The Supremacy Of Christ- Part #1

Nothing says Christmas like a water buffalo. For a poor family in Asia, getting a water buffalo is like getting a farm tractor to pull a plow, or getting a milk truck full of delicious milk, or getting a stand at the market to sell cheese. A water buffalo opens the door for work, food, and income. More importantly, it opens the door to talk about Jesus.

And nothing says Christmas better than that. The Truth Network Podcast is playing now. For more information and to connect with Russ Andrews and Finding Purpose, you can visit us online at findingpurpose.net or connect with us on Facebook. Now let's listen to Russ Andrews as he teaches us how to be a Christian without being religious. I've entitled this message, The Supremacy of Christ. And I want to begin in Colossians chapter 1, where Paul, I think, does an amazing job of describing the supremacy of Christ. Colossians 1 15-17, Paul writes, He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. Whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things were created by Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. What's Paul trying to tell us? He's trying to explain that the one who stopped Him dead in His tracks when He was on the road to Damascus is the Lord and Maker of the heavens and the earth, which makes Him the supreme ruler over all of creation. Paul says He is the image of the invisible God.

I want you to understand this truth. Whenever God manifests Himself in bodily form, in the flesh, it's always through the second person of the Trinity. Jesus is the image of God.

It's like a stamp imprint. He's the perfect likeness of God. And when you see Jesus, you have seen God because He tells us that they are one. And I'm going to say some very important things in a few minutes about the Trinity because this is a very important doctrine that we all need to understand.

But for right now I want to focus on the Son. Jesus as the Son, Paul writes, is the firstborn over all creation. Now this does not mean that Jesus was created.

It simply means that He is the preeminent one, the supreme ruler over all that has been created. Like when you go out there and look at the heavens and you look at the earth, as far as you can see, even with a telescope, beyond what we can see, Jesus created it all. Moreover, as the Son, Jesus is the Creator. For by Him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. Hebrews 1 verses 2 and 3 confirms this truth. But in these last days, God has spoken to us by His Son whom He appointed heir of all things and through whom He made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful what?

Word. Jesus as the Son is before all things and in Him all things hold together. This is why I don't worry about who's a king, who's the president, although I have my preferences.

I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep over it and I haven't lost one bit of sleep over climate change. Do you know why? Because it just says right here that in Him all things hold together. He's the one who controls the thermostat. Add all this up and it's clear that Jesus is both co-equal and co-eternal with the Father. Let me pause for a moment and address the Trinity. And the reason why I do this is because some people will tell you that they don't really believe in the Trinity.

I had a man tell me that recently. I want you to understand this. Our finite minds cannot understand this concept that how can one God exist in three persons and still be one? And even though we can't understand it, there's some other things in the Bible we can't understand. But we take it by faith because it's where? It's in the Scripture. It's in chapter 6, verse 4. It's known as the Shema.

That word means here. And it declares the oneness of God. The Jews love to recite this verse in Israel even to this day. Here O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.

And guys, you also need to know this. Nowhere in Scripture will you find the word Trinity. But that doesn't mean that you don't see its truth from cover to cover. John 1, verse 1 and 14 says, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. And just so we know who the Word is, verse 14 says, And the Word became flesh and made His dwelling where? Among us. Who is the Word?

Jesus. And the Word was in the beginning. And the Word is God. Genesis 1, I want to go back to the very beginning. So we see that the Word, the Son, was in the beginning.

Who else was in the beginning? In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty.

Darkness was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the water. So in the beginning, who do we see? We see the Trinity. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. They are tri-equal and tri-eternal. Thus the doctrine of the Trinity is clearly established in Scripture.

Now listen, I don't have time tonight because it's really not the subject of this text. I just want to lay this truth out because we need to understand who God is. But we could go through the Bible and spend a lot of time just talking about the Trinity. By the way, men, this is the key doctrine that separates biblical Christianity from every other religion. The Bible teaches that the Father is God the Son, that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The Bible also teaches that there's only one God. I mean we also affirm this whenever we recite the Apostles' Creed. I believe in God the Father. I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. And then we say, I believe in the Holy Spirit. The Reformers believe this.

John Calvin, one of the Reformers said, it is impossible to praise God without also uttering the praises of the Father, of the Son, and of the Spirit. One final word on this subject. I believe that the evidence of one's salvation, well I know it is, is the presence of the indwelling Holy Spirit. And one of the key roles of the Spirit is to guide us into what?

