Episode Transcript
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Of that Song Man. Well,
so we come to God's word this morning.
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Let us prepare our hearts by praying
for illumination on God's word. And
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now, Lord, you who indeed
inspired the words of the prophets as they
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wrote, the apostles as they wrote. Lord, you who gave life to
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these words, you, God,
to whom many of us here, if
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not all of us here this morning, can attest to the fact that your
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words gave light and life to us. And so, Lord, we come
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to you because you are the founder
and the author of these words, and
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so, Lord, we desire to
understand them. Lord, we look at
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a very familiar story this morning.
But yet I pray, God, that
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in some way I may be able, through your grace and that you may,
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through my words, illuminate your people, that something about this story that's
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so familiar may still resonate in our
hearts as new, or, if not
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new, at least anew, that
we may be thankful for it. It
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is your word, God, and
you can enlighten it and illuminate it to
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us, and we asked you would
do so in Christ name. Amen.
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Our passage this morning comes from the
Gospel of Luke, Chapter Five, making
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our way through that chapter. We
look last week at the Lord's healing of
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a leper and we're going to see
another healing this morning, beginning in verse
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seventeen. Here is God's word.
On one of those days, as he
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was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of
the law we're sitting there would come from
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every village of Galilee and Judaean from
Jerusalem, and the power of the Lord
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was with him to heal and behold. Some men were bringing on a bed
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a man who was paralyzed and they
were seeking to bring him in and land
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before Jesus, but finding a way
to bring him in because of the crowd,
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they went up on the roof and
let him down with his bed through
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the tiles into the midst before Jesus. And when he saw their faith,
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he said, man, your sins
are forgiven you. And the scribes and
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the Pharisees began to question, saying
who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who
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could forgive sins but God alone?
When Jesus perceived their thoughts, he answered
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them. Why do you question in
your hearts which is easier to say your
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sins are forgiven you or to say
rise and walk but that you may know
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the son of men has authority on
Earth to forgive sins. He said to
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the man who was paralyzed, I
say to you, rise, pick up
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your bed and go home. And
immediately he rose up before them, picked
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up what he'd been lying on and
went home, glorifying God. And Amazement
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sees them all and they glorified God
and we're filled with awe, saying we
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have seen extraordinary things today. Thus, sins, the reading of God's please
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be seated. Well, we have
been looking through the weeks here on the
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gospel of Luke, specifically as it
relates to Christ authority and victory over every
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enemy that he faces, whether it's
temptation in the wilderness, whether it's a
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leper that comes to him, whatever
we have come across in the ministry life
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of Jesus, he has shown he
has ultimate authority over it. And so
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now this morning he comes to perhaps
our most persistent enemy that we have and
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here again will show that he has
become the victor over even that enemy.
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If you're a Sunday school student,
or were once a Sunday school students as
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a child, I should say,
but the chances are that you're familiar with
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the story this morning. I don't
know that many Sunday school curriculums can get
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by without putting this story in it. And perhaps you can remember the pictures
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and your workbooks or if you're old
enough like me to remember flannel boards and,
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uh, the things that the teachers
were put up there. We probably
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remember seeing the pictures of the man
being brought through the roof and being brought
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into the presence of of Jesus and
UH, since I didn't grow up in
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a reformed church, we actually had
Jesus and the pictures at that time.
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But nonetheless, you probably remember that
this is one of those stories that is
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found in all three of the synoptic
gospels. Matthew, mark and Luke all
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give us this story. They don't
all tell us everything. Matthew actually eliminates
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the part of how the man comes
before Jesus. He doesn't mention at all
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that going through the roof or any
of that. So he does tell the
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story, however, has do mark
and, of course, Luke, which
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we have just read. So let's
begin with verses seventeen to nineteen. Luke
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doesn't give us the location of the
healing, but Matthew tells us that it
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is in his own city, which
we presume to mean Capernaum, because that
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seems to be where Jesus had his
headquarters. Wouldn't be Nazareth or anything out
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of that, but but copernum was
where Jesus had his headquarters of Ministry.
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And again, regarding the time,
I've noticed with you in the past weeks
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here that Luke isn't real concerned about
the time. He's not concerned about giving
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us a chronological account of the life
and Ministry of Jesus. So don't get
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all bent out of shape. And
you read this story in another Gospel and
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said, well, wait a minute, this happened after this and not before
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this, because Luke isn't concerned about
that. He wants to give it topically.
