Unbelief, Rejection, and Faith

We're going to Matthew 13 with the end of the chapter now,

verse 53. I always do this to you.

I say verse 53 and then I start talking about what happened

before it and I'm about to do it again.

You ought to know. You ought to expect it at this

point. Jesus remember, all in the same

day. Everything else has happened.

Now we know that the time the timeline has changed.

But before he had said he had been he went nuclear on the

Pharisees and then he goes into those parables, the seven

different parables all on the same day.

But now we transition and when Jesus had finished in verse 53

with these parables, he went away from there.

So it's not a 15 minute drive that could be, you know, miles

of walking and coming to his hometown.

So now we know he's and Nazareth coming to his hometown.

He taught them in their synagogue, so that they were

astonished and said, where did this man get this wisdom and

these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son?

Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James

and Joseph and Simon and Judas? Are not all his sisters here

with us? Where then did this man get all

these things? And they took offense at him,

but Jesus said to them, a prophet is not without honor

except in his hometown and in his own household.

And he did not do many mighty works there because of their

unbelief. God, we pray that you would fill

us with wisdom as we would have great humility today to trust

you, to receive from you. It is the wise thing to be

obedient. It is the wise thing to be eager

to receive everything that you have.

That's the posture of our hearts now, Lord, so bring us light and

revelation in Jesus name, Amen. So Jesus goes to his hometown

and when he gets into his hometown, he runs into folks who

have this perspective that says we know him, we know him

already, we already know what he's going to say, we know what

he's going to do, and we understand his background.

They thought they understood his background.

The Scripture tells us in verse 54, they were astonished.

So we're going to understand their errors where there's three

points we're going to look at today.

We're going to look at how easy it is for people to reject

Christ and how we have to be careful not to do the same

thing. We're going to look at how easy

it can be for people to reject us because we can be in the same

situation bearing, bringing the gospel.

Folks can reject us and say, I know you, I know your

background, I know your past. What do you think you're doing

this Christian thing now? And then the third thing we're

going to look at is the importance of faith compared to

unbelief, where the passage tells us that Jesus could do no

mighty works there or he did no mighty works there because of

their unbelief. So that's the way we're going to

break down this text. Jesus goes and teaches in their

synagogue. Remember, the temple has priests

working in it in Jerusalem. But other communities, I think

it's, if you have 10, is it 10 Jewish men in a community, then

you can have a, a synagogue. I don't know.

I thought some of my historians wouldn't know for me, but I

think Adam, Mr. Bible College here at Adams like to go to.

So I think you've got 10 Jewish men in the community then now

you can have a synagogue in that community.

So this is essentially their church.

And you don't really have a ruler though, or you don't have

a, a priest or a teacher or a rabbi.

You have a ruler of the synagogue.

So he's a godly man that we've, we've probably nominated into

that role, but he's not necessarily preaching, he's just

kind of officiating things. And he is scheduling for the,

for the traveling rabbis to come around and minister to us in our

town. So that was a common practice in

Israel. So we've all got synagogues in

our different communities, but there's like like in the United

States, they used to call them circuit riders, so preachers on

horseback. And they were just traveling

just throughout the nation and they're just all on rotation,

just finding local churches throughout the country.

And they're saying, hey, we're going to preach.

I'm going to stay with y'all for two weeks and I'm going to

encourage you in the Scriptures and then I'm going to ride on

and maybe another one comes on another couple months.

So this is, this is what it looked like, something similar

to that. So Jesus is a rabbi and he's

going and he goes to teach in the synagogue in Nazareth.

The thing with Jesus, though, when Jesus teaches, when Jesus

preaches, he's not preaching like everybody else.

He preaches like someone who has authority.

He's not just saying, hey, here's one way to look at it.

He's saying this is the way that it is.

So Jesus's boldness, Jesus's power, Jesus's ministry is

marked by mighty works. It's marked by mighty wisdom.

You can see that Nazareth even recognizes that.

They don't say he has no wisdom. They don't say he doesn't have

any power. That's not their argument that

they're making against him. They said where did he get that

from? Where did he get that wisdom?

We've been here the whole time. We know.

We remember his life, Remember Jesus born where Bethlehem.

And then he's warned or Joseph is warned in a dream to take

Jesus away, to take him and Mary to Egypt.