Truth. Therefore, if a man says he does not believe in the Holy Spirit, I'm not the judge, but I have to say that's a huge red flag concerning his salvation. Because if the Holy Spirit is in you, He will explain to you the truth about Himself as you study the Word of God.

He lifts the veil from your eyes. Do you believe in the Trinity? I believe you must believe in the Trinity.

I believe it's a Category A item. Now let's get back to the Son. Who is Jesus? Well who does the Father say He is? Hebrews 1 and 8 gives us the answer. Of the Son, He says, your throne, O God.

Did you catch that? The Father speaking about the Son says, your throne, O God. He's talking to His Son. It's forever and ever. And the righteous scepter is the scepter of your kingdom, the kingdom of the Son.

So guys, you've got to understand this. Jesus is God. And when we get to heaven, how many gods are we going to see?

One. And what will His name be? Jesus says, where will the Father and the Son be? They'll still be existing eternally with the Son. But the Bible says that God is Spirit and the Holy Spirit is Spirit. So you cannot see the Father and you cannot see the Spirit.

That's as far as this limited brain can go. If I get to heaven and I find it is different, do you think I'm going to lose any sleep over it? But I believe that's what the Bible teaches. And I believe that's what we have to all believe. 2 Peter 1, 16, Peter says. You know, a lot of people like to say that what happened is that after the events happened in Jesus' life, some writers came along and made up all these stories, cleverly invented them, so that we would believe these things about Jesus.

Let me tell you what Peter says. He said that we did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. From the beginning of the Gospel of Luke, He has been providing us with testimonies from eyewitness accounts so that we might know, man, that what we're studying is the truth. Do you believe it to be the truth?

I do. In chapter 1, remember the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary as an eyewitness account from where? Heaven.

It doesn't get any better than that. And he proclaimed good news to Mary. You will be with child and will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He'll be called great in the Son of the Most High. In chapter 2, angels also from heaven appeared to those lowly shepherds with the same good news, and these angels announced today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord. So these angels identified that this baby is the Messiah from the Old Testament, the Christ. In chapter 3, at the baptism of Jesus, God the Father spoke from heaven saying what? You are my Son whom I love.

With you I'm well pleased. And at the very same moment, the Spirit descended from heaven and landed on Jesus in the form of a dove. And so right there you get a picture of what? The Trinity. In chapter 4, when Jesus visited His hometown of Lazarus, remember He read from the scroll of Isaiah, chapter 61, and then He sat down and He declared to everyone that was listening, every eye in the synagogue was on Him, all these religious priests. And He said, today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.

What was He declaring? The great I AM is here. I AM the Messiah. I AM the Savior of the world.

Do you believe that? This brings us to verses 33, excuse me, 31. So where Luke is going to give us more evidence that Jesus is the one He claimed to be, deity veiled in human flesh. So you all track along with me, okay? And guys, I've been working on this all day, so I hope you see it, okay?

And it's not about me. It's about the Lord taking His Word and opening it up to us so that we can actually see Jesus for who He really is. And what I want you to see tonight is I want you to see Him like you've never seen Him before, in all of His majesty and glory. And I want you to see Him as the supreme God who rules over the universe. By the way, the word supreme means highest, greatest, preeminent, transcendent, unparalleled, unmatchable, and unsurpassing, and I could go on and on.

There's not enough words to describe it. But this is why the highest and most important court in the United States is called what? The Supreme Court.

When the Supreme Court makes a decision, it is final because it is the preeminent court in the land. Man, Jesus is the supreme ruler in the universe. And one day, this is going to become abundantly clear when the trumpet sounds and He appears in the sky because the Bible says that every eye will see Him and the whole world will know then who He is. And then it says He's going to judge the nations and every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that what?

Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. This is what all of heaven is waiting for. This is what I'm waiting for. I'm just down here in this body that's breaking down. I'm getting tired.

I'm getting old. But I'm going to try to do this as long as He allows me to. And then I'm going to be ready. So in tonight's text, I want you to see the supremacy of Christ in four ways. In His authority, in His power, in His love, and in His purpose. So first, let's look at His authority. Look at verse 31. Luke writes, And He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and He was teaching them on the Sabbath, and they were astonished at His teaching, for His word possessed what? Authority. You know, the Jewish people had been listening for years to the Pharisees and the scribes preach and teach. So what were they hearing? Not much.

You know I'm going with this. It's similar to what we hear in many churches today. Were you all expecting that to come from me? Most sermons today are just short, little, cute homilies that are dry, dead, unconvicting, and powerless. And this is why tens of thousands of churches are closing right now in our country. In 2020, David Kenneman, the president of Barnard, which is a research institute, said as many as 20, they said this back in 2020, as many as 20% of churches could close within the next 18 months. There are more than 300,000 churches in the United States.

