Discover Jesus Series Pt. 11 - Pastor Greg Addison - February 23, 2025

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

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

Thank you for listening.

I want you to turn with me in your Bibles to Luke chapter 8.

Luke 8 · chapter mention

We're continuing on our Discover Jesus series.

We've been walking through from Christmas to Easter, uh learning who Jesus is and not just what the world says or not what they describe.

I saw an interview this week, and they've been trying, some folks have been trying to make some hay out of the fact that in Los Angeles, do you get nervous when I say things that happen in California?

In Los Angeles at the Hollywood Bowl, they're doing a uh a Renaissance uh production of Jesus Christ Superstar.

And they have a woman, trans lesbian, I don't know that she knows what she is, we're not sure what she is, but she's not a man playing the person of Jesus.

And I saw this interview where they talked about here's an opportunity to explore all these different facets of Jesus and who he could have been and what he was and what he meant and all that kind of stuff.

And I thought, there's nothing to explore.

Scripture tells us who Jesus is, and there's a very clear statement and picture of who Jesus is and what he came to do and what he's teaching.

So we've been studying through this really understanding of who Jesus is.

And today we're going to talk about one aspect of Jesus' life that I think that is often misunderstood, and that is the message and the meaning of miracles.

When Jesus uh works through miracles and how that works, why did that, how that worked, and all of that.

Now we use the word miracle.

That's kind of a broad term in our life.

I heard someone say when the hogs went to uh Rupp Arena and and uh and beat the Wildcats, praise the Lord, that was a miracle.

I don't think that was a miracle.

I mean, we're we're we we deserve to win that game.

That was good.

Sometimes I hear people say, Janet has put up with Greg all those years.

That's a miracle.

Now that probably is a miracle.

Uh we use terms, that term miracle to describe a lot of different things.

And one of those things we do is we use that term to talk about when Jesus would intervene into the normal physical flow of how things happened.

He would interrupt that and do something that was not the normal consequence of the flow of, you know, physical life and how that works.

We use that term to describe miracles.

And as I was getting ready for today and praying through that and addressing this part of life, I was reminded of a book that uh the pastor where I grew up, Dr.

Adrian Rogers, wrote, written many books, but one of them he wrote years ago, and it's this is the title of it, and this is the theme of what we're doing today.

It's a great title.

Believe in miracles, but trust in Jesus.

You can believe that Jesus did these miracles and he accomplished them.

He made people the lame to walk and the blind to see, and he made the deaf to hear, and he walked on water, and he did all that stuff.

He did all that.

You can believe in those factually, but that's not really the point.

We believe in Jesus, we believe in miracles and that they can happen, but all of that is worked to make us trust in the person of Jesus.

Believe in miracles, trust in Jesus.

That's the theme of the message today.

And so since Jacob put me on the spot to do it very quickly, I want to ask you to bow your heads and we'll close in prayer.

Some of y'all were way too quick to actually bow your heads, all right?

That I'm a little offended by that.

But let's look there in Luke chapter 8.

Luke 8 · chapter mention

You're in Luke chapter 8, and here's, we're not gonna read the whole chapter, but it's important that you understand what this chapter is, okay?

Luke 8 · chapter mention

So what I've done is put together in this passage of Scripture, 8, 22 through 53, I've categorized different miracles for you that Jesus has done.

And we're gonna kind of kind of skim over those to capture the high points and really help you understand what that is.

Now, every one of the four Gospels is written to give the history of Jesus.

They are based on actual eyewitness accounts, factual events, what we would call a secular historian from those days.

They have accounts that affirm the accounts written in the gospel.

You have all throughout that first generation of Christians, they're repeating these moments, they're there are preaching these moments, people are not pushing back, they know these things happened, they're listening to them, and they're learning what those things mean as they're identifying the person of Jesus.

And so all four Gospels are historically accurate documents, been affirmed by every kind of archaeological thing that you can imagine.

Uh there are some, last week I gave you a podcast, um, the Cold Cased Christianity podcast.

If you'll look at that, there are a number of uh podcasts he has where he goes back through the historicity of the gospels, and they're really incredible.

I really encourage you to listen to those.

They'll be a blessing to you.

But we know that these four gospels are eyewitness accounts.

We also know that each of these four men were writing and taking the entire life of Jesus and putting it into a gospel message, much the way that we do on Sunday mornings.

