Good morning to you all. Or as some of the greetings have been to me lately, good day, eh? My wife and I have had a wonderful time here in Canada. We've just had just a wonderful time and how friendly all of you have been to us.
So keep it up. Been enjoyable. Well, I'd like you to take your Bibles and turn to Luke chapter seven. I'm gonna preach two messages from the book of Luke.
It will not be from the same passage. I'll preach Luke 7 today and then Luke 9 this evening. But in Luke 7, I'd like you to read along with me as I begin in verse 36 and go through 50. This is the word of the living God.
Then one of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him. And he went to the Pharisee's house and sat down to eat. And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at the table in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster flask of fragrant oil, stood at his feet behind him weeping, and she began to wash his feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head. And she kissed his feet and anointed them with fragrant oil.
Now, when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he spoke to himself saying, this man, if he were a prophet, would know who and what manner of woman this is who is touching me for she is a sinner. And Jesus answered and said to him, Simon, I have something to say to you. So he said, teacher, say it. There was a certain creditor who had two debtors, one owed 500 denarii, the other 50.
And when they had nothing with which to repay, he freely forgave them both. Tell me, therefore, which of them will love him more? Simon answered and said, I suppose the one whom he forgave more. He said to him, you have rightly judged.
Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, do you see this woman? I entered your house. You gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head. You gave me no kiss, but this woman has not ceased to kiss my feet since the time I came in.
You did not anoint my head with oil, but this woman has anointed my feet with fragrant oil. Therefore, I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little. Then he said to her, your sins are forgiven.
And those who sat at the table with him began to say to themselves, who is this who even forgives sins? Then he said to the woman, your faith has saved you. Go in peace.
Introduction
The Bible primarily teaches two things. Those two things are what is man to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of man. And within that context of the Word of God, there is a vast difference between the righteous and the unrighteous, between those who have faith and those that are not believing. Now, when I use the word contrast, while they may be vastly different, there's a relationship there.
For example, summer and winter. Here, they're quite different. In California, we have one season, that's it, and it's great. But here, you definitely have two seasons.
I was born in Chicago, Illinois. You had two vastly different seasons, winter and summer. Those are different, but they have a relationship. They are seasons.
Black and white, vastly different, but they're the same color. Some have argued that black and white are not colors. I'm not here to argue that. All I'm here to say is that there is a great contrast in God's word And Luke is no exception to that as well.
When you consider Herod, who is seeking to kill our Lord at his birth, and the shepherds who went to worship, quite a difference. Their relationship is that they're made in the image and likeness of God. They were born with the sin nature of Adam. In Luke's gospel too, you have our Lord's healings and his teachings.
As we just read, our Lord preached with authority where the scribes didn't. Big difference between our Lord's ministry and the ministry of the Pharisees. You had the parables of the tax collector and the Pharisee, quite a big difference, the prodigal son and his brother, and of course the rich man and Lazarus is found in Luke 16. Now, here in Luke chapter 7, we have this nameless woman and this righteous, religious leader, teacher of the Jews.
Now, this is only recorded in Luke's gospel. And I wouldn't make any judgment about that. We don't elevate one part of God's word above another. All of God's words should be elevated before our eyes.
But this woman is not to be confused with Lazarus' sister, where she anoints our Lord before his crucifixion. in Matthew 16, as well as in John chapter 12. And what we'll look at today, this morning, are four things. First of all, we will look at the episode. Then we will look at the parable about the episode.
Then we'll look at the application of the parable about the episode. And then fourthly, what can we learn from this? So the first thing is, is normally when I preach, I like to give context briefly. explain the text, and then apply the text. So that's how I approach preaching.
I'm assuming that's similar to what Pastor Butler does here as well. But let's look at the context here. Earlier, the common people heard our Lord gladly, and they praised Him. In verse 29, all the people heard Him.
Even the tax collectors justified God. However, the Pharisees rejected Jesus, and his father and the will of God, where it says in verse 30, but the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the will of God. And then our Lord poses a parable to these religious leaders. And he says, we played the flute for you and you did not dance.
We got a celebration. Usually there's dancing that goes on. And he says, we mourn to you and you did not weep. You had a funeral, there's weeping.
