If you would turn in your Bibles with me to Luke chapter 18. Luke chapter 18. Look at verses 31 through 34 this morning. Luke chapter 18. Starting in verse 31. hear the word of the Lord." And taking the twelve, he said to them, See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles and we'd be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise. But they understood none of these things. The saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said." Let's go to the Lord in prayer. God, we come to you this morning with eager hearts, hungry hearts, We do stand in need of your grace, and we come to this time in your word in search of your grace. We pray that you would give it to us through your word. We ask that you would also do these things that are necessary, that we profit from the reading and the preaching of your word, that you would illumine our minds to understand the truth and give us clarity to understand the meaning of these words that you've revealed. But God, we also ask that you would touch our hearts and that we would not be distracted from applying these words to our own hearts or resistant in any way. We pray that you would make us receptive and that we would have ears to hear, eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to receive the truth as it is in Jesus. And God, we pray that you would change us, that you would help to prepare us for life in this world and make us to walk more faithfully after you as we follow your Son, Jesus Christ. We pray that you would make us heavenly minded as we make our way not to Jerusalem, but towards the heavenly Jerusalem. And God, undertake our own earthly pilgrimage there. Pray that you be with us by your spirit. God, we pray that these words and these truths would profit us for eternity. We pray all of this in Christ's name. Amen. Ever since the end of chapter 9 in Luke's gospel, Jesus has been determined to get to Jerusalem. If you just flip back for a moment to Luke chapter 9 and starting in verse 51, towards the end of that chapter, We read that when the days drew near for him to be taken up. And so we see here a foreshadowing of Jesus, I think, his crucifixion, his You see a lot in here. What has he taken up? He's taken up, arrested by the authorities. He is taken up and lifted up on the cross when he died there. He was, of course, after his resurrection, he ascended to the right hand of the Father on high. But very clearly there is an idea that Jesus has come for a purpose. that he is determined to fulfill that purpose, and we read there in verse 51 that he set his face to go to Jerusalem. Knowing what this is going to mean, what his arrival will bring about, Jesus determines to get to Jerusalem. His face was set towards the city. We read again in verse 53, that this affected the way that his ministry began to take a turn and some people were turned off. They turned aside and turned away because they saw that Jesus was determined to go to Jerusalem. He was single-minded and focused on this reason why he came. And so we read in verse 53, his face was set toward Jerusalem. People did not receive him because his face was set towards the city. Well, in many ways, Jerusalem functions in Luke's gospel the way the Celestial City functions in Pilgrim's Progress, if you've ever read through that classic Christian work by John Bunyan. And we actually read through this on Wednesday nights a few years ago, and I love that book, one of my favorite books outside of the Bible, and one of the best-selling books of all time in the English language outside of the King James Bible. But in that book, the main character, Christian, is on a perilous journey towards this celestial city, which is the city of the great king. And no matter where he's at, what danger he's facing, everything that happens to Christian, every decision that's made, every hardship that's endured, every temptation that's faced, all of it is with that destination in mind. And we've got, the kids have some maps that illustrate the pilgrim's journey, Christian's journey. And so you can see the city of destruction where he begins and all of them, the places that he visits along the way and eventually at the top of the mountain, usually these maps are long if you've ever seen one of the pilgrim's progress. At the very end of the journey there is the celestial city. in the clouds, beyond the river, and it just seems as you're reading it that you're never out of sight of the Celestial City because it's always in mind. It's always the focus. All of the shortcuts and the by-paths and everything is to avert Christian on his journey away from the true pathway towards the Celestial City. Well, in the allegory of Pilgrim's Progress, the city represents the heavenly destination for God's people who make our way along a difficult and dangerous earthly pilgrimage. Now, from our perspective, in light of what we know happened in Jerusalem when Jesus and the disciples arrived, we know that Jerusalem was no heaven. That this isn't a, you know, their journey to Jerusalem from Luke 9.51 through the end of the book whenever Jesus arrives and the events that unfold at that time. We know that there's not a correspondence, but nevertheless, just as Christian is always aware of the celestial city. He's always focused on and determined to go there. Jesus is determined to make his way to Jerusalem. And that city is always in mind. It's always up to Jerusalem. And this is the focus. And so we know that Jerusalem was no heaven. Jesus, he likewise