Healing Service

Thank you brother. Testimony, praise, gratitude,

Thanksgiving. It just shifts everything,

doesn't it? Shifts perspective.

I can find plenty of problems. I mean, if we had a gripe

session, I could have led the charge for sure on that one.

I mean, let me tell y'all, you know, like, but I don't want to

be an expert in griping. I don't want to be an expert in

complaining or whining. I want to wind up the chain of

command to the Lord, cast my cares on him and then actually

trust him and depend upon him. And yes, I can come to you for

prayer and support, but not to just not to just forget that

there is a God. I think it was is it Martin

Luther's wife who he came home. So this is in 1500s.

So he came home one day, very, very busy man trying not to be

murdered and by the Catholic Church, you know, trying to, you

know, spread the gospel, very, very active role in the body of

Christ. And obviously we're thankful for

him still to this day and the way that he has shaped theology

back to the Scriptures. But he was also given over to

melancholy and discouragement, which is kind of a, you didn't

have to say that it's a pastor thing, but it can be a pastor

thing at times. So he came home one day and his

wife greeted him at the door and she was wearing funeral of a

funeral gown, like whatever that would look like, you know, But

it was very, you know, it was very officially back then, like

you knew what you were dressed for.

And he opened the door and he goes, who died?

And she goes, I thought God died based off the way you've been

behaving lately and and and he and he, he laughs.

And that was one season where, you know, she broke him out of

his funk because she was like, well, I was convinced that God

had died because of the way that you've been carrying yourself,

pastor. So my point was gratitude

blesses us. Gratitude strengthens us.

It shifts our perspective and go God, you're so good, you're so

faithful. Are there's things that we still

want to stand on his promises for the things we haven't seen

yet, of course. And also let's make sure we're

starting with praise with Thanksgiving, with gratitude.

So what a good way that our hearts are now prepared.

We're in Matthew 15. So we took a break for Christmas

the week before that. Remember, Jesus was entire and

Sidon, he had met the Canaanite woman, he or my daughter.

Jesus says, Nah, I'm not going to do that.

Why did he do it? He was testing her.

He wanted to heal her daughter. He wanted to bless this woman,

but he also drew her nearer to him and she was rewarded because

of it. But now we're in 15 chapter,

chapter 15, verse 29. Jesus went on from there and

walked beside the Sea of Galilee, and he went up on the

mountain and sat down there. And great crowds came to him,

bringing with them the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute,

and many others. And they put them at his feet.

And he healed them so that the crowd wondered when they saw the

mute speaking, the crippled healthy, the lame walking, and

the blind seeing. And they glorified the God of

Israel. Yeah, we bring you glory even as

we've shared testimonies of praise.

And there are many other things we could have said.

It helps us, God, to be drawn into worship.

I pray that we would not just say, wow, look at what the Lord

has done, but I pray we would also say, and therefore we

worship you. We continue to honor you.

We continue to glorify you. Draw us nearer to you this

morning because of all that you've done and because of who

you are. And also God, I pray that you

would pour out your healing power upon this church, that we

would experience New Testament Christianity among us, that we

would experience New Testament Christianity through us, so that

it would be a, a powerful and profound example in our

services. But even beyond that, God that

we would carry out the power in the presence as missionaries and

as ministers to the to the world around us, to the loved ones, to

the friends, to the enemies, to every place you would send us

for influence, glorify your name and help us to bring people to

your feet in Jesus name, Amen. So Jesus left tyrant side and

remembered north of Israel. And now he's come many miles

back down South, many, many, many miles, you know, 40 plus

miles. He's come back down to the Sea

of Galilee. He is in in among the Jews.

Now he comes and he sits down. If you'll remember back in

chapter 5, the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus sits down.

That was a common thing. He sits down to teach.

So oftentimes the rabbi would sit and teach and everybody else

would stand. I told you we ought to do that

around here. I should get to sit down and all

y'all stand up while I preach. I don't, I don't know if I could

get that to fly, but that's what they did.

So Jesus sits down on the mountainside, as was his way

probably to teach. And now here come thousands.

Remember, we are definitely, definitely in the last third of

his ministry. I would say very probably in the

last quarter of his ministry. He knows that time is drawing

short, like I said before. Well, we're only halfway through

the book of Matthew, roughly, yeah.

But when we get to 21, we're like in the last seven days.

So we cover a lot there at the end, and we're getting closer

and closer to that. So his fame is everywhere.

