Sign-seekers Rebuked

Take your Bibles and turn to
the Gospel of Luke once again. There is a discipline in theology
that has grown in popularity, especially over the last 30 years. The particular discipline is
called apologetics. And it has grown in popularity
with the concurrent mindset that we have the ability to argue
people into heaven. There’s no doubt that the Bible
tells us in Peter’s epistle that we are to have an answer. We
are to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us.
But there is also an imbalance that comes from that thinking
that says that I can argue anyone into heaven. And that all I need
is to be fully equipped with every arsenal, every argument
that there is to be able to do so. There is nothing
wrong. May I say this clearly as I can?
There’s nothing wrong with the study of apologetics. There’s
nothing wrong with the study of facts. There’s nothing wrong
with having a well-built and well-fortified arsenal of data,
able to greet anyone in any cult or any false religion, anyone of any problem, even a
heathen with many arguments against Christianity. But the bottom
line, when it’s all said and done, it’s always a work of the
Spirit. It’s always the Spirit Applying
his blessing to the Word of God. Sovereignly bestowed. That does
the work in a person’s life, it’s not our argumentation, it’s
not our apologetics. Someone who will stand to you
toe to toe and say to you that you haven’t provided them enough
information is just not honest. It’s not just not true. Anyone who holds out for more
information until a later date is living on very dangerous ground.
We live in a day and age when there are those that clamor for
signs. Show me more signs. Show me more
proof. Give me more apologetics. If
I could only see the ark. And so you have people that have
made this great search for Noah’s ark. that somehow if they saw
the ark itself resting on the top of a mountain, with all the
questions answered, how did they feed all those animals for so
long a time? If they were somehow able to
see that, they claimed that they would come to faith. You know
what? In the last couple of weeks,
you know that I was studying for last week’s message. It was
amazing what we have made idols of. It’s amazing. And you would
think that given the quantity, even if all of the things that
we’ve discovered or claimed to have discovered were true, you
would think that the whole world would have come to Christ by
now. Listen to some of it. In the imperial treasury at Vienna’s
Hofburg Palace, there is a sphere. It is claimed to be the Holy
Lance. The sphere of destiny. the very
spear that pierced Christ’s side. In another church, there is an
iron nail that was hammered to the perimeter of a crown and
embellished with gold. The very nail from the cross,
they claim, the very nail that held Christ to the cross was
turned into a crown embellished with gold and jewels and now
sits in a church. Some have claimed that there
are fragments of wood that were part of the original cross of
Christ. Fragments of wood. And those
fragments have been divided and broken up year after year after
year, generation after generation, and dispersed as favors from
kings and popes. In fact, one Erasmus in the 14th
century, joked that there was so much wood that Jesus would
have had to be crucified in the whole forest. Ridiculous, some
of the things that were made or claimed to have been discovered.
There’s one called the icon not made with hands. This iron crown of a band that
was somehow said to be delivered by God himself. There is a claim
that the thorn of crowns itself is still possessed by churches.
Thorns have been broken off and dispersed also as gifts. Veronica’s
veil, of course, you remember Veronica from Scripture, don’t
you? You shouldn’t. Although Mel Gibson
did, Veronica’s veil was this piece of cloth that allegedly
and legendary legend has it pressed to Christ’s face on the cross,
left an imprint. The Holy Grail, which cup is
only made passing reference, there isn’t it isn’t called the
Holy Grail in Scripture. We know that Jesus drank from
something. But God never set up an idol. And even if we found
it, people still wouldn’t come to faith. People claim to have
found Jesus seamless robe and on and on and on it goes. The
question is, why aren’t more people believers in the Lord
Jesus Christ? If we’ve really found these things,
if they’re really that important, if things like this are really
that important for faith, If they’re really important, why
doesn’t God provide more if He wants us to come to faith? We
need some things. We need some proof. Or do we really need it? Desire for more signs. Desire
for more proof isn’t always rebuked in Scripture. But it is in the
passage before us this morning. It isn’t always rebuked in Scripture.
