← ArchiveMarkSunday, November 11, 2018DateNovember 11, 2018Speaker—TextMark 7Passages in this sermonMark 7:310:28Mark 73:23Matthew 911:02Genesis 13131:33Philippians 1:632:32TranscriptMachine transcribed. Click any line to jump there.0:00Music Music Music Music0:28Music Okay, if you have your Bibles, and I hope that you do, turn to Mark 7:31 with me. Mark 7:31. We're continuing a series that we call "Quotation Marks" in the Gospel of Mark. You guys are with it this morning. God bless you for that. And today's sermon is simply a marvelous Savior. Mark 7:31. Have you ever had the opportunity to really marvel at something, to either see, view, or experience something that you've never had the opportunity to do?0:56I had that opportunity this morning. This was actually not prepared. If you go back and look at the notes, it's not in my notes online. But I was able to share Christ with a young man, a youth in our church. And I was not trained in this evangelistic style, but I was able to use a banana moon pie in my Gospel presentation.1:13I just remember thinking, "I just remember thinking, Lord, only you can use a moon pie to point someone to your grace." And I was just amazed at that. Unfortunately, the moon pie represented sin. So I will partake of that this week, hopefully, and rid the world of that sin. You're welcome for that.1:39But just seeing how God, you never know how the Holy Spirit works in our lives. You say, "Well, I can't share faith." If you, you could use anything that God has given you to share your faith. I remember in grade school, this was after Where's Waldo, the Where's Waldo trend happened in my life. But they had these things called stereograms. They were pictures that had all these colors. And they told me if you stared at the picture long enough that some image would pop out.2:08Anyone remember those? I was going to put one on the screen, but I was scared of what might jump out at the screen. So I didn't put that on the screen, but you can Google those later. I could not, I was the one kid in my school that could not see the picture. And I remember one day I had this, I had this picture and I just stared at it for like 30 minutes. And eventually my eyes crossed. Have you ever seen a pug? Like one eye is going this way, the other eye is going this way.2:33My eyes crossed and this rabbit jumped out at me. And that was one of the, up until that point in my life, that was the greatest moment in my life. Yeah, I had a boring childhood, obviously. And so I went to the library for our young, the library are houses that have books and you can check them out. And so that's what I did.3:02And, and they had these books that all they were are stereograms. And so I would, I would look at these images and they would jump out. I tried it actually this week and it didn't work. So I've lost my mojo when it comes to that, but I was truly amazed that I thought this was awesome. And, and we're going to look at a story in Mark today in Mark chapter seven. This is one of the only three stories in Mark that are not found in Matthew and Luke, the synoptic gospel.3:26So synoptic means similar or the same. So often Matthew, Mark and Luke have similar stories, similar patterns. And this, this story is not in either of the two. But what we're going to find is a group of people in Mark that are truly amazed at being in the presence of God. Jesus does something and they are, they're overwhelmed by his power.3:49And I begin to think and pray over the sermon thinking for us, why are we not amazed? Why does this, why did this stereogram amazed me more than the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis?4:17Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis?4:46Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis?5:11Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis?5:39Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis? Why does this mean the power and presence of God on a daily basis?6:08We are hard of hearing. And we need you to restore to us the joy of your salvation.6:33We need you this morning to restore to us a heavenly vision where we are amazed daily at your grace. Where we are overwhelmed by your mercy. And Lord, where we will not and cannot get enough of the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit living in us and through us. That the world might see we are amazed at you, our King and our Redeemer.6:58Father, restore to us that vision this morning. And I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. Three points and then I'll make some application at the end. First is the malady. I'm a preacher. So there's a malady, there's a miracle, and then there's a Messiah. Good preaching points today. There's a malady, a miracle, and a Messiah. Look at verse 31 at the malady.7:27We see Jesus in verse 31 