SPEAKER_00: This morning's scripture reading comes from the Gospel of Mark.
SPEAKER_00: Continue on in our series, beginning in chapter 6, verse 53 and 56.
SPEAKER_00: So you can follow along in your pew Bible there or in your bulletin.
SPEAKER_00: And just a short passage this morning before a longer discourse next week, but no less uh important to us this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Here now the reading of God's holy word.
SPEAKER_00: When they had crossed over, they came to land and at Gennesiret and moored to the shore.
SPEAKER_00: And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized them and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they had heard he was.
SPEAKER_00: And wherever he came in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick at in the marketplaces and implored him that he might touch even the fringe of his garment, and as many as touched it were made well.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_00: That we might know of your healing heart and power.
SPEAKER_00: And that we may be agents of your healing grace.
SPEAKER_00: We ask and pray these things in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: So as we looked at last week, we continue on from an amazing, uh miraculous site where, as you might remember, the disciples had hopped on this boat on the Sea of Galilee, and they were making their way, and then the winds started to pick up and trouble started brewing.
SPEAKER_00: And so they were making painful, painful headway into these winds, trying to make it to their destination.
SPEAKER_00: An hour went after hour, painfully and tirelessly working to make progress.
SPEAKER_00: And in the midst of this scene, they see this figure coming toward them.
SPEAKER_00: And miraculously, Jesus is here, walking on the water, and they're left, just utterly astounded by who he is and what they're seeing.
SPEAKER_00: And the truth is that although they had been with Jesus, they still needed to be further awakened to his deity and his majesty.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus then comes on the boat with them, and the winds and the waves begin to cease, and and they make their way then to the to the shore, and they come to dock their boat in a place called Ginniseret.
SPEAKER_00: And this place was a fertile place.
SPEAKER_00: It was a place uh that was well watered and known for uh good growth, and uh, in some ways, because of that, uh the beauty or the fertility that was able to be um taken advantage of there.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, surprisingly, even in the midst of this richness of the land, there seems to have been many who were there who had been suffering from various illnesses.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus here and the disciples are faced with this situation where the people there recognize who Jesus is and they and they take off and they go and they grab their friend or their family member, someone who they know needs healing.
SPEAKER_00: And they bring them to Jesus, begging him that he will heal them.
SPEAKER_00: And it's significant here that they the mention is made to touching his garment.
SPEAKER_00: You might remember a few chapters earlier, as we a few weeks ago we we heard we read about the the woman who had this blood condition, and and it was her who who came and just touched Jesus' garment, not wanting to be seen.
SPEAKER_00: And and and Jesus at that time commends her for her faith.
SPEAKER_00: Even though many had touched Jesus at that point, not all were healed, but she was.
SPEAKER_00: And so the point is that there are many here who are coming to Jesus and who are coming to him in some degree of faith, knowing that he has healing power to give to them.
SPEAKER_00: And not only this, it not only happens in one place, but then he goes on to uh travel in these villages and these cities and the countryside and wherever he goes in the midst of this place, here they are.
SPEAKER_00: They come bringing people for healing, laying them down in their beds and their stretchers, begging him that they might touch his garments so that they might be healed and made well.
SPEAKER_00: And unlike our day when uh medicine and hospitals and even an urgent clinic can be just down the road there, we have to imagine what this was like for them.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm sure there were many who no doubt had to endure significant suffering for quite some time in order that they might then go on to be healed.
SPEAKER_00: And and and uh it reminds us, I think, of even the communal impact that that can have, that sickness can have, uh the toll of disease that spreads uh to family members, to to friends, to colleagues, um, to a wider community, or in some cases the challenge of even providing for families and putting food on the table.
SPEAKER_00: And so there's significant challenges to sickness.
SPEAKER_00: And so they're coming to Jesus and they're leaving transformed and totally different than when they came.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what a spectacle that must have been.
SPEAKER_00: And not only a spectacle, but I think as more and more people came to him, just the imagine the impact that that would have had on the broader community and families.
SPEAKER_00: German theologian Jürgen Moltmann points out that miracles like this are not intended just as an interruption of the natural order, but the restoration of the natural order.
SPEAKER_00: The point being that we must always remember that sickness, disease, pain, death, they are the interruption and the intruder and not the thing most natural.