Everybody's heard of somebody who's been healed by Jesus.

The testimonies are crazy. You've seen that crippled person

your whole life, and now they're not crippled.

You saw that person who you knew was dying like this has spread

all over the place. But people still have to live

lives. They still have to work.

They still have to feed their families.

So not everybody has walked away from everything to follow him.

And yet still when they can, when they can make exceptions,

they go. The Lord is doing something.

Many have begun to believe and say this is the Messiah.

Of course, the Pharisees have fought against that truth, which

is why Jesus put them on blast over and over in front of

everybody. But now he sits down, probably

to teach like he did for the Sermon on the Mount.

And now people are brought to him.

Great crowds came to him. How many people you know, I'm so

thankful for. And we're going to get into

another testimony next week where Jesus feeds the 4000.

He already fed the 5000 plus. Could have been 20,000, could

have been 25,000 because it said it was just 5000 men.

So it wouldn't have included the women and children that would

have very definitely been with them.

I'm so thankful though, for those two passages to say it was

this many thousand. It was that many thousand.

Because if we didn't have those, we would kind of be like, oh, a

great crowd came and we're like, is that 300 people?

Is that 400 people? Maybe it's 1000 people.

Like it's a ton. It's thousands and thousands and

thousands. So much.

So the disciples can't count them.

They don't know, but they're just saying it's, it's a great

crowd. And they brought to him they've

or they brought with them the lame, the blind, the crippled,

the mute, and many others. And they put them at his feet.

So I'm going to be brief with our message this morning and

then we are going to take time to pray together for healing.

Verse 30, it references the lame mini lame.

What is lame refer to? Lame refers to any issue with

walking. It could be a limp, it could be

a maimed foot, it could be an injured knee.

It it includes anything and everything pertaining to

walking. And then he says the blind.

Matthew says the blind were healed.

This would include anything pertaining to the eyes.

The Holy Spirit doesn't have the Gospel writers go into extreme

detail because Jesus is healing thousands of people all the

time. So what he's doing is

emphasizing the ones that seem the most spectacular to people

because obviously everything under that would be included.

The Lord did this thing that seemed impossible to us.

Well, did he do that? Wait.

Yeah, He did that. Of course he did that.

Well, I don't have that great of a need.

Well, then yours is easily covered.

By the way, the great need is also easily covered.

The lesser need is also easily covered.

The crippled. This refers to anyone who is

crooked or bent, and it could also be used in place of lame.

So people with back injuries, people with deformities, you

name it. Someone who is mute.

This includes any and all speech issues as well as hearing

issues. So I would think mute.

That just means they don't speak, but that was also used to

refer to issues of hearing. So they can't hear well, they

can't see well. Like what's going on?

Do they have to be completely blind?

Jesus heals them all over and over and over and over and over.

You should expect and know what He wants to do because He's done

it. He wants to do the same thing

for you. Any list of healings in the

Scriptures is not to be read and search for what's not there.

That is not the way you go to a list of healings and you go,

they did this, they did this, Oh, the thing I needed wasn't

listed. That would be reading it wrong.

What's what we're supposed to do when we come across a list of

healings? We're to rejoice over them

because the Holy Spirit wanted to show, like I said, the most

extreme cases are covered. So obviously everything else is

included, thousands and thousands and thousands of

people coming to Jesus and they're being brought to his

feet and they're being healed. How does he heal each of them?

We don't know. We don't know what his most

common practice was. Throughout the New Testament,

throughout our gospels, we see all kinds of unique exceptions.

He spits in the dirt, makes mud, and rubs it in a man's eyes.

Is that the way you heal the blind?

Is that the formula you and I can follow to heal every person

with vision issues? I would recommend not.

I would recommend being led by the Holy Spirit, no matter how

ridiculous it seems. Obey the Holy Spirit, it'll be

the right thing. Or it could be, I don't know.

How did he heal? Person after person after person

after person? It's not that important.

What's important is that the will of God is being revealed

again and again and again. God healed.

God heals. This reveals His will.

I've preached many sermons to you on healing.

I'm going to continue to do so with joy and without apology,

but I'm going to continue moving fast.

This morning, verse 30, great crowds came to him, bringing

with them the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute, and many

others. That's where all the other

things were included. Well, I don't have that, but I

have that. Well, you're the many others.

The answer is yes. The Lord gives his yes to you.

