Mark 5:24-34 - Powerful Faith

so we're in the Gospel of Mark and I understand the passage we've arrived that today is Mark chapter 5 verse beginning at verse 21 I'd like to read it when Jesus had again crossed over by the boat to the other side of the lake a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake then one of the synagogue rulers named Jairus came there seeing Jesus he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him my little daughter is dying please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live so Jesus went with him a large crowd followed and pressed around him and a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years she had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had yet instead of getting better she grew worse when she heard about Jesus she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak because she thought if I just touch his clothes I will be healed immediately her bleeding stopped and they and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering at once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him he turned around in the crowd and asked who touched my clothes you see the people crowding against you his disciples answered and yet you can asked who touched me but Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it then the woman knowing what had happened to her came and fell at his feet and trembling with fear told him the whole truth she said to him daughter or he said to her daughter your faith has healed you go in peace and be freed from your suffering if you were to take all the miracles of Jesus and eliminate the duplicate accounts and the four Gospels you would see that Jesus did our did far more than this but there are thirty-five specific miracles reported in the Gospels they fall into four broad categories which is where we're at now in mark the context of mark from chapter four thirty five to the end of chapter five the four categories were his authority over nature so you have the storm at sea his authority over demonic possession so you have the gadarene Damania his authority over illness so you have the story of the woman with the condition that had lasted for 12 years and then you have this authority over death the gyres daughter sitting that the woman has suffered for 12 years and the daughter is 12 years of age that dies and we'll look at that story with pastor Jordan next week the incredible power of Jesus and this account today that I've just read gives us by way of application a window into how to press through in situations in life that are difficult and where we're encountering adversity so I called this message for four steps to a powerful faith for those who were here years ago you know that always my sermons had at points the and and and what would what would the value be of a pointless message you know so so I try to do points so here are the points from this woman we learned that we must have the mentality of faith because she thought Mark's Gospel says because she thought if I just touch his clothes I will be made well she was saying within herself another gospel said what you say is what you think what you think is what you say she was thinking as sick as I've been as much of my income I have spent it all on doctors I have seen one specialist after another but there's one great physician that I've not yet seen I must she was thinking if I can just get to Jesus proverbs 23 verse 7 says for as a person thinks in his or her heart so is she and so often what we think is what we become this woman had many obstacles to overcome to even having the thought life of if I can get to Jesus I will be made well she could have said to herself I've been this way for over 12 years and there is no hope for me it's often our circumstances when we're going through tough times we get into a dark tunnel of despair and we think I can never get out of this there's no use trying anymore I know something about that dark tunnel of despair because in several years after I left pastoring this church I went through a deep depression for two years kind of unthinkable that I ignore Mele happy adjusted person would go through a time when I did not see my way through and perhaps you're in a situation where the circumstances of your life feel like they are closing in on you I want to encourage you in the tunnel of despair and in the night of difficulty to have the mentality of faith that says this will not last forever storms do not last forever God has for my life a plan a purpose and a hope and this woman was filled with hope as she heard that Jesus was passing by she got to set all four kinds of things to herself self-talk is very important she could have said the crowd is big I'm frail I could never get through she could have said you know I am ritually impure in fact in her culture and the religious life of her day she was because of her condition she was regarded as ritually impure which meant that she couldn't go to the temple it also meant that any time she touched someone who was ritually pure she made them ritually impure so they couldn't go to the temple either so she could have said you know what if I go in fact this is one of the funny moments really in the gospel because I'm sure there were Pharisees clustered around Jesus who were smug in their self-righteousness and in their own external holiness and she's defiling them left and right as she presses through the crowd it's really it's really a great comic scene in the Gospels she could have said you know what she could have said others needed me you know need I mean gyrus is an important person he's the ruler of our synagogue he's got a daughter who is dying I mean Jesus got to get there too and I Who am I I'm just a nobody no you know I'm I'm kind of isolated with my condition I've lost a lot of my friends people don't come around me anymore and I'm just I'm just a nothing nobody knows my name and and he's more important than me I sometimes we feel that way well you know I'm what do I really mean to God and does Jesus really have his eyes on me but what we think is so important I'm at the point where I reflecting on some circumstances in my life and I you know 61 years ago I was 15 I just gave him away how young I am and as a kid growing up in a migrant pasture missionary home where we never stayed anywhere longer than a year or two I became very shy and in fact I I used to say that I had an inferiority complex but Wayne Test corrected me one time and said George you don't have an inferiority complex you're just inferior and that really that helped me you know that really helped me so how I know yet I had this call to preach the gospel how I wasn't gonna do that what I couldn't even in in a high school class stand up and give a book report I was too shy I had unruly red hair I had a face that looked like a pepperoni pizza because if so many freckles I had a chipped tooth in front of my mouth which when I smile I look goofy and how was that to be but I was thinking God had called me to be a preacher of the gospel the good news by the way my daughter's name is young Gallion from the Greek Evangeline good news good news girl so we were mentally thinking named our daughter our first child good news and anyway I when I was my junior in high school