Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] All right, let's take our Bible and go to the Book of Matthew, chapter nine.
[00:00:04] And if you have a little scrap piece of paper or a pen, if you turn also to Mark Chapter two, we will flip back there a little bit today as well. But we will mainly be in Matthew 9, Matthew chapter 9.
[00:00:38] We will read from verse one down to verse number eight. This morning.
[00:00:44] And he entered into a ship and passed over and came into his own city.
[00:00:49] And behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy lying on a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said unto the sick of the palsy, son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee.
[00:01:06] And behold, certain of the scribes said within themselves, this man blasphemeth.
[00:01:13] And Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?
[00:01:19] For whether is easier to say thy sins be forgiven thee, or to say, arise and walk, but that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins. Then saith he to the sick of the palsy, arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house. And he arose and departed to his house. But when the multitude saw it, they marveled and glorified God, which had given such power unto men. Would you pray with me this morning?
[00:01:49] Our Father, thank you again for the chance to meet as the Church of God together. And thank you for the people that are here and the people listening in that can't be with us this morning. Thank you for the preciousness of the fellowship and communion of the saints in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you for the fact that we have one Father, one Spirit, that we are saved by the same grace of God. Thank you for the word of God. Thank you for the work that you're doing in us, in us as individuals, but also in us as a body.
[00:02:23] And Lord, we pray that you continue to do a great work. And Lord, this morning is an opportunity for us to hear the Word, for us to respond to the Word. Lord, I pray that we would be wise as we hear God's word, that we would be responsive to what it says, that we would listen to you, that we would obey you, we would believe to obey you. And so, Lord, guide me, help me to say what I need to say and not say what you don't want me to say. But Lord, that all might be done, that you would be pleased, that the Lord Jesus Christ would be glorified, your people would be strengthened and helped and guided in your way.
[00:03:00] And so we commit the service to you, the message, the Word, all that's done in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:03:07] This here is a Matthew 9:1:8 is the second time in Matthew that we see someone that is sick of the palsy, that just simply means paralyzed, that is brought to the Lord Jesus and is healed. And we note that in this case the man, he comes to Jesus, but of course he is unable to go to Jesus on his own. You know, in the physical sense, he's unable to come to Jesus on his own. And so he has some friends that are willing to help him. And that's, I'm sure, a great blessing to him. In chapter eight, we had the other man who was paralyzed, the man with sick of the palsy, that was the centurion servant. But this is the first time that Jesus actually meets the man personally, because remember, with the centurion servant, he did not meet the centurion servant or even really technically the centurion personally.
[00:04:04] He healed him not even present. And so this is the second time we see this.
[00:04:12] And this is. Although there's similarity with the illness, the emphasis in every one of these instances, the emphasis is on something different. And that's. That's been the interesting thing as we've gone through Matthew. And this is something you only learn by going through. Going through it kind of methodically is you start to pick up on patterns. And in each case, we know the Lord healed far more people than we read in Scripture. I mean, thousands and thousands of people he healed. But the ones that are recorded in Scripture are recorded for a specific purpose. They're not. They're not. This is not an attempt to give a thorough and exhaustive historical record of what Jesus did. It's specifically to show certain things about Christ. And that is exactly what we see here.
[00:05:02] Now notice in verse number two, it says this. And behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy lying on a bed. Now, you and I, we might read this and overlook this, but notice at the beginning it says they brought him.
[00:05:20] They is not identified in this passage, but it is identified in the parallel passage, which is why I wanted you to Mark chapter two. So would you go back to Mark chapter two? I want to show you kind of the background of this.
[00:05:34] Mark 2, verse 1.
[00:05:43] Mark 2, verse 1 says this. And again he entered into Capernaum after some days, and it was noise that he was in the house.
[00:05:53] And straightway many were gathered together insomuch that there was no room to receive them. No, not so much as about the door. And he preached the word unto them. None of that is in Matthew, in other words, you would think, this is what I'm talking about. You would think that if Jesus went to a place and it was just thronged with people, you would think Matthew would mention it, but he doesn't. He just ignores it all like it didn't even happen. So you would read Matthew and get the impression that this was a private affair. And it was far from that. In actuality, there were a lot of people in the house. Now notice in Mark, chapter two, verse number three, and they come unto him. Again, they is not identify, but we'll see in a minute.