Remember, Moses himself said, show me your glory. And God didn’t
show Moses his face. Moses wanted to see his face,
but God allowed him to catch a glimpse of his glory. But more
often than not, a desire for more proof from God elicits rebuke. You remember Elizabeth’s husband,
Zechariah, When he stood toe-to-toe with the angel and doubted him
and asked for more proof, the angel said, you’ll get your proof.
You won’t speak. You won’t speak for nine months.
That kind of doubt, that kind of doubt is engendered in our
society. It’s the popular thing to do.
to doubt, to ask for more proof, to ask God to prove Himself.
If He’s really real, reveal Yourself to me. Do something miraculous.
2 Peter quotes those kinds of people. Everything continues
as it is from the beginning of time. Where is the promise of
this salvation? God has a rebuke for them. You
know, the amazing thing is even when miracles were given, it didn’t elicit faith. Not a
great part of the time. The most astounding example to
me is the arrest of Christ in the garden. They’re arresting
Christ. Soldiers with swords and clubs
had come out to arrest him. And Peter, ever the impetuous
one, reaches up with his sword and whacks off one Malchus’s
ear. And Christ reaches down, picks
up the ear and heals the man on the spot. And nobody comes
to faith. They proceeded to arrest him.
Let’s get away from this idea that if we only give people more
information, more data, greater apologetics, that then they’ll
come to faith. If we give them more proof, they’ll
come to faith. That’s not what Jesus says. If
you would look at the Gospel of Luke, we’re in chapter 11.
We’ll take just a few verses this morning, beginning in verse
twenty nine. As the crowds were increasing,
they began to say he began to say this generation is a wicked
generation, it seeks for a sign and yet no sign will be given
it, but the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah became assigned
to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. The Queen of the South will rise
up with the men of this generation at the judgment and condemn them
because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom
of Solomon. Behold, something greater than
Solomon is here. The men of Nineveh will stand
up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it because
they repented at the preaching of Jonah. And behold, something
greater than Jonah is here. Sign seekers rebuke. That’s what
we have this morning. Those that clamor for more proof,
those that say that they’ll believe, they’ll defer their faith until
that moment when God really steps up to the plate and proves Himself. Or so they say. And the same
can be said even of some in this room that we’re deferring our
faith until God proves himself. Let me tell you. I’ve outlined
it simply this morning, God gives a threefold judgment, a judgment
to those who hold out for more proof if you’re ministering to
someone. telling them the gospel. And
all you’ve told them about is that, look, you’re a sinner and
you are in desperate need of what God has already provided
in the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s enough. I’m not saying
that you don’t go the extra mile with them, but you tell them,
you know what, you’ve got all you need. Right now, you’ve got
all you need to keep you out of an eternity in hell. Sign seekers are rebuked. Here’s
how it started. Go back to verse 16 of chapter
11. Actually, go back to 14. The challenge was issued to him
there. Beginning in verse 14, he was casting out a demon as
if that wasn’t a sign enough power over the devil himself. And it was when the demon had
gone out and the mute man spoke and the crowds were amazed. But
some of them said he cast out demons by Baalzebul, the ruler
of demons. Others to test him were demanding
of him a sign from heaven. They wanted some proof. They wanted something more. It’s
amazing to me when you look at that. It’s astounding that out
of all the miracles that Christ had done, that people would still
be asking Christ for a sign. They should have been falling
on their faces and thanking Him for allowing them to see what
they had seen already rather than battering him for something
more. Luke tells us here that they
did it. There was a motive behind it. They were doing it to test
him. They were challenging his his divinity. They were challenging
his authority. They were challenging his ability. They don’t even say here what
they mean by a sign, but it’s clear they wanted him to do something
fantastic. Something a striking miracle
is what they wanted, something like what they read about in
the Old Testament. That’s what they wanted. They wanted something unmistakably
from God, the healings didn’t matter, the raising of the dead
didn’t matter, the feeding of the five thousand didn’t matter.