And so each one of them has an audience that they are talking to, trying to show them who Jesus is.

Matthew was writing to Jewish believers, trying to teach them and help them understand that Jesus was the promised Messiah.

And so what you get in the book of Matthew is that phrase repeated over and over and over and over.

It was done to fulfill what was said by the prophets.

It was done to fulfill what was written by the prophets.

And so when you read Matthew, that's what you get.

Mark, we understand, was written by Mark.

He was a protege of Peter, and it is him traveling often with Peter, Peter preaching from his eyewitness accounts of walking with Jesus, understanding who Jesus is, watching him be crucified, meeting the resurrected Jesus.

And so Mark reflects a lot of the straight gospel message that this is who Jesus is.

The book of John was written by the person of John to give distinct insight into who Jesus was and why he came.

Very much like the way we have been approaching this series.

Luke is very interesting in his writing of the Gospel.

Luke begins at the very beginning of the gospel.

Luke is a physician of that day.

He is a believer in Christ, follower of Jesus.

And he says at the very beginning, I am writing an orderly account of what happened with Jesus.

And so if you want to think about him as the chronicler of Jesus' life.

And so when he says and describes an orderly account, he is saying these are generally the events and the order in which they happened, and I am giving you sort of in today's parlance, maybe the Wikipedia description of Jesus' life and ministry.

Often in these uh in these uh events, they will make the comment that in three years of ministry, Jesus did way more things than we could possibly write down.

And so what they are doing is they are capturing to each of their audiences a historical, accurate account of the person of Jesus and what he did.

And that's important to understand with the book of Luke, because as you're walking through the life of Jesus, he is walking through it chronologically and factually to give you those moments.

So you get to Luke chapter 8.

Luke 8 · chapter mention

And Luke chapter 8 is a very significant chapter as he is chronicling these moments.

Luke 8 · chapter mention

It begins, if you have your Bibles there, just look.

Um He begins to describe some of the people that are following him.

Verse 1, he is preaching and telling the good news of the kingdom of God, and these people are supporting his ministry.

And then he begins to tell the parable of the sower.

Now, the parable of the sower, if you know there's a guy who's a farmer and he has a bag and seed, and he's walking around and he's sowing seeds.

And Jesus uses this parable.

We'll talk about parables later and how he used them, but basically, it is an earthly story or illustration that helps unpack spiritual truths.

And so Jesus tells the story of the sower.

He's sowing seeds, and then he explains that his story means this the seed is the gospel.

Spreading the gospel.

And the gospel will land on solid ground.

The ground is hard, it's packed, the seeds can't take root.

It will land in some places where there is some soil that's effective, but maybe it's rocky and has weeds as well, it gets choked out.

As a farmer is sowing seeds, sometimes birds will come and they will steal the seeds away, but much of that seed falls on fertile ground on the farmland, and it takes root and bears fruit.

And what he says is, he's teaching them, we are going sowing seeds of the gospel.

Our job, the way he told Peter, Andrew, James, and John that we saw a couple of weeks ago, they're fishing for men.

He is using another illustration to teach us, we are sowers of the seed of the gospel.

Then he moves from that into a moment where his mother and his half-brothers are trying to get to him.

The disciples come to him in the middle of the crowd, you need to get, they want to talk to you or whatever, and he says, listen, in verse 21, my mother and my brothers are those who hear and do the word of God.

He's not trying to be disrespectful to his parents or his family or to his disciples, but he is trying to get the point.

Here we are sowing seed.

I've just taught you that we're sowing seed, and our primary purpose is going out and sharing the gospel, sharing good news.

Then you go in this context that Luke tells us of Jesus is sharing the gospel, just what we've been talking about.

He's teaching us to be sowers and sow the gospel.

Our priority is sharing the gospel and following Jesus.

We now have a series of events that we refer to as miracles that occur.

The first one you'll find in verse 22.

One day he and his disciples got into a boat on the Sea of Galilee, and he told them, Let's cross over to the other side of the lake.

So they set out, and as they were sailing, he fell asleep.

Then a fierce windstorm came down on the lake.

They were being swamped and were in danger, and they're all freaked out in this storm.

They wake Jesus up and they say, Master, we're going to die.

Now, one of these days I'm going to do a sermon series on dumb questions in the Bible.

What in their experience to this point made them think that they were going to die in that boat with Jesus in the boat?

