Jesus Saves a Boy (John 4:43-54)

WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.040 --> 00:00:04.960 Earn your attention with me to John Chapter, for this is the end of 2 00:00:05.080 --> 00:00:11.910 this chapter John, for I'm going to read from Verse Forty Three To the 3 00:00:11.949 --> 00:00:17.589 end of the chapter. Let's give attention to God's word. After two days 4 00:00:17.629 --> 00:00:22.219 he departed for Galilee, for Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no 5 00:00:22.420 --> 00:00:27.100 honor in his own hometown. So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans 6 00:00:27.140 --> 00:00:30.899 welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast, 7 00:00:31.379 --> 00:00:34.740 for they too had gone to the feast. So he came again to 8 00:00:34.859 --> 00:00:39.890 Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water wine. And at Copernum 9 00:00:40.369 --> 00:00:45.450 there was an official whose son was ill. When this man heard that Jesus 10 00:00:45.530 --> 00:00:49.530 had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and asked him to 11 00:00:49.609 --> 00:00:53.600 come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 12 00:00:54.679 --> 00:00:58.640 So Jesus said to him, unless you see signs and wonders, you 13 00:00:58.759 --> 00:01:02.880 will not believe. The official said to him, sir, come down before 14 00:01:02.920 --> 00:01:07.829 my child dies. Jesus said to him, go, your son will live. 15 00:01:10.150 --> 00:01:14.030 The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went on his 16 00:01:14.109 --> 00:01:18.469 way, as he was going down, his servants met him and told him 17 00:01:18.510 --> 00:01:22.459 that he, his son, was recovering. So he asked them the hour 18 00:01:22.579 --> 00:01:25.780 when he began to get better and they said to him yesterday, at the 19 00:01:25.819 --> 00:01:30.500 seventh hour the fever left him. The father knew that was the hour when 20 00:01:30.540 --> 00:01:34.329 Jesus had send to said to him your son will live, and he himself 21 00:01:34.450 --> 00:01:41.409 believed and all his household. And this this knell, the second sign that 22 00:01:41.489 --> 00:01:49.640 Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee. Amen maybe seated in 23 00:01:49.799 --> 00:02:00.670 this passage we have this interesting contrast between Jesus's strong words. Unless you see 24 00:02:00.670 --> 00:02:07.509 signs and wonders, you will not believe. Reminiscent of rebukes, he gives 25 00:02:07.550 --> 00:02:14.789 another places about signs and wonders. Well, also we have John's comment at 26 00:02:14.789 --> 00:02:17.020 the end of this section that this was the second sign that he did, 27 00:02:17.180 --> 00:02:23.939 and indeed it was a sign that he gave. There is, I'm here 28 00:02:23.659 --> 00:02:30.889 in this in this story that John Records for us about this event when Jesus 29 00:02:30.009 --> 00:02:37.330 went back to Galilee and met this official, important lessons for us about faith, 30 00:02:37.370 --> 00:02:42.889 about what it means to believe in Jesus, about the results that come 31 00:02:43.050 --> 00:02:49.080 from believing him. Another and other things along these lines. I'm just to 32 00:02:49.520 --> 00:02:51.840 remind I know I just read it, but I think it's always helpful to 33 00:02:52.360 --> 00:02:55.199 just review the story a little bit. I'm partly for those who have heard 34 00:02:55.240 --> 00:02:59.590 it for the first time. I'm partly for those who've got a little distracted 35 00:02:59.789 --> 00:03:07.030 the first time. It's helpful, but just to review it. Jesus comes 36 00:03:07.469 --> 00:03:12.349 back to Galilee, a place he's been before, to Cana and that area, 37 00:03:12.900 --> 00:03:15.139 John tells us. Or remember, Jesus was here before. This is 38 00:03:15.340 --> 00:03:21.139 where he turned water into wine. We get a sense that the word is 39 00:03:21.460 --> 00:03:25.020 spreading, just as we saw when Jesus was in Samaria. He told the 40 00:03:25.099 --> 00:03:29.729 woman at the well. She went and told her town. The word spread 41 00:03:30.689 --> 00:03:34.129 the things that he had done in Judea had the news had spread not just 42 00:03:34.289 --> 00:03:38.689 through Judea but now up in Galilee. John tells us why that was. 43 00:03:38.849 --> 00:03:42.520 There were folks who were there when Jesus was there. I'm doing the things 44 00:03:42.560 --> 00:03:46.360 that he was doing, and now they go back home and they're telling people 45 00:03:46.400 --> 00:03:50.599 about it. This reminds us over and over again. John is showing us 46 00:03:50.599 --> 00:03:55.270 how this word is spreading, how the the news of Jesus and who he 47 00:03:55.509 --> 00:04:02.789 is is is indeed going out into the world. And so there he meets 48 00:04:02.789 --> 00:04:08.710 a man and official. It's doesn't say exactly what kind of official he was. 49 00:04:08.909 --> 00:04:15.779 Commentators disagree as to whether he was a gentile or not. Nevertheless, 50 00:04:15.819 --> 00:04:21.699 Jesus meets this, we could say, a high ranking person of some sort, 51 00:04:23.459 --> 00:04:30.610 and this person has a problem, very serious problem. His son is 52 00:04:30.810 --> 00:04:35.449 about to die. We have actually a number of accounts throughout the scriptures, 53 00:04:35.490 --> 00:04:41.279 and maybe in your lives as well, of children who are about to die 54 00:04:42.279 --> 00:04:46.000 and the the the sadness that comes with that, the pleading that comes with 55 00:04:46.160 --> 00:04:50.879 that, of the desire for God's salvation. This man is no different. 56 00:04:51.910 --> 00:04:58.509 He comes to Jesus and he he asks him to come down, come to 57 00:04:59.069 --> 00:05:06.699 my child before he dies. Jesus says go, your son will live. 58 00:05:09.420 --> 00:05:13.500 And interestingly, the man it says he believes right here at this point. 59 00:05:14.579 --> 00:05:18.699 He doesn't believe later, when he does also believe later. But his turning 60 00:05:18.860 --> 00:05:24.610 point is not when he finds out when his son was healed. Right. 61 00:05:24.649 --> 00:05:28.129 It's only later that he asks the servant and the Servant says it was at 62 00:05:28.129 --> 00:05:30.129 the seventh hour, and he kind of connects all the dots and it of 63 00:05:30.209 --> 00:05:34.370 course encourages his faith, right, he says, and he believed. What 64 00:05:34.569 --> 00:05:40.879 happens there is and his whole household. I'm some I read one commentator that 65 00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:46.839 suggested a little bit speculatively that perhaps the man asks this question of the servant 66 00:05:46.959 --> 00:05:50.470 not just of his own curiosity but for the purpose of spreading the word, 67 00:05:51.029 --> 00:05:58.790 for the purpose of seeing his whole household come to faith in Christ as well, 68 00:06:00.149 --> 00:06:02.069 and all these things. We see a lot of different things about who 69 00:06:02.110 --> 00:06:05.819 Jesus is, what is mission is, and I want to to think about 70 00:06:05.860 --> 00:06:11.620 some of those with you this morning. The first thing I think we can 71 00:06:11.660 --> 00:06:16.300 observe here is that Jesus, Miss Jesus, Jesus is mission is truly for 72 00:06:16.459 --> 00:06:21.810 the whole world. We're only in John Chapter Four, and think about and 73 00:06:21.889 --> 00:06:28.050 Jesus hasn't even traveled that far. And think about who has been affected already. 74 00:06:29.290 --> 00:06:34.519 We've had backwater GALILEAN's, high ranking Jewish leaders, men, women, 75 00:06:35.000 --> 00:06:41.680 honorable people, dishonorable people, secular people, religious people, family members of 76 00:06:41.720 --> 00:06:46.079 Jesus, non family members of Jesus. As Jesus is going out, we 77 00:06:46.199 --> 00:06:55.589 see very quickly that there is this great broadness, broadness in the way that 78 00:06:55.709 --> 00:07:00.779 Jesus is bringing a light to the world, is how John Describes it, 79 00:07:02.100 --> 00:07:06.660 and this leads us to a truth with too corresponding parts. The first one 80 00:07:06.779 --> 00:07:13.339 is that no one has a particular claim on Jesus. No person here or 81 