The Restorative Power of Jesus | Luke 7:31-37
Sermon Transcript
Good morning. Well, summer is winding down, and yesterday, my wife did such a good favor for me. She took John David, five year old, and the girls swimming, and I just stayed home and watched football. It was amazing. And took her just for a few hours. And it was amazing. She said, to see how when the summer started, he still had some trepidation about swimming and that kind of thing. But we had some great we gave some more lessons and this and that. She said, at one point yesterday, he was a no adult with all the children in the pool, and he said, I'm going to the deep end to hang out there by myself. And so he just was in the deep end. So he kind of transformed this good little swimmer. And then this week, he got a note from his kindergarten teacher. So he's been in kindergarten for 12 days now, and it was a little post it note. And by the way, we found out he goes by the name John in kindergarten now, so, and I think he dropped the David because it's five less letters for him to write in his name. Pretty sure that's what's going on there. And so the note says John is doing very well, but if you could please work with him writing his letters, and needs to improve his letters. I'm thinking, isn't that what he learns in kindergarten? Like, you know, he's had 4k and 3k didn't have any problems with the finale. There's a few. I guess he's rusty, I don't know. So I wanted to write back and be like, I don't know who John is, but anyway, I'm sure that John will do a better job as the year progresses, and writing his letters as as he changes and as he transforms into a little kindergartner. And we're looking today at the transformative power of Jesus, how he can change us, and He can change things in our life. And so we are in Mark chapter seven, starting in verse 31 you then he, being Jesus, returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee in the region of the Decapolis. And they brought to him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, and they begged him to lay his hand on him, and taking him aside from the crowd privately, he put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting, touched his tongue and looking up To Heaven, He sighed and said to him, ephepha, that is be opened, and his eyes were opened. His tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. And Jesus charged them to tell no one. But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it, and they were astonished beyond measure, saying he has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the newt speak. Heavenly Father, we thank you for today, as we look into the Scripture today, I pray that you would show us today how you are a God that transforms us, that takes things out of our lives, makes our life better all so we can be better followers of yours. Show us today what that looks like in our own lives, the things that that you might need to change in our lives, the things that we need to be looking forward to as we follow you, Lord, I pray that that my words today reflect your heart as you gave them so many years ago. I pray that you would fill me with your Spirit and that those in here today would receive your word with gladness. We ask these things in Jesus name Amen. I want to show you three things about Jesus and His transformative power that we see in this passage, three things here in this passage that we see that Jesus can do for us. Number one, Jesus can restore your hope. Jesus can restore your hope. That's the great thing about the beginning of college football season. All fan bases have hope. And then the ball kicks off, the first game's over, and some have more hope than others. Even if you win as a Gamecock fan, you still might not have hope after watching the game. And so Jesus, though, can restore that hope you have in your life. Verse 31 said he returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee and the region of the Decapolis. Now, Tyre and Sidon were similar cities. They were located and was called. Modern day Lebanon. And they were wealthy cities known for their trade, known for the commerce. They traded purple dye, which was used by the wealthy and the royalty. But they were also major naval powers. They controlled the trade routes throughout the Mediterranean. They had an impressive harbor where they built boats and shipped everything out. And so it was a rather wealthy area, and it was a pagan area, not a lot of Jews. But even these people who were wealthy still needed Jesus, and they needed help. So it says in verse 32 and they brought to him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, and they begged him to lay his hand on him. The Bible here doesn't tell us how the man became deaf. Sometimes it will, it'll say something like this, man was born blind. Doesn't say he was born deaf. So we don't really know how he became deaf or why he became deaf. It's difficult to know exactly what his medical condition was, but there's a lot of ways you can go deaf. You could have been he could have been born with it. He could have lost his hearing through chronic ear infections or diseases or things like that, or he could have lost his hearing due to loud noises. He could have experienced some head trauma, some type of injury, a lot of different ways could have caused him to lose his hearing, but he also couldn't speak, so somehow it was tied to that. So it was a complicated issue, a severe issue, and whatever the calls, the man probably had no hope that he would ever be able to hear or speak again. So Jesus's reputation was going around about him, and so his friends brought into Jesus. Because in Jesus, no matter how hopeless Your situation may seem he can restore your hope. One scholar, GK Chesterton