SPEAKER_00: They are the blight on God's good creation and ordering of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And even though it might come intimately close to us, and even though it might start to feel like it is sealed in, we must never grow comfortable with it.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's not how things ought to be.
SPEAKER_00: And so we see Jesus here, his expansive and generous heart, who, in his willingness to heal, begins to heal many, restoring their humanity, making things right again.
SPEAKER_00: And what's clear is Jesus' heart toward sinners and the sick and the suffering here.
SPEAKER_00: We read that he healed all who implored him and in faith touched him.
SPEAKER_00: Pity ignites from his heart and he binds them up.
SPEAKER_00: And so we look at a scene that we read of, and we see Jesus' healing hand, and we see his power, we see his majesty on display once again, and we see all of this unfolding, this huge pouring out of healing mercy.
SPEAKER_00: But the question I think remains for us, yes, but what is the significance of all of this?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's that's good for them, that's good that that happened for them.
SPEAKER_00: What am I to understand and take away with from this wonderful and historic moment?
SPEAKER_00: Because we might argue, well, I do see Jesus doing good, and I can believe that, and yet leave discouraged because we've been praying to Jesus that he would heal us, and we haven't yet quite had that same experience, or in a positive sense, we might have a takeaway to look at Jesus healing and say, Well, yes, I know I can't do it in that degree, but I know I ought to be about healing, he's an example for us.
SPEAKER_00: And whereas that's absolutely true, it misses the heart of the matter.
SPEAKER_00: If the deduction that we draw from a passage like this is Jesus is a healer, and therefore I also ought to be a healer, then what's missed in the midst of that is the very heart of what Jesus came to do.
SPEAKER_00: And what empowers our being used of Him to heal in holistic ways.
SPEAKER_00: For example, passages like this have been seen as a license for some to travel around conducting healing meetings.
SPEAKER_00: You've perhaps heard of people who profess to have a gift of healing, and so they go from town to town and city to city with the intention that they can bring miraculous healing to people and the sick.
SPEAKER_00: And the spectacle that that kind of meeting can become.
SPEAKER_00: And whether God has purposed to use meetings like that, or to ever heal in these meetings or not, that's not the question.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is that with many like this who are who aren't healed or leave these meetings, often do so with a deep sense of guilt that they must not have had enough faith to have been made well.
SPEAKER_00: I've known more than a few who have gone to healings like this.
SPEAKER_00: And they have been left in the same way that they came.
SPEAKER_00: And it has really added insult to injury, and they have left very depressed and questioning their faith.
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's why maybe James was led to write about this.
SPEAKER_00: We read in James that yes, there are specific situations, not every situation, but there are specific situations where if someone is sick, there's a way to petition God for healing.
SPEAKER_00: And he says to do it in the prayerful presence of the elders.
SPEAKER_00: The idea being in the presence of those who know you.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, there is a concern here that James has in his writing for the entirety of the person.
SPEAKER_00: You see, healing from a biblical perspective can't just be focused on the physical body alone.
SPEAKER_00: The notion of healing is actually more than that.
SPEAKER_00: We often, I think we want to tend to separate the physical from the spiritual or the communal from the individual disorder.
SPEAKER_00: But the Bible refuses to allow any kind of easy division like that.
SPEAKER_00: Healing is more complex than that.
SPEAKER_00: And so often sickness and disease touch on all of these areas.
SPEAKER_00: And so we do come when we do pray.
SPEAKER_00: There is something very natural when we're sick to want the problem removed, isn't there?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, even think about the body, how the body seeks to remove a splinter when it's been pierced.
SPEAKER_00: It's trying to get that thing out of there.
SPEAKER_00: But there are also thorns in the flesh which God may allow to remain in us for a time.
SPEAKER_00: And that time may be lengthy, even though they're not part of our future.
SPEAKER_00: The emphasis, you see, lies in the purposes of God.
SPEAKER_00: So the elders do pray, and we pray.
SPEAKER_00: We pray in our families, we pray together, we pray individually, but we pray for for God to bring his healing power because God is at times pleased to remove our thorns through miraculous healing.
SPEAKER_00: In other times, his purposes are to work through our thorns in faith for his glory and for our eternal benefit.
SPEAKER_00: But you see, in both of these cases, it is not a matter of God's heart toward us, but of his wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: He is working all things, the Apostle Paul says, working all things together for good.