[00:06:38] Bringing one sick of the palsy, which was born, that is carried of four.
[00:06:46] So this man's on a litter essentially, and he's being carried by four others. So the they in Matthew chapter 9, verse 2 refers to those who are carrying this man to Jesus. All right, everybody get that? So continuing Mark there. Mark, verse chapter two, verse four. And when they could not come nigh unto him, for the press, they uncovered the roof where he was.
[00:07:10] And when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay. Now, I don't know about you. Matthew emphasizes the faith of these four. But I would say that probably, unless the man's completely out cold, which I don't think he is, because he gets up and takes his bed and walks out, I don't think the man's like, you know, so I think his faith is involved too. I think that's wrapped all in together. So you have these four guys and his buddy, the buddy is paralyzed, can't go anywhere. And you have these four guys that want to help him. So you have the man's faith there who is sick because he's like, yeah, I'll go. I mean, are you going to let somebody lower you down, you know, from the roof without permission? I mean, not that he could really do anything about it, but that's beside the point. We assume if they were carrying him around, they probably were doing so with permission. Does everybody can we all agree? Can we take a vote right now? All in favor?
[00:08:10] So this man had faith. These four men also had faith. And so they go up on the roof, the flat roof houses back then, and they broke up. The roof destroys apparently someone else's property to let Jesus down. Let Jesus let the paralyzed man down into the midst.
[00:08:29] And in verse 5, notice what it says in Mark 2, 5, When Jesus saw their face. Same thing in Matthew.
[00:08:36] Same thing in Matthew. Now we can go back to Matthew.
[00:08:39] So now you kind of have A background of the full, kind of the fuller picture of what happened. There's a lot of people standing around, and these.
[00:08:49] These four men are doing something by faith. Now, how do we know that? Verse 2 says this. And behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy and Jesus seeing their faith. Jesus seeing their faith. So these four men, including the man who's paralyzed, exercised faith, which is why they're there. Okay, everybody kind of get that. That's why they're there. They're not there for any other reason except that they had faith. Now their faith was tested.
[00:09:24] How easy. How many times have you and I had a swelling of faith, we might say, and we set out to do something by faith.
[00:09:39] And then there was something a little bit kind of a roadblock, a hindrance, a discouragement that kind of stopped us. And we were like, you know, I just don't know.
[00:09:49] You know, it's probably not what the Lord wants. I mean, look at the hindrance and this thing in the way. And our faith withers at the first.
[00:09:59] At the first resistance. And so what do we do? Go back home? That swelling of faith just withers as fast as it swelled, right? That's not what happened here. These men take. They're literally carrying the man on a litter.
[00:10:15] They go to the house and see the crowd. At that point, a lot of us would have been like, oh, well, we'll just have to try next time. Or maybe it just maybe. Maybe it's not God's will for you to be better. You ever thought about that?
[00:10:30] But what do they do? They don't let that hindered them.
[00:10:34] There is a certain persistence in their faith. Their faith is tested slightly and they persist. That's how you know it's the real thing.
[00:10:45] They're convinced that Jesus can help him, so they're not hindered. But they can't get in. Not only see the crowd, they go to the crowd, they push through. I mean, they got a big guy with, you know, on a litter and everything. They can't get through. The houses are not like enormous houses like. Like we have. These are small houses. And so they find another way. Faith found a way. Faith finds a way.
[00:11:10] And they went through all the trouble, made a scene. All of that stuff, all of it was done by faith. And I want you to notice this before we move on and talk more about faith here is that Jesus takes note of their faith. Jesus seeing their faith. Now, just please hold these thoughts in your mind if you. You would, because I'm going to say More about faith in a minute.
