Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible
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Luke
Book: Luke
Chapter: 17
Overview:
To avoid offences, To pray for increase of
Faith,
Humility
taught.11-19. Ten lepers cleansed.
(1-10) Christ's kingdom.
(20-37)
1-10 It is
No abatement of their guilt
By whom an
Offence
comes, nor will it lessen their
Punishment that offences will
come.
Faith in
God's pardoning
Mercy, will enable us to get over
the greatest difficulties in the way of forgiving our brethren.
As with
God nothing is impossible,
So all things are possible to
him that can believe. Our
Lord showed his disciples their need
of
Deep Humility. The
Lord has such a property in every
Creature, as
No Man can have in another; he cannot be in
Debt to
them for their services, nor do they deserve any return from
him.
11-19 A sense of our spiritual
Leprosy should make us very
humble whenever we draw near to
Christ. It is enough to refer
ourselves to the compassions of
Christ, for they fail not. We
may look for
God to meet us with
Mercy, when we are found in the
way of obedience. Only one of those who were healed returned to
give thanks. It becomes us, like him, to be very humble in
thanksgivings, as
Well as in prayers.
Christ noticed the one who
thus distinguished himself, he was a Samaritan. The others only
got the outward cure, he alone got the spiritual blessing.
20-37 The
Kingdom of God was among the Jews, or rather within
some of them. It was a spiritual kingdom, set up in the
Heart By
the power of Divine
Grace. Observe how it had been with sinners
formerly, and in what state the
Judgments of God, which they had
been warned of, found them. Here is shown what a dreadful
surprise this
Destruction will be to the secure and sensual.
Thus shall it be in the
Day when the
Son of Man is revealed.
When
Christ came to destroy the Jewish nation
By the Roman
armies, that nation was found in such a state of false security
as is here spoken of. In like manner, when
Jesus Christ shall
come to
Judge the world, sinners will be found altogether
regardless; for in like manner the sinners of every
Age go
On
securely in their evil ways, and remember not their latter
End.
But wherever the wicked are, who are marked for eternal ruin,
they shall be found
By the
Judgments of God.