Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Prayer Meeting Lesson Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/pm/pm19971210.htm

LUKE: GOSPEL OF CERTIFYING THE CHRISTIAN FAITH
Part XVII: God's Supply For Our Credibility When We SEEK It HIS WAY
(Luke 5:12-16)
  1. Introduction
    1. When we take a stand for the truth, and our stand is not readily received since our efforts to prove our credibility is blocked or countered, we may wonder if it was worth taking the stand in the first place!
    2. In presenting His Gospel, Jesus faced the blockage of His efforts to establish the credibility of His stand. Nevertheless, the truth of His credibility eventually got through, and supplies a directive for us today:
  2. God's Supply For Our Credibility When We SEEK It HIS WAY, Luke 5:12-16.
    1. When Luke wrote his Gospel, he focused on presenting the certifications of Jesus to his reader, Theophilus so that he might know the certainty of the Christian Gospel he had been taught, Luke 1:4.
    2. However, in Luke 5:12-16, Luke records Jesus' marvelous track record of how He sought to establish His credibility even though the effort was blocked, and that track record ITSELF establishes His credibility:
      1. First, Jesus sought to back up his witness by Recognized Biblical Leadership Testimony, 5:12-14:
        1. Jesus healed a man who was infected with leprosy, Luke 5:12-13. This was a great signal of His power as leprosy cleansings were highly unusual, for only Miriam (Num. 12), Namaan (2 Kings 5) and Moses (Ex. 4:6-7) experienced this in Sc ripture, cf. Bib. Know. Com., N.T., p. 217.
        2. Now, to certify this work, Jesus asked the cleansed leper to show himself to the priest, Luke 5:14.
        3. The reason this function would be such a great testimony was due to the way God had stratified the Levitical laws regarding leprosy: (a) Leviticus 13:1-59 described the extensive steps the priest and the infected leper had to go through when he came down with the disease. Any leper in Israel would have had a medical history then that would have been well-known by the priests. (b) However, if a leper were ever to be healed , Leviticus 14:1-57 detailed equally involved, intricate steps that had to be taken for the reunion of the leper with his Hebrew community. (c) Thus, for this leper who had been healed by Jesus to go to the priests with his offering would have alerted these priests that a highly unusual event had occurred, for they had previously witnessed the infection to verify that it had happened, and this would testify to them about Jesus' credibility! (d) Since verification by the Biblically sanctioned lea ders, the priests would have added weighty certification, this move to get the cleansed leper to the priests was an important step in certifying Jesus' credentials as the Messiah.
      2. Second, the fact that Jesus was urging the cleansed leper to do what was commanded by the Scripture writer, Moses (Leviticus 13-14), He demonstrated how his work was certified by Scripture. That would be a testimony TO the priests about Jesus' claims, Luke 5:14c.
    3. However, this effort to obtain credibility by this miracle before the priests was blocked, Lk. 5:15-16.
      1. After Jesus gave his command to the cleansed leper, we know from Mark's record of this event that the man did not obey Christ in going directly to the priests instead of broadcasting his healing to the masses, cf. Mk. 1:44-45a. Instead, he broadcast abroad the cleansing so that Jesus could no longer openly minister in towns due to the crowds, but had to mi nister in wilderness places, Mk. 1:45b.
      2. As this happened, news of the healing would have reached the priests by second-hand testimony, becoming only a hearsay witness, countering Jesus' effort to establish His credibility with them.
    4. Jesus' response to this setback was not to force the issue outside of God's will, but to commit the issue to the Father: He simply retreated to the wilderness to pray and leave the whole matter with Him, Luke 5:16.
    5. Nevertheless, Christ's track record in HOW He sought credibility by use of verifiable Scriptural standards and by established religious leaders produces a credible witness for Luke to use for Theophilus at a LATER date, Luke 1:4! Thus, it was worthwhile in the long run after all for Jesus to use the Biblical approach to gain credibility for His witness, and not push buttons otherwise!
Lesson: In seeking to CERTIFY our witness before others, like Jesus, we should (1) try backing up our credibility with the witness of RECOGNIZED OVERSEERS in the body He has established (in our case, the CHURCH), and (2) back up our credibility wit h Scriptural authority. (3) However, if such a certifying effort is blocked or countered, RESIST taking things unbiblically into our OWN hands, but LEAVE the blocked credibility with GOD! That way HE still has something CREDIBLE to promote!