leaving the region of Tyre and Sidon and going to the Decapolis. And so some of you have journeyed to Israel with me this year. If you missed out and want to go again, 2020, we will go to the Decapolis. But it's basically, it's not a straight line. So Jesus is, if I'm the Sea of Galilee, so the map is now reversed. So Jesus is going from your west to your east.7:54It would be like you going from Moody to Atlanta through Fort Payne. Does that make sense? So it's almost a horseshoe trajectory. You say, well, what does that even matter? Why? This is not a geography lesson. Well, it does matter in the fact that Jesus is leaving to your west a more Jewish area, and he's going to a Gentile area. So he's going to a people that don't know who he is. Now, church, let's just stop here.8:22These people who don't really know who Jesus is, they're more amazed than the people who should know who Jesus is. If that doesn't wake the church up, nothing will. If outsiders are more amazed at the grace of our Messiah than we who have tasted and seen that he is good, something is broken in us. So Jesus is traveling and he gets to this location, and he sees this non-Jewish audience, and look at what they do in verse 32.8:46They brought him a deaf man who had difficulty speaking, and they begged Jesus to do what? Heal him. And specifically, how do they want Jesus to manifest that healing? They want him to touch this man. Now, again, they don't know any better. They're not churched.9:14If they were, they wouldn't do this, right? They're not Jewish. So they are -- Jesus is leaving the Jewish area, going to the Gentile area. What they don't understand -- and if you've been in Mark with us for the last month, you know where we're going here. It happens over and over and over again. They don't understand that Jesus didn't touch this man. If they were reversed in tradition, they would know that Jesus shouldn't touch him. But they don't know tradition, so they don't care.9:43I love that. They're like, "Jesus, we don't care about tradition. We just need you to change our lives." That's not even part of the sermon that we'll preach. Because for Jesus to touch this man, he's going to become unclean. And we see over and over again, Jesus always chooses healing someone in the tradition that says, "This is not a good time." So Jesus is here, and you see this individual is deaf, and he's difficult speaking, and there's just something about Jesus that attracts broken people.10:08There's something about Jesus that the sick people are rushing to him, and this non-Jewish crowd who doesn't know any better, they say, "We don't really know who Jesus is, but we do know this. If you're sick, he's the man you want to see." And we're no different, aren't we?10:34Once you realize your sickness, you realize Jesus is the one that can heal you. And when you get to that point, you don't care what anyone says. Even if they say, "Well, you need to wait until the end of the service before you put your faith in Christ." I couldn't wait. "Pastor, I don't need you. I need Jesus Christ." It's by faith or grace. See, Jesus was the one who changes him. Jesus in Matthew 9 says, "It is not those who are well who need the doctor, but it's the sick."11:02They get that. This man has a malady, and specifically what's wrong with him. Huh? Huh? Anyone? I can't hear you. That's your hint, right? He's deaf. And so what's amazing here, the translation is he is dull or severely impaired in his hearing.11:26Most likely he's gone deaf later in life. You say, "Well, Pastor, how do you know that?" Well, because his second malady. Not only is he difficult of hearing, what is he also difficult of doing? Speaking, and I have some friends that are deaf, and usually if you're born deaf, you never learn how to speak. So most likely this man has formed this malady later in life, and he has the Greek here for speaking as some translations even have, that he is hoarse in his speech.11:54He's growling. He can't say what he wants to say. You say, "Well, what does this have to do with us?" Like this man, we are difficult of hearing. Listen to what Acts says.12:21Go to these people and say, "You will always be listening, but never understanding. And you will always be looking, but never perceiving. For the hearts of these people have grown callous. Their ears are hard of hearing. They have shut their eyes. Otherwise, they might see with their eyes and hear with their ears, understanding with their heart and turn. And I would heal them."12:49You say, "Well, my hearing's perfect, Pastor." Sin always leads to a malady. Your sin and my sin always prevent us from hearing God clearly. There is never a time where your sin or my sin helps you hear God. And if you have come in here deaf, it is because there is sin in your life.13:16But if you