made his way toward Jerusalem knowing full well the trials his arrival would initiate. Just as we look back and we think, we know what's going to happen when he gets there. But here's the thing, the disciples, they were not so sure. They had some idea that Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah. He was the promised great king who would free his people from their bondage and bring about the reign of God on earth. But they did not understand that the Messiah would have to suffer. And so as Jesus made his way toward Jerusalem and towards the suffering that he would have to endure and the sacrifice that he would ultimately make, The disciples grew uncertain and afraid. The Gospel of Mark really captures what was happening in the minds and hearts of the disciples when Jesus spoke these words, preparing them for what was to come. In Mark 10.32, we have a parallel text, and Luke and Mark tell the same story, but they include some different details. And here's what Mark tells us in Mark 10.32. We read that they were on the road going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them, and they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid. And so taking the twelve again, he began to tell them what was to happen to him. And so in light of their uncertainty and their anxiety and their fearfulness, Jesus takes a moment. He's walking out ahead of him. He is walking at a quick clip. He's ready to get to Jerusalem. He knows he has unfinished business. And this is the reason why he came. And he has a realistic expectation of what's going to happen. He knows he's going to have to suffer and to sacrifice. But they don't understand this. And because of their uncertainty, They're fearful, they're anxious, so Jesus speaks to them. And if we, like these men, if we're going to follow Jesus along life's journey, we had better be adequately prepared. And so, for example, Jesus teaches his disciples elsewhere to count the cost. And what is this if not to prepare those who would follow Jesus by giving them a realistic and biblical expectation for what following Jesus is going to mean for us. That's where Jesus teaches his disciples how they can expect to be treated by the world. No servant is greater than his master, and if the world treated Christ in this way, we can expect a similar mistreatment if we're going to follow him. Well, Jesus would have us to enter into the Christian life clear-eyed and know what's to come. Now if we believe what some preachers say, then we might expect to live our best life now and to enjoy prosperity and good health if we have faith. Maybe you've heard certain TV preachers or maybe you've heard this way of thinking on the radio or have known people who believe this sort of thing. And there are Christians who believe that health and wealth come That's God's will for Christians in this life and they'll come to those who have enough faith. But this isn't consistent with the Bible and with the expectations that Jesus instills in his followers. And so Jesus and his disciples, they're heading toward Jerusalem and the disciples are beginning to be afraid of what they'll find there. They don't yet understand the necessity and the purpose of Christ's suffering and death. And so then Jesus speaks these words which are intended to address their uncertainty and their anxiety. And in time they will recall these words and they'll find in them help and comfort. My hope is that this morning that we will pay close attention to these words and reflect upon them and find help and comfort now. And so that we will be prepared for the challenges facing us in the Christian life, we must set before us the suffering and sacrifice of Christ and understand why it was necessary, what its purpose entails. So first of all, we learn here that the suffering and death of Christ is personally significant. If we're going to understand Christianity, we've got to see that the whole thing really revolves around the cross, and whether we're looking forward to the cross, as the disciples were, or whether we're reflecting back on what Jesus did 2,000 years ago on Calvary. We've got to understand the suffering and death of Christ, and we need to understand that the suffering and death of Christ is personally significant. Jesus speaks to his disciples in verse 31. He says, see, we are going up to Jerusalem. And it is interesting, and you might just take this as there's no real significance to these words, it just is a description of what actually happened, that there were people with him. But it is interesting how often in the New Testament the gospel is explained, the details are recounted, and the meaning is explained in connection with these first-person pronouns, I, me, we. You need to understand that if you don't understand the death and the suffering of Christ in connection with this first-person personal pronoun, me, I, then you're going to miss out on the help and the comfort that that might give you. This so-called Jerusalem journey that we're in the midst of here in Luke's gospel, it's not made by Jesus alone, but by Jesus and his disciples. And it was important that they realize that Jesus' work included them, even though it did not involve them in the way they might expect. as they're anticipating this great king. This is going to be the son of David, the descendant of the great king David, who God has promised that there's going to be a son. And they think this is Him. This is Jesus. He is the descendant who God is going to put on an everlasting