Right?

But they're still learning who Jesus is.

They're trying to understand that.

And Jesus wakes up and his comment to them in verse 25 is, Where is your faith?

So he rebukes them and then he calms the storms.

Now, if you get, that's verses 22 through 25.

That's the first miracle.

The second miracle is in verse 26, and he tells a long story that's very famous about a man who has so many demons in him that the demons have named themselves Legion.

Jesus gets off the boat as soon as it docks.

Immediately, just the presence of Jesus is an offense to these demons.

And these demons drive this man's body to come and confront Jesus.

And Jesus casts them out.

He casts them into pigs who run off into the water and drown.

The man is radically changed and saved from this experience.

And then he turns to Jesus and he said, I want to follow you because of what you've done for me.

And Jesus says, I want you to stay here and I want you to tell people what God has done for you.

What God has done for you.

So what you have is you begin to see this series of miracles begin to unfold topically Jesus' authority as the creator God of the universe to do miracles.

So the first one, he has authority over nature.

This one he has authority over the spiritual world.

Then they begin to leave, and a man comes running, uh the uh comes up to Jesus in the middle of the crowd.

His name is Jairus.

He's a leader of the synagogue.

His daughter is sick at home on her deathbed.

He pleads with Jesus to come to his house and to save his daughter, heal his daughter.

On the way is the famous story of the woman with the issue of blood.

Jesus is trying to get to Jairus' house, and there's all these crowds and all this, and all of a sudden he stops everyone in the middle of this and he says, Stop.

Someone has touched my coat.

And the dean the disciples look at him like, Are you crazy crazy?

Like we're trying to fight through this crowd, and everybody's jostling and pushing and shoving, and we're barely getting.

How in the world do you know somebody touched your coat?

And he calls out this woman, the Bible says that had an issue of blood.

That means she had some bleeding disorder.

We don't know if she's a hemophiliac or whatever ways we would describe that, but she has tried every means to resolve this health issue, and all of it has failed.

And she had placed her hope and trust that if she could just touch Jesus' garment, that was enough for her to be saved.

So Jesus stops, he calls her forward, they speak, and Jesus says, Woman, because of your faith, you are healed.

Now, in the middle of this story, where he stopped with all this chaos, you have a dad whose daughter is on her deathbed.

And you know he's looking at Jesus thinking, What in the world are we doing stopping for this?

My daughter is gonna die.

What are you doing stopping for all this?

Can you imagine?

They're trying to fight through this crowd, and Jesus stopped and says, Somebody touch my coat.

And this guy's saying, Who cares?

My daughter is gonna die if we don't get there.

As soon as Jesus has healed this woman and they turn to begin to fight their way back over to Jairus' house, some servants come up to them and they say, Sir, don't trouble this man anymore.

Your daughter has died.

And Jesus turns to him in verse 50, and he said, Do not be afraid, only believe, and she will be made well.

And he encourages that man's faith.

You trust, stay with me, she'll be healed.

And of course, as you get to the end of the chapter, they get to the house, and Jesus raises her from the dead, tells them to give her food so that he can show that she is healthy and has been saved.

And then you get to Luke chapter 9, verse 1.

Luke 9:1

Summoning the twelve, he gave them power and authority over all the demons and power to heal diseases.

Then he sent them to proclaim the kingdom of God to heal the sick.

And we talked about that a couple of weeks ago as Jesus sent people.

So you see in this chapter this incredible picture where people are following Jesus.

He's doing these miracles, he's proclaiming the gospel, people are getting saved.

He tells all of his followers, we are sowers of the seed, we're going to sow seed, and the Lord of the harvest is giving that.

You have this moment where they say, Your parents want to see your mom wants to see you, your brothers, and he says, Listen, our family are the people that are being obedient to God, pursuing this sowing of the seed of the gospel.

And then he does these miracles.

They show authority over nature when he calms the seas, his authority over demons in the spiritual world when he casts out the demons, his authority over circumstances and struggles and healing and all of that with the woman with the issue of blood, and then his authority over life and death with the daughter.

And what we get here in this chapter is this overview and this theological picture of Jesus' authority and power to do what we call miracles and their purpose in why he's doing them.

So, truth number one, I want to show you this today.

Miracles have meaning.

They have a meaning.

There is a purpose to them.

Jesus is not just stepping in and doing something so people will glorify him or show off or make things easier or whatever.