[00:11:33] But I want you to see first that Jesus takes note of faith. Not only does he take note of faith, he takes note of lack of faith as well. Let me show you a couple verses that we've already studied. Matthew, chapter 8. Look at verse number 10.
[00:11:57] In verse number 9, the centurion who's not a Jew says, listen, you don't even have to come to my house. I'm not worthy if you'd be under my roof. Just say the word. I'm a man under authority.
[00:12:09] I say you do it. He does it. And I know you are a man of authority. You are the Lord. You say it will be done. I believe that he says it. And Jesus says in verse 10, what does he say?
[00:12:22] He says, when Jesus heard it, he marveled and said unto them that followed, verily I say unto you, I have not found so great what faith. Notice, Jesus noticed faith. That's what stood out.
[00:12:40] He noticed faith.
[00:12:43] Then you go a little bit further down to verse number 26, on the sea of Galilee.
[00:12:51] The guys are panicking because the ship is in a storm.
[00:12:55] And when Jesus calms the storm, he says in verse number right, before he calms the storm, he says, he saith unto them, verse 26, why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Jesus noticed the absence of faith in both cases. Here's what I want you to see. That our Lord has an eye for faith.
[00:13:16] You know, Hebrews 11:6, many of you could quote it, but without faith, it is impossible to please him. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.
[00:13:32] Faith is what gets our Lord's attention.
[00:13:37] Listen now.
[00:13:39] Not works faith, not doing duty. Although that's good faith.
[00:13:50] You know, the Bible teaches that we should be living by faith. We should be serving by faith. We should be obeying by faith.
[00:14:03] Not just out of duty, not just because we're commanded by men, but as a direct response to faith in God. You understand this. Our life is supposed to be lived by faith. It's not supposed to be machinery.
[00:14:22] This is what our Lord notices. We saw it in Matthew 8, twice. We see it in chapter 9.
[00:14:29] Jesus notices their faith. That's the thing that notice. They had great courage. They had zeal. They had a lot of other good things. But what is noted is their faith.
[00:14:45] Now, I want you to. I want to just park a minute talking about faith, because I'm afraid that faith is such a common word you hear in church. That we think of it as basically something that we exercise to get something from God.
[00:15:08] In other words, faith is just something you have great faith. You're praying and you have great faith. And God answers, they have great faith. Look at their faith. Because God answered their prayer. Let me tell you something.
[00:15:21] Faith is not defined that way in Scripture at all.
[00:15:24] Faith is not about getting things from God. It is not about praying. I mean, we pray in faith. It exists in that case. But that is not the primary way faith is exercised, nor the way it's seen.
[00:15:38] It's not seen in that way.
[00:15:41] We think, you know, well, you know, our car's almost out of gas, and so we're just gonna, you know, trust God to get us to the next gas station. Or, you know, listen. That's not the kind of faith we see in Scripture.
[00:15:56] Look at these men just as an example. And then we'll look at a few other passages. I want you to see these men. Jesus said he saw their faith, the four of them and the paralyzed man. Now ask yourself. Think about it. Meditate with me.
[00:16:10] Why are they there?
[00:16:13] They are there because they are fully persuaded that Jesus can heal this man.
[00:16:21] And listen, that happened, that thought, that faith in their heart is not. It's on display for others to see, but it's already been there for a little bit.
[00:16:33] Because back when they were at home, the four of them, the five of them, having a conversation, hearing about what Jesus had done, hearing perhaps hearing Jesus preach himself, because Mark says that Jesus preached the word unto them. So maybe at a different time, maybe they had heard Jesus preach. I have no idea. Maybe they had seen him heal. I don't know what the background of it is, but there was a. There was a basis or a foundation that led them to believe. That's what I want you to see. And so when they were at home, they had a conversation and probably encouraged one another in their faith and said, well, I think Jesus can do it. I think Jesus can do it.
[00:17:07] What we're seeing in Matthew chapter nine, you know what that is? That's the outworking of their faith. Their faith, which started in their heart, that's where faith dwells, led them to actually carry the man to the house. And then seeing the hindrance, climb up on the roof, drop the man down in the midst so that he would be healed. That was all done in direct response to their faith.