said this. He says hope means hoping when things are hopeless or it is no virtue at all, as long as matters are really hopeful, hope is mere flattery or platitude. It is only when everything is hopeless that hope begins to be a strength. We don't need hope unless things are hopeless, is what he's saying. Things aren't hopeless. There's no need for it. So by the definition things are hopeless when you need hope, and Jesus can restore our hope. There's numerous scripture references to why we can have hope in Jesus, Romans, 1513, says this, that he is the God of hope. And may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so by that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, you may abound in hope. God is a a God of hope, and our hope is is not based on our circumstances. Our hope is not based on our own strength, but our hope is based on the character and the promises of God. We can trust in Him, knowing he can fill us with that joy, knowing he can fill us with peace and hope through the work of the Holy Spirit. Hebrews 619 says this, we have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain. Hope in Christ is like an anchor. It keeps us steady in the storms of life. Jeremiah, 2911, For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. And this is a common scripture reference that people have. You might have it printed out on a coffee mug or something like this, but it was prophesied to people who were being severely judged by God because of their sin, because of their lack of faith, because of their disobedience in him, and so their land was being taken from them, and they were about to be exiles for many years. And it is in that context that God gives this verse, he says, he says, but I still have a future for you, even though I'm judging you and will judge you, I'm still going to remember you no matter what you've done. God gives them a future hope. It's the same for us. I. No matter our circumstance, whether we brought it on ourselves, whether we're the victim, God says you have a hope, you have a future. Jesus can restore that hope. Secondly, Jesus can remove your impediments. Jesus can remove your impediments. Verse 33 and taking him aside from the crowd, privately, he put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting, touched his tongue. Now there's interesting details here. Why would he make take him aside privately? He has healed people in public, in front of people before, but this one he he took aside. Well possible reasons. He's just possibly showing his compassion to him, showing his empathy to him, taking him aside, gets it out of the public eye, gives him some dignity, gives him some privacy. Maybe he took him aside to focus the removing the man from the crowd, from all the distractions and and you know, he can't hear but, but maybe he would take him somewhere, to a quiet place, so when he would heal him, he would be able to hear and see what it was like to communicate with them. Maybe it was because he was just trying to build that trust with him. We don't know the reasons, but Jesus wanted this healing to be private because he didn't want to attract the unwanted attention. And it says that he took his fingers and put his fingers in the man's ears, and then spit and touched his tongue. Now he didn't have to do that. Jesus could have just said healed, and he was healed, but he felt it necessary, and that way to touch the man in biblical times, touching was a way to physically convey empathy to someone, to show your compassion, to show your understanding, to bring that healing. And so by touching his impediments, he's putting the hand of God on them, to say, God's hand is here, I'm going to remove these things. Verse 34 looking up to heaven. And said, He sighed. Now I sigh when I read this because I have then pronounced the next word, ephetha. But Jesus sighs because he looks into heaven and he does his father's will. And he spoke, be opened verse 35 and his ears were opened and his tongue was released like it was tied in some way. And he spoke plainly, my oldest son, Jackson, was two and a half, and we figured out that he was tongue tied, as my father told us. My father told us, when he was a baby, that he thought he was tongue tied. I'm like, you know, Papaw, he doesn't know what he's talking about, right? You know, I think that child's tongue tied. It's our own first child. We don't know the doctor looked at it. Doctors missed it. They all missed it. Wasn't in here. It was different, though. And then we took him and had a person come and look at him, a speech person, they said, well, until he has this tongue tied surgery, he's not going to talk like he wanted to talk. He was just making gibberish. And so we went to the ENT and they clipped this thing out air. And on the way home, he was speaking words we never heard. He was saying the word yellow and things like that. And it was just amazing how one little procedure just could unloosen the tongue. And this man had a similar situation, he all of a sudden, now could could speak. And I'm sure it was emotional, as he was speaking words that he wanted to say, but couldn't say. And he was speaking these words, and people could hear him speak. It was no longer tithing, and he could hear as well that Jesus had removed this man's impediments. Now I want to be careful not to allegorize this miracle. This is a real man who was really healed, and his healing existed for the good of the man, and to showcase Jesus's compassion, to show Jesus's power, to show Jesus's divinity. But we know we all have impediments in our life. We all have obstacles. We all have things that that hinder our lives, and many of these things hinder our spiritual lives. This man couldn't hear that means he couldn't hear the Word of