He gives His Amen to his people, says they put them at His feet.

And we'll just make the obvious connection here.

Where else can the incurable go? Where else can the incurable

spirit of a sinful man go? Where can you go with your guilt

and your shame? Except for the feet of Jesus?

Where can the incurable broken mind of man go except for the

feet of Jesus? And where can the incurable,

sick, injured, malfunctioning body go?

Except for the feet of Jesus, The feet of Jesus that were

pierced for our transgressions. Yes, the Lord wants to provide

spiritual healing. Yes, the Lord makes us new

creations. That is the greatest miracle.

Sherry said that well earlier. The greatest miracle that you

and I will ever see and experience is the miracle of the

new birth. You are dead and now you're

alive. That's it.

But we would be stupid and unbiblical to say that's the

only thing that matters, because clearly it doesn't.

It's not the only thing that matters.

What you find strangely absent from many of the healing

passages in the Gospels. What's the spiritual state of

these people, Jesus? Are we doing a full inspection

on everyone who comes to make sure that they have a saving

faith in the living God, or are we just healing them?

I would. It seems to me that the text is

just saying you're being healed, you're being healed, you're

being healed, you're being healed.

What do you qualify? Qualify.

Nobody qualifies for anything but Jesus in his grace and His

kindness. He heals and He heals and He

heals. It's not to say that we want sin

in our life. It's not to say that we want to

be separated from God. And yet we're just taking the

text for what it's giving us. The Lord heals people.

How many people we don't know, but we know God has given his

yes to people who believe that He rewards those who diligently

seek Him. And we know that these people

have diligently sought him. The passages that are coming

next week we're going to see as he's feeding the 4000, he tells

his disciples, He says these people have been with me for

three days and they haven't had anything to eat.

So there's diligence among this crowd.

At least 4000 people have been following Jesus for three days

on the mountainside and he's going.

We've been here, we've been camping at night, I've been

preaching during the day, I've been healing people during the

day, I've been ministering to people during the day.

And he's looking out over his flock.

He's gone. My, my flock's hungry.

These people haven't eaten in three days.

We can't send them home. They could, they could faint

along the way. So he's being gracious, He's

being kind, but they have diligently sought him.

We can't miss that part. It doesn't.

It doesn't say Jesus goes door to door, does it?

Anybody sick in this house, All right.

Anybody sick in this house, all right?

What we see is people come to Jesus.

So if we were going to say there's a prerequisite, hunger

and thirst, again is the prerequisite, what are you going

to do to get to the feet of Jesus?

Well, you know, there's all these exceptions.

Well, the exceptions can't stop you from getting to the feet of

Jesus. That's the thing that you've got

to find a way. The woman with the issue of

blood, she had no right to be in the crowd.

It was not right. She was ceremonial, ceremonially

unclean because of her bleeding issue.

She should not have done what she did and the Lord did not

rebuke her for it because she was saying I've got to get to

him a diligence to seek the Lord.

Verse 31. So the crowd wondered that word

wonder doesn't mean I wonder what's going on here.

It means they were filled with awe and wonder.

They were overwhelmed at the goodness of God.

The wonder means that they were utterly amazed and that they

marvelled. They said wow.

But that's an understatement because they didn't just stop

there. They glorified God, they praised

God and they worshiped God. They they wondered when they saw

the mute speaking, the crippled healthy, the lame walking and

the blind seeing and they glorified the God of Israel.

This is this is the important destination that everybody

should arrive at instead of wow, God, that's a good start.

Keep going, keep going. Don't just be impressed.

Don't just be thankful. Be drawn all the way in to

worship. Don't just say, wow, that sunset

was beautiful, wow, God, you're so good, I worship you again.

Wow, my wife is beautiful. God, you're so good.

I worship God again. Wow.

Look at all the good gifts that he has given.

Look at all the provision and blessing he's poured into your

lives. We don't just say wow.

We always make sure that the horizontal things that we see,

they are intended to draw as vertically, the horizontal

things are not to be worshipped. That is what that is where we

build idolatry in our hearts. Natalie and I jokingly say when

we've ordered something new on Amazon, we say it ironically and

jokingly, we say that gets here on Tuesday and then I will be

happy. We, we say this, this show as a

this will, this will be the thing like this $7.00 kitchen

item that we found like that's good.

And then my soul will be satisfied.

No, it won't. No, it won't.