[00:17:34] I want to ask you a question.
[00:17:36] How often is faith just words?
[00:17:44] We Baptist people are bad about talking about our faith, but there's no evidence of that faith outworking and actually living out and doing things.
[00:17:56] We talk about it a lot. We say big things about faith, but we don't do it. These men are doing it.
[00:18:03] These men are doing it. Their faith is driving their works.
[00:18:09] You know, it reminds me of James chapter 2.
[00:18:12] Faith without works is dead. I know people abuse that, but that's in the Bible. That's God's word. Here's what it says. Listen, here's what that means.
[00:18:22] Faith does stuff. It is not just words.
[00:18:26] It's not about what we say.
[00:18:30] It's about what we do.
[00:18:33] It's about what we do.
[00:18:39] You know, it's easy to say that we believe this and we believe that and we believe this. We believe this. That is God's will. God wants us to do this. God wants us to do that. But how many of you, how many of us say that or would acknowledge that this is God's will? But we don't do it.
[00:19:01] We express our assent to something in faith. We don't do the thing that we say is God's will.
[00:19:10] We don't do it.
[00:19:13] We should read our Bible. We should pray. We should walk with God. We should evangelize. We should be faithful to our local church. We should. Whatever. Whatever the case. We should love our wives. We should submit to our husbands.
[00:19:27] Right. We should have clean mouths and pure hearts. Right?
[00:19:32] We. Yeah, this is all. Yeah, this is what God. This is what God says. But we don't do it.
[00:19:37] Let me say something. If these men had said, yeah, Jesus can heal him, but they didn't actually take the man to Jesus, what would that say about their faith?
[00:19:49] It is vain. That's not real faith.
[00:19:57] James chapter two says, thou hast faith and I have works. Show me thy faith without thy works and I will show thee my faith by my works.
[00:20:15] Let me tell you something. This is.
[00:20:18] I hope you take it in the spirit in which I give it. But this is a reality.
[00:20:23] It's true of you as well as me.
[00:20:26] If at any point in our Christian life we are not doing what we know and believe to be the will of God, the thing that's lacking is our faith.
[00:20:36] Don't tell me you believe it.
[00:20:39] Don't tell me you believe it.
[00:20:41] Do not say, oh, I believe that we should give the gospel and never give the gospel to other people. Don't say, well, I believe we should be faithful to our local church and be involved in our local church. And then not.
[00:20:54] What we're showing is we don't really believe it.
[00:20:57] That's what we're demonstrating, you know, even. Well, I believe these should be my priorities, you know, and we list those out and we have a, you know, a doctrinal statement of priorities. But we don't. But we don't follow that.
[00:21:10] Well, I just, you know, I make mistakes. No, no, no, no. The problem.
[00:21:13] There are mistakes, I give you that. But the problem is a problem of faith. If we really believed it, we would do it.
[00:21:24] Now, I'm going to show you some scriptures to demonstrate what I'm saying. Look back at numbers, chapter 14, if you would.
[00:21:32] Numbers, chapter 14.
[00:21:58] In numbers 14, we see the children of Israel rebelling. They're in the wilderness. They have sent the spies. Ten were bad and two were good. You've heard that before, right? So the 12 spies have gone out. Ten were bad, two came back and had a good report.
[00:22:15] And in verse number 14, chapter 14, verse 1, and all the congregation lifted up their voice and cried, and the people wept that night. You know why? Because God said in chapter 13, you're not going. You know why? Because all the people wept and cried.
[00:22:31] They wept and cried because of all of the bad report from the 10 spies. And they. The truth is they believed the 10 spies instead of believing Joshua and Caleb. And so they sorrowed. And verse one. They wept that night.
[00:22:51] Now, nobody came. Nobody said, note this. Now, none of the children of Israel said, you know, I just don't believe that God can take us up into the land. Nobody said that. There was always some little flimsy excuse they threw out like this.
[00:23:11] Look at chapter 13, verse number.