God proclaimed. He couldn't hear people singing and. Praises to the Lord. He couldn't physically praise the Lord. What if you could not praise the Lord with your mouth? Could not shout amen. You could not say Praise Jesus. He couldn't do those things. So these physical impediments was a spiritual impediment in his life. We all have those things, but Jesus can remove those from us. Look at Psalm 18. He sent from on high. He took me, he drew me out of many waters. He rescued me from my strong enemy and from those who hated me, for they were too mighty for me. They confronted me in the day of my calamity, but the Lord was my support. He brought me out into a broad place. He rescued me because he delighted in me. Maybe your impediment is an enemy like David. David shows how God rescued him from those who hated him. They confronted on him on a day that he he referred to as the day of his calamity. Yet God was his support. God brought him out to a broad place, and he rescued David. Why? Because he delighted in David. God is willing to remove our impediments because He delights in us, even though we were sinners, even though we broke God's law, even though our righteousness is like filthy rags, God still loves us and delights in us, and that's what David says. Isaiah, 42 and I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know, in paths that they have not known. I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light the rough places into level ground. These are the things I do and I do not forsake them. God promised here the Jewish people that he would guide them, that they were spiritually blind, but he would remove that spiritual darkness, that their rough places in their life would be smoothed out. He says, there are these. Are the things I do. No matter who you are, Jesus beckons you to come to him. Look at Matthew 11. Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light, whatever is impeding you. Jesus can remove it. Jesus is willing to remove it. What are some common spiritual impediments that people have, that we all have, some of these. Number one, maybe yours, is pride. Pride causes us to think that we do not need Jesus or his help. Pride causes us to rely on ourselves to solve our own problems. Pride is what keeps many people from darkening the door of the church. Pride is what keeps the baptism waters quiet. Pride is what keeps relationships from thriving. You know, in 20 years of being married, my relationship with my wife goes so much better when I am less prideful, when I show humility, it's amazing how better my marriage is when I can do that. Pride is what keeps churches from making disciples, and pride is what sends people to hell. If you're struggling with pride, ask Jesus to remove that impediment from your life, because all in all, we have nothing to be proud of other than Christ and Him crucified. He is our pride, not our own works, not our own selves. Pride. Maybe your impediment is unbelief. Sometimes doubt, lack of faith prevents us from fully trusting in Jesus, fully trusting in his ability to bless us, to save us. Uh, for some of us, our lack of faith in that Jesus will do what he says will keep us from living the life that He has for us, because we don't trust him, so we don't follow him in the ways that we know we should go. Third, maybe it's a type of sin. You know, sin, sinful behaviors create guilt. They create shame. They create a sense of unworthiness that that keeps us from wanting to come to Jesus, because we feel like we're not holy enough, and we're not but when there's sin that's unconfessed in our lives, we feel it more. So we need to ask the Lord to lead us away from those temptations, like he tells us to. We need to ask the Lord to remove those sins that keep us knocked down with shame, that keep us tied up in guilt. Jesus died for those sins, and He wants to remove those from us. Maybe yours is number four fear. Maybe you just have a fear of judgment from people in your life. Maybe you have a fear of rejection. Maybe you have a fear of the unknown. Well, if I really follow Jesus, he might ask me to change something in life. He might ask me to move towns. He might ask me to to get a new job. Abraham was 80, I think he, he was he, he was retired. Moses was certainly 80, right? He was retired. He God said, No, I have a better life for you. Moses is like I've had a good life. I've lived 40 years in the wilderness this great. You know, fear can hinder us from seeking what God has forced in our life. Number five, we all have this not business busyness. Busyness. We get preoccupied with the world, with the goals of the world, with what the world tells us we should be pursuing with what the world tells us is important for us, we get preoccupied with that and and the distractions that that keep us from prioritizing Jesus, our relationship with Him. Sometimes you can be too busy for Jesus. Sometimes you can be too busy to come to church. Sometimes you can be too busy to read your Bible, and sometimes we are too busy to know what it takes to get to know Jesus better. Maybe you're just too busy of a person. Well, Pastor, I just have all this I have to do. Well, do you have you prayed about it when there's we know, I have a lot of people in my in my house, they get to where they get complaining about things. And I say, Have you prayed about this at all? I know, I know to pray, dad or I know to pray, right? Yeah, someone asked, I know you know to pray. Have you prayed about it? Are you just worried? Are you just talking about it? I just need to vent. Well, no, Have you prayed about it? If you're too busy, Have you prayed about it? What the Lord would have you to do? And I don't think we do pray, because I think we know the answer. A lot of times we don't pray