throne. is going to make him king, and his kingdom will know no end, and it will know no limitations. It's going to have a universal extent. He'll rule over all nations. And so they're looking forward to the glory of the Christ kingdom. And we see this in Mark chapter 10, just after Jesus says these things. You see how In Mark's account of these words, you see how just following after them, the disciples misunderstand what it's going to mean for them to go with Christ. And we read about this expectation to reign with Christ in glory. Jesus responds by telling them that if they were to reign with Him, then they must suffer for Him. I want to read Mark 10, starting in verse 35. And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you. And he said to them, What do you want me to do for you? And they said to him, Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory. So they know that this is God's anointed king, and he is the savior, and he is the hero of the story of redemption, and God is about to enthrone him, and he's about to finally free God's people from their bondage, and they want to be involved. They're happy to go with him, but their involvement means we want to be involved in your glory, Christ. We want to be involved in your victory. We want to be involved in the prosperity of this, the triumph. And Jesus said to them, you do not know what you're asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? And they said to him, we are able. And Jesus said to them, the cup that I drink, you will drink. And with the baptisms with which I am baptized, you will be baptized. to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, for it is for those for whom it has been prepared." And when the ten heard about it, they began to be indignant at James and John. Their hearts were perhaps motivated by a desire to rule over their brothers. They wanted not only to share with Christ and His glory, but they wanted an exalted position, even among the disciples. Well, of course, whenever the other disciples caught wind of this, they weren't too pleased. They began to be indignant at James and John. And Jesus called them to him and said to them, You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them, but it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came, not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." So as we look at Luke 18, verse 31, we see Jesus preparing them as he uses these words, we are going up to Jerusalem. It is, I think, to remind them that yes, they're going to be involved. with His ministry, His work, to a certain degree. Because as we follow the Savior, as we seek to live the Christian life on this earthly journey and pilgrimage that we're on, we have to expect not just to share in His glory, but also in His suffering. And certainly as the New Testament unfolds, we see this working its way out in the book of Acts. further in the ministry of Paul and others, even into the book of Revelation. There's a expectation that Christians will in this life suffer for their love and devotion to Christ. So he wants to prepare them for this. So the death of Christ is personally significant for this reason. We'll come back to there's another reason I think also that we need to pay attention to, but it's at least personally significant for this reason, is that Christians will follow in the footsteps of their Lord and suffer with Him and for Him, and we need to be prepared for this. Certainly Jesus sought to prepare them for this so that when it occurred, when the moment arrived where they had to boldly bear witness to Christ, knowing that it would cost them dearly, maybe even their own life as it had cost Christ dearly, that they would at least not be able to say they weren't expecting this, but that they would know that this was part and parcel of the Christian life. So the suffering and death of Christ is personally significant. There's an even greater personal significance we'll come back to in a moment. But I want to I want to show you also that the suffering of death the suffering and death of Christ is prophetically explained here. Jesus goes on to say we are going up to Jerusalem and everything that is written about the son of man by the prophets will be accomplished. Jesus death is it is in some sense predicted and prophesied and it's proclaimed by the scripture, by the prophets in the Old Testament. And the death of Christ has such a rich meaning. It can only be understood or made sense of with reference to the prophetic writings which are fulfilled by his sufferings sacrifice and so he's going to do for them now what despite their lack of understanding what he'll eventually do for them on the road to Emmaus and as he teaches them in the future from this perspective And that is to help them understand the connection between the Old Testament prophets and his suffering and death so that they can understand the meaning of this. Because from where they're standing, a crucified Savior makes no sense. And a king who's just put to death is shamefully mocked and scorned and spat upon and treated in this way and then ultimately executed? This doesn't make any sense. How can you have a conquering hero who's defeated? This makes no sense. You can see why although they know some of what's going on and what's going to happen, this is why they're fearful, they don't understand it. It doesn't make sense to them. The death of Christ from their perspective does not sound like victory as it does for us. We can think about the