00:07:13.420 --> 00:07:17.649 anywhere in the world is more privileged than another there before God, by virtue 82 00:07:17.649 --> 00:07:24.649 of their ancestry, ethnicity, social status, good works, money, power, 83 00:07:24.730 --> 00:07:30.079 land, knowledge, anything that might mark us out as being higher or 84 00:07:30.319 --> 00:07:34.920 lower, rightly or wrongly, in this world. None of it gives us 85 00:07:35.000 --> 00:07:41.439 any edge before God. None of us have a special back door channel, 86 00:07:41.519 --> 00:07:46.509 none of us have a extra way into the presence of the Lord. Jesus 87 00:07:46.509 --> 00:07:48.430 says, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the 88 00:07:48.430 --> 00:07:53.750 light. No one comes to the father except through me. It's not through 89 00:07:53.790 --> 00:08:01.100 our works, it's not through our backgrounds, are education anything else, only 90 00:08:01.339 --> 00:08:07.300 through him. No one has a particular claim on Jesus because before Him we're 91 00:08:07.339 --> 00:08:13.930 all just weakened, helpless sinners. He is our only way. There's nothing 92 00:08:15.009 --> 00:08:18.250 that we can bring. But this has a corresponding side to it, and 93 00:08:18.689 --> 00:08:24.170 that's this. And that means that none of us are excluded from the promises 94 00:08:24.250 --> 00:08:28.600 he's makes because of these things either. It means that, just as none 95 00:08:28.639 --> 00:08:35.200 of us have a particular edge or a particular way into the presence of God, 96 00:08:35.759 --> 00:08:39.279 it also means that none of us are excluded either because of these things, 97 00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:45.309 wherever the world would push us aside, wherever the world would treat us 98 00:08:45.350 --> 00:08:50.549 poorly because of things in our pasts that we have done, things that we 99 00:08:50.870 --> 00:08:54.980 have no control over at all. Whatever it is, God promises that all 100 00:08:56.100 --> 00:09:01.820 who come to him and faith will be received by him, that he saves 101 00:09:01.980 --> 00:09:09.539 all those who put their trust in him. Jesus's mission is a very broad 102 00:09:11.529 --> 00:09:15.970 a second observation we can make from this passage is that Jesus is mission is 103 00:09:16.049 --> 00:09:22.889 not just about doing fancy miracles. This is very important because some Christians teach 104 00:09:22.129 --> 00:09:31.320 and live their lives in a way where signs and wonders are everything everything. 105 00:09:31.360 --> 00:09:35.480 I have had many friends and even grew up in some environments like this, 106 00:09:37.720 --> 00:09:43.190 where signs and miracles and wonders it's all they talk about, it's all they 107 00:09:43.350 --> 00:09:48.629 want. You can go into a certain bookstores and and read the titles of 108 00:09:48.710 --> 00:09:52.389 books. You know how to get your sign, how to get your miracle, 109 00:09:52.669 --> 00:09:56.580 how to find this amazing thing. And so, in this view, 110 00:09:56.659 --> 00:10:01.580 of the Christian life. The Christian is one who's simply searching for that next 111 00:10:01.779 --> 00:10:09.330 moment, that next experience, that God thing that happens. Miracles and signs, 112 00:10:09.409 --> 00:10:15.970 visions, words from God, amazing things, they're everything, so much 113 00:10:16.009 --> 00:10:20.889 so that they become the source of faith, reason for their faith, the 114 00:10:20.049 --> 00:10:26.279 hope for their faith. People that believe this way they ground their their life, 115 00:10:26.519 --> 00:10:33.600 their piety, their hope on these things, and what ends up happening 116 00:10:33.759 --> 00:10:37.429 is that their faith goes up and down, up and down, and correspondence 117 00:10:37.470 --> 00:10:45.190 to how frequently they experience what they perceive as this power or thing from God. 118 00:10:46.789 --> 00:10:48.190 I haven't had a sign in a while, I haven't had a vision 119 00:10:48.190 --> 00:10:50.620 in a while, I haven't had a word from the Lord. I'm feeling 120 00:10:50.659 --> 00:10:54.059 dry, I'm feeling