If you've never been with us on a Sunday before, I would tell you what our normal practice is. Normal, not exclusive, but normally. We are preaching through New Testament books consecutively on Sunday mornings as we're doing today. And that's why we'll be looking at Matthew's gospel, Matthew chapter four. And we preach through Old Testament texts in the evening. And so this evening, we hope you'll join us at 6 p.m. as we close out the Lord's Day together in worship where we'll be continuing with our study of the life of Solomon, seeking to understand generational sin and the consequences of our sin for our children and grandchildren following us. I took a geography class as I was required to in eighth grade at Robert S. Kerr Junior High School with Mr. Williams. This was before the internet, before computers. We had these odd things called globes We had atlases and I got hooked on maps. And I wanted to understand the history and culture of places. And so the crowning achievement for geography class in eighth grade was we each had to write a paper on one of the 77 counties of Oklahoma. I chose Comanche County. because all my family was from there and I could still by memory tell you some of the points that I made. The topography of Comanche County, the high spot in the county and the state was Mount Scott, which could be climbed so quickly that I walked up it between breakfast and lunch and still had a little while left over before I got back. And we had to talk about the crops. Well, that was easy because the crops in Comanche County could all be found on my granddad's farm. Pecan trees, cotton, wheat, and then there was the wildlife. I knew about that because my granddad was always chasing them off. Coyotes, bobcats, and there was the only surviving herd at that time of bison in the world. We're about five miles away from my grandfather's farm. There were water resources. That took about five minutes to know. Medicine Creek, that was the only water in Comanche County. Kind of dry there. And there were the natives of the region, some of whom lived at the end of my grandfather's farm. Wichita Indians, Osage and Caddo Indians. But that year in eighth grade, I was hooked and became a lifelong geography nerd. The Bible is no different. Its events take place in a specific location. Not in Antarctica or the Galapagos Islands, but in the Middle East. And I hope that you were handed, as you walked in, not only a bulletin, but a map on both sides. Because, oddly enough, I'm going to ask you to look at this map during the preaching of the Word. What we're going to see today is perhaps more so than any other text in the Gospels, we're going to see the geographic context of a particular passage is vital. We're lovers of hermeneutics here, hermeneutics meaning the interpretation of the word. And the geographical context of any text refers to the specific location, the surrounding environment where a text was written or intended to be understood, which is crucial for accurately interpreting the meaning of the text. Context is always important. Think about every context in the Bible, every passage, has at least the following context. What's the historical context? What was the time and place in which this text was written? Well, this text was written in the middle of the first century. There's a literary context. What type of text is it? Is it history? Is it poetry? Is it didactic? What's the political context, meaning what was the governance of the nation or the people at that time? So the key principle, and we're developing our interpretive skills, the key principle of hermeneutics is that context always determines meaning. You know how the cults do this, how they will take yanked text out of their context, they will quote part of a verse, they'll not refer to the context, but taking verses out of context can lead to misinterpretation. And so you must know today, especially in our text, the geographic context, geographic features such as mountains and rivers and oceans. They have a significant impact on trade, transportation, and the movement of people and goods. Today we're going to see Jesus moving from one place to another. Each of these places are vitally important. And then things like climate and weather patterns and natural disasters can impact agriculture, industry, and human settlement. So in our text today, it's going to be vital for you to carefully grasp the geographic context. So not only am I going to ask you to look at your Bible, beginning in Matthew chapter 4, but also that map. And what we will see is that Jesus fulfills a prophecy that's made to people who live in a distinct region. It's not made to the residents of Egypt or Jerusalem. It's made to the dwellers who live in Galilee. We'll be looking at the map very carefully. You must know who they are. And so let me encourage you to, at least metaphorically, roll