They wanted something really spectacular. And in the Old Testament,
there were sometimes those kinds of signs given. But they were
always the gift of God. They were always the gift of
God given for his purpose and his timing, for his glory, not
to meet the demands of skeptics. And that’s why I tell you that
if you’re ministering to somebody, if you’re sharing the gospel
with somebody and they are claiming arrogantly to be holding out
for something more, tell them, don’t bother. Don’t bother waiting. God doesn’t work that way. The Pharisees here evidently
saw a sign as a miraculous thing. A happening produced on demand
so that God would prove Himself. They thought they could get away
with that request, that demand. Some of those scribes and Pharisees
didn’t agree with ascribing Christ’s miracles to the work of the devil,
and that much was good, but it still wasn’t enough. Still wasn’t
enough. They wanted to see a sign, an
unmistakable, fantastic sign. Moses had given bread, manna,
from heaven, right? Maybe it was something like that.
Give us a sign from heaven, Matthew’s Gospel says. Joshua made the
sun and the moon stand still. Maybe that would do. That would
be fine. If you can do that today, that
would be good. We’ll settle for that. Samuel caused thunder and
hail to come at the time of harvest. That would work. Elijah brought
down fire from heaven and rain at his word. Any of those would
be fine, Jesus. Came at a time, Luke’s Gospel
goes on in verse 29, that the crowds were increasing. Certainly, there must have been
a constituency in this large and ever growing horde of people. It’s a graphic word there in
the Greek. There should have been a constituency there that
knew of the verity of His miracles, that knew of their legitimate
nature, that knew that they were miraculous, that they were works
of God. But as was so often the case,
the miracles had fallen on deaf ears. Over and over again, repeated
in Christ’s ministry, to Him who has ears to hear, let Him
hear. But those who could hear and see spiritual truth ended
up being very few. Very few. This argument that
if we only provide more information, more people will come to Christ
isn’t biblical. It’s not biblical. What was Jesus response? Look
at verse 29. He began to say this generation
is a wicked generation. It’s a wicked generation. That
word is graphic. It means evil to the core. It’s
what is so often used to describe the devil himself. This is demonic
thinking. This generation is a wicked generation
in seeking for a sign. What Jesus said is this generation,
largely Jewish, was spiritually corrupt, corrupt to the core. Even though all the miracles
that he had provided, clear and glorious revelations of himself, of his messianic calling, of
his deity, all of those things that he had done, they still
demand this extraordinary sign. It was wicked. There’s an allusion there to
the diabolical spirit, the devil himself. He says that they are
the offspring of the devil. What was demanded, as we’ve already
seen, was something different from what Christ had already
done, what he’d already wrought. The scribes and Pharisees wanted
a direct testimony from God, and Jesus acknowledges that. This wickedness that they are
manifesting, it sounds like a strong term, but it wasn’t too strong
for them. Jesus had just worked a number
of miracles, casting out demons, and even that didn’t satisfy. Matthew adds an interesting word
here, though, in his account. Not only are they wicked, Matthew
says that they are an evil and adulterous generation. Adulterous? Now, is Jesus talking about their
married life now? Was he looking deeply into the
Pharisees and saying that You are adulterers. I know you just
like the woman at the well. He’s not talking about physical
adultery here, he’s talking about spiritual adultery. And what
he’s saying is, is that they had gone astray. They no longer
were worshiping God. Now they were idolaters and they
are as such spiritual adulterers. This was graphic language. This
was these were fighting words. This was you couldn’t say anything.
worse to the scribes and Pharisees, those who claimed to have a direct
connection, some kind of special relationship with God Himself. Their profession of religion
was selfish. They imposed their own rules.
They even began to impose rules on God Himself, as we’ve seen. So, Matthew notes that Jesus
called them adulterous because they turned this proper relation
of a beautiful relation, intimate relation they had with God into
an adulterous one. Their demand for a sign showed
their failure to trust God. Their readiness to try to impose
their will on God Himself. Demanding of a miracle of Him
when they should have been content with Christ and His faithfulness.