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He has his own reasons for telling
the stories in the order that he
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does so. Instead of being definite, as we've seen all along, he
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just says as one of those days, that's all he tells us about the
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timing at that point. And then, for the first time in the gospel
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of Luke, were introduced to a
group of people called the Pharisees, and
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I told those of you that have
been in the Bible Studies. If you
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need to remember when the Pharisees are
just remember they're the ones that look in
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the mirror and say, Oh,
I'm fair, I see so if you
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remember that, remember the Pharisees and
UH. Anyway, Um, I am
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guessing that most of you, when
you hear that word Pharisee, you don't
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have pleasant thoughts. It's kind of
like a couple of weeks ago when I
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asked you to think about a lot
and asked you what was the first thought
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that came to your mind. I
don't think it was pleasant thoughts. Well,
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I don't think coming to mind about
the Pharisees, you'd have very good
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connotations as well. And Uh,
it's probably uh this way and there's,
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there's. There's really a good cause
for this? Of course it's not that.
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Well, we do that for no
reason. Uh, there's a good
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reason why. We don't have much
good to say about it. Jesus has
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actually several bad things to say about
them. We might particularly think about later
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in the Gospel of Matthew when Chapter
Twenty three, when Jesus gives an entire
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series of woes upon the scribes and
the Pharisees for how they live. But
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I need the side. We actually
do have some good pharisees in the Bible,
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don't we? There are some good
ones. Say. Oh well,
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let's start with the Apostle Paul.
That's pretty good pharisee. Now again,
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he was changed, of course,
but he was a Pharisee. He says
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in Philippians, three, five,
as to the law, pharisee. So
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that's a good pharisee. Probably the
most famous pharisee outside of Saul would be
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Nicodemus, who came to Jesus by
night and although we're not specifically told exactly
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the state of his soul, it
appears from the end, where he does
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come and help in the burial of
Jesus with Joseph of Arimathea, that he
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had come around. And he also
defends Christ before the council, and so
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we could also think about him.
And then there's a Pharisee by the name
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of Gamilio who, although may not
have been a believer, nevertheless he comes
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up in acts five and stops the
consul from killing the apostles. So they
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weren't all bad. But the name
Pharisees seems to indicate separated. One or
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maybe even holy one. They seem
to have arisen between the testaments, basically
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around the maccabean revolt time, around
one BC. Josephas, the Jewish historian,
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tells us the Pharisees were extremely influential
among the common people. They held
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them in very high regard. And
Uh, there's one particularly good thing that
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Jesus says about the Pharisees, and
I don't know if you'll remember what that
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is or not, but in that
Chapter I spoke about Matthew Twenty three.
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As he begins it, he says
this. The scribes and the Pharisees sit
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on Moses seat, so do and
observe whatever they tell you. So that
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is the good thing that our Lord
says right there. We should listen to
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what they taught because they were Orthodox. They were the Orthodox Presbyterians of the
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day. They they believed in the
Orthodox teachings. They believed in the resurrection
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of the dead, which the SADDUCEES
denied. They believe in the existence of
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angels, which others denied. They
believed in the sovereignty of God, they
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believe with man's responsibility and they they
were Orthodox believers. And there was about
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six thousand of them at the time
of Christ that were there. Of the
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other four Jewish groups that inner uh
have some some kind of action, interaction
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with their Lord, Luke will only
mention two of those, the Sadducees and
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the zealots, and he will only
mention each of them one time in his
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gospel. The other two he doesn't
mention at all. But the Pharisees he
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will mention Twenty Five Different Times in
his gospel. But sitting with the Pharisees
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is another group that Luke originally describes
as teachers of the law, but later
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would describe them in this passage by
our more familiar name, that of the
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scribes. In Verse Twenty One,
he mentions that the scribe was known to
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be an expert in the law.
That's why Luke calls him a teacher of
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the law. Ezra, who was
ascribed in Ezra seven six and said this
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Ezra went up from Babylonia. He
was ascribed skilled in the law of Moses
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that the Lord, the God of
Israel, had given. Scribes were very
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respected by the common people in those
days. They had the chief seats in
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the synagogue and whenever they entered a
room people would rise to honor them and
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the phariseeasons and scribes had come,
Luke tells us, from every village.