up your sleeves and prepare to dig into the word and into geography this morning. Let's seek the Lord's help at this time. Oh, blessed Lord, who count, who caused all the Holy Scriptures to be written for our learning, grant us now so to hear them, read them, learn them inwardly, digest them that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Look with me at Matthew chapter 4, the beginning of the context is in verse 12, and in our ongoing exposition of the Gospel of Matthew, our text here, verse 12, opens with Jesus receiving a troubling bit of information. His cousin, John the Baptist, he hears, has been imprisoned. in the fortress, the Palace of Machaerus, which is located in modern day Jordan. The incarceration, the imprisoning of John is the signal now that the ministry of his forerunner has been completed. John the Baptist will have no more public ministry and the baton is being passed. It is now formally time for John to decrease and Jesus to increase. Now, before we run away from this, look at verse 12. What is it that Jesus heard? This is going to come up over and over again, this little incident. This is the first telling of it in Matthew 4. It'll be told again in Matthew 11. It'll be told again in Matthew 14. And so, by that repetition, you should understand, oh, I think this is an important incident. Why was John the Baptist, Jesus' cousin, arrested and in prison? Well, because John the Baptist had been so bold as to go and rebuke the king, Herod Antipas, for marrying his brother, Philip's wife, Herodias. And Herod and Herodias had both put away their spouses in order to do this. And we'll study these in greater detail when we come to Matthew 11 and 14, John the Baptist imprisonment and his execution. But here's the problem. Here's why John the Baptist was thrown in prison. He had confronted moral wickedness in high places. And for doing that, he's thrown in prison. He stands in a long glorious line of men who'd been called to address sin in rulers. Elijah was called to address sin of Ahab. Nathan was called to address the sin of David. Few of those come to mind. But the specific thing that John is addressing in the life of Herod of Antipas is this. incest. When you look at the Old Testament laws, the moral laws about what was acceptable in terms of marital relations, over and over again God says this. For example, Leviticus 18, you shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother's wife. It is your brother's nakedness. Or Leviticus 20, if a man takes his brother's wife, it is an unclean thing. And so John the Baptist hears that the king had cast off his wife, and he's taken his brother's wife as his own. And so John, being a man who's deeply rooted in the Old Testament law, he goes and preaches these texts, Leviticus 18, Leviticus 20, to Herod of Antipas. Now, the text is clear. In scripture, John doesn't go about inflaming the public by these things. He goes directly to Herod of Antipas and he addresses him personally. We know from a first century historian, Josephus, in his Antiquities. that the prison he was thrown in, John the Baptist, was the prison of Machaerus. The most dreaded feature of the prison of Machaerus was its underground dungeon, hot and dark. And that's where John was held for about 10 months before finally Herod of Antipas found an occasion to go ahead and execute him. And what the life and ministry of John the Baptist is meant to teach us is that all preaching against sin is always an inherently dangerous enterprise. But this is what Jesus hears. Look at verse 12, this is the trigger. John has been put in prison. And so this is the trigger for Jesus, look at the end of verse 12 and the beginning of 13, to depart to Galilee. Now is when you need your map. Look at your map, it's two-sided and you see the side that says the 12 tribes of Israel. You will want to locate, I'm sorry, the Palestine in the time of Jesus, you'll want to locate The region of Galilee. This is where Jesus departs to. You'll notice in the map of Palestine, Galilee is a region. It's the northern district of Israel. Nazareth is a small town in Galilee. And then look at the southern part of the map, Judea, was a region. It's the southern district of Israel. Jerusalem was the centerpiece of the southern district. So in between Galilee in the north and Judea in the south was Samaria, which every faithful Jew studiously avoided and went around for religious reasons. They didn't want to be contaminated by the heretical religion of the Samaritans. So Jesus left Nazareth and he came to Capernaum. Look on your map there and locate where Nazareth is. If it looks like it's in the middle of nowhere, that's because it is. It's in the middle of nowhere, a tiny town in Galilee. When we read about it, and this is where I want to hang on every word of our text, when we read about Jesus is in Nazareth and then he departs