John, in his account, says this.

You don't need to turn there, stay in Luke, but I want you to see this scripture.

John chapter 20, verses 30 and 31, he says this.

John 20:30

And I want you to mark that word, pay attention to that in your scripture, in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book.

In other words, he says in the next chapter, John 21, there's so many, there aren't enough volumes to cover all the things he did.

But here he's saying that there are so many, there were lots of them that were done, but these were written for a purpose.

Verse 31.

These are written so that you may believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and by believing you may have life in his name.

The word signs is the word that we call miracles, that we use for miracles.

And this is our word miracle is a more generic word.

This is actually the appropriate description.

Anytime Jesus steps in and he does one of these things, calms the sea, raises the girl from the dead, or raises Lazarus from the dead, or he heals this woman with an issue of blood, or he casts out the demons.

We saw a couple weeks ago where he cast demons out of a lady's child.

When he does that, they are signs.

They are done intentionally and purposefully with a message so that the people watching and the people to whom it happens will understand the specific point that Jesus is the Son of God.

He is the Messiah, and He is doing this in a way to elevate their faith.

To encourage them to trust in Him.

Remember the examples that we just looked at in these categories in Luke chapter 8.

Luke 8 · chapter mention

It is winds and waves.

Where is your faith?

It is, I've saved you, you stay here and testify to what I've done in your life.

Trust me and become that sower of seeds and tell them what I've done, this sign, so others can see.

To the woman, he said, with the issue of blood, he says, Your faith has made you whole.

He doesn't heal her so she'll be better.

So she will not die and go to hell, and she will enter a relationship with God and spend eternity with him in heaven.

He tells the Father, Listen, you believe in me.

He is doing the sign of raising the daughter from the dead so that he can get to this father and this head of the household and prove to him that he is Jesus so that he and his family will have the opportunity to trust Christ as their Savior.

These miracles are not just Jesus stepping in and doing stuff, they are done with a purpose.

Now we are surrounded by miracles.

Sometimes you get this question, Pastor, do we still do miracles?

Does God still do miracles today?

Well, the answer is yes.

Definitely, yes, God does miracles.

First of all, here's the first miracle: creation and how it functions, and how it flows, and its beauty, and its strength.

God spoke it into being.

Why do you think Satan has spent so much time attacking the understanding that God created the heavens and the earth?

Why do you think he spent so much time doing that?

Why do you think we are still arguing about that today?

Because he is trying to take away our understanding of who God is.

And God created creation and life in such a way that it is miraculous in its beauty, it is miraculous in its diversity, it is miraculous in its ability to heal itself and work through it and all of that.

It's just incredible, all of how it works.

And in Romans chapter 1, the Bible says that the fullness of God is revealed in his creation.

Romans 1 · chapter mention

Every time you see a rainbow, it is a miracle.

God created that miracle as a sign following the flood that I will never destroy the earth by water again.

And every time you see that rainbow, science.

Can define what it is, but it cannot define how it is.

And it is a miracle of God that speaks to us.

I was talking with one of the guys on staff this week.

Birth is a miracle.

As hard as they try, they cannot still understand or define how that egg and sperm come together and there is life that is birthed.

There is DNA that is defined as boy and girl and height and talents and interests and personality and skill.

Why do you think we live in a world where people are trying to alter and change all those things?

It is an insidious plan, just like attacking creation, trying to get us to not understand that God is the creator and he is the author of that miracle.

I'll never forget when my children were born.

I'll never forget it.

I'll never forget when our grandson was born.

And to watch him learn and unfold and his mind grow and the light bulbs go off as he develops more and more understanding, progressing through life.

Listen, that miracle did not climb out of the slime or the ooze or whatever.

God created that and life is a miracle.

It's incredible the miracles that we see regularly.

The greatest miracle that ever occurred, Jacob talked about, and in making us worship and thank God for what he's done, thank him for what he's done, salvation is a miracle.

Jesus loved us so much that in his grace, rather than allow the judgment that we deserve, Jesus stepped out of heaven and he died on the cross.

He took our sins on the cross for us.

He rose again conquering death and sin.

And when you place your faith in him as your Savior, your entire eternity is changed.

It is a common idiom in human life that people don't change.

Well, people may not change, but Jesus changes people.

And when you give your life to Christ, you are changed forever.

It is the miracle of salvation.