confess, if you go to the one who can heal you, guess what he will do? He will heal. He will heal. What is making you deaf today? What is making you deaf in this moment? And maybe that thought in itself, the Holy Spirit is convicting you. I had a conversation this morning. And we were talking about sin.13:44And I said, "Every time you sin, do you feel bad?" And my friend said, "Yes, I feel bad." I said, "Well, who's sharing that with you? Whose voice is speaking and making you feel bad of your sin?" He said, "Well, I guess it's Satan because I don't feel good." I said, "No, that's the Holy Spirit." And conviction in the moment is not a good thought, but it is the voice of God who loves you. It's the voice of someone saying, "You are deaf." But if you come to Christ, you can hear. You say, "Well, I've come to faith in Jesus.14:13I can hear clearly." If there is sin in your life right now, confess it and he is faithful and just. To forgive and purify from all unrighteousness. Church, there's the malady. But Jesus doesn't leave us in our sickness, does he? There's a miracle. Look at what the miracle is in verse 33. So he takes him away from the crowd in private. Now, why would Jesus do that?14:42And I've often found this fascinating. Why would Jesus remove this man from the crowd? He was giving personal attention. Now, let's just stop here. Who are we talking about? We're talking about a deaf man and who? Jesus, right? Who is Jesus? He is the son of God who's going to die on a cross to redeem all of mankind. One day he's going to come back and he's going to restore all of creation to its right order. If anyone does not have time to spend one-on-one with this man, it's Jesus.15:07And he pulls them away as if to say, "Hey, Mr. Deaf Guy, you're not part of the crowd. I want you to spend time with me. I want you to have personal touch with Christ." And we see this over and over again in Jesus' life, don't we? Zacchaeus is hiding up in a tree because he can't see because of the crowd. And what does Jesus do? He looks past the crowd and says, "Zacchaeus, you come down." Why?15:36Because you're going to your house today, right? Why would Jesus do that? Because he's calling you out of the crowd. You know, we want to get lost in the crowd. Jesus says, "I'm not going to let you do that. I'm going to look at your sin. I'm going to look at your malady and I'm going to heal you." But it's by faith, your personal faith in Christ. And so this is what Jesus does.16:04In verse 33, he takes him from the crowd, speaks truth personally to him. So if you have wandered in today trying to be part of the crowd, Jesus will not let you do that. And he touches him where? He touches his ears. Now let's just stop there because the second part is, if we're honest, if you're a germaphobic, this is going to send you over the edge. But he touches his ears.16:32Why would Jesus touch him? Well, if Jesus speaks to him, can he hear? No, that's his problem. So Jesus not only knows what the man needs, but he knows how he needs it. See, oftentimes we want Jesus to cure us, but we want Jesus to cure us in a way that we want him to cure us. You know, the man could have said, well, Jesus, I just speak the words and you can heal me. But Jesus says, you can't hear. I'm going to touch you.17:02The personal touch of the savior. You see, Christ came and he died for the world, but he made it personal. He died for you. He died for you and me and you. A personal touch, a personal savior. And Jesus not only touches his ears, but look what he does next. He spits presumably in his hand and he touches his tongue.17:31Anyone else grossed out by that? At this point, I'm like, Jesus, I don't need to speak. Just, just heal me. Just do the ears. No, I'm okay with the tongue thing. Like, oh, I don't even let my kids drink after me. I'm that, I'm that parent. Once they have my drink, it's theirs. I've seen my, our kids are nasty. They are not drinking after me. This just sends me over the edge.17:58And for most of you too, Western, we don't understand what's going on, but what we need to understand is in Western, as in Eastern culture here, they were completely understood. For them, there was magical powers in saliva. So much so after Christ, we have even written a Latin document that there's a story that the emperor Vespasian heals a man by spitting upon him. What is Jesus showing the crowd? You believe in magic, but let me show you true power.18:27It's not the spit, it's the Messiah. Jesus is looking through their culture and showing them true power. And this is what he says. And it's in Aramaic because since you don't speak Aramaic and I don't either, Mark translates it. And his readers would not have mostly known Aramaic. He says, deeply, "Ephatha," and Mark translates it, he says, "That is, be open."18:56be