The Supernatural Power of Jesus - Mark 2- Pastor Greg Addison

Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.

You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.

Thank you for listening.

Thank you so much for that greeting, and thank you so much for all you have done to make Janet and I feel just incredibly welcome and a part of the church family this week.

It is humbling and honoring to be here to have just to have the privilege to preach once in this church where so many men of God, like Brother Dale and others, have preached throughout the years.

It's just incredibly humbling as a preacher.

And then to be able to pray with you about joining in ministry together as you move into that next stage of ministry.

It's just an honor and we are so excited.

I want you to know how proud of the church I am.

You guys have just done so much this week.

It has been fun to meet you and get to know you and talk ministry with you.

I can't tell you how it stirs the heart of a pastor to have folks in the church saying, How are we going to reach the River Valley?

How are we going to see people come to Christ?

How are we going to reach students and children?

How are we going to reach people?

What is our mission strategy?

I'm telling you, it's incredible to see the heart of the church that you have as a people.

And so I want to thank you just for the honor and privilege to be here.

And we have a few things going on this week because of the vote and all that, but the most important thing we have right now is the opportunity to turn to Scripture and to lift high the name of Jesus and to preach the gospel to a world that needs him.

So let's pray and then we'll get started.

Lord, we love you and we thank you.

I thank you for this great church.

I thank you for the heritage of this church.

I thank you for the men of God who have stood in this pulpit and have preached clearly the gospel and lifted high the name of Jesus.

I thank you for the souls that have been saved and the folks that have been baptized here.

I thank you for so many men who've been called to preach and people who've been called to the ministry and ladies who have been called to be ministers' wives and the rich heritage of ministry and sending out that this church has.

I thank you for the ministry that they do and the faithful years and years of faithful giving to the cooperative program so that through the International Mission Board and the Arkansas Baptist State Convention, we could send missionaries and plant churches and advance the gospel.

I thank you for the love that they have for each other.

I thank you for the love that they have for the River Valley and for their desire for everyone who lives in the River Valley to have the opportunity to meet Jesus.

Lord, we now come to your word and we ask you to be our teacher.

We ask the Holy Spirit to have free reign in the lives and hearts of folks to draw them close to you, to do the work that you want to do in their lives.

I love that song that the choir and the orchestra just sang.

You are calling every person by name.

Whether they're watching us on television, whether they're watching on the internet, or whether they're here in the room, you love each and every person who will hear this passage of Scripture, who will see the image and the picture of Jesus described in Mark chapter 2, and you have a plan for their lives, and we pray this morning that you will give them a freedom to respond to you and your call of their name today.

Mark 2 · chapter mention

Lord, this is what we pray as your people, and we pray it in the saving name of Jesus Christ.

And all God's people said.

Amen.

Turn with me, if you will, family, to Mark chapter 2.

Mark 2 · chapter mention

And what I want to talk to you about today, what God has laid on my heart, is just let's focus on Jesus.

We've been singing about the supernatural power of Jesus to save in every one of those songs this morning, whether it's one that we sang congregationally or the one that the choir sang so beautifully.

And so I want to talk to you about the supernatural power of Jesus.

And just so we are clear that our role as the church is to lift high the name of Jesus and point folks to Jesus.

I have chosen a story directly from the life of Jesus.

Now it's funny, every time I say that, something like that, you know, a story of Jesus, my wife always gets onto me when I sit down and she says, Greg, it is not a story.

It really happened.

And so I'm trying to train myself to say an episode from the life of Jesus, right?

And so this is one of those incredible stories.

It is an incredibly iconic story.

There's so much good in this.

We could spend weeks.

But today I want you to just see the supernatural power of Jesus.

Read with me in Mark 2, beginning in verse 1.

When he, Jesus, entered Capernaum, again, after some days, it was reported that he was at home.

In other words, folks found out Jesus was around, and they all started showing up.

The Bible tells us in verse 2 so many people gathered together that there was no more room in that house, not even in the doorway.

And he was speaking the message to them.

Then they came to Jesus, bringing a paralytic, carried by four men.

And as they approached the house, you can imagine this picture in your mind's eye as you see the scenario.

These guys are carrying this guy on a rug, they're lagging, they're lugging him up to the house, and you see all of these people thronging around the house, and they're staring into windows, and they're pouring out the door, and it's jammed to the gills, and all of that's happening, and they're thinking, What do we do?

How do we even get there?