[00:23:16] Verse number 26. And they went and came unto Moses and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran and to Kadesh, and brought back word unto them unto all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. And they told them and said, we came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and. And surely it floweth with milk and honey, and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless, the people be strong that dwell in the land. The cities are walled and very great.
[00:23:42] And moreover we saw the children of Anak there. And the Malachites dwell in the land of the south. And the Hittites and the Jebusites and Amorites dwell in the mountains, and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the sea coast of Jordan. And Caleb stilled the people.
[00:23:55] And then Caleb gives his good report, verse 32, and they brought up an evil report, or verse 31, really, to pick up the context. But the men that Went up with him, said we be not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we. You know what that is? Do you know what that verse is? It is a statement of faith.
[00:24:21] They're saying we can't.
[00:24:24] They're saying God can't. I do not believe God can lead us into the land.
[00:24:33] That's what it's about.
[00:24:38] I can't love my husband.
[00:24:43] I can't love my wife. I can't raise my kids right.
[00:24:48] I can't be at church faithfully.
[00:24:52] I certainly can't give money to God's work.
[00:24:57] I can't tell any about anybody about Jesus.
[00:25:02] I can't obey the Lord.
[00:25:05] You see, the question was not cant. The question was faith.
[00:25:12] The question was faith.
[00:25:16] Now look at what he says. Verse 32. And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched out, searched unto the children of Israel, saying, the land through which we have gone to search, it is the land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof. And all the people that we saw in the men are men of great stature. You know what all this is? This is just excuses for their unbelief.
[00:25:39] Okay? All that we're reading here. Excuse me. All the bad things we're reading about the land, true or false, are just flimsy little excuses thrown out. Little dog bones they threw out to people to veil and to hide their unbelief. That's what it's about.
[00:26:00] Verse number 14, or chapter 14, verse 1. In fact, we will drop down for time. Look at verse 8.
[00:26:08] Joshua and Caleb say this.
[00:26:11] Just see the contrast. If the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land and give it us a land which floweth with milk and honey. See that? You know what that is a statement of?
[00:26:24] It's a statement of Faith.
[00:26:27] Read verse 9.
[00:26:29] Only rebel not ye against the Lord, Neither fear ye the people of the land. For they are bread for us Again, Faith, their defense is departed from them. And the Lord is with us. Fear them not. But all the congregation bade stone them with stones.
[00:26:49] Look at verse 11. And the Lord said to Moses, how long will this people provoke me?
[00:26:54] And how long will it be ere they believe me? Notice that ere they what he did not say obey. He said, how long will it be ere they what believe? Here's what you to see about the children of Israel. Did they go into the land at this moment? No. You know why? Well, the giants were too big. The land eateth up the inhabitants. No, those are all little excuses. They didn't believe God. And as a result of their failure of faith, you know what that directly led to?
[00:27:27] Disobedience.
[00:27:29] Here's the principle.
[00:27:31] When we as God's child, as God's children, do not obey God, the problem is not priorities. The problem is not distractions. The problem is faith.
[00:27:45] Faith is directly connected to obedience.
[00:27:49] Obedience to what God says is the fruit of faith. If God really said it, and I really believe it, I will do it.
[00:28:02] Now I need God's grace to do it. No question about that. But if God really said it, and I really believe it, I will do it.
[00:28:13] We have got to stop giving ourselves excuses like the children of Israel do.
[00:28:18] When those five men decided that, when they came to the realization that Jesus could actually heal them, they did it.
[00:28:27] They went.
[00:28:29] Faith had feet.
[00:28:36] We give ourselves. Listen, I'm just trying to be honest with you. We give ourselves a pass and we say, well, this is the reason I can't obey the Lord, and this is the reason I can't do as the Word of God says. And this is the reason. And we tell ourselves this. But the real problem is we don't believe what he's saying.
[00:28:57] We know he says that every one of us will give an account to God. Right? We know that. Every one of us in this room knows that fact.
[00:29:09] But do we respond in faith to that fact?
[00:29:17] They said we can't enter the land. It's impossible. The only question was faith. Look at verse number 24 in chapter 14.
