Sermon Tone Analysis

SLIDE 1 You are all probably familiar with the game show Family Feud.

Contestants are asked to guess how one hundred people responded to various survey questions.

Several years ago one of the survey questions asked: SLIDE 2

When someone mentions ‘the King,’ to whom might he or she be referring?

How would you have answered that question?

What would have been your first response?

Since we’re sitting in a church building perhaps you would have answer Jesus, the King of kings and Lord of lords.

Here are the top four answers from one hundred people interview on the street: SLIDE 3 (CLICK THROUGH LIST)

2 people said, Burger King

3 people said, Martin Luther King, Jr.

7 people said, God or Jesus

81 people said, Elvis Presley

SLIDE 4 I guess I’m surprised that even seven people referred to Jesus.

However, what may seem obvious to us was not so obvious to the hundred people asked the question.

Nor was it obvious during the years of Jesus’ earthly ministry.

In fact, even Jesus’ closest disciples took a long time to understand his true identity.

Massive crowds were drawn to Jesus, primarily because of his miracles.

His preaching and teaching were also impressive to vast numbers of people.

Nevertheless, it took years for some of them to understand his true identity.

SLIDE 5 We are going to be in Luke 9 this evening, but before we get started I want you to turn to the first chapter of John’s gospel.

As you turn I want to point out an important word — “Messiah.”

In the New Testament Greek the word Messiah is translated as Christ.

They mean the same thing.

To say that Jesus is the Christ is to say that he is the promised Messiah from the Old Testament.

The word “Messiah” comes from the Hebrew word מָשִׁיחַ (maw-shee'-akh).

It simply means anointed or anointed one.

It’s found more than three dozen times in the Old Testament.

When we hear the word Messiah we probably think of Jesus, but in the Old Testament most of the time it isn’t referring to Jesus.

The first time it occurs is in Leviticus and refers an anointed priest.

It’s also the word David used referring to King Saul when he was encouraged to take Saul’s life.

David said he could never take the life of the Lord’s anointed.

Eventually, the term also came to refer to a future deliverer who would rescue his people and usher in a time of prosperity and blessing.

While this future blessing had a spiritual sense more often they thought of it a physical reality.

Especially in the New Testament, the Jews looked forward to a time when the throne of David would be re-established.

Imagine living under the control of a foreign government that heavily taxed you and stationed troops in our country on a continual basis.

We would long for a time when we could return to self-rule.

That’s what the Jews were feeling when Jesus was born.

They were looking the promised Messiah who would deliver them from Roman tyranny.

There were some, both before and after Jesus, who falsely claimed to be the Messiah and who would stir up the hopes of the people but they were all put down by Rome.

One of the more famous was Bar Kochba who claimed to be the Messiah and led a revolt against Rome in 135 AD.

Bar Kochba was able to rally troops and after a few early local victories began to convince both the Jewish masses and some in the religious leadership that he was the Messiah and would deliver the Jews from oppressive Roman rule.

But Rome crushed the uprising and over half a million Jews were slain and hundreds of thousands more were exiled.

As word began spreading about Jesus — his teachings and his miracles — people began wondering who he was and if he could possibly be the Messiah.

They had wondered the same thing about John the Baptist.

John 1:19-23 19 Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was.

20 He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.”

21 They asked him, “Then who are you?

Are you Elijah?”

He said, “I am not.”

“Are you the Prophet?”

He answered, “No.” 22 Finally they said, “Who are you?

Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us.

What do you say about yourself?”

23 John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’

”

SLIDE 6 Now turn to Luke 9.

The Jewish leaders asked John if he was the Messiah.

When John said he wasn’t, they came up with other strange explanations as to who he might be: Elijah or the Prophet.

Why would they think that John was Elijah?

Through the prophet Malachi, God had said that Elijah would come.

SLIDE 7

Malachi 4:5-6 5 See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes.

SLIDE 8 6 He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.

SLIDE 9 The Jewish leaders took this to mean that before the Messiah came God would send Elijah or one like Elijah.

The description of this Elijah certainly sounds like John.

Though John said he wasn’t that Elijah, Jesus said that he was.

SLIDE 10

Matthew 11:13-14 13 For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John.

14 And if you are willing to accept it, he is the Elijah who was to come.

SLIDE 11 They also asked John if he was “the Prophet.”

In the NIV the word “prophet” is capitalized because they were not just referring to any prophet, but a particular prophet.

God had sent many prophets to the Israelites, but they were waiting for the prophet spoken of by Moses.

SLIDE 12

Deuteronomy 18:15 The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites.

You must listen to him.

SLIDE 13 Moses wasn’t referring to the one who would come before the Messiah, he was referring to the Messiah, to Jesus.

When John once again says no they just ask, “Then who are you?

The guys that sent us want an answer.

What should we tell them.

It’s then that John finally explained that he was the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy, the one who would prepare the way for the Messiah.

We will hear many of these same ideas in our passage from Luke.

Luke 9:18-19 18 Once when Jesus was praying in private and his disciples were with him, he asked them, “Who do the crowds say I am?” 19 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, that one of the prophets of long ago has come back to life.”

Once again Luke gives us a glimpse of Jesus’ prayer life.

That Jesus was praying tells us that he and the disciples were no longer with the crowd.

They had finally managed to get some time alone.

Jesus not only taught the disciples how to pray, but led by example.

Who did the disciples think Jesus was? They’d been traveling with Jesus for months and possibly for a couple of years.

They marveled when Jesus calmed the storm: SLIDE 14

Luke 8:25b In fear and amazement they asked one another, “Who is this?

He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him.”

SLIDE 15 The question of Jesus’ identity had been asked since the beginning of his ministry.

The religious leaders wanted to know.

SLIDE 16

Luke 5:21 The Pharisees and the teachers of the law began thinking to themselves, “Who is this fellow who speaks blasphemy?

Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

The civil leaders wanted to know.

SLIDE 17

Luke 9:9 But Herod said, “I beheaded John.

Who, then, is this I hear such things about?”

And he tried to see him.”

SLIDE 18 But now, Jesus is asking the disciples what they had heard the people say about him and they come up with the same answers the Jewish leaders had suggested about John: Elijah, one of the prophets, or maybe even John the Baptist who had been killed by this time and had come back to life.