And he was there probably till about 10 years old.

So now he spent the next 20 years from about age 10 to about

age 30 when he begins his public ministry in Nazareth.

So you've seen a 10 year old kid for all these years.

You know him for 20 years. And now for the past year, past

two years, or we're not quite sure the timeline at this point

in Matthew how far Jesus is into his ministry.

But it's no more than three years.

Can't be any more than 3 for sure.

And they're going, oh, well, that's the carpenter's son.

We know you. They thought they knew him.

Where did this man get this wisdom?

The scripture says they were astonished.

I often think of the word like that was it was astonishing.

I would always think of that in a positive sense.

But the word is not necessarily used in a positive sense.

It's a neutral word. You can be astonished at

anything. You can be astonished at how

wonderful something is. You could be astonished at how

bad something is. But their astonishment, their

amazement, it's not that they were impressed.

It's not that they were blessed. It's that they were offended.

The passage even shows us with clarity the roots of their

offense. It's that they thought they knew

him and they took the approach that said we know who he is, But

who does he think he is? I know who you are.

I know your Mama and your brothers and your daddy.

I've seen you grow up. I know who you are.

Who do you think you are now is the approach that they're

taking. Where did this man get this

wisdom and these mighty works? And then they list all the

reasons that they think they have to discredit him.

Isn't this the carpenter's son? So Nazareth is not a big place.

It's very possible that Joseph would have been the only

Carpenter in town. It's not a strict rule, but it's

very possible and probably likely that Joseph was the

Carpenter, which meant Jesus would have trained under Joseph.

Why? Because that's how human history

works. Like the father just trains with

the Son. That's what he would have done.

And just just a fun fact, carpentry, you and I think of it

as woodworking, carpentry in this context would have just

been the builder and it would have actually been a lot of

stone work. So primarily it would have

mostly stoned. It could have involved wood as

well, but a lot of stone work. So Jesus was of course, super

bulky and and big because he's doing all kinds of stone work.

So Jesus is the carpenter's son, which also meant that he was the

Carpenter. But now they're building their

case. Isn't his mom named Mary?

Aren't his brothers James, Joseph and Simon and Judas

aren't all his sisters with us? So we also know here that Jesus

it has, is at least one of seven children.

He's the oldest of one of at least seven kids because we we

counted the brothers. We count Jesus, there's at least

two sisters, potentially more. This is all of his sisters.

Just to also clarify, Jesus was the only one born of a virgin.

Mary was not a virgin after Jesus was born.

The scripture also makes that plain.

So there are different bodies, they're different denominations

that would say, hey, Mary was always a virgin.

It's not true in the scripture makes it plain.

So Joseph and Mary did get into the marriage bed together after

Jesus was born. But they say all these things,

they list all this stuff as though this is valuable evidence

against Christ. Like this is damning evidence.

His mom's name is Mary. OK, what's your point?

I know his brothers. What's your point?

His his dad was Joseph. He was the Carpenter.

Like, his shop was right there. Jesus made me a table.

He set the foundation on my house.

And your point is, congratulations.

You know people who know him, but do you really know Him?

That's a question that we should all constantly ask ourselves and

ask those who might think that they're safe.

Why? Because we want to make people

insecure? No, because we want to make

people secure. I want people to be secure.

I want my sons to be secure. I want you to be secure.

I want you to know that you know Christ.

Not that you know that your mom knows Christ, or that your dad

knows Christ, or that your pastor knows Christ, or that

your spouse knows Christ. I want you to know that you know

Christ because one day you'll stand before him all alone and

you won't be able to say, hey, I'm going to, I'm with, I'm with

this party, I'm with this family, I'm with this church.

We won't stand together as salt. We'll stand as individuals

before the king and before the judge.

Do you know the Lord or do you just know a lot about him?

Do you know a lot of data? Do you know his mother's name?

Do you know his brothers names? Do you know about his sisters?

Do you know about his crucifixion?

Do you know about his resurrection?

Do you know about his ascension? Do you know about his sending of

the Holy Spirit? Do you know about the growth of

the Church and the earth? Do you know about the coming

Kingdom? Good.

Those are all good things. But those things, it's not

enough to just know, to just have knowledge.