separated, and it's up and it's down, and it's 121 00:10:54.059 --> 00:11:00.100 up and it's down. This is a very dangerous way to live and it's 122 00:11:00.179 --> 00:11:05.529 not saving. It doesn't bring us salvation merely to experience the amazing things of 123 00:11:05.649 --> 00:11:11.009 God. There were many people throughout the scriptures who followed Jesus. We read 124 00:11:11.250 --> 00:11:15.610 people that went from town to town, place to place, that heard of 125 00:11:15.690 --> 00:11:22.919 the things he did and yet receive no eternal benefit from them, and sometimes 126 00:11:22.000 --> 00:11:28.759 Jesus even rebukes people concerning signs and miracles. Sometimes he even refuses to give 127 00:11:28.799 --> 00:11:33.629 them, as I think he is also doing here when he says to this 128 00:11:33.830 --> 00:11:37.909 man who asked, will you come save my son? Unless you see signs 129 00:11:37.950 --> 00:11:46.070 and miracles are signs and wonders, you will not believe. Want to share 130 00:11:46.110 --> 00:11:52.340 with you a quote from a German Lutheran contemporary of Martin Luther Johannes's brands. 131 00:11:52.580 --> 00:11:58.779 He writes it is not a true faith which is conceived from miracles and wonders 132 00:11:58.820 --> 00:12:05.409 or signs, for miracles are merely seals and witnesses. A seal certifies nothing 133 00:12:05.570 --> 00:12:11.370 new except what has already been committed to writing. In the same way, 134 00:12:11.409 --> 00:12:16.679 witnesses say nothing new, but they bear witness to the things which have been 135 00:12:16.759 --> 00:12:22.960 heard or seen. Thus, miracles do not confer faith and they do not 136 00:12:22.159 --> 00:12:28.919 take something uncertain and make it certain, but they confirm something that already is 137 00:12:28.919 --> 00:12:35.549 certain. They do not make believing persons out of unbelieving persons, but they 138 00:12:35.669 --> 00:12:41.669 confirm already believing persons in their faith. Now brands puts this in a fairly 139 00:12:41.789 --> 00:12:46.460 black and white way, and I think he's right to do that. There 140 00:12:46.620 --> 00:12:50.500 is, of course, a lot of room for gray. You remember doubting 141 00:12:50.659 --> 00:12:56.100 Thomas. We call him right, and he he Jesus says, put your 142 00:12:56.220 --> 00:13:01.289 finger in my side, right, and it was upon doing that that he 143 00:13:01.450 --> 00:13:05.210 then believed. He saw this thing and believed. But remember what Jesus says 144 00:13:05.250 --> 00:13:07.690 after that. He said is blessed are those who believe and don't see. 145 00:13:09.129 --> 00:13:15.360 Right. There's the sense in which Thomas. He was he I think we 146 00:13:15.559 --> 00:13:18.879 would be fair to say that he had faith, but he was struggling, 147 00:13:18.600 --> 00:13:24.279 and that's where signs and miracles do help us. Later we're going to partake 148 00:13:24.360 --> 00:13:28.870 of the Lord's supper and we confess from the scriptures that it is a sign 149 00:13:30.029 --> 00:13:35.269 and a seal, not proclaiming anything new, not doing anything different, except 150 00:13:35.350 --> 00:13:43.220 ceiling what you are hearing right now in the word. They confirmed to us. 151 00:13:43.340 --> 00:13:48.539 They strengthen our faith, and that's what Jesus that's why Jesus does this 152 00:13:48.779 --> 00:13:54.059 miracle here, to teach us about his mission, to confirm our faith in 153 00:13:54.179 --> 00:14:00.049 it. Jesus is miracles reveal his mission. His work and his life are 154 00:14:00.129 --> 00:14:07.129 about health and strength and growth. But they're only signs, signs pointing to 155 00:14:07.289 --> 00:14:11.080 him as the one who brings these things, who brings them in a greater 156 00:14:11.200 --> 00:14:18.360 way than it seems to many others. In fact, through his own death, 157 00:14:20.600 --> 00:14:24.029 Jesus would bring about the greatest miracle, the defeat of death and the 158 00:14:24.149 --> 00:14:28.470 resurrection of life, something that is anticipated here in this boy who is on 159 00:14:28.549 --> 00:14:37.669 the doorstep of death and