[00:29:27] But my servant Caleb, because he hath had another spirit with him, hath followed me fully, and him will I bring into the land wherein he went, and his seed shall possess it. Look at verse 27. How long shall I bear with this evil congregation which murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me. Why were they murmuring?
[00:29:54] Problem of faith. That's what it was.
[00:29:59] Look at verse 40.
[00:30:02] And they rose up early in the morning. Now this is after the Lord said, well, you ain't going. You're going to turn and go out into the wilderness. They didn't like that. Verse 40 says, and they rose up early in the morning and gat them into the top of the mountain, saying, lo, we be here, and we'll go up into the place unto which the Lord hath promised. For we have sinned. And Moses said, wherefore do ye transgress the commandment of the Lord? But it shall not prosper here. They change their mind. They decide they're going to go but now what? Let me ask you a question. At this point, what does faith look like?
[00:30:35] Faith is, stay put. You're not going. In both cases, the word of God said, in the former, he said, go. They said, God can't, we won't. We don't believe it. Although they didn't say those words. Now the Lord's saying, stay put. You're not going. They said, yes, we are. In both cases, they disobeyed. In both cases, they didn't do God's will. And in both cases, the reason was their faith.
[00:31:04] You can go to Hebrews chapter three. I'll read it for you. You don't have to turn there.
[00:31:09] Hebrews chapter 3, verse number 17. I didn't pull this out of thin air. This is actually written in Hebrews. Hebrews 3, verse number 17 says this.
[00:31:24] But with whom was he grieved? 40 years. Was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcasses fell in the wilderness, and to whom swear he that they should not enter into his rest? But to them that believed not so. We see then that they could not enter in because of.
[00:31:50] Not the giants, not the excuses, because of unbelief.
[00:31:56] Look at one more passage, also in Numbers, chapter 20, numbers 20, verse 8.
[00:32:17] You know the story. This is the story of Moses striking the rock. Verse 7 says this. Then the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, take the rod and gather thou the assembly together, thou and Aaron thy brother. And speak ye unto the rock before their eyes. What did God tell Moses to do? It's very simple. Speak to the rock. That's it. No rod, no strike, nothing like that. Speak to the rock before their eyes, and it shall give forth his water. And thou shalt bring forth to them water out of the rock. So thou shalt give the congregation and their beasts drink.
[00:32:51] Look at verse 11.
[00:32:53] And Moses lifted up his hand and with his rod smote the rock twice.
[00:33:01] And the water came out abundantly. And the congregation drank. There are so many lessons here. But I hasten. Here and there, beasts also. And the Lord spake unto Moses. So let me ask you a question. Before we read that next verse, let me ask you a question. What did Moses do? He smote the rock twice. And in doing so, he what?
[00:33:20] He what?
[00:33:22] He disobeyed. He did not do what God told him to do. He did not do the will of God. Let's put it in terminology we're familiar with. He didn't do what God wanted him to do.
[00:33:31] He didn't do what he knew the Lord wanted him to do. Okay, but notice how the Lord describes that.
[00:33:45] He says, verse 12. And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron because ye what believed me not to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel. Therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.
[00:34:03] What did God remember what I said at the beginning? Jesus. Jesus noted what faith?
[00:34:10] Even in this disobedience with Moses, what did the Lord notice?
[00:34:15] Not just the disobedience, but the faith.
[00:34:22] Listen, whatever it is that you understand to be God's will, as described in Scripture, whatever that thing that we know is God's will, is that we do not do. The reason we don't do it is because we don't believe that it is God's will. And we don't believe that God is serious about it.
[00:34:51] It's a matter of faith. We should stop saying, I believe we should do this. I believe we should do that. I believe we should do this. I believe we should do that.
[00:35:03] Oh, I believe Jesus is the Savior. Then why are you still going to hell?
[00:35:11] I believe there's a great white throne before which all of the world will stand and be judged according to their works. Then why in the world are you not fleeing to the Savior? You don't believe is a lie you're telling yourself.
[00:35:32] That's the truth of it.