They were adulterous. They had been forsaken by the
Lord Jehovah Himself, and this demanding of signs was just further
proof of it. In the Old Testament, it’s a
common device that the prophets used. First of all, there was
this relationship that Israel had with the Almighty. And it
was likened to the husband-wife relationship. Isaiah 54.5 says,
your husband is your Maker. That’s your husband, whose name is the Lord of hosts. And your Redeemer is the Holy
One of Israel, who is called the God of all the earth. So
God likens it, much like Ephesians 5, to the husband-wife relationship. This intimate union of this nation
and her God. But the opposite image is equally
found in Scripture. Isaiah 57.3, just a few chapters
later. Come here, you sons of a sorceress,
offspring of an adulterer and prostitute. Jeremiah used it
frequently. Jeremiah 3.8, I saw that for
all the adulteries of faithless Israel, I had sent her away and
given her a writ of divorce. It got so bad that God himself
wanted a divorce from Israel. And the Bible says repeatedly,
God hates divorce. How bad must their sin have been?
Ezekiel used it. Ezekiel used it of the people. You trusted in your beauty. You
played the harlot because of your fame. You poured out your
harlotries on every passerby who might be willing. Spiritual
adulterers. And of course, you can’t forget
when you begin to talk about spiritual adultery, you can’t
forget Hosea, the prophet. Hosea, the prophet, goes before
God and he says, I want you to go take a prostitute. Go take
a prostitute for a wife. And at first reading, if you’ve
never read Hosea before, you’ve got to go back and you’ve got
to read through it again. Now, what? Go take who? His first clue should have been
that her name was Gomer. He didn’t catch on. He went and
took her as his bride. to be a prophetic judgment. She was going to be a living
illustration, as were her children, that the nation had turned to
spiritual adultery. Over and over again through that
book, the nation of Israel’s adultery
is rebuked and they’re called adulterers. And so for Christ
to use this imagery to use this language was shocking. He couldn’t have said anything
any more direct to these Pharisees, these fools. And it’s with that that I want
to turn to those three rebukes that Christ issues forth. Three
rebukes to those who would defer their faith until there’s more
proof provided. Defer their faith until God shows
His glory. Defer their faith until God provides
us a glimpse of the ark. Defer their faith until we find
the stone that they rolled in front of the tomb. Defer their faith until God gives
them all that they need in an apologetic argument for them
to come to Christ. Deferring your faith by waiting
for more proof is dangerous business. Jesus rebukes it three ways. First of all, deferring your
faith for more proof is rebuked by the sign of a wayward prophet.
Look at verse 29. He said, This generation is a
wicked generation. It seeks for a sign and yet no
sign will be given it but the sign of Jonah. The sign of Jonah,
what was that? We’ve already seen that signs
weren’t to be demanded. And yet, here God in His mercy
is still going to give them a sign. It’s not going to be the fantastic,
amazing sign that they thought. Not going to be a flashing light
from heaven. Not going to be a pillar of fire. But it is going to be a sign
and it is going to be an incredible sign. The most glorious sign
the world’s ever seen. It’s the sign of Jonah. We’ll see what it is in a moment.
But Jesus is saying that Jonah’s the sign. You better go back
and read the prophet Jonah because there’s your sign, people. The
Lord had already worked many miracles. These should have been
considered signs of His. But when somebody began to clamor
for other signs, repeatedly Christ refused them. Remember, Herod Herod was glad
to see Christ brought Christ before him, for he wanted to
see him for a long time because he’d been hearing about him and
was hoping to see some sign performed by him. Jesus didn’t cater to his wishes. What is the sign of Jonah? At
first sight, Luke, in his recording of it, seems to make this parallel
between Jonah and Christ nothing more than the preaching. Jonah
preached and Christ preached. That’s all you’re going to get. But Matthew’s gospel gives us
much greater detail. If you will, keep your finger
on the gospel of Luke and turn over to Matthew, chapter 12,
Matthew, chapter 12. In Matthew 12, beginning in verse
39, we have the same account, just with additional detail.