to Galilee, I want to be a little clearer about this. Technically, when Jesus hears about John the Baptist, he's on his way out of Nazareth. He's about to get run out of town. Now's when you're going to have to really do some work. Keep one finger in Matthew. I know I'm asking you to juggle three things here. A map, Matthew's gospel and now Luke's gospel. Look at Luke chapter 4 and I want you to see how Jesus left Nazareth. When we talk about somebody being run out of town on a rail, that's exactly what happens. In Luke 4.16, We're told this is Jesus' hometown where he'd been brought up. He was always known as Jesus of Nazareth. And so Jesus comes back home, you'd think triumphal entry. Jesus is coming home after he's begun his ministry and he comes home to Nazareth. I bet they have parades. I bet there's a big deal made over this. Because the whole village, small as it was, would have remembered Jesus as that one who grew up in our midst, who grew up in wisdom and stature and favor with God and man. And as Jesus comes into town, he sees not many, but all familiar faces. Childhood playmates, neighbors, relatives, people he'd done carpentry work for. And Jesus comes to the synagogue, look at Luke 4.16, he comes to the synagogue, there would have been one of them, in Nazareth on the Sabbath, and he stood up to read the Isaiah scroll. And look carefully at what is said in Luke chapter 4 because very quickly we're going to see why he gets run out of town. A sermon, and the linkage between he and John the Baptist is John the Baptist gets thrown in prison for a sermon to the king, a moral sermon. Jesus is going to preach a sermon and instead of being jailed he's going to be run out of town after a death attempt. So one of the themes of this text today is preaching biblically is dangerous. That was the case in John the Baptist, certainly the case with Jesus. Look at Luke 4. Jesus stands up to preach in his hometown synagogue. And first of all, he explains his incarnational ministry. He's quoting here from the Isaiah scroll. He says that twice. Now Jesus waits until he's 30, after he's been anointed by John the Baptist and has officially entered into his public ministry, to begin explaining why he came. He takes the words of Isaiah's prophecy in his mouth to explain. And he says this, look at Luke 4.18. The Spirit has sent me, and he names several things that the Spirit, quoting from Isaiah's text, that the Spirit has sent him to do. Look, for example, in Luke 4. He tells the hearers in his hometown synagogue that the Spirit of God is upon him because he's anointed me to preach. The gospel, Jesus is telling them He was first and foremost a preacher. He preached repentance and faith. He preached the gospel of the kingdom, that good news that He's redeeming a people from every nation, tribe, and tongue, extending His rule until every knee bows and every tongue confesses He's Lord. The Spirit had anointed Him, He says. to preach good news to the poor. Certainly the economic poor is meant by this, but much more the poor in spirit. He's been called to preach to those who are so poor they recognize they have nothing to offer to God. They recognize their own moral and spiritual bankruptcy. They're struggling under the weight of their own sin. They know they need a savior. Jesus is saying, for those who want eternal life but can pay nothing and have no righteousness of their own, I've come with good news. But Jesus, in fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah, He has more tasks. Look at the text in Luke 4.18. Not only has He come to preach, He's come to be the great physician. He's come to heal the brokenhearted. Certainly Jesus was able to heal. If we track all the miracles of his healing, they run into dozens in the pages of the gospel. But he says, Jesus says, look carefully at his words, the prophecy he's quoting and applying to himself in the hometown synagogue. He's come to heal a specific kind of ailment. Look what it is in Luke 14. The broken hearted, the shamed, the loser, the bottom of the heap, The disappointed, the grieving, those who lead lives of sad desperation. I think of my favorite example of this in Luke chapter seven, the broken hearted widow who's burying her only son. But Jesus says he's come to do more. Not just to preach, not to heal the brokenhearted. Look at verse 18 again. He's come to proclaim liberty to the captives. And then again, in verse 18, to set at liberty those who are oppressed. Jesus explains his ministry. He takes Isaiah's prophecy, applying it to himself, and he explains his ministry as one who frees captives. What kind of captives? Did Jesus go about Palestine staging jailbreaks? Well, none. But He did go about telling those who were enslaved by their own sins, He's come to set them free. That's why Jesus will say in John 8, if the Son makes you free, you'll be free indeed. This