open." Here's something that's interesting about this Aramaic. It's in the singular. Jesus says, "Be opened," singular. So we don't know, is he looking to heaven and saying to heaven, "Be opened"? Is he looking at the ears and saying, "Be opened"? But why would he only speak to one ear? Or is he looking at the man and saying, "Be opened"? I believe it's that. I believe it's that. I believe Jesus is speaking to the man and saying,19:24"You think you have a hearing problem, but it's much deeper than that. I'm gonna heal your hearing. I'm gonna change your life." Gentlemen, man, you be opened. The prison doors are changed. You say, "Well, how does this work out in our life?" Because this is what we see about his tongue. Not only does Jesus speak in the singular, in the Aramaic, but he says this about his tongue. Immediately, his ears were opened19:53and his tongue was loosened. Now, that's an interesting word for tongue. It's almost as if he's tongue-tied. But the word is often used in the Greek for a jail cell that has now been flung open. Can you imagine for a man who's not been able to speak or hear for most of his life, the freedom that he has now in Jesus Christ? For him, it wasn't just a healing of his ears. It was a change, transformation of his life.20:22This week, I had a conversation. We'll call him Bob, a gentleman in our area. And he began to tell me his story. And I'm gonna run through it very quickly. And I know we have some younger adults here, so I'm going to make this G-rated. From the time he was five years old, this man was abused by his mom and by her boyfriends. It was so bad that when she would come home20:51or her boyfriend's coming, he would hide under the house because he knew what was going to happen. So at the age of 10, he ran away and lived on the streets. Lived in a bus, abandoned bus he found in the alleyway. And he did that for several months. And finally, he ran into this couple that saw him living. He said, son, what are you doing here? And they said, we'll bring you home. And he thought, this is the greatest day of my life. Well, he didn't know that this family21:20that had brought him into their family was part of the occult. They were Satanists. And he said, for the next several decades, I lived in the world of the occults. He said, my Hades went from that to a living hell. And as he grew decades later, he finally said, I'm out. And they looked at him and said, you know the only way to get out of the occult is you are going to go see Satan yourself. You are going to go to hell. You cannot leave on your own.21:50But he did. Within two minutes of leaving the house, a police officer picked him up and said, son, you're going to jail. You have marijuana on you. And he said, well, I don't have marijuana. He said, you don't understand, you do. And he was locked up for life. While he was in jail, and this is a gentleman, if you speak to him, this is a guy you don't really want to meet in the alleyway. You can tell just a rough, hardened individual. And while he was in prison, he said, his daughter died.22:19The warden called him up to his office, and he said, I never even shed a tear. Didn't even register. Several months later, his mom died. He said, I hated her anyway. Didn't care, didn't shed a tear. But while in prison, one of his cellmates began to share Christ with him, invited him to a revival. And now, as he's sharing this story with me, he is weeping. A man that didn't shed a tear when his daughter died and when his mom died is weeping. And through that revival,22:48he gives his life to Jesus Christ. Not too long after that, the warden calls him up to his office again. And he's thinking, okay, what else can happen? My daughter's died. I've been locked up for no reason at all. And my mom's died. Who has died this time? And the warden comes up and sits him down in his office and says, here's your letter, Bob. You need to read this. And he opens a letter. Here's what the letter says. You have been wrongly accused. Today is your freedom. And the warden didn't have the words to say.23:20He said, I don't understand how this happened. But he said, you need to leave now. And God has redeemed this man and changed his life. He now has kids of his own. But to hear him tell the story. My chains are gone. I've been set free. It's the story of this deaf man. It's a story of, Lord, it's more than just hearing. God, you've changed my life in Jesus Christ.23:47Now let's look how the crowd reacts. So we found the malady. You've seen the miracle. Now let's look at the Messiah, verse 37. The crowd, now again, this crowd is east of Galilee, east of Galilee, on the other side of the sea. Now we now know that the other side of the sea are who? They're the pagans, they're the people on the other side. We say on the other side of