Man, I can tell you time after time after time, if we had had time to do that, and Jacob hadn't told me I need to finish early.

Of people who have radically changed because the gospel had changed them.

And so when Jesus steps in and he alters the rules of space and time and biology and does this moment where it doesn't function the way it normally does, it is not some random miracle.

It is a sign that Jesus has stepped into and has chosen that moment to do it as an illustration that He is the Savior, has the power and the authority to save.

Signs.

That's important for us to understand because sometimes we begin to struggle.

Life gets hard.

We get in a situation like this woman with an issue of blood.

And we have this struggle, it's circumstantial.

It could be your job, your family, your marriage relationship, it could be your health, it could be whatever it is.

And we get in that moment and we plead and we ask God to do something and we ask for a miracle.

I need you to heal this person.

I need you to change the circumstances.

I need you to do this.

And in that moment, we are asking for God to step into the normal flow of how the laws of physics, the laws of relationships, the laws of biology function, and we are asking God to alter those and to make this better.

Now there's nothing wrong with that prayer at all.

Where we struggle is, I need you to heal this person, and they're not healed.

And then we face this decision: is God real?

Does God really love me?

Is God really in charge of these things?

Is he really there and is he willing to do this and he didn't?

And if I believe that he healed the one with the issue of blood, and if I believe that he raised the daughter from the dead and he didn't do this here, what does that mean for me?

He did not alter the natural flow of physics and biology in this moment for me.

Why?

And then we get struggle and we we struggle and we're mad and we're frustrated and we're hurt and we're whatever, or we lose our faith, or prayer doesn't work because he didn't answer that prayer, and we get all these struggles because we do not understand what he did in those moments.

We do not understand the truth that we've been talking about for the last few weeks, that God's sole purpose in our life is to strengthen our faith in him as our Savior.

Here's the tragedy of this: He could heal this woman with an issue of blood, and if she doesn't trust Jesus as her savior, she could live to be 92 and then die and split hell wide open.

And what good did the healing do?

This young girl, Jesus saves her, raises her from the dead, and she grows up to be some horrible person and do all these things and have 47 kids and do all this, and there's no Jesus intervened in there, and you have life after life that dies and goes to hell.

Because they didn't understand who Jesus is.

God did not work in our lives, and he does not work through us to make this a better place from which to go to hell.

He is always at work to call people to trust him as our Savior, and that's why it's so important when you understand these miracles.

These are signs chosen so that we would believe Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of God.

These are signs in a specific moment and circumstances that call someone to place their faith in Jesus and they cause us to understand that Jesus is the Savior.

Clearly, it says in here that there were a whole lot more signs that they just didn't have time to write in the books because it had taken so many volumes to do it.

Why did they pick these?

Because the Holy Spirit told them to pick these.

And the Holy Spirit told them to pick these.

Sometimes he does not alter the flow of physics or biology because in that moment we've already trusted, or that journey deepens our faith.

With the disciples in the boat, he intervened into the laws of physics and nature and calm that storm, but he did it as a rebuke of those men.

Where is your faith?

Why don't you trust me?

You are in the boat with me, and if you are in the boat with me, nothing is going to happen to you because nothing's going to happen to me.

And since I am the Messiah and you are with me, you are good.

Why are you afraid?

Why are you freaked out?

Really?

You think we're gonna die in this boat, and I'm here in this boat with you?

Where is your faith?

So you see, sometimes in these moments, Jesus intervenes in a way that we wouldn't necessarily think was a miracle, but it's purposeful so that they would believe He is the Son of God.

Once you understand that, you understand the title of this book.

Believe in miracles that they happen, but understand the purpose is to cause us to trust in Jesus.

The rest of the lessons become easy.

Truth number two is this these miracles, these signs, are recorded specifically to identify Jesus as Savior.

They are not there to confuse us, or they're not there to cause us to, hey, I want you to do this because you did it once before, or you can do this, you can do that.

They are all designed purposefully and specifically to identify Jesus as our Savior.

That's exactly what John said, who was standing there when all these miracles or signs occurred.

They identify him as God the creator.

He's in charge and has the authority over all.

That's his name for Jesus, his description of who Jesus is.

In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

And he describes that creation happened through him.

It shows his power over all aspects of creation and life.

Since he is the creator and he spoke it into being, since he created the plant and he created the animals, he created human life and he created the process of that.