[00:35:35] And that is what the Lord is looking for. Because the moment he sees a seed of faith in a person's heart, he knows if that faith is real. And God knows if it's real. He knows that it will bear fruit which will produce all the other things. And all we do is look on the outside and we see somebody, you know? And again, can you go through the motions of church and everything and not have faith? Absolutely. But God sees that. That's why he only pays attention to the faith. He knows that all these other things will follow in it, in its footsteps and in its wake. He knows that.
[00:36:16] I just want you to see it from the Bible.
[00:36:19] These men in Matthew chapter. In Matthew, chapter nine, they believed God.
[00:36:26] They believed that Jesus would heal them. And they were fully persuaded. And that's why we see them there.
[00:36:35] I wonder.
[00:36:43] The problem is the heart of unbelief.
[00:36:47] Now, back in Matthew, chapter nine.
[00:36:50] I'm almost finished.
[00:36:53] Matthew, chapter nine and verse number, verse number two.
[00:37:03] And behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy lying on a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said unto the sick of the palsy, son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee. He says, seeing their Faith. We already know the background. This was not just one person's faith, but several people's faith. And what is in view here is not which is so interesting. Although I believe the man who was sick of the palsy had faith. What is in view is not that man's faith, but the faith of really the other men who brought him, as we've already seen.
[00:37:35] And Jesus responded to that faith, not just a single individual's, but their faith as a group.
[00:37:44] The first thing I want you to see. I have two things I want to say, and we'll be finished. The first thing I want you to see is just think with me.
[00:37:53] These four men had faith that led them, that directly resulted in them taking this man to Jesus to be healed.
[00:38:02] And as a result of that, he was healed. Their faith directly led to this man being healed of paralysis, for crying out loud. Paralysis. That's a big deal.
[00:38:18] I want you to understand, I want us all to understand this, that our faith, remember, that's why I spent so much time a minute ago talking about what faith actually is.
[00:38:30] Our faith, which directly leads to our obedience is the root that leads to the fruit of obedience. Our faith directly affects others. Did you know that this man was healed because of the faith of other people? Not just his own faith, but others directly led to his own healing.
[00:38:53] Take a peek real quick at Hebrews chapter 11. I want to show you another man where this is also true.
[00:39:00] This is a very familiar story, but I want you to see it. Hebrews 11, verse number seven.
[00:39:13] What did Noah do?
[00:39:15] What did Noah do? Just come on.
[00:39:18] He built an ark, right? Why?
[00:39:23] He built an ark by faith. God said build an ark. He believed God's word, though he had never seen the rain. He did not know of a flood. He believed God. And as a result, his faith produced works which was the actual building of the ark. Please, brothers and sisters, please see the man's. The result of this man's faith and how it affected others.
[00:39:48] Verse 7 of Hebrews 11 says this by faith. Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark. Here it is. To the saving of his house.
[00:40:04] Did Noah's faith affect other people? You better believe it. His faith was the reason that his family was saved.
[00:40:14] Listen, whether you obey the Lord by faith because you are convinced something is God's will, and you know what the scripture says. And you say, I believe it, I must do it. This is what the word of God says. The Lord's will is this. I must do it. That will directly affect your family. It will directly affect your kids, whether you read your Bible and walk with God and stay off the porn and whether you stay away from liquor and whether you're faithful to your wife and whether you are honest in your dealings. And all of those things that we obey because of faith in what God says, those things will directly affect your family. They will affect your job. They will affect this church. They will affect everybody around you. Your faith affects them. And if your faith fails, they will be affected. Imagine if Noah's faith failed. We'd all be in it. In fact, I don't even think we'd be here.
[00:41:15] It's not just about us.
[00:41:18] Our faith directly affects other people. It was true in Matthew 9. Those four men's faith affected whether their faith would actually produce the works. And it did. And he was healed.
[00:41:35] Second thing I want you to see is this.
[00:41:38] Hey, have you thought about whether. Please listen to me. Have you thought about whether you believe God to tell other people about Jesus? Because that is his will. He said it over and over, right?