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That's again luke not being very specific. Doesn't necessarily mean it's like we say,
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everybody came from everywhere, and we
know it doesn't mean they came from
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everywhere. But again, they came
from most of the villages around about captain
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purliament at that time. And Luke
is a kind of unusual sentence that were
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not quite prepared for. It says
and the power of the Lord was present
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to heal them. You might think, we'll wait a minute. Wouldn't.
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Wouldn't anywhere Jesus was. Wouldn't?
Wouldn't power the Lord be present wherever Jesus
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was? Well, yes, but
the one thing we have to remember,
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which Jesus will tell us, is
that he always does the things which please
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the father. He doesn't do anything
on his own initiative. He says,
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he does what the father has commanded
him to do. So when Luke says
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the power of the Lord is present
to heal he's simply saying this is the
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time when the father is uh allowing
his son or telling his son that this
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is a time when when indeed healing
should take place, and so Jesus is
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doing uh an obedience to the father, even though really, of his own
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accord, he could heal whenever he
wanted to. And so in verse eighteen
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we are introduced to the men carrying
a paralyzed man on a bed. Luke
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doesn't tell us, but mark tells
us that there were four men. That
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would make sense, that they always
think of this as kind of a cot,
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you know, the top part of
a COT, and that they're all
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each one of them is holding to
one corner of the COT as they come
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at that time. In Verse Nineteen, they're told that as they come they
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are given a problem because they cannot
approach Jesus, we're told, is in
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the house and the accounts and therefore
they can't get in because the crowd has
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blocked the way for them. Uh
is mark who tells us that Jesus is
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actually teaching in a house, and
Matthew only deals with the healing itself.
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But mark and Luke give us how
this man comes into the presence of Jesus.
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Our text says Um finding no way
to bring him in because of the
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crowd, they went up on the
roof and let him down with his bed
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through the tiles into the midst before
Jesus. Mark says it a little different.
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He says when they could not get
near him because of the crowd,
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they removed the roof above him and
when they had made an open and they
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let on the bed on which his
paralytic lay. Now neither of the text
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tell us how they got on the
roof, but it was likely there would
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be a staircase. It would lead
up to the roof of many houses.
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Could be that there was even a
staircase on the house next to them and
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then they had to step over on
onto that and apparently, once they'd remove
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some of the roof tiles, uh, they lowered the man through the roof
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into the presence of Jesus. Now, if you're one of those people who
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might get bothered when somebody comes to
your house and spills something on the carpet,
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how would you feel if they started
taking your roof apart? Um,
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I think that would be even a
little tougher to do that. Um,
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I know as as a preacher Um
sometimes in the middle of what you think
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is maybe your best point in the
sermon and all of a sudden the baby
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lets out a whale in the service
and and all your momentum goes down the
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drain and it's not so dramatic and
and all of that. That that that
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you said, well, that could
be a will bother some. I mean
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we're glad the babies are there and
gred babies are crying because it means they're
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alive. But but still sometimes it
can kind of throw you off a little
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bit. But but I have never
ever been interrupted by someone taking the roof
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of the church apart. Uh,
and so I have not been that affected
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in regards to that. But as
we don't know how much did they take
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apart? We don't know. We
have we always have the idea, perhaps
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I know I did that, that
they took all of the way so they
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could just kind of lower him down
with ropes on each corner. But you
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know, you can jiggle a bed
kind of and put it at a thing
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like this. They might not have
had to make quite as big of a
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whole as as we oftentimes, I
think. But anyway, you get the
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point. So we look at versus
twenties. It says there in twenty that
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Jesus when he saw their faith,
and that seems to relay, particularly to
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the four men who are bringing the
man, but probably also to the paralytic
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himself. And this is the first
occurrence. We already had first occurrence of
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Pharisee. Now we have another,
the important word that appears for the first
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time in the gospel of Luke,
and that is the word faith. And
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so we have that. But we
have something that might bring a question into
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our mind this. Why is it
that in this particular healing that our Lord
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does, he speaks to the forgiveness
of sins and not to the illness,
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to paralysis itself? Now we know
in the Bible that there are times we
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know that sin causes sickness. King
Ziah was a leper to his death because
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of the sin that he committed,
and so we know that sin can cause
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illness, but we also know in
the Bible that people's illnesses may not indeed
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be caused by sin at all.