What he's saying is that John the Baptist came. He didn't come eating bread or drinking wine and you say he's got a demon. I come eating bread and drinking wine and you call me a winebibber and a glutton. What our Lord is saying is here God comes to you in two vastly different ways and you reject it and you find fault with them.
So that's the context. this.
The Episode: Woman and Pharisee
Now we have the incident from verses 36 to 40, and Simon the Pharisee invites our Lord to dine with him, and I'm always suspicious of Pharisees when I'm reading my Bible. I just don't trust these men as far as you can throw them, so I would say it could have been out of suspicion, it could have been out of suspicion to see if he really was a prophet, or might have been gaining information to throw our Lord into jail, regardless of the reason, and I can't exegete the plain white parts of my Bible, it's just not there. I just don't trust the Pharisee here. But bottom line is, our Lord, regardless of the motive, accepts it, and he goes into dine with him.
And then, I love the way that Luke brings this out, and behold, in other words, stop for a moment. Stop. and look at this woman, this nameless woman of a bad reputation. Now, some have suggested that she was a harlot, but I would say that's a hasty judgment. I mean, you don't have to be immoral to be ungodly or to be, in this case, wicked.
But it is clear that what she once was, she no longer is. Notice that word, who was a sinner. Now my teachers in my library say that this verse could rightly be translated, who used to be, in times past, a sinner. And we do that very easy with our English word was, who was, in times past, a sinner.
She had a bad reputation. And she must have heard Jesus preaching, or she heard of Jesus preaching in the contents of what he brought out, and as a result, She applied it savingly to her soul. She believed that message. It also appears that she was pardoned from her offenses against God, and she knew it.
I think she knew it. She demonstrates lavish, abundant love to Jesus Christ. It's an offering of thanksgiving to Him who saved her. He saved her.
Now, it was not out of the ordinary. Let's just stop for a moment. We'll just take a little excursion here just for a brief second. It was not out of the ordinary for uninvited guests to come into prominent teachers' homes.
Even though they weren't invited, it happened. They would come in, and just so they could hear the teachers that were going to be teaching. Some of them, if they got permission, could also serve. So it wasn't out of the ordinary for this woman to go in.
But this woman, consider this, she showed great courage with her bad reputation as a grove sinner to enter the house of this esteemed leader, this Pharisee, this strict Pharisee. However, her urge to show love to Jesus was so irresistible that she couldn't hold it back. She had to go into this house and instead of water for our Lord, she gives him tears. Instead of a towel, her hair, instead of a greeting, a simple greeting, she kisses and anoints our Lord with fragrant oil.
And then we see the reaction of the Pharisee in this episode. He doubts that Jesus is a prophet, which is a harsh and quick judgment. You could see that when he says, this man, if he were a prophet, would know Kind of woman's touching him. Now the custom of the day, I mentioned this last Sunday evening, was that whenever a Jew would go out and have an interaction with Gentiles, if they were even to touch someone that was a sinner, they were defiled.
And they usually did some type of a ceremonial cleansing of their hands just to get the Gentile filth off of them. Now, imagine this woman is notorious as a sinner And she is not only crying our Lord, but anointing our Lord. And the prophet, I mean, what the Pharisee is assuming that if he were a prophet, he would despise her and reject her. Instead, he is receiving her.
And then Jesus being God manifested in the flesh. So to speak, he reads his mind. It's difficult to say if he said this outwardly, but he said he spoke it to himself and sometimes that's just something, it's a form of speech that shows that he was just thinking this. So our Lord shows the fact that he is God in human flesh, knows the secrets of this man, Simon, and announces that he has to say something to Simon.
He's going to say it to him directly, which brings us now to the parable.
The Parable of the Two Debtors
Now, The parable, I've read it, I don't need to reread it again, is that there's two who owe their creditor one 500 days worth of work and the other 50. So it's using modern math, one owed 10 times more than the other. One was a greater debtor, the other was a lesser debtor. Both had nothing to pay, and yet he freely forgives them both.