SPEAKER_00: His prescription, yes, isn't all what we would necessarily want to prescribe, but the outcome is that he is working in us a deeper and more holistic healing.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying that that makes it easy to swallow.
SPEAKER_00: It can be a hard pill to swallow.
SPEAKER_00: But it does mean that we can trust him, even in the midst of sickness and suffering.
SPEAKER_00: I know that there are thoughts that can be particularly present when we face acute sickness and disease.
SPEAKER_00: One thought that can rob us of a sense of his cure is the thought that, well, yes, I see that Jesus did all of these things during his earthly ministry.
SPEAKER_00: I believe that he could do all of this.
SPEAKER_00: But then he went to the cross, and then he rose again and appeared to a few, and then it's like he went off to this far-off, distant land, as it were.
SPEAKER_00: And although I know and I'm left believing how he felt toward them then, I don't have the same confidence that he feels the same way towards me today.
SPEAKER_00: And so the question is, well, how does he comfort us through the gospel?
SPEAKER_00: Well, we must remember this: that Christ is the same yesterday, he's the same today, and he will be the same forever.
SPEAKER_00: And so the same heart that we see being displayed in a passage like this to all the people with compassion and pity and concern is the same heart that is still moved to work in that way today, with compassion, concern, and pity today from heaven.
SPEAKER_00: What we need to see is that if Jesus is willing to do such a work like this to the crowds, how much more if the diseased are not merely strangers but his own family?
SPEAKER_00: As intimately attached as a head is to a body, as loving as a groom is to a bride.
SPEAKER_00: The point being that Jesus, just as Jesus showed concern for their bodies then, he is also deeply, deeply concerned in heaven today toward his body.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, it brings him joy.
SPEAKER_00: It brings him joy to help and to heal us from our from our uh ailments.
SPEAKER_00: The story is told of a compassionate doctor who has traveled deep into the jungle to provide medical care to a primitive tribe and they're afflicted of a contagious disease, and this doctor has the medical uh equipment flowing in, he has all of the antibiotics ready to go, he has correctly diagnosed the problem, and and and he is available and prepared to help.
SPEAKER_00: And and and he is also independently wealthy and has no need of any kind of financial compensation.
SPEAKER_00: But as he seeks to provide care, the afflicted refuse.
SPEAKER_00: They want to take care of themselves, they want to heal on their own terms.
SPEAKER_00: Well, finally, a few brave young folk come and take that step forward to receive the care being freely provided.
SPEAKER_00: And the question is, well, what does the doctor feel at that moment?
SPEAKER_00: And the answer is, well, he feels joy.
SPEAKER_00: His joy actually even increases to the extent and the degree that the sick come to him for help and healing.
SPEAKER_00: It's the whole reason he came, you see.
SPEAKER_00: And so he has joy when when people come and avail themselves of this healing medicine.
SPEAKER_00: And likewise, Jesus has joy at ministering to us and to the needs of his children.
SPEAKER_00: That's his heart toward us today.
SPEAKER_00: And so to bring us into a deeper and a richer experience of Christ's comfort and sympathy and love, he is working through the ministry of the Holy Spirit to heal us even now.
SPEAKER_00: You see, we'd be mistaken if we thought that Jesus would have us satisfied with only one touch of his power and not receive the constancy of care.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has the ointment of blessing to apply to our souls and to bring us repair.
SPEAKER_00: And so you may have come here this morning, perhaps you're here this morning and and you have a particular sin that is just plaguing you and your conscience.
SPEAKER_00: And you're in church, but you know it's there.
SPEAKER_00: He has an antidote to your pain.
SPEAKER_00: If you haven't already done so, go to him and faith for his healing touch.
SPEAKER_00: His sprinkled blood is ready to quiet your guilty conscience and to bind up that wound.
SPEAKER_00: Or you may be afflicted with distress and anxiety this morning.
SPEAKER_00: He has healing power for that also.
SPEAKER_00: His prescription is his promises.
SPEAKER_00: How many times in the midst of my own anxieties and distresses, God has graciously given me a pill in the morning.
SPEAKER_00: One of his promises, and I've swallowed and digested it, and having swallowed and digested, has brought me much sympathy and strength.
SPEAKER_00: Here's a remedy for your distress and anxiety.