But the Bible says in verse 4, since they were not able to bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, because it was so crowded in there, they removed the roof above where he was, and when he had broken through the roof, they lowered the mat on which the paralytic was lying.

Now, if you've raised in Sunday school or you've heard this story before, or you know about the culture of that day, then you know this is not quite as strange a story as it sounds.

In those days, what would happen is they would build houses made of, you know, brick, made of sand and mortar and all of that, sort of adobe type things, that kind of deal.

They would be build these square houses, and on the roof, they would put like a thatched roof.

So they would have some poles or sticks across, and they would put hay and those kinds of things on there.

They could open that up and get air circulating and all of that sort of stuff.

And a lot of times they would have a step, uh, a series of steps on the outside of the house, and they could get up there.

So the story doesn't sound quite as strange as it might sound.

They see that deal, they work their way up those steps, they get on the roof, they start to pull that thatch back, and they start to lower him down into the roof.

Now, I don't know about you.

I have I have been excited about church this morning.

I've been looking forward to being here and preaching to you, and I'm not sure really how I would react if all of a sudden out of the catwalks up there or something, you know, plaster starts falling and this chaos, and they start lowering someone down through the roof.

I mean, it's a little bit disruptive to the service and what you're trying to accomplish as the preacher.

Let's see how Jesus responds.

The Bible tells us in verse 5, seeing their faith.

We're gonna come back and look at that in a moment.

But here's what Jesus responds.

They're not interrupting him, they're not getting in the way of what he's trying to accomplish.

He sees them and he knows they believe in him and they want to get their friend to him.

Seeing their faith, Jesus told the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven.

Now there's another moment where you stop for a second and you say, I'm not sure that those four guys were working that hard for that sort of answer, right?

They were probably looking for a take up your bed and walk or something like that.

But here Jesus says, Son, your sins are forgiven.

Now that creates some real consternation for some of the people in the room.

The Bible tells us in verse 6, the scribes who were there, they're always checking out Jesus.

They're always frustrated at what he's saying, they're always trying to watch him because he's saying stuff they don't like and it frustrates them and bothers them.

And this in particular really sticks in their crawl.

But some of the scribes were sitting there thinking to themselves, why does he speak like this?

He's blaspheming.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

Now, right there, they are accurate.

That last statement, they are accurate.

No one can forgive our sins but God alone.

You see, God is the creator of the universe.

He spoke all of this into being.

He created the planet on which we live, he created us, he is the author of life, he created all of that, he designed all of us.

The Bible says we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

And you, he knew you before you were formed in your mother's womb.

He is the creator.

But as the creator, that means he has the right to set the rules for his creation.

And the Bible tells us that God has placed in rules that we are to worship him and nothing else.

There should be nothing that interrupts our love, adoration, and worship for him.

There are rules that we are supposed to follow because he is the creator God and we are his creation.

And when we violate those rules, the Bible calls that sin.

The Bible makes very clear for the wages of sin is death.

You see, as the creator God, as the ruler of the universe, he has the freedom to choose the punishment for breaking his rules as the creator.

And the Bible calls that sin.

And the Bible tells us that God, as a holy job, as a holy God, cannot allow sin to go unpunished.

And so he also then has in his authority and in his ability to set the process of when and how he alone will forgive.

And it is a huge moment in the ministry of Jesus.

He is setting up the very purpose of who he is and why he came.

When he, in this spectacle of this moment, this man who is a paralytic is dropped down into this room.

All these people are watching what's going to happen.

Many of them have come to hear him preach or to hear him speak, but many of them have come to watch him do something, to watch him do something amazing.

They've heard stories of people who have been healed, who have stood up and walked when they couldn't walk.

They've heard some stories.

They're beginning to circulate of the blind beginning to see, and those who are deaf beginning to hear, and they are looking for the spectacle.

And Jesus takes this moment with everyone's attention on him, and he says, Son, your sins are forgiven.

And in that moment, Jesus stakes the claim for who he is.

He is the promised Messiah and the method of salvation and forgiveness that God the Creator has promised to bring.

And these men who are steeped in Jewish theology and they weren't sure yet that Jesus was the Messiah and they didn't understand that they are really frustrated with this moment.

Verse 8, the Bible says right away Jesus understood in his spirit that they were thinking like this within themselves.

And he said to them, Why are you thinking these things in your heart?

And then he gives them the object lesson of the moment.

He is trying to define what his supernatural power is and how incredibly powerful it is.

And he says, which is easier to say?