death of Christ and say that in that moment During that moment in time when Christ hung there on the cross and He suffered under the wrath of God that Christ was accomplishing a great victory. He was defeating all of His enemies. He was securing our salvation. He was the Savior in the moment, the victorious and triumphant Savior in the moment of His seeming defeat. We understand that, I think. I hope you do. The disciples did not understand this and so Jesus sought to explain this to them with recourse to the prophetic writings. Well, this is also instructive for us if we're going to be prepared for the Christian life and if we're going to be prepared to understand what it means, what Christ's death means for us. If I ask you this morning, what does it mean that Christ died for you? What does it mean that Christ, the Savior, died? And what would your answer be, I wonder, and how would you explain that? Well, I would encourage you to explain that in the way the Bible explains that. Use scripture to do this. In John's Gospel, we talked about this some yesterday morning during our men's breakfast, and we have the example of John the Baptist. the last of the Old Testament prophets in one sense. We find this in the New Testament, but he belongs to this office of old covenant prophets that ends with him, but we see it going back all the way through to Moses. And John the Baptist, as he points to Christ, and as he explains the significance of Christ to those that he's speaking to and preaching to, He says this in John 1, 29. He says, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. And so you see the way that he is using Old Testament teaching and images and ideas to explain what Christ has done. What is he doing? He's going back to the Passover. is going back to this Old Testament, Old Covenant institution where the people of God would take a spotless lamb. that symbolized sinless perfection. This was a creature without sin, without the stain or the pollution or the guilt of sin, and that they would take this creature's life, that it would be sacrificed, that its blood would be spilled as a substitute so that God, seeing the blood of the sinless one, this spotless lamb, would pass over the people who had made the sacrifice, that because of their faith in God's promise, that they would not have to, as we read in our scripture reading earlier, that they would not have to bear the curse. They would not have to face not only a physical death, but an eternal punishment. That God would pass over their sins, that there would be a propitiation made. Well John, to people who know exactly what the Lamb of God refers to, this sacrificial Passover Lamb, for him to say Jesus is that Lamb, is him making this connection between the Old Testament and the New, between the prophetic writings and the person and work of Jesus Christ, so that we might understand the purpose of his death. And so if you want to know what Christ did, what he accomplished, you can't read half your Bible. Some of it is explained in the New Testament, but there's so much there in the Old Testament which adds a depth of meaning and helps us to see this in three dimensions. and aids us in our understanding. And so, Jesus helps them by showing them the personal significance. He explains that this is personally significant for them, but also that it is prophetically explained and fills in some of these details as he undoubtedly goes to passages of Scripture like Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53. These are passages which we ought to be familiar with. Finally, we see the suffering and death of Christ is providentially discerned. Jesus' death is providentially understood. The disciples could not yet grasp the meaning of the cross despite Jesus' biblical explanation of what it meant for Him to go to Jerusalem. We read in verse 34 that they understood none of these things. Perhaps sometimes whenever the word is being preached, you feel like there's a veil before your eyes, or the eyes of your heart, preventing you from understanding. And maybe it's just because the preacher's not doing a good job of explaining the word. Maybe that's partly the reason, and you wonder about that. But other times you wonder, why can't I understand? Why can't I grasp the meaning, the fuller meaning of these things? And the reality is that it is God who gives understanding, which is one reason why we pray before we preach. We're asking God to illumine the truth to us. We want to understand and we need God to explain the truth and make it known to us. We know from elsewhere in the New Testament that the God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that if you're not in Christ, if you've not yet come to a saving knowledge of Christ and have believed, then it is impossible for you to understand the deeper things of God. This is something that is a gift, insight and understanding. And we see that here. They understood none of these things. And then we see an explanation. This saying was hidden from them. It was hidden from them and they did not grasp what was said. It wasn't because they were illiterate. It wasn't because they were uneducated. That may have been the case, but the reason why they did not understand is because it was not God's will for them to yet understand. And so in God's providence, they did not yet grasp the meaning of the cross. And this is ultimately the significance, ultimately the significance of it was hidden until the plan of God was fulfilled and the time was come