because we know what God's going to tell us, and so we don't. Maybe it's business number six, just the cultural influences we have from people, from society, which we've already mentioned, from family. You know, family is a good thing, but family can put unbiblical determinations on you, unbiblical pressures on you, unbiblical expectations on you, if we're not careful peers. I've got two children in high school and another one in middle school. This is like the height of peer pressure time. Really, they're learning what it is to grow up and everything and peer. Our friends can impact our decision. Impact our decision to come to Jesus for have him to remove what he wants to remove from our lives. Many people don't come to Christ because of cultural expectations. They're worried about losing friend groups. When I was in 11th grade and really started following Jesus, really was on fire for the Lord, I had a really good friend who was Jewish, and I knew that, and we've been best friends since probably eighth grade, but good friends since third grade, and had three or four like that, and I knew that that probably wouldn't last. He had no desire to know about Jesus. He just would go to his synagogue and and we lost our friendship over that, another friend that I was worried about losing that started to come with me to church. We have to be willing to lose friends, to follow Jesus. Sometimes we have a fear of the cultural influences, what they think, what my parents think. Most of us in this room had Christian parents, I'm guessing, but that's not the case in all over the world, there are people in foreign countries that come to Christ that are disowned by their family, disowned for them to follow Christ. Most of us have not had to have that situation, but we still have expectations from the culture that keep us that impediment in our lives, Jesus may have to remove those for your life to be transformed the way he wants to transform for you. And finally, number seven, we often have past hurts or experiences that keep us from Jesus. We have trauma or pain past negative experiences with church, maybe a negative experience with a pastor or a Sunday school class or something like that. It might create a barrier to coming to church. Many people don't come to Jesus, they don't come to church. They don't worship because of these bad past experiences. But Jesus is not your bad past experience. It's not Jesus's fault. It's not him. What you experienced was people who sinned against you, if they indeed sinned, Jesus, however, is for you, and He wants to bring healing into your life. And so it's important to acknowledge and address these impediments, recognizing that Jesus invites us to come to him as we are, to bring our doubts, bring our struggles, bring our burdens, and give them to him say, Lord, forgive me for not trusting you fully. Remove these impediments from my life so you can transform me to be the Christian man or the Christian woman you've called me to be. And if you're still alive today, you still haven't achieved where he wants you to be, still not there, because if you were, he would have called you home. Jesus can remove our impediments. Number three, finally, Jesus can reignite your passion. I bet Moses didn't have much passion at 80 years of age, living out in the wilderness, and God says, Moses, you're going to rescue my people. But they did it because it was such an amazing transformation. It was such an amazing change. Can you imagine having a friend who couldn't hear, who couldn't speak, but now he can hear everything you say to him, and now he can talk back. Maybe that's why he was your friend. He's never spoke back to you. I don't know why, but now he can talk back to you. He can hear you. What a wonderful day that was for that community. Who knows how long he was like this? Maybe it was a gradual time. I don't know. Maybe he was born that way. We don't know, like I said, But now he can hear, and now he can speak, and He can say everything he's wanted to say to everybody in that community. Maybe that wasn't a good thing, I don't know, but he could praise Jesus, he could worship, he could hear. And there was a celebration in that community for what Jesus did. Look at verse 37 and they were astonished again. These were pagans. They were astonished beyond measure, saying, Jesus has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak. I know that if I was backsliding in my faith and I saw a mighty work of God in a friend of mine, it would reignite my passion. And when you see an impediment removed from your life or a friend's life, it should light a fire under you for the things of God, and it did so for this community, and it did so for this man, Jesus, when our impediments removed, can reignite your passion for him, as we see the mighty works of God, Heavenly Father, as we close our time together today, where we thank You for Your mighty works, as we've gone through this series, Lord, seeing just a just a sampling of some of the good works You've done in people's lives, and we know that you're doing those works all the time, all the time across the world. Never truly place their faith and trust in you for salvation. Never asked you to forgive them for their sins, that today they would do so, that today they would would be the day of salvation, that today would be the day that they are born again. They are renewed with the new spirit, and they follow you, Father, for those of us who are believers, show us today what that impediment is in our life, that's but these impediments keep us there, keep us from doing so that you would show us what it is and give us the grace and the strength and The ability and the know how to remove them. But we love you. We ask these things in Jesus name, amen.