the track, they're on the other side of the sea, right?24:16They're the non-covenant people of God. Look at what happens to these people. Verse 37. They were extremely astonished. And they said, "He does everything well." Now, what does Jesus tell them to do? He says, "You be quiet." And we'll say, "That's a strange." Why would Jesus command them to be silenced? If you had the little booklet we made earlier from this series, it talks about the divine silence in Mark.24:45There's two reasons for that. One, they were expecting a political Messiah, one who would make their kingdom great. Jesus says, "That's not who I am." Isaiah says, "He does not come with the warrior's sword, but with the servant's towel." The second reason for that is Jesus wanted to make sure that their faith was not coerced by the miracle. We want the signs and wonders of God,25:13but truly what we need is faith. And God was impressing upon them, it's by faith that this man was healed. The power of Christ, but it's by faith. You're looking for God to do something great in your life, but what you need is God to do something great in your heart. It's by faith. And then the astonishment comes. They were extremely astonished.25:40It might not surprise you at this point that this is the only time this word, this noun is used in all of the Bible. It's as if Mark uses the word, says this is gonna surprise all of you guys. This was amazing. They were radically astounded by Jesus Christ. Yeah, I just can't help but think that once you get a glimpse of the Savior,26:08you'll never be the same. Once we truly see God work in our life, it's impossible to go back. Even people on the other side of the sea understand this. They're not even Southern Baptists. I don't know what they are. They're the sea peoples. And if they understand it,26:38how much more should we who have the word of God, who have heard how good he is working in our life, that we should daily be amazed? May we never lose our sense of wonder about God. I remember several years ago now, at the time I lost my sense of wonder. And I'm gonna tell on myself, because I'm easily the butt of my own jokes. It's not that hard for me to do that, because I offer a lot of material for myself.27:08But when we moved into our house, to the Moody area, we, my wife and I sort of divided and conquered on the chores. We just naturally do that. And so she was more inside the house. I'm more outside the house. So I would do the, not the landscaping, but I would mow the grass. It takes me like 30 minutes. So I'm not saying I'm Conan, the barbarian here, right? But I remember thinking as a guy, if I'm gonna do the grass, there's not gonna be a weed in this yard. This is war. So I'm going to the store, buying chemicals.27:36I don't even care what they are, but I'm gonna kill any, I'm gonna eradicate any enemy that I see. Well, doing that, there was one patch of clover that I could not kill in the backyard. And I remember us playing in the background. The kids were trying to find the four-leaf clovers. And I think our oldest at the time was about four. And I remember it like it was yesterday. He comes to me and he picks this little clover thing and he brings it to me. He says, dad, look at this flower I got you.28:04And you want to hear my good dad moment? I said, son, that's a weed and it won't die. And I remember like my wife, who is the most loving person in the world, she was outside with me. And you know, we're mostly expected to read our spouse's minds, but this was one of the moments I could. I felt this laser gaze from my right side.28:31And I don't know if it was a still small voice or the mother of all bombs, but I remember the voice saying, take the flower. And I remember looking at him, I said, that is the most beautiful flower I have ever seen. And I looked at the rest of the clovers and I'm gonna kill you guys.29:04But I think of that this week and said, what did he see that I didn't? My son saw the beauty and the majesty of something that I thought was so ordinary. He saw the power of the creator. And how dare I look at something that he saw the beauty of God's handiwork in and say, you know what? We see that they're everywhere. It's not special. If we're not careful, that's what we do to God's grace. We walk through life29:33and we see God working everywhere and we say, you know, I've seen that before. Yeah, another miracle. Yeah, they're everywhere. We must never lose our sense of wonder. Why does our heart not rejoice when we worship? Because I think we come and say, yeah, just another song. We sung this one before. May we never lose our sense that he has done everything well.30:02And I pray the image of that four-year-old picking up a clover and saying, dad, this is the most beautiful flower I've ever seen. That's the way we should