Remember the brilliant question of the disciples of
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the man born blind who did this
sin this manner? His parents that he
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was born blind. I was wondering
about that. That what you know?
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He was born and what? What
kind of Sin Doy you think this guy
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did? was He in the womb. What you know, what was he
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doing that that would have been sinful
in the womb? I'm not exactly sure
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what that was, but again,
Jesus makes it clear that it had nothing
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to do with either his sin or
the sin of his parents. So it
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seems to lead many to believe that
in this instance, perhaps indeed sin was
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the cause of this man's illness.
But we don't know, because, personally,
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I think there's another reason why Jesus, in this instance, uses that
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line son, thy sins are forgiven
thee and that is because present that day
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are the scribes and the Pharisees and
he knows that this saying is going to
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elicit some criticism and give him an
opportunity to tell them something. So I
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think that might be the reason why. Well, in Verse Twenty One,
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a statement indeed does what the Lord
intends it to do, and the scribes
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and the Pharis start saying, who
is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can
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forgive sins but God alone? And
so what? You know? What do
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we guess? What do we get
from that? Now, the better response
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from that would have been to maybe
just ask a question. You know now,
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Jesus, we know that only God
can forgive sins, and I'm sure
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you know that too. So you
know maybe you're making a mistake and what
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you're saying here maybe intend something we
don't understand. Maybe you could explain that
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nicely. But they don't do that. But there is nothing wrong with their
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theology. And the second part of
that statement when they say who can forgive
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sins? But God only. And
of course someone might sin against you and
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they may come to you and say
please forgive me it. I mean to
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do that and then you forgive you. We have the ability to do that.
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But all sins are eventually and essentially
against God, and so god alone
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has the prerogative because all sins are
against none of us can claim to forgive
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sins because of that, because only
God could do that. God assigns that
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prerogative to himself in several scriptures.
In giving his essence to Moses and Exodus,
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thirty four, six and seven said
the Lord passed before him and proclaimed
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the Lord The Lord a God merciful
and Gracious, Slow to anger and abounding
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and steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping
steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and
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transgression and sin. But who will
by no means clear the guilty, visiting
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the iniquity to fathers and the children
and the children's children to the third and
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the fourth generation. God says,
that's my prerogative, I am the one
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who forgive. So on one,
Oh, three, two and three,
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we read this psalm last week.
Bless the Lord O my soul. Forget
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not all his benefits, who forgives
all your iniquity. It is God who
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must forgive our iniquity, and so
every sin we do, even if it
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involves someone else, is ult a
sin against God. So David Praise in
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the midst of his adultery against Bathsheb
and your Rya and his murder against you,
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Riyah. He prays and says Lord, against you and you only have
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I sin so all. I can
sin against you, I certainly can,
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and and you may forgive me,
but there is another party with whom I
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have to do in regards to that
sin, and that is God. I
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must always ask forgiveness of him,
for he is the source of it.
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The Pharisees are right to forgive sins
by a mere creature is equivalent to blasphemy
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and thus, by the old testament
standards, was equivalent to being killed by
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the death penalty because of blasphemy.
They're right in that point. They are
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missing, however, one piece of
the puzzle, one thing that makes what
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Jesus says actually a wonderful statement and
not a blasphemous statement, and that is
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that of course only God can forgive
sins, but Jesus is God and that
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changes everything, doesn't it? And
so in verse twenty two, it's interesting.
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I love this verse, coming right
on the heels of verse one,
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it says Jesus perceives their thoughts.
What does that tell us? There,
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right there, who can perceive thoughts? Only God. Jesus now is God
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who has forgiven sins, now perceives
their thoughts. And so again he gives
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to them. Not only by perceiving
their thoughts. What should have astounded them
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to how did he know what we
were thinking? But he also says to
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them, in a very logical argument, what's what's easier to say to someone?
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Your sins are forgiven you, or
rise and walk. Now we have
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to understand what Jesus means by that. Of course, US in a sense,
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either statement can be said. I
just said both little statements to you.