is why we love to sing Charles Wesley's majestic hymn, O for a Thousand Tongues. He breaks the power of cancelled sin. He sets the prisoner free. His blood can make the foulest clean. His blood availed for me. The only person who can sing that song and be true is the person who's been liberated by Christ. But there's more. Jesus says in verse 18 of Luke 4 that he's come to be the one who heals the blind, to give recovery of sight to the blind. And certainly he does this physically. But he's talking about something much deeper. He's talking about spiritual blindness. How terrible is it to be physically blind, unable to read a book or see the expression on your grandchild's face? And Jesus certainly mercifully gave sight to the physically blind. But how much worse is it to be spiritually blind? Because what we're going to find out is Jesus came to give sight, enabling men to see the kingdom of God. And notice Jesus goes on in verse 19 of Luke chapter 4. This is his sermon that gets him in trouble. Jesus goes on to say he has come to proclaim the year of Jubilee to people to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord in the year of Jubilee. Every Israelite would know this from Leviticus 25. In the year of Jubilee, every 50 years, once every 50 years, all debts were canceled, all slaves were liberated, all inheritances were restored. And Jesus is saying, I've come to inaugurate not a day of Jubilee or year, but an age of Jubilee, the new covenant. In this era, what was lost in Adam will be restored only better. Look at what Jesus does in Luke 4, verse 21. This is what gets him killed. He began to say to them, today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. He's telling his hometown friends and relatives in Nazareth, he's the Messiah. He's the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy. Now you would think at this moment, wouldn't you? That everyone in Nazareth and the little synagogue there would be overjoyed and you would think wrong. So outraged are his friends. Relatives in the synagogue of Nazareth. Look down in your text to verse 28 to 29. So all those in the synagogues, when they heard these things were filled with wrath and they rose up and thrust him out of the city and they led him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built so that they might throw him down over the cliff. First public sermon. Everybody wants to kill him. Nazareth was the first place that refused Jesus. And so notice what Jesus does. shakes the dust off his feet, leaves Nazareth and walks the 40 miles in the region of Galilee to Capernaum. Now, if you're looking at your map, you will notice that Capernaum is several miles to the north, 40 miles to the north of Nazareth. And we are told in Matthew 4.13 that this is where Jesus, when he left Nazareth, he came here. He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea. Notice it's quickly added in Matthew 4.13, in the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali. Now's where I'm going to ask you to be really quick. You're back in eighth grade geography with me. Turn your map over and you will notice. the regions of the 12 tribes of Israel. This is going back in time 1,000 years from the day of Jesus. Notice what the regions are that border the Sea of Galilee, Zebulun, and Naphtali. So in Jesus' day, people would say, oh yeah, he's in the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali, the old tribal grounds. So in this season of ministry that Jesus is entering into, he largely stays in the Galilean region of Israel, the north of Israel. And he does this for several reasons. First of all, He goes to Galilee to fulfill prophecy, we'll see momentarily. Jesus moving around inside of Galilee is a fulfillment of an ancient prophecy. But the second reason, and you can see it, I want you to visually see it, the second reason Jesus stays in the region of Galilee, going from Nazareth even further north, to Capernaum is he wants to escape the scrutiny of the religious leadership of Jerusalem that's down in the south. The temple is way down in Jerusalem. The religious establishment is 95% there, and the people in Jerusalem look down on the Galileans. They viewed the Galileans as rural bumpkins who didn't know the scriptures. Galileans even had a distinct accent. Jesus had an accent, and it was Galilean. And Galilee, no self-respecting resident of Judea, the city of Jerusalem, wanted to go to Galilee because Galilee was notorious as a hotbed for zealots and revolutionary movements. And so this is why, for example, in John chapter 7, when everybody in Jerusalem realized where Jesus was from, they could hear it as soon as he opened his mouth. There's that Galilean accent that was very pronounced. So everybody in Jerusalem, when they hear Jesus is preaching and they say, where's he from? Galilee. In John chapter seven, here's what they all said