In Luke 5:17–6:11, the Lord has five consecutive encounters with Jewish religious leaders. They clearly see Him as a threat. He does not accept their rigid, legalistic, man-made rules. His teaching is a threat to everything they hold dear. Will they be able to see the error of their ways and realize that He is teaching the truth?

In these encounters, the Lord reveals to them that He is the Christ. He causes a lame man to walk. Prior to that, He cleansed a leper. Only Someone sent from God could do either. In the fifth encounter, He heals a man with a withered hand. The religious leaders see and are aware of His power and authority.

Will they respond to what is obvious? Will they be willing to believe in Him as the Christ and reject what they have been taught and believe?

It seems that Luke wants us to see these five encounters as a unit. In the first, the religious leaders are wondering about what Jesus is doing. Luke tells us that Jesus was able to see the “reasoning in (their) hearts.” In other words, the Lord was able to read their minds (5:22). In the last encounter, the same thing happens. The leaders once again have thoughts about the Lord’s actions and words. Luke tells us that He “knew their thoughts” (6:8).

What pattern do these men display in these five encounters? One pattern is that they fall deeper into their spiritual darkness. In the first encounter, after hearing of Jesus cleansing a leper, they have come to a home to hear Him speak. There is nothing negative about what they do. Perhaps, they have come to find out more about this Man who could heal a leper. When they hear Him tell the paralyzed man that his sins are forgiven, they ask a reasonable question: “Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

One could conclude that, initially, they genuinely want to know how Jesus could say such a thing. The Lord then heals the paralyzed man and points out that His ability to do so shows that He could also forgive his sins (5:22-24). A Man who could do that was obviously sent from God. He was the Christ.

This was a difficult proposition for these men to accept. Jesus was not what they expected in the Christ. But the Lord was calling them to be willing to look at the evidence and believe. In this first encounter, the reader is hopeful that these men will respond in a positive manner.

But the following encounters show that they did not respond to the revelation Christ gave them. They were not willing to consider the evidence. In the next four episodes, they accuse Him of not following their rules. They want Him to do what they do. They accuse Him of entering the wrong kind of house and eating with the wrong kind of people (5:30). They rebuke Him for not fasting and praying the way they do (5:33). They accuse Him of not keeping the rules they had established for people concerning the Sabbath (6:1-2).

By the time the reader gets to the Lord’s final encounter with these men, it has become obvious that they are not willing to hear the words of the Lord or consider the authority that He has from God. Now, when they come to hear Him, they do so to spy on Him and find fault with Him (6:7). They are angry when He heals the man with the crippled hand. In fact, Luke tells us that they became “filled with rage.” The word for rage means that they had an anger that was illogical. It was the reaction of a madman. It made no sense. They have fallen a long way from where they were in the first encounter.

It seems to me that Luke is showing us what happens to anybody who refuses to consider what God reveals to them. For people today, this revelation is found in the Scriptures. The Word of God is a light that shines into the darkness of our minds. But what happens when a person rejects that light and is unwilling to consider that the light is revealing the truth?

The leaders in Luke 5:17–6:11 show us. They spiral down deeper and deeper into the darkness in which they find themselves. Their thinking becomes more and more irrational.

This can certainly happen with an unbeliever. He can hear the gospel of grace, with its offer of eternal life as a gift that can never be lost, received by faith alone. He can hear it but be unwilling even to consider that it might be true. If he remains unwilling, he will spiral down deeper into the darkness of unbelief.

A believer can follow that pattern as well. If the Word exposes a truth to us, we can be unwilling to believe what it says. When we do, we remain in the darkness of our ignorance, even though we still have eternal life.

The religious leaders of Luke 5:17–6:11 are an object lesson for everyone. For both believers and unbelievers, it is tragic to follow their example.