Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

Alright, let’s dive into the message tonight.

We are continuing in The Gospel of Luke, learning what the spirit chose to reveal through Luke about Jesus.

Every week, we are learning something new about Jesus, seeing him in a different light…all with the hope of following after him and imitating him, to become more like him.

Tonight we are going to be focusing on Jesus as a Rejoicer.

As one who Rejoices.

And the title of tonight’s message is...

Rejoice Like Jesus

And as we start out time together tonight, I want to ask you…when is the last time you Rejoiced in the gospel?

Now the definition of Rejoice is to “show or feel great joy and delight”…so what I’m asking is…when is the last time the Gospel, your salvation, has caused you to feel and show great joy or delight?

A feeling of overwhelming joy that causes you to see things differently, or act differently.

It causes to either laugh, or smile, or worship.

When is the last time that the gospel has done that in your life?

Now, I know for some of you that’s more recent.

You’ve had your heart stirred by the joy of your salvation within the last few weeks.

But I also know, that for some of you it’s been a long time.

Life has gotten to you.

Your sin has gotten to you.

You’re weary, burdened, heavy.

Maybe you’re discouraged, or disconnected.

I’m thinking that many of us in the room tonight are like King David, when he has sinned against God by committing adultery, he feels far from God, and in that moment, in Psalm 51 he says this:

Even King David, a man after God’s own heart…had moments where he pleaded with God to return to him the joy of being saved, the joy of coming to know God, the joy of being brought from death to life...

Because sometime we don’t always feel joyful in the Christian life.

We don’t always take pleasure in it.

And the best we can do is pray to the Lord like David did, and seek God in his word.

And here’s my prayer for us tonight…that we would see how Jesus rejoiced in this passage, and that it would restore to us the joy of our salvation.

That’s my prayer for you tonight.

That as we turn towards the holiday season, and it gets colder, and darker out…that God would restore a joy in you that is unexplainable and amazing.

I want to pray that over you right now.

****PRAY****

Alright, so turn in your bibles to Luke chapter 10.

As you’re turning there, let me set up what’s going on in this moment of Jesus’ ministry.

So at the beginning of Luke 10, Jesus sends out the first ever missionaries.

Really, a huge historic moment.

And he doesn’t just send out a couple… he sends out 72, two by two, into every town that he was planning to go to.

Essentially sends out 72 people to prepare the way for the gospel to be preached.

He sends them out and he gives them some specific tasks.

Pray for laborers.

Go into danger - “Lambs amongst wolves”

Rely on God’s provision.

Heal the sick.

Preach the Kingdom.

No small task right?

Many of those things we struggle to do on a daily basis, let alone being sent out to do all of them at once.

So…Jesus sends out these missionaries and in verse 17 they return.

And when they return, it says that “with joy” they spoke of all these amazing things that happened and all the amazing things that they got to do.

It’d be like me rejoicing over the things I just got to do, right?

So Brittany and I were gone last week and we got to go to disney and unviersal...

It’d be like me coming back and being joyful and being like, we got to ride roller coasters, and eat food, I got to drink butterbeer, and see hogwarts and diagon alley.

I tried some crazy slushies and dole-whip…it was amazing.

That’s what they are doing, rejoicing in the things they were able to do and got to experience.

And Jesus says to them

So, you’re right you got to do all these things.

All these good things.

None of the things you did were wrong, for you indeed had the ability to do them...

But, Jesus says, don’t forget that what you should be rejoicing in…is the fact that you have been saved in the first place.

That you have assurance of salvation from hell, that you have been redeemed to God, that you have been saved a place in heaven…that’s what you should really be rejoicing over.

Just like on the vacation my family had, yeah..we can be rejoicing over the specifics we just got to do…but what Jesus is saying is rejoice over the fact that those things you were able to do, happened because someone bought your ticket for you.

Yes, rejoice over the roller coasters, and food, and experiences…those are things that you were able to do…but…what you should really be rejoicing over is that your ticket was bought in the first place.

And that that experience was given to you because someone loved you enough to buy it for you.

(my mom).

But here, Jesus isn’t talking about their moms buying them tickets to disney world, he’s talking about God saving them from the wages of sin, which is death.

And it’s on the heels of making that clarification, that we see Jesus himself rejoice.

So, in this passage, we see Jesus as A Rejoicer.

We see him rejoice over the gospel, and we see three reasons why we should also rejoice over the gospel.

And here’s the first one.

Rejoice in the Gospel because it’s simple.

(v.21)

It’s simple.

As in it’s easy to understand.

It’s easy to comprehend and digest.

And not just that it’s simple, but that God purposely made it that way.

And the fact that God purposely made the gospel simple, is a reason for Jesus to rejoice.

Look back at verse 21.

In that same hour…that’s saying that shows that this is a connected story/line of thought from the previous one told.

So in relation to people having their names written in heaven, it says Jesus “rejoiced in the Holy Spirit”.

Now the word “rejoiced” here is a super special word.

The greek word is aggaleow…which there’s no reason for you to know that word, other than it’s fun to say.

Aggaleow.

The reason I’m taking a moment to tell you the greek, is because you need to understand the depth of this word.

Aggaleow means to rejoice exceedingly or exuberantly, it means to be over-whelmingly joyful.

It’s a very strong word that describes an emotion…in fact..out of all four gospels and all the rest of the entirety of scripture, it is the most exuberant/joyful that Jesus is ever described....in all of scripture…the height of Jesus’ joy is described in this passage.

A passage pertaining to the preaching and receiving of the gospel.

And what does he say that he’s rejoicing about?

In other words, Jesus gets so worked up and full of overwhelming joy that he bursts into prayer and can’t help but say “Thank you God! Thank you that as the Lord over all the heavens and earth that you decided to make the gospel simple.

That you don’t have to excel in wisdom or understanding to understand salvation”

“Thank you God that you are gracious and have done this according to your will”

That’s what gets Jesus excited.

That’s what brings him to the greatest point of joy...

The simplicity of the gospel.

And the simplicity of the gospel should bring us back to a place of joy.

Think about it…God the father created all that you see, all that we experience…the heavens and the earth.

He created the complexity of the human body, and physics of creation, and the stars in space.

All things that people have dedicated entire lives worth of study and understanding and have gotten no further in.

The things that took God only a word to create are so complex that mankind has barely begun to grasp the function of some of them, let alone the way in which they are built.

And yet this God who can create the most complex things in all of creation, who thought of them and then just simply spoke them into creation…that same God…chose to make his plan of redemption and salvation simple enough for my 5 year old son to understand.

Simple enough for a human mind to not only comprehend, but embrace fully.

The fact that a God who can and does create amazingly complex things chose to make the gospel simple is a reason to rejoice.

All these things may be complex in your life, difficult, hard, strenuous…all of them…except the gospel.

Rejoice because despite all the complexities of life..the thing that matters most…that can bring you the most peace, the most assurance, the most joy...is a simple thing.