Many folks have knowledge. Bradley and I had a conversation

this week. He was talking about somebody he

met. He said, man, it sounded really

fruitful. This guy seemed to have a lot of

knowledge. And then at the end of the

conversation, that guy takes a weird hard left turn and reveals

that he does not know the Lord. So a strange thing can happen,

right? People can be so familiar.

People can grow up. Y'all, there's pastors, and

they're the worst people who used to be pastors online.

They're the absolute worst where that when they turn from the

Lord and then they make it their mission.

They make it their mission to also now shepherd others, but

they're not shepherds. They're called wolves at that

point. And they want to draw people

under this themselves. And they think because they have

some knowledge that it also gives them some authority and

some power. And they go, oh, I've seen this

in the church and I've seen that in the church.

They're just critics. Anyone can be a critic.

It's easy to be a critic, but these these people, they have

the King of glory standing in front of them and they're making

inappropriate judgments about Jesus.

And they think that they have some powerful knowledge and they

think that this knowledge gives them authority, gives them the

power to judge Christ. It's really, really, really

foolish. We know who he is.

Who does he think he is? You might know about Him, you

might know people who know him, but do you really know Him?

They're saying we think we know your past and we're going to

keep you stuck in it. The truth is, they actually

don't even know His past. They don't know about His

miraculous birth. They don't know about His

creation of the world before that, and they don't know about

His eternity before that. And they're certainly not going

to keep Jesus stuck in the framework that they have built

for Him. Unfortunately, they're going to

be the ones who suffer for it. He's grieved because He loves

them, because He did grow up around these folks, and he knows

this sweet old lady and that sweet old man, and he cares

about these people. God loves all of these people,

but they won't receive him because of their unbelief.

It matters who Jesus is to you. It matters who Jesus is to you.

Wait a second. Isn't Jesus isn't relative?

Jesus is who Jesus is. That's true.

And yet it also matters who you say Jesus is.

This is why in Matthew 16, we're eventually going to see Jesus

said to his disciples. But who do you say that I am?

The carpenter's son, Mary's boy, brother of so and so, friend of

so and so. Who do you say that I am?

He first asked his disciples who?

Who do the people say that I am? And they answered him.

Some say John the Baptist, others say you're Elijah, others

say you're one of the prophets. And Jesus goes, Yep, I've heard

all that. And then he turns to the guys

and goes, but but who did you say that I am?

That is the question. Well, there's all kinds of

theories on it. Y'all there?

There's plenty of things in scripture that we can hold with

an open hand. There's things that I hold with

an open hand. There's some things I will # the

pulpit on and I'll be pounding the pulpit this morning and this

is one of them. And there's other things that I

go, I got an open hand on that. This is not one of those open

handed issues. This one has to be settled.

Who do you say that Jesus is? Who you say Jesus is determines

who Jesus will be to you. If you say he's a builder, you

might get the foundation of your house laid.

If you say he's a good moral teacher, you might get some good

principles that'll bless your life.

But if you say like Peter did that day, you are the Christ,

you are the Son of the living God.

Which, by the way, was the first time any of the disciples had

said it with that kind of clarity, that kind of certainty,

that kind of boldness. That was a special moment.

It was a special moment for Peter, for Christ, and for the

disciples because it was like, we're all thinking it, we're all

seeing it, we're all believing it, but no one has said it yet.

But with the heart you believe and with the mouth confession is

made unto salvation. So in this moment Jesus goes,

Who do they say I am? Like, well, some people say

this, some people say that, some people say that.

He goes, I know that voice. But who do you say that I am?

Peter? You love Peter, right?

Or bellows Peter. He either gets it really right

or he gets it really wrong. It's just like there's not a lot

of Gray hair. You're just, oh, you missed it

big time, buddy, or you nailed it right on the head.

Well done. He nails it.

You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.

I bet some of the other times we're saying it now we're we're

we're in this thing. This is it.

Bunch of good Jewish boys waiting their whole lives along

with thousands of years with other Jews for the Messiah to

come. And we're saying, this is it.

I'm walking with him. He's the one I sit around the

fire pit with at night. He's the one who I travel with

during the day. He's the one who I'm going to

follow. And and they still had their

misunderstandings and we're going to take over the Romans.