rises up and is made well, hear what I'm 160 00:14:37.710 --> 00:14:41.299 saying. Clearly, I'm not saying don't believe in miracles, because John Clearly 161 00:14:41.460 --> 00:14:46.980 says this is the second sign that Jesus did right. We're supposed to believe 162 00:14:46.500 --> 00:14:52.220 the miracle. But the point is not don't believe in miracles, but the 163 00:14:52.299 --> 00:14:56.490 point is don't separate them from the one who is doing the work. Don't 164 00:14:56.490 --> 00:15:03.330 separate the signs from the one who is being pointed to. Don't go around 165 00:15:03.649 --> 00:15:09.600 hoping and trusting for this experience or that experience or this wonder or that wonder 166 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:20.559 and miss the very thing that they are I'm teaching you when they teach you 167 00:15:22.110 --> 00:15:31.470 believe, believe. Now this brings me to my third point, which is 168 00:15:31.590 --> 00:15:37.500 that faith is hard. Belief can be difficult sometimes, like this official, 169 00:15:37.779 --> 00:15:43.340 like Nicodemus, like the Samaritan woman, like Jesus's own mother, and all 170 00:15:43.379 --> 00:15:46.139 of these conversations, in these meetings Jesus has had up to this point, 171 00:15:46.779 --> 00:15:50.889 we see him at work, but not always at work in the ways that 172 00:15:52.009 --> 00:15:56.889 people expect. Jesus mother says, we have a problem here, and he 173 00:15:56.970 --> 00:16:00.090 says, woman, it's not my time, and she has to wait and 174 00:16:00.210 --> 00:16:07.759 rest and say do whatever he tells you. Jesus Nicodemus comes to Jesus and 175 00:16:07.879 --> 00:16:10.960 says, rabbi, I have these questions for you, and Jesus says, 176 00:16:10.960 --> 00:16:14.080 you're a teacher of the law, you don't even understand what you're talking about. 177 00:16:15.039 --> 00:16:21.309 Jesus says to him strange and mysterious things about being born again. Jesus 178 00:16:21.389 --> 00:16:25.350 comes to the woman at the well, asks her for a drink of water 179 00:16:25.509 --> 00:16:26.990 and, well, we've spent some time on that. You know what happens 180 00:16:27.029 --> 00:16:36.620 next. A strange conversation that ultimately ends up exposing her sins and that she 181 00:16:36.820 --> 00:16:47.970 was trying to hide. Faith sometimes is a struggle. Sometimes it even comes 182 00:16:48.009 --> 00:16:53.169 with rebukes, with the scalpel of the Lord, as he as our surge 183 00:16:53.250 --> 00:17:00.610 and works on US painful things. Again, I would like to quote from 184 00:17:00.610 --> 00:17:07.440 brand's he says, but how is it that Christ makes faith stronger by hard 185 00:17:07.599 --> 00:17:11.680 and adversarial responses? Right, you come to Jesus and say, right, 186 00:17:11.759 --> 00:17:15.630 here's this man, my boy is sick, I need your help. Why 187 00:17:15.630 --> 00:17:18.470 are you saying this stuff about? Unless there are signs of miracles, you 188 00:17:18.509 --> 00:17:22.150 won't believe. I'm here because I trust you. Right, I'm here. 189 00:17:22.309 --> 00:17:27.750 Why does Jesus say this hard thing to this man who's come to him for 190 00:17:27.910 --> 00:17:33.099 help? You could ask this about your own life. Why does Jesus do 191 00:17:33.220 --> 00:17:41.259 a hard things in your life when you're asking him for help again, brand's 192 00:17:41.339 --> 00:17:47.250 how is it that Christ makes faith stronger by a hard and adversarial response to 193 00:17:47.369 --> 00:17:51.569 this man in particular? Does he not in fact make it much weaker? 194 00:17:52.849 --> 00:17:56.690 You are speaking truly brand's rights, but you should learn the way God works. 195 00:17:57.680 --> 00:18:02.920 He strikes in order to heal, he afflicts in order to console, 196 00:18:03.519 --> 00:18:07.680 he destroys in order to save, he kills in order to give life, 197 00:18:07.599 --> 00:18:12.269 and so Christ makes the faith of the royal official weaker so that it may 198 00:18:12.309 --> 00:18:18.990 be made stronger. He does his alien work in order to do his proper 199 00:18:18.190 --> 00:18:25.150 work. People sometimes will say that such and such a thing, that was 200 00:18:25.190 --> 00:18:27.539 a god thing, and what they mean is what the official will say later. 