Say to a paralytic, your sins are forgiven?

Or to say, get up, pick up your mat and walk.

Clearly, you could tell him his sins are forgiven, and you can't visually see whether that happened or not.

You don't really know if it happened or not.

It's easy to just launch out into that and be charismatic and make some kind of thing and say your sins.

And nobody really knows in a tangible, actual way whether that's happened or not.

And what Jesus is trying to do is define his supernatural authority and power as the Savior.

And so what he does is he sets up first in this object lesson, your sins are forgiven.

And then when they ask and they are frustrated, he says, which is easier to say.

But so you know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.

In other words, so that you will know, he uses the phrase Son of Man, which is a prophetic description of the Messiah.

He uses that to clarify, I am the Messiah, and so you will know that I am God.

My Father has sent me, my Father and I are one, so that you will know I am the Messiah to come with the power to save from sin, the power to forgive sin.

I will now tell him, rise up and walk.

Take up your bed and walk.

I'm gonna use the tangible to show you the intangible.

I'm gonna show you the natural to show you the supernatural.

I am gonna take care of the earthly right now so that you know Jesus as Jesus, he has the right to take care of the eternal.

And so he looks at the young man and he says, I tell you, get up, pick up your mat, and go home.

Immediately the man got up.

He picked up the mat and he went out right there in front of everyone.

As a result, now this is really an amazing statement right here.

As a result, they were all astounded.

Wouldn't you and I be, right?

They are all astounded.

And here's what their response is.

And they gave glory to God, saying, We have never seen anything like this.

Man, when we worshiped, it was such a joy to worship with you today and to hear you singing and to see the choir and the orchestra and everyone playing like they know the Jesus that we sang about.

When we talked about he has risen from the grave and conquered death and sin, when we sang those moments about he has saved us and we have been brought back to life.

We have been saved from our sins.

We are singing because we have seen Jesus do that.

We know he's done that in our lives, and that's what worship is.

We are amazed at what God has done.

We're giving him glory, and we want other people to see look what the supernatural power of Jesus does in a life.

There are two lessons I want you to see from this story this morning.

The first one is I want you to see that we are going to focus on the purpose on the person of Jesus so that we can see him.

We're going to focus on Jesus so that we can see him.

And then we're going to recognize that when we focus on him, we are called to walk by faith on Jesus because we see him in his supernatural power.

Now let's think about that first thought for a moment.

We want to focus on Jesus.

I want you to see that we as the church, as believers, we are to focus on the purpose and the power and the person of Jesus.

The purpose and the power and the person of Jesus.

Look what the Bible tells us.

Jesus is at home, and all these people come and they invade his house, and they're taking over and they're emptying the refrigerator and they're putting their feet on the coffee table, and they're not using coasters, and you got all this chaos going on, right?

They all show up.

And what does Jesus do every time there's a crowd?

The Bible says very clearly his purpose.

He was speaking the message to them in verse 2.

Anytime Jesus had the opportunity, anytime there was a crowd, anytime there was an individual, anytime there was a moment, anytime he could create a moment, Jesus was on purpose.

He was sharing the gospel.

In fact, this story is told also in the Gospel of Luke.

And in the gospel of Luke, he records for us that Jesus said about himself, the Son of Man, this same phrase, this identification of him as the Redeemer, the Son of Man has come to what?

You know, church, seek and to save the lost.

When you see Jesus, you must see the clear purpose of Jesus.

He is about one thing and one thing only.

He is here to bring about redemption for eternity.

He is here to save people from their sins.

He is here to rescue us from an eternity and a future spent in hell.

And he is here to restore us and redeem us and bring us into a place where we can spend an eternity in heaven.

And Jesus is always focused on his purpose.

In fact, when they bring this man and they drop him into the floor and all of this moment happens, Jesus orchestrates this entire thing not to show them that he's powerful and not to show them that he is God, but to show him he is those things so they will understand he can say your sins are forgiven.

This is a gospel passage of Scripture, and Jesus is defining the gospel, and he is showing himself to be the Savior, the God who saves.

He is saying that I am the one and I love you, and I have come to save you from your sins, and he is on purpose in every moment of ministry that he does throughout his life here.

It's incredible when you think about who Jesus is and how singular he is in his purpose.

The Bible tells us, for God so loved the world that he sent his only Son.

The Bible tells us in 1 John chapter 4, not that we loved him, but he first loved us and gave himself to be the payment for our sins.