to one another. Will the Christ come out of Galilee? And they all had a good laugh. Even Nathanael, who's meant to be one of Jesus' disciples, when he hears where Jesus is from, he's from tiny town Galilee, Nazareth. Even Nathanael says, In John chapter 1, can anything good come out of Nazareth? Another reason why Jesus goes from Nazareth, look at the top of your map, to Capernaum is because he's lowly. And that's who lives in the northern region of Israel, in Galilee. And it pleases God generally to call the lowly. Remember how Paul states this in 1 Corinthians 1? Paul says this, and this has been, when people ask me if I have a live verse, I say yeah, 1 Corinthians 1. This is God's method of redeeming men. He is usually pleased to call the lowly. In 1 Corinthians 1, Paul says it this way, See your calling, brethren. There are not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God has chosen The foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise so that no flesh should ever glory in his presence. Jesus gravitates to the lowly. He gravitates away from Jerusalem as he moves north from Nazareth into Capernaum because that's where the lowly are. The fourth reason why Jesus goes to Capernaum, it's in the area called Galilee of the Gentiles. This deliberate commencement and centering of his ministry in a region dominated by Gentiles hints at his calling, which is to call people from every nation, every tribe, every tongue. And so he goes where there's even a larger population of Gentiles. So I want you to notice the key word. Look at the active verb in Matthew 4.13. Jesus is dwelling in Capernaum by the sea. Dwelling. The term for dwelling is the actual same word that's used, for example, in John 14.17 to describe what the Holy Spirit does when he saves a man. He comes in and dwells. Makes his residence there. And so for a while, if you were going to send a letter to Jesus, you'd have to send it P.O. Box Capernaum. Because that's where he's dwelling. Look at the village of Capernaum, where it is. You can notice this, what would be very predictable for what would be the economy there. The village of Capernaum is on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. It's a fishing village and surrounding it on land are agricultural fields. There was a Roman garrison there. And if we carefully tracked where Jesus was move by move in the gospel, he seems to have spent more time in Capernaum than anywhere else in his public ministry. The area of Galilee, look at your map very carefully. I want you to get a real sense of geographic context. The area in Galilee is called by scholars the evangelical triangle because you have these tiny villages that are all set together in a triangle. Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazin. Chorazin is so small it's not even lifted on the map. But they're all about two miles apart from each other and they form the three corners of what again New Testament scholars call the evangelical triangle, Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazin. And here's the amazing thing. You're thinking, Carl, those three towns you just said, Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazin, where does that come from? When we come to Matthew 11, we're going to hear Jesus say this. that he did so many miracles in these towns, far away from Jerusalem, in these tiny nowhere towns, fishing villages, country towns. Jesus did so many miracles. He taught so much that he's going to say one of the most scathing, chilling words of rebuke to a location. Jesus will point to these three little towns. And he'll say, if Tyre and Sidon and Sodom had experienced such miracles as Capernaum, Chorazin, and Bethsaida did, they would have repented. And so what we're going to find is Jesus, he pours his life, he pours his healing miracles, he pours his teaching ministry into these three tiny towns, largely. Capernaum, Chorazin, Bethsaida. And there's almost zero response. Well, Jesus coming to this area is a fulfillment of prophecy. Look at verse 12 through 16 of our context. Now the motif, if you remember, one of the primary motifs of Matthew's gospel is promise and fulfillment. Already we've seen several promises that Matthew has pointed out. Oh, by the way, this actually Jesus fulfills that Old Testament prophecy. This word of Jesus fulfills that Old Testament prophecy. So I want you to notice the fact. Look at verse 13 and 14 of our text. He departed to Galilee, leaving Nazareth. He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali, that it might be fulfilled that which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. By the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light. And upon those who sat in the region, and the shadow of death, light has dawned." Now, this prophecy, I'm going to ask you to do a tiny bit more work. Look at Isaiah's Gospel, Isaiah 9, the