I think at some point. They still don't fully get it,

even though he tells them over and over and over and over, I'm

going to die on the cross on the third day, I'm going to be

raised. They're like, yeah, yeah, we're

going to beat the Romans, right? He's like, you're not hearing

me, boys. We are going to beat the Romans.

We're going to beat the whole world, just not the way you

think we're going to do it. It matters who you say Jesus is,

because who you say he is determines who he will be to

you. And then you'll get the fullness

of who he is, and He'll do the mighty works in your life

because of your faith. And then he says in verse 57, a

prophet is honored everywhere except in his hometown and in

his own household. How do you receive Jesus?

That's our first point. And now to go into our second

point, you also need to know that a similar thing can happen

with you. What happened with Jesus in his

hometown and those who knew him. This is especially true for

those of you who haven't walked with the Lord since childhood.

So when you come to the Lord sometime after childhood, even

sometimes as a teenager, but certainly it would always be

true for adults. When you come to Christ anytime

like that as an adult, there will usually be people who were

close to you at one time but are now offended at your new life.

It's a strange thing because they see fruit, they see power,

and they even see love. Remember Nazareth?

They didn't deny any of that. Where does he get this wisdom?

They didn't say he's stupid and doesn't have wisdom.

They said where does he get this power?

They didn't say he doesn't have any power.

They looked it right in the face like this is astonishing.

I'm offended. Why a hard heart does that?

You and I always want to believe naively that with more

information, people will be saved.

If I could just explain it better than they would believe

it better. And I love your tender heart.

I love that you're that way, and the Lord loves that I'm that

way. But it's not true.

It's actually naive. It's not wisdom, and it's not

what the Scripture teaches. Hard hearts are a real thing.

But that's hard to see when it's my sister, when it's my brother,

when it's my sweet aunt that I love.

And I just want to be convinced that no, no, no, she doesn't

have a hard heart. She just needs the right

information to hit the right way.

No, she needs the Spirit of God to break in.

So you need to pray, Joe Michael, because she does have a

hard heart. That is the blockage.

There is an enemy, there is a Satan who is blinding the people

of this world so that they cannot see the light.

And there is spiritual warfare happening.

Yes, and we have to pray that blinders would come off and then

we have to give people the only hope that they have of breaking

up that hard ground. And that is the gospel again and

again and again. It is the foolishness of

preaching the gospel to that family member who you've shared

the gospel with 100 times. It is the foolishness of

preaching the gospel to that Co worker for the millionth time.

Why? Because you know that the gospel

is the power of God unto salvation for those who believe.

The gospel is the power. The gospel is the power, not

your presentation, not doing it the right way.

It is the bloody messy cross, the foolishness of preaching the

cross and the resurrection and telling people the good news of

the Kingdom. That is what God uses because it

keeps the prideful proud, but the humble get to receive and

that is exactly what the Lord intended.

You cannot have the Lord if you will not humble.

Humble yourself before the Lord. So these people, they see fruit

in your life, they see grace in your life, they see power in

your life, they see love in your life and they're astonished, but

they're astonished at the stench of it and it breaks your heart.

2nd Corinthians 214 through 16 says But thank God, who is

always leading us around through Christ as if we were in a

parade. He releases the fragrance of the

knowledge of Him everywhere through us.

We smell like the aroma of Christ's offering to God, both

to those who are being saved and to those who are on the road to

destruction. We smell like a contagious dead

person to those who are dying, but we smell like the fountain

of life to those who are being saved.

Wait, wait, wait, what is our smell?

He tells us we smell like the aroma of Christ's offering to

God. That is the smell.

The smell doesn't change. It's, it's in the the problem is

in the nose of the sniffer. That's where the issue arises.

The scent, the scent is the scent.

One person smells and says praise God and another person

smells the same smell and says stinks like death and I hate it.

That was Second Corinthians chapter 2, verses 14 through 16.

2 Corinthians 2:14–16

But thank God, who is always leading us around.

What is he talking about? He's talking about the ministry

of reconciliation. We're going around as disciple

makers in the end of the earth into the world.

He's saying God leaves us, leads us around as if we were in a

parade. He releases the fragrance of the

knowledge of Him everywhere through us.

We smell like the aroma of Christ's offering to God.

So Christ's offering to God is a sweet fragrance.