201 00:18:27.579 --> 00:18:33.539 Right. We recognize these this amazing way in which this event corresponds to 202 00:18:33.619 --> 00:18:38.940 to that event, and we say wow, God was surely in that and 203 00:18:40.140 --> 00:18:45.170 truly that was a god thing, something to notice, something to name and 204 00:18:45.410 --> 00:18:52.329 praise God and proclaim and believe, even as his whole household did. But 205 00:18:52.450 --> 00:18:56.759 we want to be careful when we use language like that, not to be 206 00:18:56.279 --> 00:19:02.960 limiting God, not to be seeing sort of this moment and this amazing timing 207 00:19:03.200 --> 00:19:07.160 is as a God thing, but not the word that he heard when he 208 00:19:07.440 --> 00:19:14.029 came from Judeata Galilee, or not the path that he walked on on his 209 00:19:14.150 --> 00:19:18.190 way to go see Jesus, not the things that happen the next day and 210 00:19:18.230 --> 00:19:22.789 the next day and the next day after that. It's important because, as 211 00:19:22.869 --> 00:19:27.660 Paul says, we see the things of God through a glass darkly. Have 212 00:19:27.740 --> 00:19:32.140 you ever tried to look through like if you pick up your glass at lunchtime 213 00:19:32.259 --> 00:19:36.779 today and you look through it at the world right, does it look like? 214 00:19:37.779 --> 00:19:41.210 Well, it's distorted. Right, you're seeing reality, but you're seeing 215 00:19:41.329 --> 00:19:48.569 it not right right. It's it's bent. It's there but hard to see. 216 00:19:48.849 --> 00:19:52.839 There's a limited scope of view. This is so true when we think 217 00:19:52.880 --> 00:19:59.960 about the work God is doing. God is always at work, even in 218 00:20:00.039 --> 00:20:03.279 the things we don't like, even in his rebukes, even in his hard 219 00:20:03.440 --> 00:20:10.029 statements, even in his nose. He may make you wait for things, 220 00:20:11.349 --> 00:20:15.910 but faith goes forward all the same. We don't have to know all his 221 00:20:17.190 --> 00:20:22.339 plan, we just have to know him. In that way, faith is 222 00:20:22.460 --> 00:20:26.980 blind in one sense, but not in another. It's blind in the sense 223 00:20:26.019 --> 00:20:30.859 that we don't know everything that God knows. If that's what blindness is, 224 00:20:32.180 --> 00:20:37.009 all right, I guess. I guess we're blind, but it's not blind 225 00:20:37.089 --> 00:20:41.369 in the sense that it depends on nothing except, sort of, I don't 226 00:20:41.369 --> 00:20:45.849 know, optimism in one's heart. Faith is not trusting that one has mastered 227 00:20:45.970 --> 00:20:51.240 the universe and knows all things and knows the secret plan and will of God. 228 00:20:52.440 --> 00:20:56.000 Faith is knowing God as he is revealed himself, as he has made 229 00:20:56.119 --> 00:21:00.160 his promises in Christ as he shows to us over and over again in his 230 00:21:00.200 --> 00:21:06.309 scriptures that Jesus is the one in if we believe in him, we have 231 00:21:06.549 --> 00:21:12.069 life, eternal life welling up in you, as he says to the woman 232 00:21:12.150 --> 00:21:17.549 at the well, or as he says to the son or the father, 233 00:21:17.869 --> 00:21:22.259 go he lives, John says. If we believe in him, we have 234 00:21:22.539 --> 00:21:26.019 life in his name. That's what these things teach us and that is what 235 00:21:26.779 --> 00:21:34.529 we can depend on. One more long quote, and it's the last one, 236 00:21:34.650 --> 00:21:41.450 from Philip my lengthen he writes this shows us what the nature of faith 237 00:21:41.529 --> 00:21:47.559 is, namely to conceive a trust in God that he will save us. 238 00:21:48.079 --> 00:21:52.039 How and when and through what a flickans. None of that concerns us. 239 00:21:52.519 --> 00:21:57.240 Believe and you will be saved, even if all creatures should oppose you with 240 00:21:57.599 --> 00:22:03.630 every bad thing. Thus Abraham leaves the Promised Land, not knowing where it 241 00:22:03.710 --> 00:22:08.910 would be entered. Thus he awaits the promised offspring, although he was commanded 242 00:22:10.029 --> 00:22:14.710 to kill his son. Thus Moses leads out the children of Israel, although 243 00:22:14.710 --> 00:22:18.460 he does not know how God will defend them against the might of Pharaoh. 