be to God's grace. When we see one person coming to faith, it should wreck us because that should not happen. Dead people don't come to life. And when we see that, we should weep and say, God, this is a miracle. This is a clover that we just sometimes gloss over.30:32But Lord, this is your work in our life. We need to be Mark 737 people. We need to be astounded at God's grace. And maybe today you came in here and think that this was a normal service and a normal Sunday. But there is nothing normal when the people of God worship together. We should be astounded at God's grace. And shame on us when we had to learn that lesson from people on the other side of the sea.30:59Shame on us when we had to learn that lesson from three-year-olds. But praise God for three-year-olds. Praise God for the sea peoples that show us that we, the people of God, must be astounded. This is what they say. He has done everything. Well, it harkens back to what we see in Genesis, isn't it?31:28That when God created everything in Genesis 131, God saw all that he has made. And he said that it was very good. And just a reminder in our life, look, God doesn't make junk. He doesn't. God didn't make the world say, how did that happen? Josh, I made you perfect and beautiful. Man, you really messed it up. God does everything well.31:58He said, well, pastor, what does that mean of my life? You know, I think the more we see our non-goodness, the more we see the goodness of God. It's not hard when you're deaf to realize that God making you here is a good thing. It's not hard when you can't speak and God loosening your tongue, letting you out of prison. You say, this is God, you're doing this well. That's the power of Christ.32:29And listen to the words of Philippians 1.6. Some of you are thinking, well, how in the world do I live this out? Philippians says, Paul, by the way, a murderer, a persecutor of the church. If you wonder who's writing this, this is not, this is not St. Paul. This is also murderous Paul. He says, I am sure of this, that he who started a good work,33:00sound familiar? He who started a good work, where? In you. Is what? Is faithful to carry it to completion until the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you know Jesus Christ, he has done a good work in your life. And not only, I love this because we live in a world of half finished things, right?33:29Not only does God start a good work in your life, what does he do? He carries it to completion. So if you've come in here and you said, man, my world is broken. I'm in shambles. I feel horrible. If you are in Christ, what kind of work are you? You might be a piece of work, but you're a good piece of work, right? We're a piece of work through the Holy Spirit. That's the power of God. And if you say, well, I'm not complete yet. God will not leave you unfinished.33:59Wow. He does everything well. In Christ, you are his work. And then we see this. They say, I love when the pagans teach us lessons that we need to learn. They're astonished. They say he has done this work well. And then they say this. He even makes the death the death hear34:28and the mute speak. And you say, well, why is that so amazing? Well, it's amazing because Isaiah says this about the Messiah. Isaiah says this about the coming kingdom. In 35 verse 5, the eyes of the blind will be opened. The ears of the deaf unstopped. The lame will leap like a deer. The tongue of the mute will sing for joy. For water will gush in the wilderness and streams in the desert.34:58This is not an accident or incidental phrase at Mark Husey. You know what he's saying? The kingdom of God is now. 2,000 years ago. And if the kingdom of God was then, what does that mean for today? The kingdom of God is now.35:25They're waiting for a Messiah that will unstop the ears of the deaf, that will loosen the tongues of those who can't speak. And guess who's doing that? Jesus is saying, here I am, boys. The kingdom of God is now. And even the disciples aren't getting it, right? They're saying, Lord, when will you restore the kingdom of God? And the short paraphrase is, I am. I am. You see, often we are waiting to die35:55so we can see heaven. Those streets of gold would not glimmer if the light of Christ is not shining upon them. There's not even gold. It's trash. Without Christ, there is nothing. And we need to quit longing for tomorrow. And God, if you would just make everything right, and God, if you would just bring the kingdom, Lord, if the Messiah will return and my life will pick up the pieces,36:24Jesus is saying, I am here now. And more than anything in our life, the world needs to see the invisible kingdom made visible in the life of his people today. And so I don't have anything. All I have is a moon pie on my desk. Make the kingdom of God visible with