It pleases the Lord. He says that's how the church

smells. As we're on the mission, we

smell this way to both to those who are being saved and those on

the road to destruction. But to those on the road to

destruction, we smell like a person who is dying, like dead

flesh. But to those who are being

saved, we smell like the fountain of life.

Jesus knows how you feel whenever you're rejected by

loved ones, by people who are familiar and they want to keep

you in that place. A lot of times the Lord knows

how you feel. He experienced it, but if you

seek Him, He will comfort you and He will strengthen you and

He will remind you of what He did when pressure comes from

friends and family. We looked at this just maybe a

month or so ago. Jesus is putting the Pharisees

on blast, and Mary and his brothers come and they say, hey,

hey, hey, could you get His attention for us?

It said they came to seize Him and take him away.

They said that He had lost his mind.

They don't believe until after the resurrection.

This is Mary, who literally knows that she had a baby as a

virgin. Does she just need more

information? Angels appeared to this woman,

but she's human. She's human just like you and

just like me. This is why the Lord marvels at

faith and He marvels at unbelief because both are miraculous.

Both are incredible unbelief. Are you kidding me?

You don't believe great faith. Wow, you really believe it?

It's strange. You should expect that the Lord

would expect faith, right? That he would see faith and go,

Yep, it's reasonable. But the Lord marvels at great

faith. He goes, yes, surprised to see

that. Why?

Is it because he's unbelievable? It's not because he's

unbelievable. It's just because we are so

fickle. It's because we are so weak.

We are so small oftentimes in our faith.

But Jesus will remind you what he did when pressure came from

fins and family, he doubled down.

They said, Lord, Lord, your, your, your, your mom and your

brothers and your sisters house. They want to speak to you real

quick if you could just take a breather.

And he, he knows exactly what's happening in that moment.

He understood all the social dynamics.

He knew they were embarrassed. He knew they thought he was

crazy. He knew everybody couldn't

believe that he was the trouble he was getting himself into.

And he doubled down. He said, who are my mother and

my brothers and my sisters? And he points to his disciples.

He says, whoever does the will of my father, oh, he's really

gone off the deep end now. That's what they're going to say

about you. That's what they said about me.

They're going to say it again and it's going to hurt and it's

going to break your heart and the Lord is going to comfort you

as you draw near to him. You smell like Jesus is offering

to the Father. What an awesome thing.

What a beautiful blessing that is.

But to those who won't believe, that's the problem.

You smell like the sacrifice of Jesus to the Father.

That is the problem. They hate it.

I don't like that, and I wish it wasn't that way.

But for anyone who hates the way that the church smells, for

anyone who hates the aroma that the body of Christ gives off,

it's because they hate Christ's sacrifice to the Father.

They receive it as condemnation instead of receiving it as

grace. And the cross will be

condemnation. If you don't receive it as

grace, it has to be received as raise.

Otherwise it is your condemnation.

So that's why when you share the message of the cross, you're

going. I don't understand.

I told him good news. Why are they not happy?

Why are they not blessed? Why are they not relieved?

I was so relieved when I was told the gospel.

What a relief for my conscience. What a relief for my soul.

What a deliverance for my life. But others hear it and go.

He died for my sins. You trying to say I got sins?

Well, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was implied.

You're a bad guy. That's the implication here.

Well, I don't accept that. Oh, then you can't have him.

No, no, no. If you can't accept that you're

bad, then you you won't accept that he's good.

And that's what you see. So what do I do?

You pray. You pray.

You trust. Just like the testimony of

earlier. A year ago I couldn't have

imagined this happening. But look what the Lord has done.

So we pray. We don't write anybody off.

We don't say I think they've committed the unpardonable sin.

That's not your in my jurisdiction.

That's not our place. We continue to pray.

Do we commit all of our waking moments?

Do we sow all of our seed into a place that consistently shows us

it's bad ground? No, that would be foolish

because the harvest is ready, the Lord tells us, and yet there

is much to be done. People won't always, always

receive you like old classmates at a, at a class reunion.

They might be stuck on who you were and they don't want to

allow you to enjoy this new life.

That's bad news for them. But thankfully for you, God has

made you new and he has given you a new identity in Christ.

Amen. And now we're going to go to

verse 58 and we're going to focus the rest of our time here.