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So they were both equally easy to
me. But of course the point
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Jesus is making is if you say
your sins are forgiven you, if you
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go to a man and that man
says your sins are forgiven you, you
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know you can, you can think
what you want, but you know there's
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it's easy to say any anybody can
say it if they want to say it,
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and and nobody could really say.
Well, I don't know if that's
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true or not. I mean weekend
by Bible standards, but nonetheless, but
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if somebody says rise and walk,
we're gonna Watch, aren't we? We're
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gonna look and say, okay,
or maybe you know, maybe there's something
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to this guy. I'm not sure, but it looks like it. And
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then Jesus says, to make it
even more emphatic, to the cripple rise,
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pick up your bed and go home. So let's look at the last
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two verses. Verse Twenty Five,
we see the first reaction, or the
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reaction of the paralytic to the words
of Jesus. He rises up, picks
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up as that he was lying on
and he goes home, glorifying God,
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as he does in the reaction of
the crowd. In verse they are amazed,
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they glorify God and they're filled with
awe. We need to look at
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some Greek words here because they're kind
of important. The Greek word for amazed
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is the word where we get our
English word ecstatic. They were ecstatic,
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the crowd is ecstatic and they glorified
God, the word where we get doxology.
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They doxologized God, they gave praise
to him, they glorified him and
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gave and gave him that. And
then they make this statement we have seen
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extraordinary things today, and that's an
interesting word. You may or may not
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know what that word is in the
Greek. That that phrase that the S
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V says extraordinary, that word that. That's a good translation and there's nothing
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wrong with that. The King James
says we have seen strange things, and
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there's nothing wrong with that translation either. In fact, I think I like
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the King James Translation better. They're
strange things, spurgeon said. No Man
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ever spent the day with Jesus Christ
without being filled with the sight of strange
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things. But the Greek word is
very interesting to us because we have the
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same we we take that word from
the Greek into English and it is the
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word paradox. Now that doesn't mean
to doctors, but paradox, as you
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know, means that there's something and
in fact, strong says the word means
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contrary to expectations, and I think
that's what the word strange denotes. And
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the King James something. Sometimes something
will happen to someone and and there'll be
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surprised and about it happening and you
might have said, well, you should
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have expected it. Then they might
say, well, I never expect that,
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and I remember, forgive me for
this, but years ago there was
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a television show and and they have
this little sketch where somebody would say,
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you know, well, you should
have to expected and you and you would
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say, well, I never expected
the Spanish inquisition. And then immediately a
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bunch of soldiers, Spanish soldiers,
make their way into the door and said
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nobody expects the Spanish in position.
But UH, anyway, that's beyond the
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scope of the sermon. But Um, but sometimes something happens and you just
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can't make rhyme a reason of it, you can't figure out what to make
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about it. And they say we
have seen strange things. We have seen
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things para against Doc's opinion or things
that we think about. We have seen
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things that are against what we normally
think would happen this. These are strange
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things, you're not these are not
the ordinary things we have seen. Well,
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let me make some applications as to
close this morning. As I said,
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the Pharisees were the Orthodox of their
time, as opposed to the other
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Jewish groups. The Pharisees indeed professed
good and straight and right doctrine. The
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problem with the Pharisees wasn't what they
believe, nor even really what they taught.
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The problem was how they lived,
and this is something we will proclaim
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ourselves Orthodox as well. Have to
be careful of one of the worst things
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Jesus ever said about the Pharisees,
and these are very harsh words, in
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Chapter Twenty Three of Matthew, Verse
Sixteen. Would you, scribes and Pharisees,
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hypocrites if you travel across sea and
land to make a single proselyte and
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when he becomes a proselyte, you
make him twice as much a child of
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hell as yourselves? What a terrible
thought to make a convert and then make
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that convert twice the child of Hell. As they are correct. Theology is
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a wonderful thing, no doubt about
it, the great blessing. But it's
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important to see where that theology leads
us. And if we become at all
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Pharaceutical, which we can very easily
in our lives, there's a problem.
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But with correct belief we need to
walk in love and mercy and not be
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harsh to those who may disagree with
us, but to be loving and merciful.