1 John 4 · chapter mention

The Bible says in the book of Romans that even while we were in the condition of sinners having rejected him, he demonstrated his love towards us in sending Jesus to be our Savior.

You see, Jesus has a very clear and singular purpose.

In fact, when you read the first three chapters of Genesis, what you find there is the beauty of creation, and God made it all, and it was awesome and it was wonderful, and he put Adam and Eve in the garden.

You know, he said, I he made the trees and all of that, and it was good, and he made the sun, moon, stars, it was good.

He made the animals, it was good.

He made everything, it was good.

The only thing that wasn't good was when he made Adam, he said, It's not good that Adam is alone.

Right?

Fellas, it's not good when we're left to ourselves, right?

We get in trouble.

But all of it was good.

And then he conducts that marriage ceremony, and Adam and Eve and all of that, and Adam and Eve sin, and what happens as the result of their sin?

Their sin is punished.

There is judgment that enters into the world, death enters into the world because of that sin.

But even in that moment, immediately God steps into that judgment and he steps into that sin.

And in Genesis chapter 3, he brings the very first clear prophecy of salvation that he's going to send a redeemer.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

He looks at that serpent that is Satan in that form, and he says, one day, she, her progeny, a child that will come through the line of Adam.

A child will be born, and you will bruise his heel, but he will bruise your head.

It was a picture of the salvation of Jesus.

It is a picture that he would go to the cross, and yes, he would be harmed.

The Bible says by his stripes we are healed.

He would die there in our place.

But that was not a mortal wound to Jesus.

Because he is the God who has the authority to save us from our sins.

He is a Jesus with supernatural power.

And the Bible tells us on the third day he stepped out of that grave, he conquered death and sin, and is the author and finisher of our faith, the completer of our faith, so that he could offer us salvation.

And so from the very first moment that sin entered into the world, God had already stepped in with a purposeful plan to bring Jesus into the world as our Savior.

And when we see Jesus, we need to understand that Jesus has a singular purpose.

And that is he comes to save.

When we focus on Jesus and we see him, we also see his power.

It's incredible to see the supernatural power of Jesus.

And he wants to make sure that we don't misunderstand or limit his power.

You see, if he had raised that man from that bed first, if he had healed him first, people like me, we'd have started talking in church and turned around and go, Man, did you see that?

How awesome is that?

We'd have missed the whole point.

Jesus is on purpose.

He doesn't want to miss, he don't want anybody to miss where his power came from and what its purpose is.

You see, he wants us to understand that his supernatural power is to change us for eternity.

It is to change our future direction.

It is to remove the barrier of sin between us and God, and it is to reunite us in relationship with him here on this earth as we walk through this life and in heaven forever.

And he says, I want you to know that I am the only one who can step in and wipe away your sin.

And so I'm going to act with power in a way that teaches the lesson of the magnitude of my supernatural power.

Now you think about someone who is lying in that bed and their legs or their hips or their bones or whatever it is that have been broken, whatever their nerve system is, it takes incredible supernatural power to look into their body that has been broken and heal those wounds.

Mend those bones.

Restore those ligaments.

Bring strength to muscles that have been atrophied because they've never been used or they have atrophied to the point where he is trapped in that bed.

It takes a miraculous power in order to do that.

But let me ask you: does it take more power to raise someone from a bed or to raise them from the dead?

Does it take more power from the God of heaven to look down at our sin and understand the nature of that judgment and to recognize, man, sin must be punished.

And as a holy God, I'm the only one that can do that.

I'm the only one with righteousness that remains that can step into that place and can take that punishment for that person.

I grew up in church.

My mom and dad grew up in church, and I'm blessed to have that testimony.

Tonight we're going to talk about your salvation testimony and the power of being able to share that.

But that just happens to be my testimony.

Every testimony is special, and every testimony cost Jesus his blood on the cross and changed a life for eternity.

But mine happens to be I was raised in church.

Mom and dad drove us to church all the time, and we were in church all the time.

In fact, I grew up in the balcony of the church.

That's my people right there.

That's my people wave at me right there.

The way I was saved, the journey of my salvation, very simply, it kind of went like this.

Every time I got in trouble in my house, like nine, ten times a day, I got in trouble.

And mom and dad would always say something like this.

Even when I was little, it would always go something like, We told you not to talk back to your mom, we told you not to beat up your little brother, but he deserved it.

What he did was, you know, no, that doesn't matter.

You know, they teach us all that.

You didn't clean your room, you lied, you spoke back to your mom, whatever.

And they said, Listen, we're gonna have to punish you for that, but there's a reason.

See, the Bible calls that sin.

And you need to understand, and one day you'll be old enough to understand that, that your sin has to be punished, and so we're gonna teach you that must be punished.

But son, one day also you're gonna understand that Jesus loved you so much that he stepped out of heaven and took your punishment on the cross.

And all of that, and we go through all that and didn't get all that, but when I was nine and a half years old, one morning in church, I was sitting on the balcony in the front row.

Can't remember what the pastor was preaching, but we got to the invitation and went something like this.

No one ever loved you as much as Jesus.

He stepped out of heaven and went to the cross to take the punishment for your sin.

And at that point, all of that teaching and the Holy Spirit and mom and dad and Sunday school teachers and VBS teachers and little league baseball coaches and all those people that have been pouring that into our lives.

It all made sense.

I came down on the balcony, walked the aisle.

There was a deacon right there in the front of that aisle's name is Dewey Burton.

I said, Mr.

Dewey, I want to give my life to Jesus because nobody has loved me as much as Jesus.

He took my penalty for my sin on the cross.

You see, only Jesus could do that.

Only Jesus has the supernatural power to step out of heaven and live a sinless life.

And so only Jesus has the authority and the position and the ability to take his sinless life and go to the cross and take on our sins and die in our place and pay the price for our sins.

He's the only one that has that supernatural power.

He's the only one in that position can do that.

And then Jesus, as holy God, is the only one who could step out of that grave and conquer death and sin to offer us salvation.

And what Jesus wants us to know is this is my supernatural power.

It is greater than to be able to say you can see.

It is greater than to be able to say you can stand up and walk.

It is greater than to be able to make the deaf to hear or the blind to see.

My power is so supernaturally powerful, I can change your eternity forever.

I can rescue you from the shackles of sin.

I can rescue you from the penalty of sin.

I can steal you away from the lies and the scheming of the culture and all of that that the devil does.

I can paint for you the picture of heaven, and I'm the one who can die in your place, and I can redeem you and save you so that you can spend an eternity forever.

The supernatural power of Jesus.

See, sometimes people ask when we go through difficult times and struggles, why doesn't God take that away?

He's got the power to do that.

Why does he let COVID wreak havoc and culture and all of that?

Thanksgiving week.

We went through an experience that many of every family goes through.

My father suddenly died the week of Thanksgiving on Monday.

We had sat down to dinner, we had a call, my brother, my sister called me and said, Hey, dad's in trouble, going to the hospital.

What do you do?

We sat down and prayed, and we began to pray for healing for my dad.

And they called me back later and he had passed away.

You think, why?

My dad was healthy, he was strong, he was doing great, he was strong enough to constantly tell me how to preach and what I was doing wrong every time I talked to him and all that I mean, you know.

Why doesn't God fix those moments?

He has supernatural power.

If he can tell that man to get up and walk, if he can tell Lazarus, his friend, to come out of the grave and raise him from the dead, why doesn't he do more of that here?

You get that picture.

You can't tell me that in a normal guy, at least one of those four guys, when Jesus looked at him and didn't get him up out of the bed and told him, hey, your sins are forgiven, and turned back to teach the rest of his lesson, that they were thinking, wait a minute, we brought him for you to fix his legs.

We brought him for you to give him a new life and a future because you have the power to do that.

Where's the power?

But you see, here's what happens.

Because of his purpose, he uses his power in that direction.

Because his purpose is salvation, his power is wrapped up in that.

And what happens is he runs his power and that supernatural power through the process and the grid and the purpose of salvation and leading people to Christ.

This man, because Jesus saved him, because he forgave his sins and then worked, all of those people knew who Jesus was, that he was the Savior.

And sometimes there are times when Jesus takes his supernatural power into our lives and we want him to do this or fix that or make this not be hard, and Jesus is like, no, I'm bigger than that problem.

I'm bigger than that situation.

And if you'll stick with me and if you'll trust me, I'm gonna work in this situation and I'm gonna put my thumbprint on this eventually that will bring people to Christ.

I'm going to do something that only I can do supernaturally, and I'm gonna make it bigger than just making it not hard anymore.

I'm gonna do more than just you standing up out of that bed.

In fact, he looks at this man and he says, if you'll trust me for a moment, I'm gonna use you as a track to lead people to Jesus.

In fact, son, if you'll hang with me a minute, I see your faith and I know that you believe I'm the Son of God.

The Bible says very clearly that he saw their faith.

He saw the faith of those four men who worked that hard to get their friend.

He saw the faith of that friend.

And here's what he's knowing.

He says, if you'll hang with me, I'll use you an example that one day on a continent that you don't know exists, in a city that you never heard of, some guy will stand up and tell your story and give the example of how I can change their lives forever.

And God uses his supernatural power to step into those moments.

You see, when we have faith that Jesus saves, we have faith that he saves to the othermost.

We have faith that he's bigger than anything.

We have faith, as Paul said in the book of Romans, for I am convinced, I am persuaded, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things that are present, nor things that might come, nor anything we've been through as a church, nor anything we've been through as an individual, nor any experience, nothing can separate us from the love of God which is found in Christ Jesus.

And the supernatural power of Christ Jesus.

And so we see that his power is bigger than just the moments.

It is a power that saves for eternity.

When we focus on Jesus to see him, we see his purpose, we see his power, and we see his person.

I don't want you to lose the picture of the person of Jesus in this moment.

Because you see, sometimes we read these things and it's black words on a white page, and we get cool because there's some red letters, and we focus on the red letters and all that.

But we forget that this is, as Janet reminds me often, an actual episode from the life of Jesus.

This really happened.

I believe that there's a physical house where this happened, and these physical people were there, and Jesus stepped out of heaven, and he was an actual, physical, real person and savior, and he stood in that house, and these men actually pulled real thatch off that roof, and they dropped a guy down into a real floor on a real mat, and Jesus really stood there, and he said, Your sins are forgiven, and rise up from that bed, take up your bed and walk.

I believe those things actually, really happened.

And sometimes we forget and we miss some of the beauty and the joy of this.

You look at the person of Jesus in this moment.

Think about the things that are happening here.

Man, Jesus loves this man.

They interrupt his lesson, and he is preaching, and people are amening, and stuff is happening, and they wreck the moment in this sermon.

And what does Jesus do?

You guys are welcome.

Come on down.

We'll wait for you to get here.

You never interrupt Jesus when you come to him.

Look at the person of Jesus in the middle of this.

He sees what everybody's thinking.

I see.

I see your faith, fellas.

I know that you believe in me.

Son, on that mat, I can forgive your sins because I know you have faith in who I am.

Scribes, man, I see y'all questioning.

I know you got problems.

Let me teach you and show you in this moment.

I even believe that in this moment, with this crowd of room, Jesus wasn't just focused on four and one and a few scribes.

I think Jesus never lost in his mind that there was a teenage guy sitting right back in the back of that house in the corner.

He had squeezed himself in there.

He didn't know if anybody loved him.

He wasn't sure about all this.

And as Jesus taught all of this, he saw that young man in the back.

And he said, I want you to know who I am too.

He never lost anybody in the room.

Jesus loves everyone in that moment.

He has a supernatural power to know what you're thinking and feeling.

The Bible teaches us that clearly.

The person of Jesus is invested in your lives.

The person of Jesus knows and understands what's in your heart.

You think about how many times Jesus looked at someone and talked to them.

He said, I know your faith to those four men.

He said, I know your faith, and your sins are forgiven.

I know your questions in the rooms, scribes, and let me help you understand this.

The Bible tells us when the rich young ruler, the man who's described that, comes to Jesus, the Bible says he looked at him, he loved him, and he put his finger right on his question that he was struggling with in life.

The Bible tells us that there was a Roman centurion who came to Jesus and he wanted him, Jesus, to heal his servant.

And Jesus said, Well, I'll get up and go from where I am and go to your house.

And he and the guy said, No, I understand all this.

And Jesus said, I have never seen such greater faith.

And you will have your prayers answered and your servant is healed.

The Bible tells us that there was a crowd surrounding Jesus, and he was on his way to heal a young girl who was on her deathbed.

And as he worked through this crowd and all of this, there was a lady who didn't think she was worthy of anything, a lady who had been struggling with an issue of blood in her life, a lady who had no hope in her life, a lady she had gone to the doctors and they couldn't do any with her, the Bible told us.

And all she thought is if I can just touch the hem of his garment, I don't have to disturb him.

He doesn't have to know who I am.

I don't want to be conspicuous.

I just know that Jesus, and she had faith in him, and when she just touched his garment in the midst of all that chaos and jostling, Jesus immediately stopped and he knew who she was and he knew what her question was.

I love that song that we sang about he is calling you by name.

As Jesus walked through the street, the Bible tells us in the midst of that crowd, there was a sinner, a man who was a thief and a crook and a tax collector, and his name was Zacchaeus, and he was short apparently, and he climbed up in a tree just so he could get a view of Jesus.

And as Jesus walked through that, he knew that that man had questions.

He knew that man needed to be loved.

The Bible tells us he even knew his name because he stopped in that tree and he looked up and he said, Zacchaeus, you come down.

The Bible tells us in the book of Hebrews, for the word of God is living and powerful and sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of the soul and the spirit, the bones and the marrow.

It is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

And the next verse says, For all things are naked and open to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

When we focus on the person of Jesus, church family, I want you to know today that Jesus knows where you are.

He knows your faith.

He knows your situation and what you're struggling with.

When Jesus is working in someone else's life, he has not forgotten you.

And he is as invested in your life, your questions, your desires, your fears, your needs, your doubts, even where you are rebelling against him, he knows it.

And he loves you.

He wants to reach into your life with supernatural power.

Isn't it incredible when we take time to focus on the purpose, the power, and the person of Jesus?

But here's what I also know.

In my years of pastoring and teaching the Bible and just being a Christian, I know this.

It's more than just the focus on Jesus.

The whole point that we have a story like this, the whole point that Jesus teaches us a lesson about his purpose, the whole reason that we get this sense of power and Jesus works so clearly to help us understand the nature and purpose of his supernatural power to save, his desire to change our eternity.

The reason that we see these moments where we can get tangible pictures of the person of Jesus is because he calls us to a faith response.

So the first thing is we want to focus on Jesus, but the second thing is by faith we want to respond to Jesus.

We want to respond to his purpose.

Church family, we are here as the body of Christ to do the work of Christ.

His purpose is our purpose.

If Jesus came as the Son of Man to seek and to save who's lost, if the person of Jesus knows and loves every person and what's in their lives, and he understands and he has a plan and he has a call, then we must be about the same purpose.

We all have to be engaged in this Jesus, and the more that we worship him and the more that we focus on him, the more we see him, the more we see the clarity of his purpose, and the more it calls us by faith to be a part of that purpose.

The more it calls us to be invested in the lives of people, the more it calls us to do the same thing he did.

Wherever we are, in our home, in a line, at harps or whatever grocery stores you have in Fort Smith, there's no Kroger.

Really?

Anywhere in Arkansas, I can always say Walmart, right?

Because we're all in Walmart.

You can't go 24 hours without spending 50 bucks in a Walmart.

It's just how it works, right?

Wherever you are, every person there, at a gas station, kids, in your homeroom, on your basketball team, in the band, with the cheerleaders, wherever you are, men and women at work, whatever you're doing, when you are there, just like Jesus in his home, when he is surrounded by people, he is on the purpose of showing them, I've come to save you and I have a plan for your life.

It was a blessing in every session I spent with you at the church.

Early on, somebody asked, How are we going to reach the river valley?

How are we going to see people say?

What's the mission strategy?

How are we going to reach kids and students?

How are we going to bring more young families and get the gospel into their home and their children and their lives?

How are we going to do that, Pastor Greg?

What's your plan for that?

What's your vision for that?

How do you want to do that?

We see.

We focus on Jesus.

We stay focused on him so we see his purpose and we join him in his purpose.

We believe in his power.

You know?

We need to believe that Jesus saves.

The power.

Man, Jesus saves and he still saves, and the gospel has not been watered down, the gospel has not changed.

It still saves sinners for an eternity.

People still respond when they hear the gospel.

When you tell someone, Jesus saved me, that still has a supernatural power in someone's life.

And when we come to church, we need to come to church waiting and believing that people are going to be saved.

When we come to church and people haven't come down the aisle and we haven't had a baptism, we need to say, God, I know you can still do that.

What are we doing?

What are you doing?

How do we get there?

We need to have a church that believes in the power of God so much that it bothers us when somebody's not baptized on a Sunday.

It bothers us when someone hasn't come forward to receive Christ.

When we see our friends and we know that that's a good person and we know that Jesus loves them, but they haven't given their lives.

Lord, I am not going to give up because I know you can change their life.

And we believe with a power that Jesus saves.

When we reach one of those moments like my family in Thanksgiving or your church family, some of the journey you've been through, or a moment in your life, or the doctor gives you a report, or your company is struggling and they eliminate your job, or you have a problem with your kids, or there's some issue, we need to move into that moment with a place of faith.