And he did not do many mighty works there because of their

unbelief. It's interesting Matthew makes

this reference and Mark makes the same exact reference to this

passage here in Nazareth. Mighty works are so common in

Jesus's ministry that you need to make a note of it when they

don't happen. Just reading comprehension stuff

here. No fancy preaching.

Mighty works are so common, so obvious, the normative

circumstance in Christ's ministry that when they don't

happen, you have to go, no, mighty works happened there.

That was, that was, that was weird, except he healed a few

sick people and I'm going that was, it's kind of a big deal.

They go, Oh no, no, no, we're talking mighty works.

No, no, no, we're talking like he, he did lesser stuff.

So isn't it interesting how the gospel writers inspired by the

Holy Spirit even make reference to there's great works and

there's lesser works. Some things are more

significant, some things are less significant, but mighty

works are so common that it's noteworthy when they're absent.

It is Jesus's standard operating procedure to do mighty works.

Mighty works are the rule. A lack of mighty works is the

exception. I'm going to go to Mark chapter

Mark 6 · chapter mention

6. Well, I'll just read it to you.

Mark chapter 6 verse 5 Marks account of this same event.

Mark 6:5

Mark put it this way and he could not do any mighty works

there except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and

healed them and he marvelled because of their unbelief.

So Matthew said he did not do any mighty works there because

of their own many mighty works there because their unbelief.

Mark says he could not do any mighty works there because of

their unbelief. What's the point?

The point is not that faith is the power supply that God needs.

That's not true. That would be false to say that

if I don't have any faith, then God's power is cut off like he

is. He is somehow become weak.

That would be heretical. That's false doctrine.

That's bad teaching. It's not true.

And yet God has chosen to interact with our faith and that

most definitely impacts the fruit of what we do or do not

see. So to say, he could do no mighty

works there because of their own belief.

Well, why could Jesus do no mighty works there because of

their own belief? Because the Lord has bound

himself to his word and Lord has chosen to function in a certain

and particular way with his people that he created.

So it's not that he was weak and powerless and going, oh, I'm

handcuffed here. But it's that the Lord has said,

I will move through my people's faith.

These passages, along with plenty of others that we've seen

in Matthew that we're going to continue to see in Matthew, they

reveal that our lack of faith, that our lack of faith or our

abundance of faith, it impacts what we do or do not receive

from God. However, you want to divide the

details after acknowledging that truth is your business.

But you cannot sidestep this important biblical truth that

without faith it is impossible to please God.

For whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists

and that He rewards those who seek Him.

We must ask in faith with no doubting.

For the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven

and tossed by the wind. That person must not suppose

that he will receive anything from the Lord.

He is a double minded man, unstable in all his ways.

I just read to you from Hebrews 11 and James 1.

The Scriptures are full of this important truth, from Genesis to

Revelation, and our text today is just yet another example of

this important reality. The Holy Spirit saw fit to make

it perfectly clear He did not do many mighty works there.

Why not? Because he was mad at them?

No, because of their unbelief. Why are you emphasizing this?

Because of the common belief that God is going to sovereignly

do what God is going to sovereignly do.

And there ain't nothing you can do about it, sweetheart.

It is what it is. It be what it be it do what it

do. Well, are you saying God's not

sovereign? Hang on, slow down.

God is most definitely sovereign.

This is true, this is certain. But God's will is not

automatically fulfilled. This is why we pray for God's

will to be done. This is why we should pray that

He would give us revelation of His Word, because His Word

brings us faith. Does God want everyone to be

saved? Yes.

Will everyone be saved? No.

Does God want everyone to be healed?

Yes. Will everyone be healed?

No. The truth is, this church, I'm

not willing to move the bullseye for you, and I'm not willing to

move the bullseye for me. I'm willing to paint the target.

I believe the target is already painted.

I don't think I'm painting it. The target is the saying, no

matter where our darts land, God wants to move in powerful and

miraculous ways, and sometimes He does that in spite of our

unbelief. Sovereignly.

How do you explain that God is good?

My theology is simple, if you haven't figured that out yet.

God is good, the devil is bad, the world is broken, people are

stupid. That's how we come to the

conclusions that we come to. Why do bad things happen?

Oh my goodness, if I if I went out of here and died in a car

wreck today, I guess the Lord need another Angel to help pour

out the rain. Please don't let anyone say that

at my funeral, my sons, please like throw something at that.