Look at verse 39. An evil and adulterous generation
craves for a sign, yet no sign will be given to it except the
sign of Jonah the prophet. For just as Jonah was three days
and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the
Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of
the earth. What Jesus points to is the resurrection. You’ll get a sign. It’s not what
you’re looking for. I know you’re hoping for flashes
of light and pillars of fire and all kinds of fantastic signs
from heaven. You’re not going to get that,
but you are going to get a sign. My burial and my resurrection. That was the sign they were going
to get. The sign of this wayward prophet. That’s all they were
going to get is this wayward prophet that was thrown into
the sea, heaped into a great fish’s mouth, whether you believe
it was a whale or what have you, whatever it was, as if God couldn’t
make a giant fish, He made all the rest of them, thrown in, swallowed by a fish,
spit out three days later, and that was the miracle. That was
the miracle that Nineveh behold. Some have said that because of
the bodily acids, the stomach acids in the fish, that his skin
would have been turned white. Others have suffered a similar
experience. Who knows? But by God’s grace,
it’s told here plainly that they knew that this was a miracle
man. that God had a mission for him and that he had sent him
on this mission to preach to their land and that God was serious
about it. So serious that when he tried
to get away from it, he had him swallowed up for three days and
spit back out and recommissioned. Boy, if there was anybody ever
that I would, you know, pulled my financial support of, it would
have been Jonah. I mean, he was sent and instead
of going, he went 180 degrees in the opposite direction. Instead
of going on land, he went by boat. And even after he’s recommissioned,
do you remember the story? Nineveh was a was a three day
walk and Jonah began to take it in one day. He was this was
fast walking. Preaching as quick as he could
go to get through there and even still, This great prophet was
used of God. They knew this was a miracle
man and they repented, as we’ll see in a moment. So the point
was not so much just the preaching, but this sign, this attending
sign, as Matthew points out, three days in the belly of the
whale. That was the miraculous sign
that attested Jonah’s preaching that brought them to repentance.
Jesus said, you get no other sign. You get only the sign of
Jonah. Turn back to the gospel of Luke.
Luke doesn’t skip this part. He doesn’t give you the full
detail, but it’s woven into his gospel. Look at how it’s stated there. No sign will be given but the
sign of Jonah. Just as Jonah became assigned
to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation.
He’s promising it. It’s future. What he’s referring
to is the resurrection. Clearly, Luke just doesn’t give
us all the detail. The infallible sign is still
in the future. It’s his resurrection. But even that should not have
been necessary. because Christ had already preached.
He proclaimed Himself. He had attested His ministry
with great miracles. He was proven by God. But He
says one last sign. You’ll get it. It’s the sign
of Jonah. Paul acknowledged this in many
of his writings. Luke acknowledged it later in
the book of Acts. The book of Acts. repeatedly
through those early chapters. God raised him up again, putting
an end to the agony of death. Acts 2.32, this Jesus God raised
up again to which we were all witnesses. Acts 3.15, they put
to death the Prince of life, the one whom God raised from
the dead, a fact to which we are all witnesses. Matthew says, there’s your proof. Three days and three nights.
It wasn’t the whole life of Jonah the prophet. It wasn’t his fantastic
ministry because it wasn’t that fantastic. You can’t say that
Jonah’s preaching was just so stupendous because that isn’t
the point of the passage. It was the three days and three
nights, and it indicates that after Jesus is raised, that’s
the sign. That’s it. That’s all that generation
is going to get. For the Ninevites, that sign
was the miraculous reappearance of Jonah from the dead. From that current generation
to ours, to all eternity, the final sign is Christ resurrected.
It’s said that there’s a threefold judgment to those who hold out
for proof, not only Is it the sign of a wayward prophet? But
secondly, deferring faith for more proof is rebuked by the
devotion of a heathen queen. The devotion of a heathen queen.
Look at verse 31. Where Jesus says, the queen of
the south will rise up with the men of this generation at the
judgment and condemn them. Because she came from the ends
of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Behold, something
greater than Solomon is here. What Jesus is referring to there,
the Queen of the South was, I never knew this, the Queen of Sheba.
