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CHRIST CHURCH. LONDON,
Scripture Lesson, Luke 10:1-16.
Special Text, Luke 10:16: “He that heareth you
heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth
me; and he that despiseth Me despiseth Him that
sent Me."
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UR Scripture lesson is in connection with
the beginning of our Lord’s ministry in
heathen Perea. It will be observed that
His ministry was divided into three geo-
graphical parts: Galilee, with its sub-division, Phoen
icia; Perea, known as “the region beyond Jordan;”
Judea, with its sub-division, Samaria.
In Galilee his purpose geemed to be that of teach
ing. The population was made up of Jews, who
knew the prophecies and hence the effort of Jesus
there was to show how he fulfilled the prophecies
concerning the Messiah. Most of his miracles were
wrought in Galilee.
When he came over into Perea his work was
very different —Perea being heathen. It was made
up of a mixed population with a few Jews. Perea
was a section in which the Jews had practically
no interest. They were heathens, made up of every
kind of population that had come into Palestine
from various sections of the country. The Jews
had gone over and amalgamated with a population
that was heanthen. So here our Lord is entering
upon what we might call an evangelistic campaign.
He is going on a purely foreign missionary tour of
evangelism, and it is in Perea that he issues those
parables or illustrations, which are of an evange
listic nature, sounding in them the note of wooing
and winning that sets forth the winsomeness of
God as revealed in Jesus Christ. Here is a list of
them:
The Lost Coin.
The Lost Sheep.
The Prodigal Son.
The Rich Man and Lazarus.
The Rich Fool.
The Unjust Steward.
The Marriage Feast.
The Good Samaritan.
You can easily see that every one of them is
adapted to the special work he has gone over into
Perea to do. They are all evangelistic, they all have
the note of revelation and appeal. Thev reveal the
love and interest of God. his searching, and his ap
peal. You will see as you study further how in
this Perean ministry Jesus uses these parables as
an evangelist, keeping in mind the section of country
he is using them in, and the people to whom he
is using them.
After he has finished in Perea, he comes over
into Judea and begins again his work around Jeru
salem. Now these Judean Jews were a very differ
ent type from those in Galilee—they were the offi-
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cial element, the cultured class that dominated the
whole of the Judean country. They always resisted
the claims of Jesus, that is the reason why Jesus
left there. Hence you find in this ministry a note
of judgment ringing through his whole teaching. It
will help you in these studies if you will just keep
these three sections of Palestine in your mind, and
remember where he is at work as you study the
various lines of procedure; it will throw great light
upon them. He is sounding the note of judgment,
“The kingdom of heaven is taken away and given
to another.” Then follows the crucifixion. These
severe notes of Jesus, as you see when you read
your four Gospels, were for the most part sounded
in Judea.
This brings us to what we want to say about the
first phases of this evangelistic, or missionary tour.
You will observe from the study of the lesson that
the first thing stated about this tour is the selection
of the seventy. It is said that “He appointed other
seventy.” That is not an accidental way of express
ing it, nor an error in translation, nor a whim of
the translators j it is there for a reason, to express
the real purpose of our Lord. The disciples occu
pied a closer relationship to Jesus than the other
seventy. They were the immediate standard bearers;
they were (if we may use the term) the official rep
resentatives of our Lord in his business on earth,
while he was here, and when he was gone. The other
seventy seem to ]jave been brought into the service
as an expedient to meet a necessity that had de
veloped, hence, he “appointed other seventy.”
You will also remember that these were ordinary
men that had been gathered up in and around Gali
lee; they were orthodox Jews, converted to Christian
ity through the preaching and teaching and minis
try of Jesus. But they were of so little importance
as not to have their names even recorded; it is sim
ply stated that “he appointed other seventy,” and
with them he crosses the Jordan and goes over into
heathen Perea, beginning that great missionary tour
through the land.