I told you my story about when I got the hot tub, right?

I got in the hot tub the very first night.

I was all alone out there. And it's like finally after

after having a goal for years, I have a hot tub.

I set my hot tub the very first night.

All right, it's hot. It's a tub.

It didn't do what I thought it was going to do.

And in that moment, I went from going horizontal and I went

vertical and I said, God, thank you for this blessing.

This is a wonderful gift. And by the way, I've enjoyed it

a ton since we put it in there. But if I was looking to it to be

the fulfillment like I think I was for a moment and I was like,

come on, hot tub make me happy. Hot tubs, like I can't do that.

I'm just a hot tub. I can't fulfill everything you

need in your soul. Only Jesus can do that.

And that was a moment for me. I was just like, Lord, look at

me being an idiot. And I dollar her again.

Lord, I dedicate this hot tub to you.

May it, may it bring you glory. May it bring me rest, may it

bring my family fellowship, you know, just glorify.

It's, it's just yours again. And now I can enjoy my hot tub

appropriately and I go, I love my hot tub.

I love it. I enjoy it.

I love my motorcycle. I'm gonna ride my motorcycle

today, but it's just a motorcycle.

You could take it away and I'll be all right because it's not

the deep joy of my soul. But I am thankful to receive the

blessings that the Lord has provided.

All that was free. Wasn't planning any of that.

Keep going here. They glorify God.

That was the point, the horizontal thing that you saw

the goodness of God, the healing of God.

But think about that. Thousands of people, we know at

least 4000 people on this mountainside.

And you're seeing the sick, the crippled.

People are sitting around, people are resting, people are

camping. Jesus is up there.

Have you gone up to see him yet? No, I haven't gone up to see him

yet. You saw that crippled guy hobble

up there earlier and you're like, is he going to?

And you watch up on the hill, 100 yards up and you watch him

straighten up and you watch him rejoice and you hear people

break out into song like this happened.

It was awesome. And people are going praise God.

So people are praying and people are conversing and the disciples

are probably among the crowd saying he is the Messiah, he is

the one. You know, they're connecting all

the dots. We're we're reading past a lot

that was taking place there. But all, all the humanness, all

the joy that happened, thankfully they didn't stop

there. They allowed it to draw them

vertically and they praised God, they worshiped God.

It's not enough to marvel. It's not enough to stop and say,

wow, you should worship and you should love.

And the other point I'll remind you of in this passage, like

other passages on healing, and I'm closing because like I said,

I want us to pray together. This passage is not to be over

spiritualized. There are plenty of passages in

your Bible that are spiritual in their nature and what they're

getting at. This is not one of them.

These verses are about physical healing.

They are the physical healing of real people who have real

physical bodies. Like we said, is our spiritual

need greater than our physical need?

Yes, a million times yes. And still the Lord cares deeply

about physical healing. He cares present tense.

He cares deeply about physical healing.

He loves you like he loved those people.

He loves your loved one like he loved and cared for those people

on that mountainside that day. So this is what you and I are

going to do. We're going to bring ourselves

and we're going to bring one another, and we're going to

bring our loved ones to the feet of Jesus.

How do we do that? We do that through prayer and we

do that through actually sharing the gospel with them because the

gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

It's also been said that healing is the dinner bell for

salvation. So you ring the dinner bell to

bring people in. So healing gets people's

attention. Healing makes somebody go, wow,

that's, that's incredible that God would be so kind to me.

You don't know how long that's bothered me.

You don't know how long that's hurt me.

You don't know how long this has affected my life.

And they're shown the love and the kindness of God.

There are many, many ways that God shows His love and His

kindness, but healing is one of them.

And it is my prayer that we would see like I I am honest

enough to acknowledge the massive gap between my life and

what I read in the scriptures. And I say I'm the one found

wanting. I'm the one found lacking.

God's word is true. God's word is faithful.

But I don't get into condemnation.

I just say Lord, lead me, help me.

I want more. I want to see your people

blessed. I don't want to see people sick

and ailing. Like Adam said, it's so easy for

me to become passive. Oh, I got a little pain.

What kind of things do I tolerate?

What kind of things I'm like, oh, I've prayed about it, you

know, prayed about my elbows, you know?

But, you know, it just kind of is what it is.

And it's a, it's easy to become comfortable with things because

life happens. These bodies are wearing out.

