While this slave was serving to take care of God’s household in this way, according to the Gospel of Luke, He was a genuine, perfect, and entire Man to seek and to save the lost sinners in the way of the highest standard of morality. It is very strange that certain cases are recorded only in Luke and not in the other Gospels. In Luke 7 there is the case of the son of the widow in Nain who was dead and being carried in a coffin on the street. The Lord Jesus came in to raise him up. Following this, there is the case of a sinful woman weeping and washing the feet of the Lord Jesus (Luke 7:37-38). In chapter ten there is the good Samaritan, and in chapter nineteen, Zaccheus, a chief tax collector.
All of these cases are found only in Luke, not in the other Gospels. If you consider these cases, you could realize that Jesus is presented here as a perfect Man who was carrying out His saving work in the highest standard of morality. Actually, the word morality is not adequate to describe His standard. The standard was something more excellent than morality, but we are short of words to describe it. Nevertheless, if you take this concept and go back to read the story of the good Samaritan, you could see something there that is not merely His saving, but His saving in a way that is indescribable.
It was against a very black background that the good Samaritan came to the wounded one in Luke 10. The Jews themselves called the Lord Jesus a Samaritan in John chapter eight (v. 48). Luke describes how a priest came to the place where the wounded one was, and he passed by on the opposite side of the road without doing anything. Likewise, a Levite passed by and did not do anything. Then this good Samaritan, the despised One, came in a way that is beyond human words to describe. He was not asked or begged to do something to rescue the fallen one. He did everything out of Himself on His own initiative. Here is a story which shows us in what kind of standard and way, Jesus, the perfect Man, carried out His saving. This case does not emphasize His power. To call Lazarus out of the tomb shows His mighty divine power. However, this case shows us something of the highest standard of morality.
Then in Matthew this One lived a life that is the reality of the kingdom of the heavens. While He came as a Slave to serve God’s household and as a Man to save the lost sinners in the highest standard of something that is beyond our utterance, this One lived a kingly life. Many Christian teachers talk about the kingdom in Matthew, but they have failed to see that the kingdom was portrayed by a kingly life which we do not have words to describe. This life portrays the reality of the kingdom of the heavens. If you want to know what the kingdom of the heavens is, you need to look at this life. In Matthew this life is the kingdom of the heavens.
Furthermore, this matchless One who came as such a Slave, taking care of God’s household, as such a perfect Man saving in that high standard, and as such a One who lived a life which was the kingdom of the heavens, also expressed God. God lived through Him, God was expressed through Him, He lived by God, and He lived as God. In the Gospel of John we see such a life as God’s expression. What indescribable life is this? We must confess that we are utterly short of a proper vocabulary to describe such a fourfold life in this way. This life was the ministry of the Lord Jesus. You need to look at this ministry and also look at His person. Consider what kind of person He was and consider His ministry. This is marvelous. This is the New Testament ministry.
After He had completed such a life as the very New Testament ministry, the Lord Jesus went to the cross to die a death as the last Adam (1 Cor. 15:45) to terminate the old man with the old creation. The death He died was also a death as the Lamb of God (John 1:29) to take away sin and its result— sins. In addition, He died a death as the brass serpent (John 3:14) to destroy Satan and his kingdom, the world. Moreover, we need to realize also that the Lord Jesus died to abolish the ordinances (Eph. 2:14-15) which include human culture, habits, and customs which divided the very mankind created by God. The death that He died to abolish all of these things may be designated the death of the Peacemaker. In addition, as a grain of wheat (John 12:24), He died a death which released the divine life. The Bible tells us that He died at least a fivefold death, a death as the last Adam, as the Lamb of God, as the brass serpent, as the Peacemaker, and as a grain of wheat. When He was dying there on the cross, in the eyes of God He was at least a fivefold person, a person in at least five aspects.
The Lord Jesus as such a person terminated everything through such a death. That termination means that He accomplished the real baptism, as He said, “I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how I am pressed until it is accomplished!” (Luke 12:50). He had already been baptized, but He still had to go through a real baptism, a baptism that was the death on the cross, signified by the death water used by John the Baptist.