passage that Pastor Dodds read for you a moment ago. In Isaiah 9, if you're listening very carefully, you noticed these places introduced. In Isaiah 9, 1 and 2. Isaiah speaks 600 years before the incarnation. He says there, he speaks of the land of Zebulun, the land of Naphtali, and afterward more heavily oppressed her by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan. In Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined. When was that verse fulfilled? Now, right now. Matthew chapter 4, when Jesus left Nazareth, run out of town, almost killed, and He comes to Capernaum where He'll be rejected, that was prophesied 600 years before in Isaiah chapter 9. This is a fulfillment. So if you look back at your map of the 12 tribes, there comes Jesus into the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali, also called Galilee of the Gentiles. Because in the great Gentile invasion by the Assyrians 100 years before, this area was conquered, Jews removed, Gentiles inserted. So Jesus is fulfilling prophecy by coming to a people, listen to how they were characterized 600 years before the fact. He's coming to a people who sat in great darkness. That's their spiritual moral characterization of people who sat in great darkness. In other words, they were afflicted with extreme spiritual blindness, delusion, depravity, despondency. Blindness is one of the most used figures of speech to describe the condition of the lost man. Well, he's blind. Listen to how Paul describes the Gentiles in Ephesians 4. He says, the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that's in them, because of the blindness of their heart. That's where Jesus is going. When he leaves Nazareth, he goes to Capernaum, where every man, if his physical condition were really a reflection of his spiritual condition, everybody would be blind. Blindness is a spiritual analogy showing men's lost state. And by the way, just to remind you that men don't hate their blindness, they love it. Men are endeared to their spiritual blindness. Do you remember what Jesus said about lost men in John 3, 19? Men love darkness rather than light. When Jesus goes from Nazareth to Capernaum to begin this next season of ministry, he's going to people who are spiritually blind and they love it. They want it no other way. They shut out the light, as Romans 1 says, and they suppress the truth in unrighteousness. They love ignorance, even though here comes the light of the world, Jesus bringing them truth, they would rather be in ignorance. They love immorality, even though Jesus is bringing holiness. In fact, men can't even, according to Paul in 1 Corinthians 2, men can't even see the light. Adam's sin has been so effectively transmitted generation by generation. Tonight, we will in our exposition of the life of Solomon, we're going to be looking at generational transmission of sin. A sermon you need to hear. Maybe it describes the reasons your family is the way it is. But Adam's sin has been so effectively transmitted that the consequences turns out All men have been born spiritually blind and they remain that way until God graciously opens their eyes. And so notice who's coming to this city, Galilee or this region, Galilee of the Gentiles, where men sit in great darkness. It's the one who's called the light of the world. Christ's first recorded words, of course, in scripture are Genesis 1-3, let there be light. Israel was taught to sing, preparing for the Messiah. The Lord is my light and my salvation in Psalm 27. When Jesus is born, even though it's at night, the lights come on and supernatural light transform the midnight sky outside of Bethlehem as if to say, the light has come. What does it mean to say, here comes the light of the world strolling into Capernaum? What do we mean by that? Well, it means when we say Jesus is the light of the world, it means the world has no other source of light, other source of truth, other than him. If a man is going to know truth, the options are Jesus or darkness. There's no third alternative. Therefore, everyone who's ever lived is in need of Jesus the light. The world was made for this light. It's not a foreign light, but the light of the creator and owner of the world. When this light comes in, it makes all things beautiful and shows sin for the ugliness that it is. And one day, one glorious day, Jesus in his return will shine. in all his glory, so that the scriptures end by affirming in Revelation 21 that the heavenly Jerusalem won't even need the sun, the moon, or the stars because Jesus will be the light of heaven forever and ever. Now by coming to Capernaum, this historic region in the tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali, Jesus is formally fulfilling ancient prophecy. Matthew tells us so. Now, I want to remind you, because I'm keeping score here, how often Matthew does this. Look back, just turn two pages