And so Jesus directly now asks the question, who will love more? It's simple. It doesn't take an MDiv to figure out that particular parable. And so Simon, almost in a spirit of indifference, he says, I suppose, I might be over-dramatizing, or I guess the one he forgave more.
Was he right? Yeah, he was right. Did it do him any good? Doesn't appear so.
It was a plain and easy case that the one who owed the most and was forgiven the most will love the most. He will love the one more earnestly. And that is the parable there. Now I'm going to expand a little bit on the parable because I think we see just in light of God's word is that the creditor obviously is the Lord.
The debtors are two sinners, a greater sinner and a lesser sinner. Sins are debt. I think we can see that. Sinners are in need of God because God has made them He provides for them.
He gives them food, shelter, and clothing. But He also, because of the fact that God has made us, He has given us commands. He has the right to do that. And if anyone breaks those commandments, they are indebted to God with punishment.
And I would submit to you everlasting death. All the sorries in the world cannot pay or satisfy God. These sinners here in the parable are bankrupt, have no money, they have no righteousness. Even if they had any righteousness, it wouldn't be enough to pay for that great debt of violating the Ten Commandments.
But the man freely, God here freely forgives, or the one here in the parable freely forgives, and it's not because of any for any good he's going to see them do or any righteousness of their own, but he freely forgives them. So that briefly, and I'll explain the parable because there's some problems people will have with both being forgiven. We'll get to that. So just hang on.
Don't jump to that conclusion yet. But that's the interpretation of the parable.
Parable Applied to the Episode
And now we have the application of the parable about the incident. And so here we have our Lord comparing this woman with this Pharisee. This would appear to be an unfair fight. I mean, here's this woman who's a great sinner, and here is this Pharisee who's not that bad.
She is an ignorance. He is an esteemed teacher of Israel. She's just a common woman, and he is an esteemed teacher. Now, I'm keeping track there.
Right now, it's four to nothing. That means anything for those of you that are sports related. But in all seriousness, our Lord now turns to Simon. He says, do you see this woman?
Do you understand her actions? And now Jesus is going to expose the shabby treatment that he received from this Pharisee. They were in a dry, hot, dusty place and the normal A bit of hospitality when a guest came in as they were given water to wash their feet, get the dust off. And a simple greeting.
The Pharisee did none of that. That's what our Lord says. You did none of that. She gave me her hair.
You gave me nothing. She has dried my feet with her hair. You gave me nothing. Simple greeting.
You didn't give that to me. She has not stopped to show love and affection towards me and to anoint me with fragrant oil." So he says to Simon, I declare to you that she, being a heinous sinner, she is freely pardoned, forgiven of her sins. Many though they be, yet she is forgiven. And it's shown that she knows that she has been forgiven by her love that she shows to the Savior here in this Pharisee's house.
It is the person of no forgiveness or considers their sins to be little, they show no love, and therefore they are not forgiven. She was pardoned, not because we're loved to Jesus Christ, but because of the God-given faith granted to her. Notice he says, your faith has made you well. Your faith has saved you, I should say.
And our Lord makes His declaration in front of everyone, including this Pharisee, so that she would not be regarded as condemned, but she is a pardoned sinner. The guilt of her sin being removed, and she is no longer to be looked upon as, oh, this is a wicked and vile person, because our Lord has freely justified her. Now Jesus turns the table on this Pharisee, who never even thought to apply that parable to himself. Now the Pharisee considered himself to be righteous, maybe forgiven of his little crimes.
There were just little mistakes that he may have committed. This Pharisee, being 10 times better than the woman, saw no need of forgiveness. No need of a Savior since He was His own Savior. And therefore, our Lord justifies this woman.
This man was self-righteous, remember that. We all come into this world self-righteous, so it shouldn't come as any surprise to see it being laid out here in front of us in our Bibles. What this woman knew in faith is affirmed by Jesus' word of assurance that all her sins were blotted out. Jesus protects her as He delights to forgive sinners.
He protects her. He tells her to go in peace. It's as if God, and He does, embraces this woman with peace, love, and protection. I'm reminded of Romans 5.1, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Even Paul the Apostle said that he walks by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself for me. This woman will not need to fear that her sin will be to her ruin. Instead, the smile of God is upon her soul. She is accepted.
