And why call ye Me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? Luke 6:46
More than 100 years ago, a business in New York City had on one of its walls a large painting entitled ‘Jesus Talking to the Doctors’. The painting was an exceptionally fine one, in which the artist depicted the 12-year-old Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem, asking questions of the doctors of the law. One day, a judge of the supreme court came into the company’s offices on business, and immediately noticed the painting. While he was conducting his business, his eyes would constantly go back to that picture. A short time after the judge finished his business and left, he returned, and told the owner of the company, ‘I need to see that Boy again’. The owner took the picture from the wall and carried it into his private office, and told the judge to look at it as long as he liked. More than an hour passed before the judge emerged from the office, with tears streaming down his face. ‘The Boy has conquered me!’ he declared. And he went forth to live a life of service and devotion to his Lord. He had discovered the answer to the question asked by the Lord Jesus in our text.
In His great sermon, the Lord Jesus is teaching His disciples great lessons, and comes to the issue of obedience. Just as in His day, there are many today who call Him Lord but pay no heed to His commands. They are like the young ruler who knelt before the Lord Jesus but who went away sad because of his great possessions. Religious leaders of all stripes will call Him Lord and yet will carry out their religious activities contrary to the pattern of the Word of God. Members of religious congregations will call Him Lord and live in flagrant violation of all that the Lord Jesus and His apostles taught. To properly address Jesus Christ as Lord is to do far more than to accord to Him a formal title. To properly address Him as Lord is to bow in submission to Him in acknowledgment of His lordship and authority in our lives. The judge spoke of being conquered by the Boy, and he was right. Unless we surrender to the lordship of Jesus Christ, He is not our Lord.
I had always been uncomfortable about a saying that I have heard a number of times since I was a teenager: ‘If He is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all’. That expression bothers me because among the thousands of Christians I have met in my lifetime, I have yet to meet anyone who did not have some area of their life that was not totally and utterly surrendered to the Lord Jesus. Now, some dear folks came very close, and the unsurrendered areas in their lives were not what you or I would call major. For many of us, acknowledging Jesus’ lordship is a progressive journey, one in which we learn and grow and become more like our Lord through the passage of time, and with specific occasions in which we make a direct commitment of surrender to Him. And we need to surrender to Him each day of our lives.
When we fail to follow the words of Jesus, we fail to surrender to Him as Lord. – Jim MacIntosh