244 00:22:18.420 --> 00:22:22.579 When he stands at the Red Sea, not knowing how they will escape, 245 00:22:22.900 --> 00:22:29.980 he commands them to stand firm and see the mighty deeds of God. That's 246 00:22:30.009 --> 00:22:34.529 what we do as Christians. We stand at the tumultuous sea, filled with 247 00:22:34.730 --> 00:22:41.009 chaos and unknowing things and death and fear and all the rest, with the 248 00:22:41.250 --> 00:22:49.400 army of the world against our backs and we wait on the Lord. But 249 00:22:49.519 --> 00:22:53.640 these miracles, these signs that Jesus are showing us and that he's getting to 250 00:22:53.720 --> 00:22:57.630 us remind us and are telling us and teaching us over and over again, 251 00:22:59.150 --> 00:23:03.309 that we have every reason to there's no kneasn't no reason to doubt. Abraham 252 00:23:03.470 --> 00:23:08.509 did come into the promised land, the Israelites did pass through the Red Sea, 253 00:23:10.390 --> 00:23:15.180 the man's son was healed, and so on and on and on. 254 00:23:15.339 --> 00:23:21.539 Ultimately, this leads us to the cross, doesn't it? Where Jesus died, 255 00:23:22.059 --> 00:23:26.609 the one who is supposed to save US died, but in his death 256 00:23:26.769 --> 00:23:33.650 he took on our sins as a perfect sacrifice and overcame death. He rose 257 00:23:33.809 --> 00:23:42.480 from the dead. He had victory in the cross. Is Jesus powerful to 258 00:23:42.599 --> 00:23:48.440 save? Absolutely he's powerful to save, just as he promised to do. 259 00:23:48.680 --> 00:23:52.119 This is why we put our faith in him, and this is why we 260 00:23:52.759 --> 00:23:56.950 put our trust in him. Here's an interesting question. I'll end with this. 261 00:23:57.710 --> 00:24:03.990 Can a mere word from Jesus hold so much power? The man wants 262 00:24:04.029 --> 00:24:10.420 him to come down to his son. Right, come, right, but 263 00:24:10.500 --> 00:24:15.339 Jesus, why don't need to come, I can do it right here and 264 00:24:15.539 --> 00:24:19.980 do it anywhere. Why? Because the word of God is powerful, it's 265 00:24:21.019 --> 00:24:25.730 affective. It's compared in scripture to a sword, for example, that is 266 00:24:25.769 --> 00:24:33.410 able to to cut. Can a mirror word from Jesus holds so much power? 267 00:24:34.569 --> 00:24:41.240 Go your son lives, get up, walk, come to me and 268 00:24:41.400 --> 00:24:48.359 you will be saved. Miraculous. Yes, the word of Jesus can hold 269 00:24:48.359 --> 00:24:52.069 so much power, and it's that, and it's because of that that the 270 00:24:52.190 --> 00:25:00.750 word of God went out and has gone out into all the world and that 271 00:25:00.869 --> 00:25:06.269 now there are people, there are but believers like us all over the World 272 00:25:06.309 --> 00:25:11.700 Worshiping and serving our Lord and Savior. Because, as Paul writes and Romans, 273 00:25:11.819 --> 00:25:15.460 the Gospel, this good news about Jesus and who he is and what 274 00:25:15.660 --> 00:25:22.329 he did, what he's doing. That Gospel is the power of God unto 275 00:25:22.410 --> 00:25:33.410 salvation, first to the Jews and then also to the gentiles. God healed 276 00:25:33.490 --> 00:25:40.599 this man's son from his illness, but on the cross Jesus did much more 277 00:25:40.680 --> 00:25:45.119 than that. He took on the sins of the world so that we wouldn't 278 00:25:45.119 --> 00:25:49.789 be saved just from a momentary illness in this life, or even immortal illness 279 00:25:49.869 --> 00:25:56.109 in this life, but we would be saved from mortality itself, so that 280 00:25:56.190 --> 00:26:02.230 we would have immortality, not just life but eternal life. In his name, 281 00:26:04.099 --> 00:26:11.420 believe on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. Let's pray