Lucas 7

Lucas 7

Poole remarks, ‘The people here saw His divine power manifestly exerted; for the keys of the clouds, the womb, and the grave, are those keys which their teachers had taught them were kept in God’s hand alone.” Report is logos which means something said and describes a communication whereby the mind finds expression in words. Surrounding district (or region)(4066)(perichoros from perí = around + choros = region, place) literally means around a place, i.e., surrounding, neighboring, or around the region. The neighborhood with its inhabitants. Perichoros is used often with the preceding definite article (tes) which gives it the sense of describing the surrounding region, the region around, the country roundabout (Mt. 14:35; Mk 1:28; 6:55; Luke 3:3; 4:14, 37; 7:17; 8:37; Acts 14:6). Perichoros is used figuratively to describe the inhabitants of a certain region (Mt. 3:5; Lxx - Ge 13:10, 11; Dt. 3:13, 14) All the uses of perichoros are in the Gospels (except one use in Acts) and speak primarily of Jesus' renown spreading through the various districts of the land. One use refers to the renown of John the Baptist (Lk 3:3). ILLUSTRATION - George Sweeting, in his book The No-Guilt Guide for Witnessing, tells of a man by the name of John Currier, who in 1949, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Later, he was transferred and paroled to work on a farm near Nashville, Tennessee. In 1968, Currier's sentence was terminated, and a letter bearing the good news was sent to him, but John never saw the letter, nor was he told anything about it. Life on that farm was hard and without promise for the future. Yet, John kept doing what he was told even after the farmer for whom he worked had died. Ten years went by. Then a state parole officer learned about Currier's plight, found him, and told him that his sentence had been terminated a decade ago. He was a free man. Sweeting concluded that story by asking, "Would it matter to you if someone sent you an important message—the most important in your life -- and year after year the urgent message was never delivered?" We who have heard the good news and experienced freedom through Christ are responsible to proclaim it to others still enslaved by sin. Are we doing all we can to make sure that people get the message? ILLUSTRATION - The ripple effect of one saved soul - Who can ever tell of the powerful effects of the conversion of one soul? The results may not be known for years and years, but they can be mighty. In the fall of 1934, a fiery Southern evangelist named Mordecai Ham, preached for eleven weeks in Charlotte, North Carolina. There a 16 year-old, outwardly religious but inwardly spiritually dead, boy came under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and received new life in Christ. Who can tell of the impact that that boy, Billy Graham, has had for the cause of Christ? In 1929 in Germantown, Pennsylvania, the 17 year-old son of a steel worker became a Christian on his own through reading the Bible. For him, it was a transforming reality that changed his whole outlook, but he thought that he was alone in his experience. He knew no others who believed as he did. A year later, as he walked down the street, he came to a large tent. Wondering what was happening, he entered and heard an Italian-American man tell of his conversion out of crime and drugs and of how Christ not only freed him from prison, but from sin. When the invitation was given, the young man went forward. He entered in his diary that night, August 19, 1930, “have decided to give my whole life to Christ unconditionally.” That young man was Francis Schaeffer, whose writing, speaking, and films have had an untold world-wide impact for Christ. William