If his prediction is correct, and you all are not going to believe I'm going to say this, I hope it is. I want these dead churches to shut up and never open their doors again. But if his prediction is correct, 60,000 churches are going to close their doors.

Why is this? Because without the presence of the Holy Spirit in a church, combined with power, lifeless preaching, the people remain blind, lost, and spiritually dead. This is the atmosphere, men, in many churches. Somebody showed me a picture of a church recently right here in Raleigh. I'm not going to tell you which church. It was on a Sunday morning.

The guy is smiling who sent me the picture. I think it had eight people sitting around in a congregation that seeks about 500. Eight people! This is the same situation that existed at the time of Christ in the synagogues. So what did the people need to hear back then? The same thing we need to hear today.

A message from God's Word, men, that will change your life, that has power and authority. The text says that Jesus went down to Capernaum. You know why he went down? Because I believe Capernaum is about 700 feet below sea level. It was a small fishing village. I've had the privilege of going there and standing right there in the city. There's a restored temple that we think stands upon this temple that stood there 2,000 years ago. It looks right over the Sea of Galilee.

It's absolutely gorgeous. Then we took a little trip on a boat out around the Sea of Galilee. Do you know why Jesus went down to Capernaum?

Do you know what it says right here? To teach the people. You see, this was His mission. This is why He came into the world, to teach the gospel. So what did He teach? He taught the Word of God like no teacher they had ever heard.

Do you know why? Because He taught it with power and authority. And what was their reaction? Look at verse 32. It says they were amazed at His teaching because His message had authority.

They had never heard anything like that. And they were overwhelmed. Do you know why I believe the reason it had authority? I'm going to tell you the main reason in a minute.

But I think it's because of this. Jesus knew who He was. He knew why He was here. He knew what the people needed. And He knew He was the answer.

Furthermore, and this is the most important part, He preached from God's Word and He relied on the power of the Holy Spirit. See, I believe when you know the truth and believe the truth, you can speak with authority. The reason so many men and women who occupy today's pulpits do not speak with authority is because I don't think they know really who they are. I don't think they really understand why they're there.

And they really don't understand what the people need. And they don't have the answer for it. More importantly, they don't really preach God's Word. They may read Scripture. They may mention the name of Jesus. But they don't have the power of the Spirit.

Do you know why? Because they're not really proclaiming the Word of God. I don't think they really believe the Word of God. Here's what they do.

This is very subtle. Listen for the Word of God. What should they say? Listen to the Word of God. What they believe is that they say that some of this may be the Word of God. They want you to listen and possibly hear it. Hear God speaking to you somehow mystically as they read some really inspired words that were written by some human beings. See, I believe that God used those human beings to pen exactly what He wanted them to do, to pen. He used their personalities. He used their individual writing styles. But nonetheless, He guided their thoughts as they wrote Scripture.

Thus, when you pick up the Bible and read it, you're reading God's Word. Do y'all believe that I believe that? Yesterday, y'all will probably come and be crucified in one day, but anyway, you Wolfpack fans. But yesterday, we had 24 young men who were in two different fraternities at NC State.

Twenty-four. Do you remember how pretty it was yesterday? They drove here at four o'clock in the afternoon to sit over there in that other building with two bald-headed men for an hour.

Do you know why they did that? I believe it's not because we have such fancy words so that we look so attractive, even though I do. It's because Jim and I, we opened up that study with prayer.

We teach it by the authority of God's Word. And we rely on the Holy Spirit to change the lives of these men and change our lives. You know what happens every week?

I'm not kidding. Two more guys walk in. If all the guys show up who've been there once, we'd have 40 guys. And I believe that it's going to keep growing. Would y'all pray for that ministry? I mean, the young people want to hear the truth. They're hungry for it.

If they'll listen to a 67-year-old bald-headed man from Bethel, they've got to be hungry for something. And they know I'm going to teach the truth to them. Jesus spoke upon the authority of God's Word and by the power of the Holy Spirit. And because of this, His message was clear and convicting. You see, it cut to the core of a man's heart. Have you ever been cut by the Word of God? To the heart, to the core, it hurt.

Amy Carmichael, the great missionary to China, said, If you have never been hurt by a word from God, it is probable that you have never heard God speak. You see, the people were shocked to the core. And I believe they were divinely hurt. But you see, now their hearts were ready to believe the gospel. And Jesus, that's what He was going to lay it out for them. Listen, Jesus not only spoke with authority, but He backed it up with what?