Everybody on that mountainside that day, by the way, they're

dead. Like they died of something

eventually, you know, so, so they didn't just keep on living

forever and ever and ever. And yet the Lord healed

everybody who came to him. So I want to continually bring

this before you said you would have a hunger and not just have

the question of, well, how come and why not?

Let's hunger. Let's not just sit back as

skeptics and cynics and go, well, I would like that.

I guess it would be nice. But let's press in farther and

say, Lord, just show me. Just show me what it is I need

to do. Show me how it is I can believe,

but that's what we need to do. We need to believe.

And that's the problem with a lot of healing passages.

I'll listen to a few sermons on the passages that I'm preaching

ahead of time each week from different sermons, different

pastors and a lot of times there's there's pastors that I

love and trust faith woman of God.

And yet when you come to healing passages, they go and here what

we can learn from this. I go here we go.

He's like God wants to heal us spiritually.

My right, yes, but also get back to the book path.

Get back to the book. Pastor, you said a true thing,

but that's not what you got from that text.

So why'd you do that? Well, I'm not going to condemn

him, but it's unbelief. It's unbelief.

I've been there. You've been there.

We've all been there. Again, without condemnation.

We can call a spade a spade, but let's be hungry and thirsty and

let's actually expect, let's put the pressure on God.

You're not the miracle worker. You're not the master healer.

There's no pressure on you to perform or to do anything.

Put all the pressure on God. That's what faith does.

Faith puts him in the hot seat and says, Lord, I'm going to

walk in obedience. And if anybody looks bad, it's

not going to be me. It's going to be you.

And I know you're not going to look bad.

You're going to glorify your name.

You're going to love the people that I pray for.

You're going to show up in power.

But you've got to get used to hearing the voice of the Holy

Spirit. He will whisper quiet confidence

to you. The enemy, though, I mean, he'll

do jumping jacks in front of you to prevent your obedience.

Don't do it, Don't do it, Don't do it, Don't do it.

All kinds of reasons, all kinds of accusations.

That's what he does. That's his specialty, is to

accuse you, to harass you, to intimidate you, to get you to

give up your hope, because hope deferred does make the heart

sick. We know this.

It's true. Many of us have experienced

that, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life, and the Lord

wants to fulfill desires. So what I want to do is I want

to give you an opportunity to bring yourselves and one another

to the feet of Jesus. So I'm going to take the last 12

or so minutes that we have together this morning to put us

into groups. You can gather however you want

to. You can turn around, you can

shift around. We're going to do groups of 4-5

if you have to, and we're just going to pray for one another.

Whatever you have need of say, hey, I've got a need in my body.

Maybe it's something really, really detailed.

You don't want to get into detail and you just say, hey, it

pertains to this. The Saints are going to pray for

you. You might be in a group that

says none of us have anything, all right, but we have a loved

one. We got somebody that we love.

Hey, my friend, my brother, my so and so, somebody else in the

church. We're going to pray for Miss

Sandy. Whoever else could think of

somebody. You all know somebody.

If you don't have something in your body, you know somebody's

got something in their body, so bring them to the feet of Jesus.

Let's do that through prayer. Heavenly Father, right now we

come to you by faith with an expectation.

We're not praying just because we are supposed to pray.

We are praying because we love you and we want to bring

ourselves and others to your feet.

The feet that were pierced, the feet that carried us, the feet

that carried the cross, the feet that carried salvation that

would include the healing for our bodies.

Build faith in your church and answer these prayers that are

getting ready to to come into the your very presence in Jesus

name. Amen.

So go ahead and break up. Take 30 seconds and find a

couple of chairs to move to. Like I said, groups of four at

the most, 5 if you have to. And y'all are going to take 10

minutes to pray together. I'm not going to give you a

formula. Hey, Brock, I want to put you

over here with Mr. Adam. None.

So. Yeah.

None. OK.

None. Well.

All right. And the fact that.

And that.

Yes. I everything goes here.

I just thank you that you are and how you are and how how many

people you are. And how?

How? Many people you are this is what

they see you and how how many people are and my daughter that

also. None.

I. So.

None. None.

The. You're a filler of.

You're a filler of. The thank

you. She cut up about two or three

minutes, everybody about two or three minutes.

None. I.

Do you want us to feel the empty what we might not see that in

the natural blood? Delicious worship, the Sarma,

and great villain with all of worship.

Yeah. None.

No. Yeah.

None. None.

None. Yeah.

Me too. Are you going to?