Introduction
Have you ever thought about what the Bible is all about? And would you be able to tell in few short sentence, what is the main message of the Scriptures?
Malady
A lot of people have a lot of different opinions about the Bible and what it is saying. They pull this verse or that verse out of context and twist it to make it suit their purpose. People approach the Bible with their presuppositions and then find in the Bible what they want to find.
What’s the main message
But what really is the main message of the Bible, if you had to sum it up? And how would you know if you had summed it up correctly? Think about it before you read any further below:
No guess work
There’s no need for guesswork or random speculation. No, because someone today is going to tell us what the Bible is all about. And more than that, He is someone who knows what He’s talking about. It’s Jesus Himself, of course.
So, let’s listen now as our risen Lord Jesus Christ opens our minds “To Understand the Scriptures.”
What is God’s intent for what His Word is meant to do to us and for us? That’s what it is to truly understand the Scriptures.
First thing to note here is that man on his own, according to his sinful nature and apart from the Holy Spirit, cannot rightly understand the Scriptures.
The Bible will always remain a closed book to the person who has not been born again by water and the Spirit. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.”
Unbeliever
Oh, an unbeliever may read the Bible and understand what the words are saying, but because he does not have the gift of faith, he will not take it to heart in the way it is meant to be applied to our lives.
Malady
So our minds are in darkness, spiritually speaking, until Christ shines the light of the gospel into our lives. Then the Holy Spirit removes the veil and enlightens our understanding, and we begin to grasp the purpose that God has for us in giving us His Word.
Purpose
St. John said toward the end of his gospel in summing up the purpose of his accounts and really of all the Scriptures: “These are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name.”
St. Paul likewise told Timothy that the Scriptures “are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” So, Faith in Jesus, trust in Him, to know who He is and what He has done for us to give us life and salvation–that is the purpose of the Scriptures.
Text
In our text on Sunday, the Holy Gospel from Luke 24, Jesus Himself comes and tells us the exact same thing.
On Easter, the evening of the day that Christ rose from the dead. He appears in the room with His disciples, and He greets them with “Peace be with you!” They think it’s a ghost. How could that be their Master, Jesus, alive and standing there among them? Why, He was just crucified and died and was buried, just the other day! How can this be Him? But Jesus reassures them and shows them His hands and His feet, still bearing the marks of His crucifixion. No, this is no ghost. This is Jesus Himself, alive, risen from the dead, raised bodily, flesh and bone. He even asks for something to eat, to show His physicality.
And so it is this risen Christ, Jesus raised from the dead, who will now tell His disciples what it all means. He reminds them that He had already told them that there must be a fulfillment of everything written about Him in the Old Testament Scriptures: “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.”
Reflection
Yes, Jesus had already said that He was the one prophesied in the Old Testament, namely, the Messiah to come. Jesus had already said that the Scriptures were ultimately about Him. Jesus had even told His opponents, those like the scribes and the Pharisees, who wrongly thought they could merit salvation by their keeping of the Law–Jesus had told them: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.”
Beloved, the scribes and Pharisees were reading the Bible, but they were missing the main point, the chief purpose, which is to point us to salvation in Christ!
So Jesus is telling His astonished disciples that everything prophesied about Him in the Bible had to be fulfilled. There was a divine necessity about it. And that included both His crucifixion and His resurrection.
Amen