SPEAKER_00: Or you may be facing loss and journeying through grief this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And I would ask you, is there anyone?
SPEAKER_00: Is there anyone more suited to comfort you than Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: The person who came and wept at Lazarus' tomb.
SPEAKER_00: The one who, when Peter shed many tears over his sin, didn't reprimand Peter, he didn't even bring up Peter's fault and draw attention to his failures.
SPEAKER_00: But knowing his grief and his remorse, he loved him and he bound up this deep heart wound.
SPEAKER_00: You see, experience teaches us that the heart that's touched grief is best suited to minister to the grief of others.
SPEAKER_00: I know some people to make very miserable comforters because they haven't taken the journey.
SPEAKER_00: And so they don't know how to bind up a wound.
SPEAKER_00: They want to cover over the wound rather and just move on rather than mend it, which requires necessary time and attention.
SPEAKER_00: Others, they you know, they want to keep away from the wounded grieving.
SPEAKER_00: They treat every wound like a bruise, assuming that others ought to be able to heal by themselves.
SPEAKER_00: And so if suffering comes their way either to themselves or others, they're like the person who grows queasy at the sight of blood.
SPEAKER_00: They're averse to it, they don't want anything to do with it, and and they feel faint.
SPEAKER_00: And so they forfeit the ability to minister to others and be a healing presence.
SPEAKER_00: I've also known people who instead of looking for ways to bring healing and comfort to the sick and the grieving, use it as an opportunity to vent their own grievances.
SPEAKER_00: And the tragedy here is that not only do those who grieve have to deal with their own problems and their own troubles, but now they're made to feel all the worse for it.
SPEAKER_00: The difference being, you see, that when we bring our griefs to Jesus, we come to the one who knows how to dress all our wounds.
SPEAKER_00: And meet us in all our sorrows.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't hold his nose.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't roll his eyes.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't vent his grievances.
SPEAKER_00: He receives us so as to bind us up.
SPEAKER_00: And as a tender physician, his sympathy is offered in the deepest possible way and with the utmost of care.
SPEAKER_00: That's our God.
SPEAKER_00: That's the one whom we come to.
SPEAKER_00: That's the one whom we worship.
SPEAKER_00: But you see, here's the thing: none of this is automatic.
SPEAKER_00: To do this healing work, we we aid our faith by bringing our specific ailments and grievances to Him.
SPEAKER_00: We think of the doctor who tries to prescribe a general medication for anyone and everything.
SPEAKER_00: That person hasn't done their duty.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Well, because first they need to make an accurate diagnosis, know their patient, know the trouble, before they can then prescribe the appropriate and specific medicine.
SPEAKER_00: And so there are specific things that we need to bring to Jesus for his specific healing power.
SPEAKER_00: If you find yourself even put out a joint with another member of his body, perhaps you came here this morning and you're at odds with someone, then there's a specific treatment for that.
SPEAKER_00: The cure is not found in nursing a grudge, because a dislocated limb is not something to nurse, but something to put back into place.
SPEAKER_00: So the specific treatment that Jesus gives us and offers us is to reapply our own soul to His healing mercy, to his forgiving mercy, and then to respond in kind.
SPEAKER_00: And why this requires wisdom is because not all sickness is apparent on the surface.
SPEAKER_00: There's no point prescribing a band-aid when you're suffering from a disease.
SPEAKER_00: In that case, there may be reason to go into the surgeon's knife.
SPEAKER_00: And the truth is, because we naturally want to avoid pain, God uses providence, he uses our circumstances to cut through these areas.
SPEAKER_00: He cuts through the tissue of circumstance, as it were, in order to deal with the more concerning and deadly disease of unbelief and pride that festers within us.
SPEAKER_00: And so there are some illnesses that demand more invasive and serious attention.
SPEAKER_00: But even then, you see, Jesus still shows a steady and trustworthy hand.
SPEAKER_00: Because when his hand is moved to make an incision, he always works to make our wound no less painful than it ought to be, in order to bring his healing touch.
SPEAKER_00: There's been many a patient, you see, who have gone under his knife only to testify with the benefit of time that although it involves some pain at the time, they can now praise the careful and wise hand that treated them.
SPEAKER_00: And it has left them all the richer.
SPEAKER_00: And so trust, friends, trust the hand and trust the heart behind the hand when things seem painful.