back to Matthew chapter one, and I want you to notice, and maybe you'll say, I think I'm onto something here. I think Carl might be right. One of the things that Matthew does is every time Jesus fulfills an Old Testament prophecy, he says, here's another one, here's another one, here's another one. Because what he wants you to see, Matthew has a deep burden that you will about halfway through his gospel say, hey, I think Jesus is the promised one. Because every aspect of his life and ministry particularly fulfills Old Testament prophecy. Look at Matthew, for example, Matthew 1.22. We read, So all this was done, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall be with child. Or look at Matthew chapter two, verse 15 in Matthew. Matthew 2, 15. And they were there, this is Joseph and Mary and Jesus, until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken through the Lord by the prophet. Or look at verse 17. Then was fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying. Or look at Matthew 2, 23. He came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled. Or look at Matthew 3.15, when Jesus answered John the Baptist and said, Permit it to be so now, for thus it's fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. The point that we are meant to see is even Jesus leaving one tiny town, Nazareth, and going to another tiny town at the end of the world, Capernaum, in the Galilee of Gentiles, a place that would never even be remembered if it weren't remembered in Scripture. that every one of these events fulfills even the most obscure Old Testament prophecies so that not one word of prophecy can fall to the ground unfulfilled. How do we apply this word? This text, like a thousand other texts in scripture, draws the antithesis. You are meant to think this way when you see this. The people who sat in great darkness have seen a great light. Either as you came here today, either you're blind or you see. Jesus came to give sight to blind men. He is the light of the world. Are you blind? The Pharisees, we would see in Luke chapter four and other texts say, Oh, we see, we see just fine. But they couldn't see Jesus, deity as power, and they couldn't see their own sin and bankruptcy. My friend, if you're content this morning with your own blindness, then Jesus is passing you by. Unbeliever, you're blind. and in spiritual and moral darkness now, but that will be your eternal destiny if you don't plead with Jesus, the light of the world, to open your eyes. Lost men now love darkness. They'll have it forever. We're told in scripture that that will be the fate of the lost man who will live in the blackness of darkness forever. Oh, how great will be the judgment upon the residents of Nazareth, Capernaum, Chorazin, and how great will be the judgment upon all who have read and heard so much of the words and works of Jesus, but not responded in faith and repentance. My unbelieving friend, your unbelief is unreasonable. But more than that, it is damnable. And so what I would plead with you to do is to look at the people in Nazareth and look at the people in Capernaum and say, I don't want that. Put off the wicked darkness of unbelief and believe the gospel. If you know you're blind and poor in spirit, cry out to Jesus and he will bring healing to your blindness. He is the light of the world. But I want to speak to believers for just a moment. Never forget that you were walking in darkness. You were those people who sat in darkness, but you've been rescued. Paul writes about it this way in Colossians 1, that you've been rescued from the domain of darkness. I hope you never get over that, that even if you were converted 40, 50, 60 years ago, it would still bring you sublime joy. to remember that you walked in darkness, but Christ came and brought you into the light. But believer, one other application I would make. Don't ever be surprised at the hardened unbelief around you. When you look at that lost man or woman who lives in your house, or works at the next cubicle to you, or your next door neighbor, and you scratch your head and say, how can they not believe in the light of the world? My friend, men witness miracles. like the ones in Nazareth did or Capernaum, but they have the uncanny ability to suppress the truth in unrighteousness. If men can stare at Christ in the flesh works and disbelieve, don't be surprised at any measure of darkness. Jesus came to be the light of the world. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you once again for this glorious picture of our Jesus, who comes to the darkest places on earth. He comes to those who are sitting in darkness to be the light. And so, Lord, we pray that our Lord Jesus would shine upon those, even this morning, who are right here in this room, who are sitting in darkness, who are walking in moral and intellectual and spiritual blindness. Lord, give them sight.