Then you will remember also how he used these
seventy, dividing them into two parts; they were to
go out in two s. Two and two they were to go be
fore him through that land. There is some signifi
cance in the expression, “Before his face.” That is
to say, before Jesus entered a single village, he sent
first these seventy. It is my opinion that his dis
ciples remained to go with him. The others went
into the cities he intended to enter, and in it they
published abroad everywhere the coming of Jesus
and his disciples, telling all they knew about him
and ministering to the people in his name as they
went. You see in this great wisdom on our Lord’s
part as an organizer. It is a lesson we can well
afford to learn in our churches and Sunday schools.
If our Lord must have his personal representatives
to go out, and pave the way and advertise his com
ing, what of us? What of you? If it paid our
Lord to have such representatives, what of us? You
must remember they had no newspapers in those
days to advertise services and Jesus availed himself
of the means at hand for publishing his coming and
announcing his meetings; (I say that in no sense
belittling or under estimating the work of Christ).
He used these men because he had no other means
of advertising his coming, and after all, that way is
a great deal better than newspapers or posters. I
would rather have seventy well-trained men in Lon
don advertising my services than have all the print
ers’ ink at my command, and all the newspapers in
London.
Now, following this, Jesus instructs them concern
ing the greatness of the harvest; “the field is already
white unto harvest, but the laborers are few.” This
was specially true in Perea at this time; for while
Perea was a heathen country it was very dissatisfied.
It was in a low state of moral life, and there was
great unrest among the people. They were begin
ning to endeavor to understand and see how this
state of immorality had come about. It was just at
this time when that state of restlessness was abroad
in the land, that Jesus and his disciples and the
seventy others struck the country, so the harvest was
particularly plenteous at that time; but he said,
“The laborers are few.”
I do not want to lose sight of the fact that these
things are intended to be of service to us in dealing
with our problems. It was no more true of Perea
in the days of Jesus, that the heathen were plen
teous and the laborers few, than it is today of us
in London. The heathen in London were never so
plenteous, or the opportunity so great as today for
the work of the church. On the other hand, the
laborers were never so few in proportion to the op
portunity, as today. I do not believe there was ever
a time when Christian work, really and sensibly
done, returned a greater reward than at the present
time. Let me give you just a little illustration from
the work here: (friends not connected with us in it
will pardon me for advertising our own work!)
Some time ago we became very much impressed
here that we were not grappling with the children
of this community. A great many people said that
the children of this local community would not come
to our Sunday school; they would go to the Mission
Schools, but not here. They said they had a natural
antipathy to coming into a church that looked so
churchy as this; that they were not sufficiently
clothed to associate with the children of the bet
ter class. But we went on feeling more and more
that there was a loss of opportunity here; that if
that were true, there needed to be a change all round,
because a church standing as this church does in
this particular locality, ought to grapple with the
problem right at its door or resign business and
let somebody else do it.
We decided we would make a little test, and we
put a woman in the field to do nothing else but visit
children, all sorts and any sort, and wherever she
was able to find children not sufficiently clothed to
come, she was to let us know, and the requirements
would be met and clothes furnished. That has not
been a long time ago. And today we are beginning
to get so crowded that our Primary Superintend
ent has got to go to building another primary room;
we have packed it so full it will not presently be
sanitary for children to be there; indeed, it is already
so; and even then, we hardly touched the fringe of
the situation. It has opened my eyes. Here is a
plant that is sufficient to take care of a great area
in this community, and yet there are scores of Mis
sion Schools around us, operating upon the belief
that you cannot get them to go to church. It is
false. We have demonstrated that; they not only
come, but stay when they come.
What the church of Christ needs to learn today is
the lesson our Lord began to teach when he went
into Perea, with the seventy, who entered it for con
quest for the Lord. Get to the people personally
with the Gospel. Do not sit down and wait for the
people to come to you! If our Lord himself could
not afford to sit down in the cities of Perea and say,
“Now here I am; I can work miracles; I wlil work
just as many as you bring me.” If he did not rely
(Continued on page 7.)
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