He has power over all of that.

And so when we come and pray, we are praying to the God who can do all.

He does these because it shows his spiritual authority to act.

When he tells this woman, your faith has made you whole and your sins are forgiven, he is showing his authority as God to do more than just heal, but to save.

There are people in this house, and they are all crowded in this house, and he's preaching the gospel, and there are these four men who have a friend who has been lame his entire life, and the Bible describes it.

They put him on a mat and they take him up to the roof of the house, they pull off the thatched roof of the house, and they drop him down into the middle of the crowd in front of Jesus.

And Jesus looks at the crowd and he says, I can forgive sins.

So you'll believe that I can do that.

He looks at the man and he says, Stand up, take up your bed.

He says, anybody could say your sins are forgiven, but I'm going to show you that I have the authority to do that.

And so when he acts, he's showing he has the spiritual authority to act and save.

It shows that he is capable to do all he has claimed to do.

If Jesus says that if you are buried with me in the likeness of my resurrection, you will, if you are buried with me in the likeness of my death, you will be raised with me in the likeness of my resurrection.

It's what we say when somebody is baptized and they come by the water.

How do we know that Jesus has the ability to make us have that new life in the likeness of resurrection?

How do we know he can take our old sinful man and his punishment will be paid, his sins will be nailed on the cross, and he will be born again with a new life?

How do we know that Jesus can help us to be born again?

Because we have seen him raise people from the dead.

We know he has the authority of life.

And so he is capable of doing what he's claimed to do.

These miracles are specifically recorded for the purpose of drawing our faith to him.

Every one of these miracle sign stories that you read in all four Gospels, inherent in it is the theme of developing the faith of the person who has that need.

But you have plenty of other stories where Jesus calls and pulls at the faith of a person without a sign.

Because in that moment that's not what they needed.

Think about the story that we refer to as the rich young ruler.

He comes to Jesus and he says, Jesus, teacher, what do I do to inherit eternal life?

And Jesus understands he doesn't need a sign.

I don't need to, like, oh, watch this.

Stand up and walk.

Now, believe in me, that's not what that guy's question is.

That's not what his issue is.

That guy's already seen Jesus do those things.

That's why he comes to him and he says, What I do inherit eternal life.

And so Jesus tells him, keep the law and the prophets, knowing that you can't do that.

Nobody is perfect.

All of us are sinners and they can't do that.

And he says, I've done all that.

I'm good.

And Jesus says, You have a self-image problem.

You don't understand you're a sinner.

He doesn't need that kind of sign.

So Jesus speaks to his heart.

He sees his heart.

Jesus has the miracle of that spiritual insight and the spiritual authority to see what our questions, what our issue is, what our question of faith, and put his finger directly on it.

And he speaks into that man's wife and he says, Okay, you're rich, you're in charge of your culture, you're in charge of your life, you got safety nets, you don't have any worries.

Watch this.

Take all your money and give it to the poor.

And Jesus puts his finger right on that man's heart in question.

It is a sign of Jesus' spiritual authority that it knew exactly what was going on in that man's life.

It is a miracle, if you will, that Jesus can step right into his life and speak exactly into what the issue is and call him to himself.

If you will sell your goods, you come and follow me, you place your faith in me, you get rid of your safety nets and you get rid of your ability to control your world that you're relying on, and you put your reliance on me, you put your faith in me.

And the man says, No, I can't do that.

Listen, that's every bit as much of a miracle as telling that man on that mat to pick up his bed and walk, or to tell those wind and waves in Luke 8 to be calm.

The greatest miracle is and always will be when Jesus steps into our lives and he says, I love you, and here's your question, and I'm gonna put my finger on it, and I'm gonna, in love, call you to trust me.

Because the most important miracle that will ever have in your life is you place your faith in me as your Savior and you allow me to change your eternity.

Truth number three.

These miracles, they have meaning to us.

They didn't just mean something to the apostles in the boat.

They didn't just mean something to the dad who was struggling with the health and impending death of his daughter.

They speak to all of us.

And John makes it clear in his statement in John 20: listen, these are chosen so that we would all believe in Jesus, that we would understand him.

And so the first thing that it should happen is when we see these miracles, it should cause us to worship him.

He is the King of kings and the Lord of Lords.

He has the authority over all.

He is God Himself.

He has the power to do all those things.