SPEAKER_00: Let's bring the specific ailments and diseases that harm us to Jesus and have him ply his specific treatment.
SPEAKER_00: And that may be theologically, that may be spiritually, that may be emotionally, that may be physically in every aspect of our being, we can bring these things to Jesus for his healing touch.
SPEAKER_00: Don't think that if he hasn't purposed it, he can't provide healing in all of these areas.
SPEAKER_00: His heart's bent is toward the healing of his people.
SPEAKER_00: His heart's bent is toward his bride.
SPEAKER_00: His heart's bent is toward his body being bound up and healed.
SPEAKER_00: His heart's bent is to be the great physician that binds up our wounds, that seeks to restore the brokenness, that seeks to mend what's been dislocated and put out of joint, to repair, to make whole, to restore.
SPEAKER_00: That's his work.
SPEAKER_00: The binding up, even the nursing, the tender care toward the bruises that we might receive in life.
SPEAKER_00: And you see, because of this, throughout history, Christianity has championed Christ's heart and example here and sought to bring and to care for the sick and the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Hospitals, clinics, you name it.
SPEAKER_00: Christians have sought to use Christ as their example in the healing of his creation.
SPEAKER_00: And so I want to suggest that we grow in the knowledge of his healing, and that as we grow in the knowledge of his healing and the knowledge of his heart being applied to us, that we be those who follow his example in three key ways.
SPEAKER_00: And the first is this by looking with compassion.
SPEAKER_00: By looking with compassion.
SPEAKER_00: Second is moving towards need, and the third is serving to restore.
SPEAKER_00: First, look with compassion.
SPEAKER_00: Where do you feel a deep sympathy and concern for the suffering?
SPEAKER_00: With whom do you desire to alleviate it?
SPEAKER_00: Look with an eye to people's misfortune.
SPEAKER_00: It may be in an area where you have acutely found yourself in need of deliverance.
SPEAKER_00: Look with compassion.
SPEAKER_00: Second, move towards need.
SPEAKER_00: While empathy and sympathy are emotions that share in the suffering of others, compassion actively seeks to alleviate suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And so, whereas sympathy and empathy are important for a good bedside manner, compassion moves toward alleviating and bringing relief to others.
SPEAKER_00: And so as you have opportunity, move towards the need of those who suffer.
SPEAKER_00: Seek to alleviate in whatever ways you can the need of others.
SPEAKER_00: And move toward that need.
SPEAKER_00: And the third is serve to restore.
SPEAKER_00: I've had the unfortunate experience of a few concussions in my time.
SPEAKER_00: And at the time I had friends who were watching, one of them was playing sport.
SPEAKER_00: But even in my helplessness and my hopelessness, where my mind left me for a bit because I have no recollection of what happened.
SPEAKER_00: And my lack of conscious ability.
SPEAKER_00: They stayed with me until I was able to be discharged, and then they gave me a ride home.
SPEAKER_00: They saw me through until I was restored.
SPEAKER_00: And there have been a number of occasions where that has been the case, where I've witnessed the merciful and gracious demonstration of the love of Christ through his body.
SPEAKER_00: Seeking to bind up, seeking to help, seeking to aid in the sickness and the suffering of others.
SPEAKER_00: And so serve to restore.
SPEAKER_00: It's a comforting thought to be reminded that in our poverty and in our helplessness, the Lord takes thought for you and he takes thought for me.
SPEAKER_00: He comes to our aid.
SPEAKER_00: Truly, he is our helper and our deliverer, the great physician.
SPEAKER_00: And so let's determine to bring many to the one who so mercifully and graciously binds up all of our illnesses and relieves all our distresses.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: O gracious Father, we we do praise you and thank you for the precious gift of your Son, who is indeed to us a great physician.
SPEAKER_00: O Lord, we confess that often too often we are prone to want to go it alone.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, Lord, we thank you for your Holy Spirit's power to bring us the comforting presence and power of our Lord and Savior.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for his grace and mercy that works through his body.
SPEAKER_00: And Father, we ask and we pray that you would grant us to be both recipients who come to cherish and prize that healing power at work within us, but also, Lord, those who would seek to alleviate the suffering and pain of others for your glory and for the fame of your name.
SPEAKER_00: Our Lord, we praise and we thank you for who you are to us.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.