My sister used to get into trouble all the time and my mom would
say, who do you think you are, the Queen of Sheba? And now I
know who the Queen of Sheba is. The Queen of Sheba came from
what is now modern day Yemen from a great distance. All she
had done, you can read about it in First Kings 10. First Kings
chapter 10. She had heard about Solomon and
she wanted to hear it for herself. She couldn’t go to her local
library and check out one of his books. She couldn’t buy it
at Barnes and Noble. She had to go hear it from the
prophet’s mouth himself. And so she went from great distance,
bringing him gifts and accolades and coming to hear his wisdom.
Great distance. And here Jesus has been in the
midst of these people for years and years and years. Remember,
he just had rebuked several towns, one of which was in Samaria for
not receiving him. How close the gospel had come
to them, and yet they continued to refuse it. And here’s a woman
that Jesus says came from a great distance to hear the wisdom of
an earthly king, no doubt the wisest man that’s ever lived.
And yet here you have the wisdom of God Himself standing in their
midst and they refuse even though He’s there. She came all that way to hear
the wisdom of Solomon. It was given to him by God and
she believed the report that she heard from Him. That’s the amazing contrast.
Here’s a heathen queen contrasted with the Jews themselves. The
ends of the earth, the Scripture says, great distance, Yemen, contrasted with Solomon and the
Son of Man. Even though the wisdom of Solomon
was enough to attract this heathen queen, this queen of Sheba, Israel
demands that Jesus hasn’t provided enough. We need more. And that’s
serious enough that matters get even worse. The third judgment to those who
hold out for more proof, not only the sign of a wayward prophet
and the devotion of a heathen queen, but finally, the faith
of a godless nation. Jesus says, here’s your final
rebuke. Get this, this is shocking. Verse 32, the men of Nineveh,
these heathen people, godless nation, idolaters all. The men of Nineveh will stand
up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it. What
an amazing thought. What Jesus is saying there is,
look, not that heathens or people are going to come and they’re
going to judge people and they’re going to point fingers and all
that. It’s just a matter of the fact that they came to faith
and here the scribes and Pharisees didn’t, wouldn’t. They repented. That’s the reason. Because they repented at the
preaching of Jonah and behold, something greater than Jonah
is here. Wasn’t Jesus far greater than Jonah? I mean, Jonah practically
sprinted through their territory. He must have looked a wreck.
His attitude was terrible even after great conversions. He went
and pouted under a big plant. And here’s Jesus, the merciful
Lord God Himself, pleading with them. Pleading with them to come
to repentance. And they wouldn’t. So Luke says those Ninevites
who turned to God through the preaching of an ordinary guy
like Jonah would condemn the Jews who had the opportunity
of being saved by the Messiah Himself. But they hardened themselves
in unbelief. So at the judgment, the Ninevites
are going to confront that generation Doesn’t mean that they’re the
ones going to issue the edicts against them. Just means their own hearts are
going to be condemned by the faith of a of a godless nation,
people who with very little to go on place their faith, they
knew what was true and what was false. They placed their faith
in God because of Jonah’s preaching. That was a rebuke. And so let’s set aside this idea
that we’ve got to have every argument for every question that
anybody in this world could ever pose. We’re ill equipped. If you know that the average
person who doesn’t know Christ is a sinner in desperate need
of a savior, you’ve got enough. That’s all the argument you need.
And you know what the Bible tells them? It tells them they already
know there’s a God. You don’t have to prove there’s
a God. You don’t have to prove the verity, the trustworthiness
of God’s Word. You don’t have to. Take them
the gospel. It’s enough. There’s no excuse
for deferring faith for more proof. None at all. Take them
the gospel, take them Christ. Because Christ himself says it’s
enough. Let’s pray. Our kind and our merciful God,
O Lord, how merciful You were to
give us the signs that You did give. Oh, the glorious sign of
the resurrection. Sadly, we think of it so typically
only once a year. Yet, Father, it is the very cornerstone
Faith. Father, we thank You for our
Lord Jesus Christ. We thank You for His threefold
rebuke of this faithless generation. Father, help us not to engender
that same kind of deferring of faith that is so rampant in our
culture today. Give us great courage to proclaim
Christ. That’s enough. We thank you and
we praise you in Jesus name. Amen.