Whoever would like stop the whole thing and say no, dad

would not have this. Why do you think he died because

he was texting? Because he's being an idiot,

that's why. Why?

I don't know why the Lord didn't.

The Lord told him not to text and he disobeyed because he was

an idiot and he wasn't thinking ahead.

He wasn't thinking of the tragedy and of the impact it

would have, and he just thought it was just a quick message.

That's why. Well, couldn't the Lord?

Yes, the Lord could have a lot of things and yet he didn't.

And Joe Michael is stupid and I'm sorry.

We'll talk about it later. We got all eternity for y'all to

fuss at me and how I should have been texting that day.

We're all going to be OK on my motorcycle, texting my

motorcycle. How fast was he going?

It doesn't matter. I went out having a good time.

No, but it's it's so often because I think there's a number

of factors there. I think it's, I think partly

Christians have too great of AI think we catastrophize.

Is that a word? I think we catastrophize death

too much. We think it's the worst thing

that could ever happen to somebody.

So I think it's part of our foundation.

So when something terrible happens, we go, how could God

hang on a second? Let's have good theology here.

Let's come back to the Scriptures.

What do you think would happen if Jesus was here right now?

And I'm a person. I live in the real world.

Your pastor is standing before you with elbows that hurt every

time he does this, every time he shakes hand, every time he

reaches for this water bottle for the past six months.

Well, what is my faith is shaken?

Why would your faith be shaken by my elbows?

Your face should not be built on my elbows.

Your face should be built upon the word of God, my elbows be

damned. Let every elbow be found false

and God's word be found true. What do you think about?

I got a lot of questions about a lot of things, but I'm always

going to continue. Say the target's the target.

No matter where my dart lands, No matter where your dart lands,

I'm going to come back to Scripture.

I have a lot of circumstances I've seen that I don't like, but

they don't change what the Word of God says.

I got a lot of questions and I think there's a lot of mystery,

but I'm also going to be simple and honest enough to say he

didn't do many mighty works there because they're in belief.

Well, I do believe. Well, take it to the Lord.

Then your argument is not with me.

You, you believe I do believe. Take it to the Lord.

That's where it take that belief.

Don't take it up with me. I didn't write it.

I'm just reading it, but I'm going to continue to tell you

the truth. God has decided to mostly work

in fellowship with us and with our faith.

And you read your gospels, you look at it over and over and

over and over again, and you keep coming back to it.

And he's saying, what would Jesus do if he was here right

now? It's hard to know.

No, it's not. Jesus Christ is the same

yesterday and today and forever. What would Jesus do if he walked

in right now? What would Jesus want to do for

Angelina's knees? If we walked up to Jesus, to

Jesus one day in Nazareth and said, Lord, my elbows, what

would he say? We'll close with Mark Chapter 9.

Mark 9 · chapter mention

I want you to turn there. I want you to look at it.

Joe, Michael, this raises a ton of questions for me.

Good. I hope it drives you to the

Word. I hope it just drives you more

to the Scripture. Mark Chapter 9, verse 20.

Mark 9:20

No, let's go. Verse 19.

We're going to hear Jesus. And he answered them.

Oh, faithless generation, how long am I to be with you?

How long am I to bear with you? Bring Him to me.

This is a demon possessed boy and they brought the boy to him.

And when the spirit, the demon inside of the boy, when the

spirit saw him, immediately it convulsed the boy and he fell on

the ground and rolled about foaming at the mouth.

And Jesus asked the Father, how long has this been happening to

him? And he said from childhood.

And it is often cast him into the fire and into water to

destroy him. But if you can do anything, have

compassion on us and help us. And Jesus said to him, If you

can, all things are possible for one who believes.

Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, I

believe, help my unbelief. And Jesus saw that a crowd came

running together. He rebuked the unclean spirit,

saying to it, You mute and deaf spirit, I command you come out

of him and never enter him again.

And after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came

out, and the boy was like a corpse.

So the most of them said, He is dead.

But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up and he arose

and when he had entered the house, his disciples asked, why

can we not cast it out? And he said to them, this kind

cannot be driven out by anything but prayer.

Notice the response of Jesus to this Father.