Now, there's two last things I want to mention before we get to what it is that we can learn from this. And that is the question still needs to be answered there in verse 49. Did you notice that? Those who sat at the table and began to say to themselves, who is this who even forgives sins?
Well, I would submit to you, I think you know this, this is the Messiah. This is the Messiah that's prophesied in the Old Testament. This is the prophet that was prophesied by Moses in the book of Deuteronomy. This is the Son of God.
The same nature. Look at His miracles. Look at His teachings. This is the Lord.
God manifested in the flesh. That question needed to be answered because When you take a look at what our Lord's ministry was, His teaching, remember the people very gladly, His healing, His healings cannot be doubted. And then He says things like this, I would submit to you, that should get some people's attention real fast. It really should.
And the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins. To forgive sins. Does that sound familiar? Do you remember in Luke 5, the man that was paralyzed, not, yeah, Luke 5, the man was paralyzed and his friends wanted to take him there to be healed.
But the place that our Lord was teaching at was just filled with people. They couldn't get in there. So what they do is they take them and they put them up on top of the roof. Open up the tiles, let them down.
Jesus sees their faith and he says, son, your sins are forgiven you. And they're upset. The Pharisees are upset about this declaration that our Lord makes. And our Lord knows that.
And he says, which is easier to say, your sins are forgiven you, or rise up and take your bed and go home? Which is easier to say? It's easier to say your sins are forgiven you because it's something you can't see. You really can't see it.
But that you may know. that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, I say to you, rise up, take up your bed, and go home." People are amazed. Here, no miracle. But this had to be in some of the minds of the people, saying, this man is something else. He's different than any of the teachers at all.
There's something else I want you to consider before we look at what is it that we can learn. I'm sure we're learning things here as I go along. But I noticed that there's a lot of words by the Pharisee, Simon. There's a lot of words by our Lord.
Even those who sat there said, who is this who even forgives sin? But there's one person you don't hear a peep out of. At least it's not recorded. That's the woman.
Did you notice that? She doesn't say a word, nothing at all. And I don't know if you make any conclusions on that, but I think sometimes we do better when we just talk a lot less. She says nothing. and she shows love and affection to our Lord.
Our Lord declares her righteous. Go in peace is what our Lord says.
Lessons From the Passage
Well, what can we learn from this particular passage? And I've got a few things for us.
Only God Forgives Sin
The first thing is only God can forgive sins. Only God can forgive sins. While I'm a minister of the gospel, I don't have the ability to forgive sins. I do, have the authority to say, if you believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven you.
But I'm not a priest. Now, down in California, there's a lot of Roman Catholicism down there. I came out of Roman Catholicism. I was a strict Catholic.
And for me to get my sins forgiven, I had to go to a priest every two weeks and confess my sins. And he told me my sins were absolved as long as I did four Our Fathers and seven Hail Marys and I would just try to do better. That's how my sins were forgiven. Christ isn't even there.
The priest is a mediator between me and God, and therefore he is a false mediator. He is not to be trusted. The priesthood, there's only been one priest right now, and that's Jesus Christ. His priesthood is according to the order of Melchizedek, regardless of what the Mormons say, regardless of what the Catholics say, those priests are counterfeit.
Now, for you here in Kent, I think I've only seen maybe one Catholic church. I was talking to one of the brethren there and he said, no, Catholicism doesn't appear to be the issue. There's other things that go on here in this area. All I can say is that a minister doesn't have the ability No man has the ability to forgive sins.
Our sins are against God. It's always best for us to go to God by His appointed means of forgiveness of sins, which is through the cross, through Calvary. Christ died for sinners. He died for sinners that we might be reconciled unto God.
That's the first thing.
Liberation From Sin
Second thing I find interesting is that This is, please forgive the term, but this is women's liberation right here. Our woman here has been liberated from her sins. She's free. My brethren, we are free.
We have been given access to God through Jesus Christ. The sins that we used to love to do, we hate. The things that we used to love doing, sins, we hate. being in church now, we love. We love being in the house of God.
