new did you know that this is the first time in the gospel of Luke that we hear of people worshiping Jesus the first time and later they are continually in the temple blessing God because of who he is and what he's done they bow their hearts in praise they worship him it is crested into full blown worship you are who you said you are Jesus you've done it you you're worthy of all the praise and we worship you and as he returns to the father they may be remembering him saying that it was to their advantage if you went they're looking at each other didn't he say something about it was going to be to our advantage if he left that's right he said he was going to send something what was it he called it the helper maybe that's the promise of the father maybe that's the power from on high and it is it is the holy spirit as they watch him ascend they think there he goes he's going to do what he said he's going to send the spirit he's going to accomplish it to send us that help the promise of the father the power from on high and so what do they do they return to Jerusalem they stayed home for that package just like he told them they wait to receive what was promised they obey him because they trust him he has been true to his word they say you know what we can wait a little longer we can stay here when you trust someone it's not hard to do what they ask and through that spirit we have fellowship with
him now that's how Jesus is with us always even to the end of the age physically he is at the right hand of the father right now he returned to be our intercessor our advocate my friends he still bears those scars he still has his body like the one that left they are filled with great joy you would expect them to be weeping right great joy has filled their hearts the mission is ahead they don't know what will happen but they are assured and they are hopeful we too have join up with him in the redeeming work that he is doing he made us for this he called us for this let's do it