[00:41:51] He said to do it. I'm not even specifying when or how or how often. That's not even my point. But have you ever thought that maybe people might perish because we fail to do it?
[00:42:08] Our family members might go to hell with no warning at all because we do not believe God enough to obey him, to send them a letter and let them know about Jesus or a gospel tract or of Facebook message.
[00:42:28] I mean, how will your kids be affected if you don't believe God enough to obey him, to teach them the ways of God, how will they? They will be directly, negatively affected.
[00:42:46] They might listen. They might go away from God perish.
[00:42:52] Think about your grandchildren, the church.
[00:43:03] Your faith affects this body. Do you know that?
[00:43:09] Whether you, by faith, listen to what the Lord says and act upon it like we've been reading, or whether you don't, I think of our mission conference coming up.
[00:43:20] It'll be directly affected by your faith. You know that. Whether we can support missionaries and to what degree and who we can support and where they go, all of that is directly related to whether you and I obey the Lord by faith and believe Him.
[00:43:40] The last thing I want you to see is this.
[00:43:45] This man was healed as a result of faith, as seen as a team effort.
[00:43:53] Not just one man's faith, but a bunch of people's faith.
[00:43:58] To get this one man to Jesus required a team effort. All four of them believe that Jesus can heal him and are convinced of that. It was not something that a single person could do alone.
[00:44:12] You know, you think about Matthew 8. That's why the centurion servant was at home, full grown man.
[00:44:20] One guy couldn't bring him. In this case, you have four guys bringing the one guy, right? Each one of these four men had to exercise faith. And when each one of these four men exercised faith, that's when they had corporate faith.
[00:44:35] And it was corporate faith that was needed to get. Get someone help that needed help. It was corporate faith. And without corporate faith, the faith of all of us, he wouldn't have gotten to Jesus and been healed.
[00:44:54] Consider this.
[00:44:57] I'm not making this up. This isn't preacher talk, okay? Think about it. This is true both in the story and it is true outside of the story.
[00:45:06] A man was forgiven of his sin because of the faith of four guys together.
[00:45:19] Jesus didn't just whither is easier to say? We'll cover this later. But whither is easier to say? You know which one is easier to say? Arise, take up thy bed and walk. Jesus said, son, thy sins be forgiven thee on purpose.
[00:45:30] He wanted us to know that he was forgiven this man. Think about it. Four guys have faith together, resulting in a team, an effort, a team effort by faith. That's what we have here.
[00:45:44] And the result was a man was forgiven of his sin. I thought, what a picture of our church's mission effort, of our mission conference.
[00:45:58] It's you and me believing the Lord and saying, lord, this is what you said for us to do. This is our purpose in the earth. This is why we here, to let people know about Jesus. He said, go ye therefore and teach all nations. That's not just to the 12, that comes down to all of us. And we respond, each one of us, each one of us says, lord, that's what you said, Lord, I'm going to do my best to take part in that, that corporate faith, that faith comes together as a team effort. And you know the result. People who had sinned, who were bound by sin, who are going to perish in their sin are forgiven because somebody went to the mission field and we helped them go.
[00:46:41] So in actual reality, people are forgiven of their sin because of the faith of a group.
[00:46:52] I wonder if this year in our mission conference, I wonder if we're going to really going to really start taking this great commission seriously and believe it.
[00:47:04] I wonder if there's going to be people among us that say, lord, this is what you said to do, and I am giving myself to you. If you want to send me to the mission field. Then you send me to the mission field. I will go.
[00:47:20] This is what you said.
[00:47:25] Are there going to be people that will surrender to God in that way?
[00:47:29] That some might be forgiven?
[00:47:34] This is what it means to respond to what the Lord says in faith.
[00:47:45] This little old church in Greenville. I want to tell you something.
[00:47:51] If we say yes to faith, if we respond to God in faith and obey him by faith, I want to promise you something.
[00:48:01] People will be forgiven of their sin as a direct result of our combined faith in the Lord and His Word. It will happen.
[00:48:15] Let's pray.