God's changed our heart. Granted, I know there's Sunday mornings where you probably don't want to come in here, okay? Or maybe I'm the only one that thinks that. But there's some days, it's just not easy at all.
But the thing that helps me is know that Jesus is a great Savior of sinners. He can revive me. He can turn my heart away from those things. I've been liberated to die to sin and live unto righteousness.
I have to say this too, as well, in light of, I don't know what it's like here in Canada, but down in California, they're blurring the lines between men and women. This is a woman here in the scriptures, and God calls her a woman. And the Pharisee is a man. We are different.
God has made us different. But remember, he made men male and female. man and a woman, and those lines should never be blurred. There should be contentment in the calling that God's given to women, as well as the unique situation for men, the unique calling of men. That's all I'm going to say about that.
A word to the wise is sufficient. What's another thing that we can learn?
Head Knowledge Does Not Save
Well, we might have the right answers to spiritual questions and yet still be lost and unforgiven. The Pharisee knew a lot, and yet he was condemned. He had no hope. Now, we should have the knowledge of God, right brethren?
We should grow in the grace and knowledge of God, correct? But head knowledge alone does not save. We should teach our children. We should teach our children about saving faith in Jesus Christ.
Repentance unto life. to go through the scriptures with our children, teach them how to sit in church, teach them about prayer. Kids, when you get up in the morning, I got three things for you to do. I hope I haven't trampled on any parent's authority here. But read your Bibles, if you can read, and pray, and make your bed.
That's all. And whatever else your parent wants you to do, your parents want you to do, do it. You're honoring God by this way. Now, what I'm saying is that head knowledge alone doesn't save.
This is a grief. I've seen so many that champion the cause for the doctors of grace, and yet they are lost. Their books abounded. They were intellectually stimulated, but they love their sins.
They wanted a platform to talk and to see how great they are. And yet they were lost. No heart, no faith, No love for the Savior. It's a terrifying condition to know the way of life and not travel it.
Enter through the narrow gate. Broad is the road that leads to destruction. Now, we should have head knowledge. I'm not putting that down.
We should grow in grace. Big difference is saving faith, humility. Which brings me to another thing that's of concern, is that
Attend to Your Own Sin
many are distracted with the hatred of the sins of others, but what about our sins? How about our sins? This Pharisee considered himself much better than this woman, this sinner. But he had a plank in his eye.
He couldn't see his own sin. Now, my brethren, we hate the sins of the homosexuals. We hate the sins of our government leaders, and we may even be vocal about it, and we should hate their deeds, but are we distracted by that to keep us from dealing with our own sins? Simply asking the question because it is very easy to condemn and judge others, but we should use that same judgment on ourselves.
Use the law of God. While we are greedy of the sins around us, we are more greedy of the sin that goes on within us. If we do that, it will make us humble and not obnoxious. We won't be willing to drop the gloves just because someone disagrees with our political or even our religious views.
We should be gracious, deal with our fellow sinners, friends, our relatives, and our neighbors in a gracious, humble manner. Peter said, be ready to give an answer for the hope that lies within you with meekness and with fear. The idea with the fear of God. We do not condone the wickedness of those around us, but we seek to win them, to befriend them, to love them, though they are unlovable, just as we were unlovable.
Look at the mercy God has shown unto us. Dear Christian, you have been forgiven much. You have. The question is, do you love much?
This love that the woman had for our Savior traces back to her sins, how heinous they were, and yet she was forgiven, and she loved him freely. That's what the parable is all about. the great forgiveness of all of our sins. That's man's greatest need, is to be forgiven of their sins. Are your sins forgiven you?
For those of you in Christ, yes, they are. And that should make us to be a different people. We have peace with God. We can have peace with one another.
Remember, it was God who loved us first. We love because He first loved us, not we love God and now He loves us back. God initiated the love with us. God loves to save sinners through His Son.
An increase of our love can be traced all the way back to how much the Lord has forgiven us. Think of what you were like before you were in Christ. Now granted, children grow up in a church, they get converted, hopefully get converted, teenage, whatever years, you may think, well, not like I was a drug addict, but you have been forgiven of much. Now, for my case, I came out of a very, very bad area of history in the 60s and the 70s, and I bought into that system.