Power. Look at verses 33 through 36. And in the synagogue, there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice, Huh, what have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are, the Holy One of God. But Jesus rebuked him, saying, Be silent and come out of him. And when the demon had thrown him down in their midst, thrown him down, he came out of him, having done him no harm. And they were all amazed, wouldn't you be?

And said to one another, What is this word? For with authority and power, he commands even the demons to come out, and they do. And reports about him spread all over the region, I guess so. Man, I want you to understand this, all throughout Scripture, we see evidence of an unseen world, a world where the principalities and spiritual force of evil are waging war day and night against God and God's people. It's going on all over the world right now, guys, 24-7. That's why you see so much evil right now on television. And Hollywood is just putting out evil. You can't even watch it.

We're trying to find something, and we have to go back to shows like Leave it to Beaver, Andy Griffith Show. Guys, Jesus bore more of the brunt of this war than anyone who has ever lived. Do you know why? Because when he came into this world, it was a frontal assault on enemy territory. The day he was born was D-Day. In this text, we see Jesus come face to face with one of Satan's minions, a demon who had entered a man, and now he had had control of his mind and his body. And when the demon saw Jesus, he knew exactly who he was.

And look at what he says again. He said, Hi, what have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are, the Holy One of God. So what was going on here? The man was speaking, but he was under the control of the demon who had control of his vocal box and his tongue. And he uttered out this language, and everybody heard it.

Everybody was listening. So what was he really saying? Well, this word hi is an expression of disgust, displeasure, even hostility. In essence, he was saying, Why are you here?

This is none of your business. Leave us alone. In other words, he wanted Jesus to get out of there. I think the demon also was filled with some fear and dread because this word also can mean dread. And this is why he asked Jesus if he'd come to destroy them. Now, notice that he used the plural word us. Why did he do this?

Do you know why? Because the Bible says that at some point, God is going to destroy Satan and all of his demonic forces, and he's going to cast them where? Into hell. Did you all know the Bible says that God created hell for one reason? To send all the angels, beginning with Lucifer, who rebelled against him and who brought all this evil upon our world. That's who he created hell for. He did not create hell for mankind.

But what's the problem? If you belong to Satan and you refuse God's grace and mercy all your life, then you're going to go live in hell with him. It's going to be worse than being in a concentration camp with the Nazis running it. That's the worst image of hell I can think of. And guess how long it's going to last?

Forever. Jesus says it'll be a place where the worm devouring the wicked never ceases. Do you know what I believe that is? It's symbolic of the fact that you will have a guilty conscience that will never let up.

It'll just gnaw at you forever, drive you insane, but there's no pills to take. There's no freedom. Can you all imagine what the people were doing? They're sitting there watching this, front row seats, and they couldn't believe what they were hearing. They couldn't believe they were totally silent, watching the conversation and listening to the conversation between Jesus and basically this demon. What did Jesus do? Did he jump up and down and shout? Did he fall on his knees and pray?

No. He uttered seven simple words. Be silent. Come out of him. And immediately, just as when he spoke creation into existence, he said, let it be, and it was. The moment he said, come out, that demon came out, and that man fell to the ground, convulsing in an epileptic fit, and then he just lay there, silent and unharmed.

But here's what I want you to understand. He had been held captive by that demon for years, and Jesus did what? Set him free.

Remember what Jesus said? The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because I have come to set the captives free. Have you ever been set free from a sin? I'm not talking about one that you entangled in. Lee, you ever been set free?

I'm not picking on you. I've been set free. Jim, you ever been set free? Guys, some of you tonight, I believe, are still entangled in what the Bible calls a stronghold. It's a sin that you try to quit, and you just can't seem to do it. This can even happen to believers. Not that you can't be possessed by a demon, but you can be controlled by a sin that's got you entangled, and there's only one who can set you free.

What's his name? Jesus. Do you need to be set free tonight? Come to Jesus. Being a Christian is not about being religious, but about having a dynamic, alive relationship with Jesus Christ. You've been listening to Finding Purpose with Pastor Russ Andrews, glorifying God by helping men find their purpose for living. You can discover more about finding your purpose in life by checking out the resources at findingpurpose.net or connect to Finding Purpose on Facebook. Pastor Russ would also like to extend a special invitation for you to join him and over 300 other local men to study God's Word together every Tuesday night at 7 p.m. in downtown Raleigh. Find out more at findingpurpose.net