Lord, if Jesus does not like that and he corrects it right

away, Lord, if you can do anything, please have compassion

on us and help us. We think that Jesus response to

pity, but he doesn't. Jesus response to faith and

that's why he brings the correction to this man right

away. I don't like that.

I know I don't either because when my elbows are hurting and

hurting and hurting and aching and I'm doing my cold plunge and

I'm doing my hot tub and I'm doing my supplements, I'm doing

all the stupid stuff I'm supposed to be doing, leaning on

all the arms of flesh. By the way, all my plan.

BCDEFGI got a lot of plans to heal my elbows.

Are you in faith? Are you not in faith?

I don't get in condemnation about it either, but I'm honest

and I see many Christians who won't be honest to just go, I

don't know that I'm in faith. Oh, I believe, don't get me

wrong. Oh, I believe between these

years, Oh, I believe. I can get a paper test, right.

You give me a test on faith, I'm going to get a 100.

I'll probably get some extra credit because I'll write some

extra stuff in there. And this guy knows faith.

Congratulations on knowing faith, just like we say

congratulations on knowing about Jesus.

But there's a difference between a living faith.

Now, how do you get it? It comes from the Word.

It is not a formula. But God is a reward of those who

diligently seek Him. He is a rewarder of those who

diligently seek Him. If you can help, Jesus says no,

no, no, no. We're going to fix this real

quick. If you can believe, all things

are possible for those who believe.

And the Father responded with humility, which is exactly

right. He didn't go.

Never mind if you're going to talk to me that way.

I thought you were a good rabbi. I love to help people.

If you can do anything, please, Jesus, stop with that.

No, it's not. If I can, I can do everything.

If you can believe, all things are possible for those who

believe. Wow, you just blew my mind.

Jesus, you know what I believe? Help my unbelief.

A pitiful request and it is undeniable to the Lord because

he said I believe in the Lord says out in my compassion, in my

grace, in my kindness again, but the scriptures aren't given to

us as formulaic answers. So we don't just do what the

woman with the issue of blood did.

Can we learn from her? Yes we don't just do what the

father did. Can we learn from her?

Yes we don't just do what the father did.

Can we learn from her? Yes we don't just do with the

woman with the demon possessed daughter.

Jesus told her no, and he called her a dog and she said, but even

the dogs will take the crumbs. And he says you have just

impressed me with what? With pity.

Do I feel great pity? No, you've impressed me with

great faith. So this is meant to be an

encouragement to us. It is meant to be a correction

when we need it, but it's meant to be an encouragement to us.

All things are possible for those who believe.

We're not going to get weird. We're not going to get flaky

with our all things, all things that God promises, all things

that are in the scriptures, all things that are in the ministry

and within the promises of God. All those things are possible

for those who believe. We're going to prepare our

hearts now to receive communion. Chris and Kayla are going to

serve us. Thank you.

Who is Jesus to you? That's the first question.

The next point we talked about was the people who don't respond

well to us, the people who try and keep us stuck and locked in

an old place, in an old way of thinking, an old way of living.

What can we do for them? We pray for them.

We recognize that we just need to continue to trust that the

Word of God is their answer. And then finally we see the

people of Nazareth. How many?

How many people missed out? Apparently there were still

Jesus left that community and there were still needs in that

community when he left that day. Let's be very clear about that.

There were needs in that community.

When Jesus walked out of Nazareth that day, there were

mighty needs. He healed a few sick people.

How foolish would it be though? And the Scripture does not give

us the opportunity to say he didn't heal the other people

because He didn't will them to be healed.

That is the scripture tells us explicitly why they weren't

healed. It was because of their

unbelief. It's not I want to heal you.

I want to heal you. I'm actually working something

greater in your life, in your life, in your life that

paralysis is you'll see it's going to be super cool later.

All these other things. God bless you all.

That's not consistent with his ministry.

It's it's convenient for my life.

It would help explain a lot of things that I've experienced in

my life, in my ministry and in my personal life, but it's not

consistent with scripture. So we're we're going to, as we

prepare to receive communion right now, I want us to pray for

ourselves. Y'all can come on.

Thank you. I want you to pray for yourself,

but I also want you to pray for the brothers and sisters that

we've lifted up and their physical needs today.

And as we take the body and the blood of Jesus, we're going to

attach our faith to Christ and the cross.

We're going to look to the stripes.

Thank you.