And God has forgiven me much. It has humbled me greatly. Initially, I was too proud, and then the Lord humbled me. And throughout the years, I'm just so amazed that God would save a wretch as me, as a wretch as you.
The Pharisee Was Not Justified
I want you to notice that this parable does not teach that this Pharisee was forgiven. Notice our Lord justifies the woman, He doesn't justify the man. He declares the woman righteous, He doesn't declare this Pharisee as righteous. And the concept of love to the Savior, I think, is sometimes misunderstood.
Just some good feeling about the man upstairs, or Jesus, and they use such irreverent language to deal with our Lord. The love to our Lord is shown in many ways. In as much as you've done it to Lisa, these my brethren, you've done it unto me. We show love to Jesus Christ by being under His Word, partake of the sacraments, baptism, and the Lord's Supper, all with an eye towards our Lord, and then how we have love for one another in the church.
His body, His body, that's how that love is shown. Showing love to the least of these, my brethren.
Application to Unbelievers and Believers
Well, I have two quick things I want to say. First of all, to the unbeliever. If there are any here that do not believe, I want you to think for a moment about God's kindness to you. He's given you parents, you get to live indoors, you enjoy food, music, friends, sports, whatever thing that you find of enjoyment.
You live in an incredibly pretty area. Like I said last Sunday, my wife and I live in a concrete jungle. This is incredible. We get on our bikes and we go for a couple of hours just going through all these beautiful farmlands.
We're so quick, though, to thank the Lord for the beauty of His creation, which man can't make. He can't make a flower. It's incredible. It really is incredible.
All of you that do not believe should be thankful to God for those mercies, especially the mercy which is found in His Son. Acknowledge your sin. Confess your sins. If you feel like I just don't have any faith, then keep praying to God that he might grant you saving faith and repentance unto life.
Keep praying, keep praying. God answers those prayers. And for those of us that believe, I've already brought this out, but we should be thankful for all of his blessings. It's easy to say that when you pray, oh Lord, thank you for all of those blessings.
I would submit to you, start naming those blessings. Be specific. Husbands and wives should thank the Lord for giving you your marriage, your children, your grandchildren, your church, your job, living indoors, all of these things, and especially the forgiveness of sins, the blessedness of the knowledge that Jesus Christ died for my sins according to the scriptures and was raised from the dead according to the scriptures. That is a blessing for us We never grow old of that.
We never grow out of that. We never graduate from that school of faith in Jesus Christ. In fact, our faith increases when we come in here. We come in here.
Then he said to her, your sins are forgiven. Who is this who even forgives sins? He said to the woman, your faith has saved you. Go in peace.
Let's pray.
Closing Prayer
Our Father, with you there is forgiveness that you might be feared, and we draw near unto you at the close of this sermon. We give you thanks and praise you for your son, the forgiveness of sins, the blessedness of being right with you through faith in our great high priest, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Pray that you might seal these words to our souls, that we would remember this message, that it would be that which is of great help and benefit. You would save our children here as well as those that do not believe.
We pray, believing Father, that you're able to do far above what we could even think or ask. Thank you for another Lord's Day, where we remember the resurrection of the dead by our Savior. Richly bless these brethren the rest of this day with your truth, for we pray in Jesus' name, amen. We're going to close by singing the doxology.
But before we do that, just a few instructions so we keep things orderly and not chaotic. We will sing the doxology, and then there will be a brief time of meditation, as is our custom. Afterwards, any parents that have any children down in the nursery, please go and collect them. Gather your troops.
And everyone that would like to be part of the photo, whether you're a member or not, been coming to this church, you want to be in the photo, come up here, we will get that done as quickly and as orderly as possible. So we're going to sing the doxology, 568 in your hymnal if you need the words or the music, and then we'll have a brief time of meditation, but when the piano stops, everyone, rather than usually our usual dispersion and visiting, please come forward. Please stand with me as we sing. ♪ And saints glow ♪ ♪ Praise Him all creatures here below ♪ ♪ Praise Him above the heavenly host ♪ ♪ Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ♪ AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH