Mark 1:21-28

If you have a copy of God's Word, I invite you to open with me to Mark chapter 1.

Mark 1 · chapter mention

Mark chapter 1.

Mark 1 · chapter mention

We've been tracking with Jesus through the book of Mark over the past several weeks.

And in case you've missed it, or just to refresh your memory, I want to catch you up to where we are thus far,

and where we've been thus far in the book of Mark.

And to do that, I want to use a map.

Sometimes it's good to see a geographical context of where we've been and where we are.

So we could get that map up there.

This map that we're using is a map of the upper region of Galilee.

Galilee is a region. It's not a town. It's not a country. It's a region.

A lot of times people get confused about that.

Over here is the Mediterranean Sea, just to kind of give you a geographical context.

This is in modern-day Israel.

And where we've been thus far is, we'll come down here and we'll see that Nazareth is right there.

Nazareth is the town where Jesus grew up in.

It wasn't where he was born, but where he grew up.

But we've seen Jesus move from Nazareth over to this region over here, where it's the Jordan River.

The Jordan River flows between these two bodies of water and actually flows south of here as well.

But the Jordan River is right here where Jesus was baptized.

And then we see Jesus come down from the Jordan River to the shores of the banks of the Sea of Galilee,

where he's called his first four disciples.

So far we've seen Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John.

And this week we arrive in a little fishing village called Capernaum.

It's right there.

If I can hold the thing on there just right.

It's Capernaum. It's a fishing village.

It's a very prominent fishing town of this time.

And it's actually the hometown of Simon Peter.

And this is really where we pick up in verse 21 of chapter 1 of Mark.

It says,

They went to Capernaum, and immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and began to teach.

I want to pause here for a moment because Clay last week pointed out something that's really important to us

as we track through the book of Mark.

Mark likes to use words indicating immediacy,

or things that show quick action from one place to another.

In fact, we see this word immediate no less than ten times in the first chapter alone of Mark.

So Jesus, we see, immediately is compelled to go into the wilderness after his baptism.

Simon and Andrew immediately drop their nets to follow Jesus.

And here Jesus gets to Capernaum and immediately begins to teach.

So Mark is really, by using these words and using this immediacy,

he's really showing the urgency of the task at hand,

that Jesus' ministry is one of urgency.

It's one of necessity.

And we move from places very quick in the book of Mark.

And so, Jesus gets to Capernaum, likely with the first four disciples,

and says,

Man, that was a tough hike.

I'm feeling pretty tired today.

I think, since it's the Sabbath, we're just going to take a break and just kick up.

No, that's not what happens.

Jesus gets to Capernaum and he says,

Does somebody say it's the Sabbath?

Surely there's got to be somebody at the synagogue.

Let's get to work.

And Jesus begins to get to work.

He begins teaching in the synagogue.

By the way, the reason why Jesus is able to do this is because there is a Jewish tradition

in the synagogues of that day where traveling teachers could go into a synagogue and begin to teach.

They did that so that they could hear from other teachers.

And if somebody happened to be traveling, then it was a great thing to be able to hear from different people.

And so they allowed traveling rabbis and known teachers to be able to teach within the synagogues.

So Jesus is using that right that he has to go into these places and teach when he's teaching there.

Verse 22, it says that they were amazed at his teaching.

For he was teaching as one having authority and not as the scribes.

So there's something different about the way Jesus taught.

He was different than the scribes and the teachers of that day.

This is really important.

We're going to come back to that.

Verse 23, then there was a man in their synagogues with an unclean spirit.

In other words, he was demon possessed.

This demon possession and men filled with unclean spirits is synonymous in the New Testament.

And he cried out saying, what business do we have with each other, Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are, the Holy One of God.

Now notice here, the demonized man was in the synagogue, which is essentially the old covenant equivalent of the church gathering place.

It would be like somebody coming into this room or into this building and creating a scene and shouting out loud during the teaching time.

So don't think for a minute that in the church all the people there are great,

and that the people outside of the church are the only ones who are demon possessed.

Because I would almost guarantee you, I can't know for certain, but I would almost guarantee you there are people all across our nation right now

who are entering into church buildings with demon possession.

Jesus called them wolves in sheep's clothing, and the enemy loves to enter into these places.

He loves to infiltrate our camps.

He loves to infiltrate our churches.

And they cause all kinds of division and strife and conflict within the flock.

And that's what's happening in this text.

Jesus is bringing in the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God, we already know, is at hand.

And as the kingdom of God is ushered in, the kingdom of darkness is lashing out against it.

They rightfully don't want Jesus there, because he is disrupting their world.

He's disrupting their mission to destroy people's souls and destroy people in a very dark way.

This time, however, they're messing with the wrong person.

As we continue on in verse 25,

So three primary truths that we're going to focus on this morning.

And the first thing that we see in this passage is that Jesus had authority in his teaching.

There's something different about Jesus when he taught than the teachers of that day.

Jesus didn't bore people with the Bible.

That's one of the greatest travesties a teacher of God's Word can commit,

is teaching in a boring way.

And it's happening all over the country this morning,

where preachers and teachers are boring people with God's Word.

And to bore people with this Word that's so rich, is so meaningful,

is so powerful and authoritative, sharper than any two-edged sword,

and able to pierce as far as joint and marrow, according to Hebrews 4.12.

Jesus didn't just get up there and read some passages and just kind of make a few comments here and there,

like most of the teachers of that day did.

We've seen already some examples of Jesus' teaching,

and examples of how he taught with authority.

Last week, we saw where he said,

The time is fulfilled.

The kingdom of God is at hand.

Repent and believe in the Gospel.

It was foretold that this would happen, by the way,

in Isaiah 11.2.

It says that,

So we see Jesus teaching with authority,

and always in such a way that spurred his followers,

the people who are listening to him,

into action somehow.

And he was compelling in a very unique way.

Now, when I was in seminary,

I had the opportunity to listen to a lot of preachers and teachers.

When you're in a place, if you can imagine,

in a place where you have three chapel services every week,

in addition to your Sunday night, Sunday morning, and Wednesday night,

activities, you hear a bunch of sermons,

and you get to hear from a lot of different people,

which for the most part, is a really, really good thing.

It's good to see the different dynamics and teaching styles.

It's really good to be able to see how they divide the Word of God differently.

But every now and then, you run across someone who's in it for themselves.

And they're in it to make a name for themselves.

And oftentimes, you'll see these guys on TV.

And the primary reason is because they have made it a mission and a goal in their lives

to make a name for themselves.

And they have placed themselves in a position where they are in front of people.

And oftentimes, they're in front of people.

And they're on the news.

You see them on CNN sometimes making incredibly unbiblical comments.

It's because they've built themselves up to the point,

and they think that they are just going after it.

And these guys are really good communicators, by the way.

They'll tickle your ears.

They'll make you laugh.

But when it comes down to the content of what they're saying,

it's man-centered truth, not Bible-centered truth, and not God-centered truth.

And I want you to hear this this morning.

The deal is that good preaching never leads to man-centered praise.

Good teaching, good Bible teaching will never lead to man-centered praise.

As a teacher of God's Word, I almost cringe.

And I hesitate to say this because I don't want to discourage anybody.

But I almost cringe when people say,

Good job, Kyle.

That was a great sermon.

And it's not because I don't like that.

And if you've said that before, it's not a big deal.

I don't want to make a big deal out of just that fact.

But the reason why I cringe is because it seems like I'm taking credit where credit isn't due.

Because if there's anything good about something that I say or the way I preach,

it's not because of me.

It's because of the Spirit that works in and through me.

And God deserves the glory, not man.

I'd much rather have preached in such a way that people don't say,

Great job, Kyle.

I'd rather preach in such a way that people say,

Wow, what an amazing God we serve.

Because He is amazing.

And preaching should lead to God-centered praise, not to man-centered praise,

with the exception, by the way, of one preacher

who deserves all the praise and the glory that we can give to Him.

And I'm not talking about Spurgeon or Whitfield or Jonathan Edwards.

We like those people too.

But it's Jesus.

He speaks as one with authority because He is one with authority.

He speaks as one with authority because He is the authority.

As one writer put it,

Jesus' teaching is different than the scribes of that day

because His teaching is tied to His very character.

And that's just it.

Everything about Jesus is holy.

Everything about Him is God.

He is 100% God.

When He speaks,

every single word that comes out of His mouth

is the Word of God.

And people are rightfully amazed by Him in this context

because He is amazing.

He is the spoken, living, breathing Word of God.

And so we clearly see that Jesus had authority in His teaching

and He was rightfully authoritative in His teaching.

When I teach, or when Nathan teaches,

or when other people here,

Clay last week and Chris is speaking next week,

when we teach,

we teach on the authority of the Word of God.

We don't want to teach on our own authority.

We teach on the authority of the Word of God.

So we see that Jesus was authoritative in His teaching,

but Jesus also had authority over demons.

We see that very clearly in this text,

that Jesus has authority over demons.

So that brings up the question,

is spiritual warfare and demons, are they real?

But some people in our culture will tell you,

no, they're not real.

But it's written all over the pages of Scripture,

that yes, spiritual warfare is real.

Demons are real.

Satan is real.

C.S. Lewis wrote a good little book called Screwtape Letters.

Anybody in here ever read that book?

A few of us?

It's a tough read.

Sometimes it's hard for us to read that

because C.S. Lewis kind of gets into the mind

of what it's like to be a demon

or to be on the dark side of spiritual warfare.

It's a crazy book.

And it's amazing how he's able to write it.

Now, it's not truth.

It's fictional.

But he does write some truth in there.

And he makes this interesting little statement

in the Screwtape Letters that goes like this.

He says,

There are two equal and opposite errors

in which our race could fall about the devils.

One is to believe in their existence.

The other is to believe

and to feel an excessive, unhealthy interest in them.

And so what he's saying here is that people,

when they hear demons,

when they hear about spiritual warfare,

what they often do is they resort to one of two things.

Oftentimes they'll either go,

I don't want to see them.

I don't want to hear about them.

I don't believe in them.

I just want to ignore everything the Bible has to say about them.

You're making me feel awkward by even talking about them.

So some of you might be going there right now.

You might be like,

Kyle, I'm just kidding.

I'm feeling awkward even talking about it right now.

Others of you will have an unhealthy,

inordinate obsession with them

where you blame everything that happens

that's bad in your life on spiritual warfare.

I've heard some pretty crazy stuff.

I won't tell you exactly what I've heard,

but it's just crazy stuff.

Kind of like somebody would say,

you know,

my coffee is hot,

hotter today than it was yesterday,

and hell is hot,

so that means that the demons of coffee

are trying to scorch my tongue,

and they're trying to punish me today.

And I've heard some crazy off-the-wall stuff.

I've heard people blame Satan for their sin.

Satan made me do it.

Let's call sin what it is,

and it's an act of our own act,

our own choice to commit an atrocity against God,

to go outside of what God's Word has told us.

That's what sin is.

It's not anybody making us do it.

It's our own wrong.

It's our own decision.

So to deny spiritual warfare is wrongful,

and to overemphasize it is wrongful as well.

But spiritual warfare does exist,

and demons do exist,

and Satan does exist.

So what does that mean for us?

It means we're at war.

We're constantly at war

in a lot of different ways.

We're not just at war spiritually.

We're also at war with our flesh,

according to Scripture.

We know that spiritual warfare is going on,

and any good soldier,

in order to learn how to defeat the enemy,

has to know his enemy.

And so we see here that we need to know our enemy.

Scripture reveals much to us about Satan and demons.

We're not going to go into everything about that.

We don't have time this morning.

We could spend weeks on learning about our enemy.

So we're just going to stick to what does this text tell us

about demons and spiritual warfare.

The first thing that we should note here

is that Satan and demons can speak,

and that they are crafty.

They're smart.

They don't just come to us dressed in red,

holding pitchforks,

saying,

I'm a demon,

and I'm here to destroy your soul.

Right?

They come to us very subtly.

In this case,

a demon is coming into the synagogue,

into God's camp, so to speak,

and he is disguised inside of a human.

They're not just going to come to us

and make us fearful of them.

Satan came to Adam and Eve as a serpent.

And the way these evil spirits often operate

is they'll come to you in the context of truth.

They'll begin to twist that truth

and turn it into a lie.

And then they'll begin to promise goodness

apart from God.

We talked about this in our college Bible study

a couple of weeks ago,

where the lie that Satan tells Adam and Eve

in the garden,

it's just a mere,

it's a simple atrocity.

I mean, it is just an affront on God.

He tells them that by eating the fruit,

they will be like God.

And here's the lie.

Adam and Eve,

when they were created,

they were already like God.

They were created in God's own image.

He states it more than once in Genesis chapter 2.

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

And so we see that the Satan,

in the context of truth,

he twists that truth

and turns it into a lie.

The reality was for Adam and Eve,

they became less like God.

when they sinned.

Because before,

they were able to commune with God.

They were running to God.

They were enjoying His presence.

After they sinned,

it became a whole different story.

They're running from God

in sheer terror of God.

They became less like Him in reality.

So we need to recognize the enemy's schemes

and resist him.

The next thing that we need to recognize

and understand about our enemy

is that even though they may be crafty,

that God is creator

and they are creature.

Which means that God is sovereign

and Satan and demons are subordinate.

You look at what happens in this passage.

Verse 25,

And Jesus rebuked him saying,

Be quiet and come out of him.

There's no magic formula there.

There's no sprinkling of holy water.

There's no priest standing over him

reciting incantations.

Just a simple command,

but firm command

that Jesus gives.

He says,

Be quiet and come out of them.

And we see that demons recognize

Jesus' authority over them.

Not only that,

but they respond in immediate.

They have to respond

in immediate obedience.

Verse 26,

Throwing him into convulsions,

the unclean spirit cried out

with a loud voice

and came out of him.

And just like that,

the demon has to be obedient to Christ.

His authority and his rule

are too much to overcome.

So it's important for us to understand

because we often think of spiritual warfare

like dualism.

Dualism is what we see

in a lot of our stories

and a lot of our movies

that we come to

where,

like in Star Wars,

where you have

the evil emperor

who shocks people

into submission.

And you have this incredibly evil,

just everybody under his control

is incredibly evil.

His sidekick,

Darth Vader.

And everything that's happening

is just evil

from their side of things.

Then you come over

to the light side

and you have Luke Skywalker

and the last remaining Jedi.

And you have all the goodness

and they're fighting for the good

and trying to save the universe.

And oftentimes in our stories

you see this picture

where you have the evil side

and the dark side

are equal and opposing forces

that are going against each other.

That's not what we see

in the text of Scripture

when it comes to spiritual warfare.

This is not dualism.

This is total domination.

This is God supreme

and Satan subordinate.

God as the ruler of all things,

demons subject to his rule.

And when the time comes

for Jesus to return,

these guys are done.

They're just done.

You get the revelation

and it's all over for them.

Because the day will come

when God says,

enough is enough.

We're moving forward

with Operation Christ Return.

And when that happens,

Scriptures already told us

that the God of peace

will soon crush Satan

under your feet.

And on that day,

whether rich or poor,

whether angel or demon,

whether lost or saved,

every knee shall bow

and every tongue confess

that Jesus Christ is Lord.

And our God will reign

as He always has

for the rest of eternity.

And demons,

they come into contact with Jesus

and they know the authority

that Jesus has.

Verse 24 saying,

What business do we have

with each other,

Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us?

And the demon recognizes

Jesus' authority

and His ultimate ability

to destruct

in the spiritual realm.

This demon recognizes

that Jesus has the power,

if He wanted to,

to destroy Him.

And if that's not enough,

he further declares,

I know who you are,

the Holy One of God.

And I love the fact,

and hopefully you'll get this with me,

but I love the fact that demons,

every ounce that is within them,

they hate and loathe

everything about Jesus.

And yet at the same time,

they have no,

they are powerless

to do anything apart

from His sovereign authority,

His sovereign command.

It's just amazing.

It's good to be on Team Jesus.

It's good to be

on this side of the cross

and to be able to see

the power and the authority

that He has.

Satan can do nothing

in this world.

The minions,

His minions can do

nothing in this world to you

apart from God's divine authority

and apart from what God says

that they can do.

Satan is a lion,

according to 1 Peter 5,

but he is a lion

that is on a leash.

And the leash is being held

by the Son of God

who takes away

the sins of the world.

It would be one thing

if this just happened one time,

but it doesn't.

This happens over and over

and over again

where Jesus encounters demons

and spiritual warfare

and over and over

and over again

they submit to His authority.

I can't help but see

a contrast here.

I want you to think

about this with me.

Demons have fear

because of their belief.

They know who Jesus is

and they're scared

out of their minds.

They believe in

and know that Jesus

has authority

and that's why they're scared.

But we're the opposite.

Oftentimes, not always,

but oftentimes we fear

because of our disbelief.

And if we could only realize

what the demons realize

about Jesus,

then we can experience

security

and understand

that we have no reason

to fear.

He is the Son of God

who takes away

the sin of the world.

He came to us.

He walked among us.

He ate and drank

like we do.

He had a power over disease.

He had a power over nature.

And ultimately,

He sacrificed Himself

on the cross

so that we can come

into communion.

We can have a relationship

with Him.

And that same God

is holding us

and we can feel safe

and secure

in His arms.

You know,

this kind of reminds me

of this whole concept

of us not really

having that faith

in Christ.

It reminds me

of when He was

with His disciples

and they were out

on a boat

and the storm came

and the waves were rising

and the wind

was coming up upon them.

And Jesus was asleep

in the boat

as you recall.

And the disciples,

they are just rightfully

just like out of their minds

scared.

They're just scared

out of their minds.

And Jesus wakens

and He calms the sea.

He rebukes the wind

and the waves

and says,

Be calm.

And immediately,

nature calms

when He speaks.

And then,

He rebukes the disciples

and says,

O ye of little faith,

there's been a time

in my life

when I've been scared

out of my mind

just like the disciples.

It was on Palm Sunday,

1994.

My brother was there

with me.

My brother's sitting

in the back

and his family

and my dad

and they're all here.

It's good to have them

here this morning

with us.

If you disbelieve

anything about this story,

go and talk to my brother

afterwards

because he was there.

It was me and my brother

and my mom

were at home.

Anybody remember 1994?

Anybody from Lumpkin County

remember what happened

in 1994

on Palm Sunday?

Maybe not.

Craig remembers.

Okay.

That day,

Lumpkin County

was ravaged

by a series of tornadoes.

Our house

was the first

of the tornadoes

to come through.

We were eating

a late lunch that day

and we usually

ate around noon

but we were eating

more like 2 o'clock

that day,

I believe.

and we were

finishing up with lunch.

We had observed

all throughout the day

how strange

the weather was.

It was just

a weird weather day.

We saw the clouds

racing and sometimes

they were kind of

colliding into each other

which by the way,

if you see that,

it's time to get

to the basement

because,

I mean,

that's a good sign

that there's tornado

weather coming.

And we even made

the comment that day

that hey,

this looks like

a lot like tornado weather.

just to give you

kind of a picture

of how weird things were,

there's a cloud

we observed that day.

There's a cloud

up in the sky

that just had

lightning just

surging through it.

It was like

unending lightning

just surging

through this cloud.

Never seen anything

like it before

in my life.

So we already knew

how strange

the weather was

that day

and so Craig

goes out on the porch

and out into our yard

just kind of observing

the weather

one more time

and we'd already

been out there

several times

but he went out there again

and he's kind of

looking over to the east

and kind of

looking up to the clouds

just kind of,

man,

this is so strange

and he looks

toward the west

to our next door

neighbor's house

and there was a tornado

just standing there

moving toward us

and beginning to rip apart

our next door neighbor's house.

Now,

I want you to know that

because you need to know

why my brother

was acting

the way that he was.

He's not normally

scared of a lot of

things but he came

bolting in the house

yelling at the top

of his lungs

get down to the basement

everybody get down

to the basement

and so he and I

it was the three of us

in the house at the time

it was my mom

me and my brother

and my dad was

somewhere else

serving in the community

but the three of us

were there

and so Craig and I

just bolt down

and we get to the bottom

of the basement

and we're standing there

looking at each other

where's mom?

Mom was not down there yet.

I don't know how

she could have missed

him yelling

get down to the basement

but somehow she did

and apparently we found

out later that she

was upstairs

turning lights off

and closing the garage

door while a tornado

was barreling

towards our house.

So,

we get up to the top

of the stairs

and we said

mom get downstairs

and we get down there

and by the time

that we got to the basement

we're sitting

on the basement floor

we're kind of

in a triangle

huddled together

we start to see

the effects

of this thing.

I didn't see

the tornado

personally

my brother did

and so

this is how

is it okay

if I tell them

how you're reacting?

So,

he's going

oh no

look at the trees

let me tell you

what the trees

were doing

the trees

would be sucked

toward the tornado

they'd be blown over

and then they'd suck

back and just

snap off

I'm talking about

big trees

just snapping off

and flying away

I've never seen

power like this

before in my life

just sheer power

of wind

and he's going

oh no

look at the trees

oh no

look at the

look there goes

the fence

and I mean

he was just

like we're observing

everything

we're looking

out the windows

seeing everything

that's going on

it is utter chaos

mom's to my right

and she's going

it's going to be okay

it's going to be okay

it's going to be okay

and then Mr. Future Preacher

man I'm over here

in my corner

of the triangle

going let's pray

let's pray

let's pray

and finally

I said

let's pray

now

and I just began

to spill out words

out of my mouth

I don't remember

everything

that I prayed

but I remember

specifically asking

that God would place

a dome of protection

over our family

and over our house

after I got done

praying

Craig prayed

and mom prayed

and by that time

the tornado

had moved on

and we could see

outside

that there was

no more wind

at least there

were no more

effects of the wind

at the time

so we thought

well hey

we're okay

right now

at least we're alive

and we're very grateful

and thankful for that

we walked up

the steps

from our basement

our basement door

kind of opens up

into the foyer area

of our house

and we saw that

for the most part

our house is intact

and we're grateful

again

all over again

that we didn't know

what we were going to see

when we went up

to the next floor

we had no idea

if we had a house

above us

or if we had a roof

above us

or if there was

anything there

but we're grateful

that at least

our house was intact

so we walked

out our front door

and we looked

to the west

to that house

that Craig saw

with a tornado

hitting it

at that time

and it's leveled

all but one wall

the only one wall

was left standing

in that house

and we realized

how fortunate

we were at the time

it wasn't until

a couple weeks later

when somebody

came into my dad's pharmacy

and told him

what they saw

that we realized

the gravity

of what happened

that day

because they said

when I saw it

coming through

your neighborhood

I saw the tornado

split into two

different funnels

it's a phenomenon

that they call

the double vortex tornado

and they'll split

into two different funnels

there's a funnel

there's damage

on the back side

of our house

in the backyard

there's damage

to the lot

across from us

now there were

some damage

to our house

but structurally

speaking

it stands today

like it stood

before the tornado

structurally speaking

it was pretty sound

and the only way

to explain it

is that the God

who can calm

the wind

and the waves

place a dome of protection

over our house

and he is sovereign

there is nothing

that we should fear

and let me tell you

something

even if we had

died that day

our eternal security

rests in Christ Jesus

so either way

no matter what

had happened that day

we were secure

in him

so whom shall we fear

Paul puts it this way

he says

for I am convinced

that neither

death nor life

nor angels

nor demons

neither the present

nor the future

nor any powers

neither height

nor depth

nor anything else

in all of creation

will be able

to separate us

from the love

that is in

Christ Jesus

our Lord

we have nothing

and no one

to fear

because Jesus

has all authority

last but not least

what we see

in this passage

and I want us

to see this clearly

is that Jesus'

authority

his sovereign

authority

leads us to

total allegiance

to him

I'm going to say that

again because

that's kind of wordy

I didn't know

how else to word it

but Jesus' sovereign

authority

leads us to

total allegiance

to him

this particular passage

is bookended

with the people's

amazement of Jesus

they were amazed

first by his teaching

and then at the end

of this passage

they were amazed

by his authority

over demons

this word amazed

here in the text

is a compound form

of the Greek verb

pleso

and what pleso means

it literally means

to strike

or to smite

and so we're

talking about

a very strong

word with

very strong

meaning here

so the picture

is here

is that

the people

weren't just

amazed

they were

dumbfounded

they were

astonished

they were

shocked

in other words

Jesus may have

caused a few

jaws to drop

that day

what we know

for sure

and don't miss

this is that

people who were

there that day

were compelled

to go and

spread the news

about him

all over the

region of Galilee

you see one

thing Jesus

never had to

do was to

beg people

for followers

or to follow

him

he never had

to beg

people to

spread the

news about

him

he was just

amazing

he amazed

people

and in their

amazement

of Jesus

they went

out and

they shared

the truth

about him

the good

news

about him

last week

we saw him

approach four

fishermen

he said

follow me

there's no

begging

there's no

pleading

he just said

follow me

and it says

they immediately

dropped their

nets and

followed him

the picture is

the same

this week

Jesus didn't

ask him

people to

spread the

word about

him

they just

do it

out of

their

amazement

their

amazement

led them

to action

and those

followers

told other

followers

and those

followers

told other

followers

until Jesus

just has

these crowds

of people

who are

following him

around

everywhere

so brothers

and sisters

in here

this morning

I exhort

you

if Christ

has done

anything

amazing

in your

life

if you

are counted

among the

redeemed

then go

out and

share

what he

has done

for you

there are

plenty of

people all

over north

Georgia

and all

over the

state of

Georgia

and all

over the

United States

and to the

ends of

the earth

there are

people who

do not

yet know

Jesus

as their

Lord and

Savior

there is a

mission field

right here

where we are

in northeast

Georgia

so if you

are counted

among the

redeemed

it's time

that we

act as if

we're redeemed

and out of

the joy

that overflows

in us

through what

Christ has

done for us

it's time

that we go

and share

that with

our lost

people

to share

it with

our neighbors

to proclaim

it in your

workplace

to proclaim

him in your

schools

or on your

campuses

to proclaim

him to

the nations

he is

worthy

to be on

our minds

he is

worthy

to be

the topic

of our

conversations

more than

football

and more

than TV

shows

and more

than politics

he is

worthy

Jesus

is worthy

may his

name be

glorified

as we go

out from

here

and as we

go into

our communities

and we go

to the various

spheres of

influence that

we have

may his

name

increase

because of

our

amazement

in him

and because

we are

willing

to share

the gospel

with a

lost

and dying

world

let's pray

together

together