Not to make light of those things, but to understand in this moment, I serve a God who has a supernatural power and he can work, and not only can he do something in my life, but he can use this moment to have other people come to faith in Christ because of how we do this moment.

We want to pray and believe as we focus on Jesus that he is going to put his thumbprint on the first Baptist Church of Four Smith, Arkansas, and people are going to say only God could do that, and they're going to come and give their lives to Jesus because of the supernatural saving power of God and what he does in his church.

And I want you to respond in faith to the person of me.

He looks at this man and he says, Get up, son.

Roll up your bed and believe in what I've done for you and believe in me.

I love you.

And the Bible says he immediately got up because he saw the person in Jesus.

He looked him in the eye.

He heard his voice.

He knew the truth.

And he got up and walked.

Listen, we need to respond by the same faith.

The beauty of what we have now is we have the movement of the Holy Spirit in every life.

We have the movement of the Holy Spirit in our church.

We have the movement of God through his living and powerful word of God where he sees exactly what you need and what your questions are, and he steps in with a two-edged, sharp razor sword exactly into the question, exactly into the doubt, exactly into the thing you struggle with.

He speaks with that into your life.

The Bible says faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

And when you look at Jesus in the word of God, you see the Jesus that we know to be Him.

You see the heart of Jesus.

You see the love of Jesus.

You see the hands and the heart and the eyes of Jesus.

You see the power of Jesus.

And I want you to know if you are struggling this morning, I want you to see Jesus, and I want you to make the faith choice that God has called you to make.

Somebody watching today out of curiosity, or you've been watching and searching, as Brother Dale has been preaching the gospel in the last few weeks, we've had an apologetics lesson on the real solid foundation that we have in the Word of God.

And you're searching.

I want you to know Jesus loves you and He died for you and call you to give your life to Him as your Savior.

Take up your mat and walk.

Some of you, church family, this has been tough, and you just sort of settle back.

And you want to get excited again and join in ministry again.

Come teach third grade Sunday school.

Come help reach some students for Jesus.

You guys are blessed.

Y'all have a university in Fort Smith.

God loves y'all more than a lot of other cities in Arkansas.

They don't have universities and they don't get to do college students.

I've never gotten a pastor in a university town yet.

I'm telling you, I'm jacked up for that.

Let's go reach some college students, amen?

And God may be calling you to be a part of that.

You're a business person and you're successful and you know how to do stuff and you can go find kids that have that major and you can spend time with them and you can invest in them and you can call them to Jesus.

I'm going to ask you to rise up, take up your bed, and walk by faith into the ministry that God is calling you to.

Some of y'all, God's calling you to preach, He's calling you to be a missionary, He's calling you to get involved.

Because He loves you and He has a plan for you.

As you focus on the person of Jesus, know that plan is one of love and come to Him.

I want you to bow your heads as we close this morning.

I've shared the gospel many times, as clearly as I can in this scripture.

All of us are sinners by birth, by nature, by choice.

All of us have fallen short of God's glory.

Everyone listening on video or listening here in the room, we have some.

You've never trusted Christ as your Savior.

And I've done the best that I can do to help you see from this incredible scripture that God has given us that Jesus loves you, has the power to save you, and He came to save you.

How do I accept Him as my Savior?

How do I get my friends for my sins forgiven?

Well, you just trust in Him as these men did.

That's why we have this example.

You recognize you're a sinner, that your sin will be punished, but you recognize Jesus has the authority and the power of no one else.

He stepped out of heaven and paid the price for your sin on the cross.

No one will ever love you as much as Jesus.

Come in a moment and give your life to Jesus.

If you're a brother or sister in Christ, praise the Lord, you're already saved.

But listen, I know you can't come to this church and God not speak to you.

We got too many Bible teachers around this church.

We have too much heritage and scripture being taught in people's lives.

There's no way you can come here and go through Sunday school and meet the people of God and all of that and God not speak to you.

And so if God is speaking to you, I want to encourage you as we stand in a moment and sing, listen, the invitation is an opportunity for you to leave here different than you were when you came in.

For a person who needs Jesus, you can be saved.

For a follower of Christ, you can grow closer to Him.

You can deal with something.

You can turn something over to Him.

What step of faith has He called you to make?

We pray this message has been a blessing to you and helped to strengthen your walk with Jesus.

Please know we want to minister to you and pray for you.

Send an email to contact us at fsfbc.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.

Thank you for listening to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.