He has the grace to step into people's lives and call them to himself and draw that faith.

And that should set the framework for where we are in our lives that we are worshiping Jesus.

He can calm the winds, he can heal the sick, he can raise the dead, he can cast out demons in any circumstance.

Jesus is more than enough to work.

He is also God and He chooses how he works in these moments.

He may calm the winds to rebuke a lack of faith.

He may make this father wait in order to develop his faith.

That Jesus is my only hope, and he works in a miraculous way to confirm the faith that she has invested in him already.

He gets to choose how he does that as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.

And so I can come and ask.

I can come to him in faith, God, will you do this?

Will you do this?

Will you change these circumstances?

Will you off-alter the flow of biology or physics or economics or whatever it is?

Will you do that?

I was watching, told Dave Scrooge this week we were talking about.

I was flipping through television one time, I was watching, and I landed on a show.

I don't want to say the guy's name because I don't be critical.

You'd know who it was, a preacher on television.

And it just happened to caught my eye because I passed through, he was talking about your finances and stewardship, and he said, God is the king of kings and he controls the earth and all of that.

And if you'll place your faith and give to our church and whatever, then just imagine this: the God who's the creator of the universe, he can cause a thunderstorm to happen, and he can choose where that happens, and he can make it be a thunderstorm over the place where the bank is that houses the computer system that houses the balances of your credit cards.

And God, who is the creator of the universe, can cause that storm over that bank, over that place where all those computers, he can cause it to be an electrical storm, he can cause the lightning to strike, and he can wipe out your credit card debt.

I thought that's kind of awesome.

I'm going to his church.

That is not the God that we're praying to.

And that is not a legitimate definition of who God is.

And God may wipe out your credit card debt, or he may make you walk through it as a choice of faith to grow your trust in him, that his way is the right way, and he will provide if you will do.

But he chooses.

And as we worship as the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, and we see these miracles, and we understand that it causes us to a deeper understanding of Jesus' purpose in our lives.

It should cause us to say, What is my faith journey in this moment?

I'm going to come and I'm going to ask him to do this, but Jesus, in this, don't let me mess who you are and what you're doing.

How do you want me to grow in this moment?

And so, even as a believer, as a follower of Christ, you've already made basic faith decisions to give your life to Christ, but we still have these questions.

And so our question has got to be, God, what are you doing in my life and how do you want me to grow?

And then it should motivate us to trust him more.

I see these myriads of miracles, and I see these myriads of moments where he does not alter time and space, but he speaks to someone's heart and he challenges and he grows and he does all of that.

And it should motivate me to trust him more that he has my best in his heart.

He has the power to grow me in these moments and draw me closer to him.

He has the power to alter time and space if he wants to do that.

But he also has the love to do what is needed in my life for me to grow.

And if a miracle gets in the way of the lessons, he's going to leave those out and he's going to speak and he's going to speak through his word or he's going to draw or he's going to bring somebody in my life, he's going to speak a word.

And I'm going to trust that Jesus, who is in control of all of this, who can see everything in my life and heart, Jesus is going to work for my best and my faith to draw me closer to him.

He may not alter time and space in my life, but he's going to alter my eternity as he draws me closer to him and causes me to trust him more.

So when you read these miracles, worship him.

Ask, what is his purpose in my life?

And trust him.

Believe in the miracles, but trust in Jesus.

I want you to bow your heads as we close.

And if you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, that's your first choice of faith that you make.

It's very simple.

You recognize you're a sinner, that Jesus loved you and died for you, and you come and you give your life to him.

If you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, we're going to sing just a verse or two of a song.

Our people are going to sing a testimony of salvation, and they're going to invite you.

We're going to invite you to come.

We have pastors here.

They want to pray with you, answer your questions, help you in that journey.

Just come.

If you need a church home to be a part of, just come tell us.

Let us work with you.

It's very simple, easy to join.

Come.

If you want us to pray with you, come.

We're here to pray with you.

Lord, we love you and we thank you.

We thank you for this incredible picture and understanding of the magnitude and the power of who Jesus is.

And even more, his loving purpose to save us, to help us see and trust in Him.

I pray you'll strengthen our walk through this lesson from Luke and John.

From their eyewitness testimonies of what Jesus did and why he did it.

And help us to understand.

Give us the freedom now to respond to you in Jesus' saving name.

We pray in all God's people's hand.

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

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

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

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