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And let me ask you another question. How does Jesus see? Says
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he sees the faith of the man. Well, he might say, well,
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he's God and he can see the
heart, so therefore he sees the
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faith that way. And yes,
that that's true. But I think it's
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also true that Jesus sees the faith
in a way that you and I also
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see faith, which is by actions
the men, the thing that these men
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did, which James tells us we
also do that. He says, what
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good is it, my brothers,
if someone says he has faith but does
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not have works? Can that faith
save him later? In Verse Twenty Four,
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James, as you see, a
person is justified by works and not
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by faith alone. There was no
mention this account of any words that are
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honored by either the men bringing the
paralytic or the paralytic himself. Nobody says
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anything, but Jesus sees what they
have done and their actions speak louder than
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words, and so he perceives it
that way. When these four men go
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through everything they go through to get
his friend there, we could we could
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look at that as well, right, we could see that and see someone
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going through the roof and bringing the
bed down and say, well, man,
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those guys got faith. And indeed
they do, and even the paralytic.
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I don't think the paralytic was they
no, no, no, I
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don't want to get ill, don't
take me to Jesus. I think they
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all. and Jesus sees that by
by their coming to him, and so
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we observe it that way. But
then we might ask, also ask a
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theological question here. Well, if
the men bringing the paralytic had faith and
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Jesus sees their faith and heals the
man, does that mean that their faith
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actually had an effect on the man
being healed? Is that possible? So
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when it says Jesus saw their faith, we know it at least includes the
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four men, because otherwise it would
have been singular. And so we see
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that faith. We do have instances
in the Bible of other people coming to
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Jesus on behalf of someone else.
Gyrus comes to Jesus because his daughter is
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at the point of death. The
SYRO Phoenician woman comes to Jesus on behalf
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of her daughter who as a demon. We have the nobleman and John Forur,
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who comes to Jesus on behalf of
his son, and in every one
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of those instances the Lord honors the
faith are the people that come by doing
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exactly what they asked. James Edwards
notes on the healing here. That critical
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element in this and similar encounters with
Jesus seems to depend less on whose faith,
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whether the paralytics or as friends,
then on faith itself. So faith
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is present and here we have a
wonderful picture of intercessory prayer, that our
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prayers indeed can have an effect,
that we do something, even though we're
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not coming for ourselves, that we're
coming for our brothers, our sisters and
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and coming for someone else, that
our prayers can indeed do something. And
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why else would we pray if we
don't believe that? If we thought our
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prayer well, it doesn't do any
good? We do it because we believe
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our prayers can do that and the
faith that we have in our prayers.
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Calvin says we must hold a similar
belief with regard to all believers that by
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their faith, the grace of God
has extended to their children and their children's
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children even before they're born. That's
why I've told you before I pray not
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only for my children and my current
grandchildren and my coming grandchildren, but my
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great grandchildren and great great grandchildren,
because our faith can have an effect.
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Calvin goes on to say it's beyond
all question that earthly blessings are often,
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for the sake of the Godly,
bestowed on unbelievers. Many years ago I
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was pastoring an assembly of God church
and River Falls, Wisconsin, and I
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had a group of people come to
do a service that were called accessibility,
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but there are a group of people
who had special needs of all different kinds
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and I have to say it it's
it's in all my life. It's a
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service I remember as one of the
most beautiful services I was ever in.
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It's just a very touching and wonderful
service to glorify God in. But I
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asked a local pastor of a word
of faith church if he would like to
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have his church joined with us,
because I thought this would be a great
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time. And he said no,
he said I'm not to honor those people
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that don't have enough faith to get
healed. And Uh, I didn't say
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it at the time. I wish
it would have. Didn't think of it.
401
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I wish I'd have said, well, if you have the faith,
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why don't you come and heal them, you know, but I didn't say
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that and maybe that was God's providence
that I didn't. But well, so
404
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many applications from this story, so
little time as one of closed here,
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but one one of course. I've
always spent a lot of time and but
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just mentioned it that it's been used
before, oftentimes by people preaching on his
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passage, that the service these men
do to bring their friend to Jesus,
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and that's that's our call as well, to those that we love that we
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we are to bring them to Jesus
as well, that we should do that.