for these men to get it according to God's purposes. And so if we would understand the purposes of God in the gospel of His Son, we need to seek that understanding as a gift to be received. And that means we're going to pray, God help me to understand. And I think these are the kinds of prayers that God honors whenever they're made by unbelievers. I don't understand these things. I see that my life is a mess. I see that I'm full of sin. I have some sense of my guilt and my hopeless situation, but I don't yet understand where there can be salvation and how I can be saved, where there is hope. Well, pray the Lord would open the eyes of your heart to the significance of Christ's suffering and His death. And for us who would grow in our knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, we need to be seeking God's help, not just studying the Word with commentaries and listening to sermons, apart from a prayerful interest in God's helping us to discern on the things that he's revealed. These things are prophetically explained. We need to search the scriptures to understand the meaning of Christ's death, but they're also providentially discerned. We need to be prayerful in asking God to reveal them to our hearts. I want to circle back to something I mentioned earlier, and that is that the suffering and death of Christ is personally significant. It is personally significant because we are involved as Christians. God did not suffer and die for us so that we would not have to suffer and die. That's what some people have mistakenly assumed. That Jesus died, He suffered, He was deprived, He faced a curse so that we would face a blessing. And ultimately there is truth in that. But Jesus has led us to expect that in this life, we will know, as he's said in the previous passage, in the question that Peter asked, or the statement that Peter makes in verse 28, we've left our homes and followed you, and Jesus promises them that for those who give all for Christ and devote themselves fully to Him, that they will receive many times more in this life. There are temporal earthly blessings that you can expect on this side of glory. Mark, though, mentions in his telling of this, he says, with persecutions. And so we need to remember that there is this expectation that no servant is greater than his master. And so this is personally significant to us as we see Christ suffer. We know that we are seeing a picture of what God has called us to. But also in Mark chapter 10 in verse 45, Jesus says that the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. And ultimately the disciples go with him, they journey with him to Jerusalem, not to be involved in his work. He's not saying, we're going up to Jerusalem so that we can all suffer for sin. so that we can all accomplish the saving purposes of God. But notice what he says here. We're going up to Jerusalem and everything that's written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. He will be delivered over. He will be mocked, shamefully treated, spat upon. He will be killed. And so all of these things are going to happen to Christ. The personal significance of the death of Christ, the sufferings of death of Christ, is that He died for me. Not that we suffered together. Not that I've died for Christ. Not that I have served Him, but that He has served me. And I just wondered this morning if you can be honest and make this connection between these personal pronouns and the death of Christ. Can you say that Christ did not just die, but that He died for me? That His death avails much for me? Because of my faith in Him, I know that Christ did not just die in an abstract sense for all mankind or anything like this, but that Christ died for believers of whom I am one. I am trusting in Him. And if not, this morning, I would call on you to see the personal significance in the death of Christ and call upon him as your Savior. Let's go to him in prayer. Father God, we thank you that you have gone up to Jerusalem. God, that you made this journey on our behalf that we might not have to suffer, not under your wrath, Whatever suffering we face, we know is temporal. And what can man do to us? Only kill the body, but do nothing to the soul. And so even though we are called to suffer in this life, we do so with an assurance that our eternity is secure and that we are held in your mighty hands. We are kept by you, God. And we thank you for this. We thank you that this is only possible because of what Christ did for us. That he was not kept. That he suffered your wrath for us and felt the full weight of that awful anger and drank the cup of your wrath to the dregs. We thank you that he's done this for us. Help us to understand the significance and meaning of Christ's death for us, but not in a theological way in which our minds are filled with truths about what Jesus has done that are not personal. But God, we pray that you make this eminently personal for us. As we learn more and more and our knowledge of what Christ has done has deepened and continues to deepen, God, that we would see that this is not just what Christ has done, it's what he's done for me. If there's anyone here who doesn't have that sense of a personal connection with the death of Christ, I pray, God, that you would draw them to Him, help them to call out for mercy, to look to Christ in faith, and God, to know that Christ's suffering and sacrifice avails for them. There's blessing there, eternal life for them. And God, we pray all of this in Christ's name, amen.