whatever the Lord has given you. That's the power of his word. What a marvelous,36:56marvelous Messiah. We live in a country where people are longing to see the invisible kingdom of Jesus Christ made visible. So how do you know that, Pastor? In the Declaration of Independence, we have certain unalienable rights. among them, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.37:25of happiness. If that is what you're pursuing today, you will never find it until you find Christ. Your pursuit will never come to an end until you find the marvelous Messiah. And the world needs to look at the people of God and say, you have something that we don't. I'm pursuing happiness and your world is, it seems like it's falling apart, but you have a joy37:55that I don't have. What have you found? His name is Jesus Christ. And he's real. And his kingdom is now. And he is marvelous. And he will save you and forgive you of your sins if you believe. So church, where do we go from here? Look at verse 14 of chapter 7. Mark 7, 14. Summoning the crowd again. The crowd, right?38:25So Jesus pulls the man from the crowd and now he's speaking to the crowd. He told them, this is really good for deaf people. Listen to me all of you and understand. Why would Jesus go to a people that didn't even know who he was and heal a deaf man? Because Jesus was telling these people, no matter who you are or where you come from, you have a personal Messiah.38:55And maybe you're here right now and you think, I've grown up on the other side of the tracks. I have no clue who God is. I have not had grandparents or parents. This is my first time in a church. I am the other person on the other side of the sea. You know what they found in Jesus? Someone who loved them and would heal them. that's why the good news is good news. The good news is that you're not good.39:23So that's horrible news. No, that's why it's good news. You do nothing to earn your salvation. You do nothing to earn grace. Listen, I want you to know that the pastor right here that has gone to seminary and that's wearing a fancy suit that's grown up in church. I don't say this flippantly. I want you to know that I have done nothing to earn anything that God has given me39:53except his wrath. Nothing. The only thing I have earned as scripture says the wages of my sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life. And if you're here right now and you're living in sin spiritually you are dead and you are deaf but we see a savior that is willing to unstop your ears and save you. How does that happen? One,40:23One, you have to believe that Jesus is who he says he is. He is God. That he lived a sinless life. That he died upon the cross and in three days he rose again. You say, well, pastor, that's hard to believe. It is, but it's true. That's why this is the greatest story that the world has ever known. And if you believe in that, several things will happen. If you believe in your heart and you confess with your mouth that Jesus is the Lord, you're saved. By grace, you are saved but it's with faith.40:52What is faith? Faith is a human response to God's grace. Say, God, I don't deserve anything that you are but I believe today. If that's you, I want you to know that God's calling your name. He's not calling you as part of the crowd. He's going to call you out of the crowd and right now where you are you can put your faith in Jesus Christ. How do we do that? How do we demonstrate our faith? It's by praying.41:21It's communication with God. What might your prayer look like? I remember the day that I prayed to put my faith in Christ and it wasn't magical. The prayer wasn't but my prayer was Lord, I know that I'm a sinner and I know that you took my place and I need forgiveness and I want righteousness and today I believe and if you pray a prayer like that by faith in Christ, the promise in scripture is that you will be saved. Would you do that right now? If you're far from Christ,41:52you don't have to leave here in the way that you came in. This is good news. It's the greatest news. Maybe you're here and you say, well, I've done that. Check. If we're not careful, the greatest travesty in the life of any believer is that we lose our sense of wonder and that we sing songs about Jesus pain at all and we just sing with our voice and it doesn't do something to our heart and it doesn't stir our minds. If Jesus pain at all42:23doesn't change who we are and stir us, something's wrong. And maybe as we sing a song of invitation, that should be your prayer. God, I am sorry I have gone through the motions. Lord, let me discover the clovers of grace again. Let me be a Mark 737. Let me come away being extremely astonished. Father, we thank you← Previous in MarkSunday, November 4, 2018Next in Mark →Sunday, November 18, 2018More sermons on Mark →