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But we see the reaction of the
scribes and the Pharisees to the statement
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man thy sins are forgiven thee and
they accused Jesus a blasphemy, and I've
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told you why they do that and
what's wrong with it. But instead of
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looking at what they say, lettings, let us instead look at what they
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didn't say, which is really more
amazing. What would have been the right
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reaction in that moment? Would have
would have been the right thing I mentioned
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earlier. They could have asked a
question at least, or something like that,
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but the better thing would have been
to go to the Lord and say,
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Lord, not just that man sin, but my sins also. That
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would have been the right thing to
do, but they didn't do that.
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Our Lord Jesus has the power to
forgive sins, and I don't want you
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to walk away from here, if
you're not a believer this morning without saying
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Lord, forgive me my sins.
To do so, to walk out of
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here without that, would be as
amazing as these men not saying at the
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Christ your sins can send you to
hell, but there's one present who has
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the power to forgive you. It's
an me, but the one who can
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forgive you all your sins it is
not me, but it is the Lord
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Jesus Christ, who died on the
cross. The only person in the world
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who has the authority to say what
Jesus said was Jesus himself, because he
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is the only one who paid the
price. It's like someone doing a favor
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for me and I thank somebody else
for it. No, the only one
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we thank is our Lord. For
our sake, he made him to be
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sin, who knew no sin,
that in Him we might become the righteousness
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of God. And not only that, we are told he ever lives to
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make intercession for his people, as
Hebrew says, that he's able to save
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those to the uttermost who draw near
to God through him, since he always
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lives to make intercession for them.
The peril left glorifying God. Why?
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For his healing, Oh, I'm
sure, but still I believe he glorified
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God even more for the forgiveness of
his sins. Let me ask you a
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question. If you relying on your
deathbed because of a terrible disease and you
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could have your choice of hearing the
Lord say either be healed or your sins
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00:34:30.880 --> 00:34:37.480
are forgiven you, which would you
prefer? I know which one I'd want.
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00:34:38.320 --> 00:34:44.679
Your sins are forgiven you. There's
no greater message to ever hear.
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Yet healings a marvelous gift of God, but it's not the greatest gift.
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The greatest gift is the forgiveness of
sin, and if we sincerely call upon
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God for that forgiveness, he will
speak. Forgive this to us today.
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Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins
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be like scarlet, they shall be
white as snow. Though they are red
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like Crimson, they should become like
Woa, and no longer so. Each
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one teaches neighbor and each his brother. Say No, the Lord. For
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this you all know me, from
the least to them to the greatest,
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declares the Lord, for I will
forgive their iniquity and I will remember their
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sins no more. SPURGEON and his
sermon on strange things talks about when Martin
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Luther was in great distress of soul, a good monk said to him,
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brother, canst not thou'll say the
creedle. Yes, Luther said, I
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can say it. Well, then, replied the man in the CREEDLE,
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they'll say yest. I believe in
the forgiveness of sins. Yes, said
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Luther. I've often said that and
then inquired the other. Do you believe
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in the forgiveness of your sins?
For if you don't, how can you
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utter? I believe in the forgiveness
of sins. These four men. They
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love their friend, no question about
it. They wanted him healed. They
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00:36:15.800 --> 00:36:22.840
brought him to Jesus. But you
know who else loved the paralytic? God
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loved him and, as Kent Hues
Point points out in his commentary, God
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so loved us that he dug through
the roof of this world to let down
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his only son into our presence to
die for us, that we can walk
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away from here saying we've seen strange
things. God has forgiven my sins and
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I am a new creature. Coming
bow in prayer. Our God and father,
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we thank you for your word,
thank you for the promise of forgiveness
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that you have said, if we
will just ask and confess our sins before
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you, you are faithful and just
to forgive us our sins and cleanse us
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from all on righteousness. Those are
not empty words, Lord, those are
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true words, because you have uttered
them. And so, Lord, indeed,
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if there's any that are in doubt
this morning, may they come to
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you today and cry out, Lord, forgive me, and may they know
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the peace and the assurance that comes
from knowing you. I thank you,
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00:37:30.840 --> 00:37:37.360
God, that you are God and
that you have that ability to forgive us.
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00:37:37.320 --> 00:37:42.199
And so, Lord we say,
indeed as we will pray in a
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00:37:42.280 --> 00:37:46.880
prayer in just a few moments,
forgive us our sins, as we forgive
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those who sin against us. We
pray all this and Christ name, Amen.