I had a I had a paper route and at the close of the paper out in the in the early evening I would bicycle over to our church - which was under construction a beautiful church in Springfield Missouri Central assembly in fact you know you're getting older when the new church is now the old building but anyway it was new it was the the girders were going up the the roof was not yet in but this but the flooring had been poured at the cement platform had been poured and I would park my bike and I would walk onto the cement platform and stand at the place where I thought some day the pulpit might might be and I would look around and I would make sure all the workers were gone and then I would come out of my shyness and I would imitate preachers it's the hour of decision Billy Graham of course and I would act like Billy Graham for a few moments by the way we've lost a giant of the faith this last week Billy Graham but what I was thinking was what over the years became a reality and I've had the privilege of ministering literally all over the world and preaching to audiences small and large it would have happened without the Holy Spirit putting a thought in my heart that seems so absolutely ridiculous that you can get up and talk to a group of people what we think is so important mentality of faith encourage you to have that mentality and to go along with the mentality of faith this woman had the language of faith Matthew chapter 9 verse 21 says she said to herself or she was saying within herself that is she was thinking and she was doing self-talk she was self-talk and she was thinking they to go together what you what you think is what you say what you say is what you think now I pastored here in a time when there was in the charismatic renewal a kind of a a warped view of faith that became what we knew as the hyper faith movement the hyper wealth the hyper health movement and in fact I remember once calling on one of our parishioners in the hospital and I have been giving sound teaching on the fraud is not changing or circumstances he is changing you in the circumstances and both those situations require faith faith were the circumstances to change and faith to believe God and trust him when the circumstances aren't changing and I'll never forget what she said to me she said you know pastor I not only felt the burden of my sickness but I had the double burden that I was responsible for my sickness because I didn't have enough faith to be healed so that kind of warped view really harmed people but but you'll find that every warped or out-of-sync teaching has at its core if you come back to balance truth to it and there is truth that our language defines us so if you say to your child you're stupid you're dumb or if you say to your spouse you're just like your mother you're just like your father whatever if we begin saying those kinds of things that denigrate one another if I can define you I can confine you and on the other hand if I can give you a new picture of yourself I can release you and not confine you I have I've told this story before here probably more than once but it's my my favorite story of this of the importance of language it came about when I was a single seminary student and I was a youth pastor to church and downing and I was going to a fuller Seminary in Pasadena and one Sunday night after church the young marrieds were having a potluck food function when you're in seminary and single and needing cafeteria food a potluck sounds good pot Luck's are still good that's what's what made me what I am and so I went over and there was this couple there that had two little girls and their five and three years of age and the three year old was to this day the single most misbehaved child I think I've ever been around his child was running through the house jumping on the furniture jumping on the sofa grabbing stuff off the coffee table the poor hostess was trying to save her precious artifacts as the parents were trying to get control of this child and they kept Tiger sit down tiger behave and I thought apt name for the child it's gonna go through life clawing her way through life I thought if I ever become a parent I'll never call my child tiger so a few months went by and another son i trolled around where the young Mary's were having a food function and they invited me over again and and this time the same little three-year-old was sitting by her parents with her little hands folded on her lap and being very polite yes ma'am and no ma'am and I thought well what happened to this kid you know it was before Redlands so I didn't know what they were giving her so I said I said to the parents I said you have such a well-behaved little girl I said what is this some day I may get married and have children what are what are the successful techniques of parenting you're using to raise such a well-behaved child that question by the way explains why I became general superintendent because in the ministry in public life you have to use tact with people you don't say hey what happened to your brat so so they just beamed they said oh we knew what we were doing wrong we were calling her tiger and she was acting like a tiger and what and my wife and I we talked one day we just decided by nature of the will we were gonna give her a new name and we began calling her lamb and lamby and just a few weeks ago an by and she started to act like a lamb we're just amazed I thought wow I'll file that one away and in fact 20 years went by I lost track of that family I was teaching a course of introduction course to New Testament at Vanguard University and the first that first day of the class I was calling the roll 85 people in the class has tried to get names associated with faces I saw this unusual last name and I thought I wonder if this is Tiger growing up so I asked her Renee I said would you stay would you come what she didn't know me from Adam I said I asked her would you talk to me after class so all the other students leave the room she comes up says you wanted to talk to me I said yeah your parents Gina and Jerry gave the last name said they they are I said you have a sister she said I do I said well I don't know if this is your your sister but do you ever remember your parents calling you tiger she thought real hard and she said no I said I don't remember that so that's okay I said it must been your sister I said tell you folks hi she said she'd do that she started toward the door all of a sudden she flipped around and she looked at me with a smile and said buddy do remember they used to call me lamb and I said to her you're the one they called her lamb so long she forgot she'd ever been a tiger Jesus called Peter Rock so long he forgot he had ever been Simon he'll call you Christian so long you'll forget you ever were a sinner he is the one who gives us a new vision of our identity and it's a gift we give to others it's how relationships spoil when we start well you're you're fat or you're lazy all these things that come out of our mouth that denigrate people rather than build them up power of speech if anyone goes on saying to this mountain Jesus says in mark 11:30 23 if anyone goes on saying to this mountain be removed I love what Paul says the Apostle Paul says in Philippians chapter 4 verse 13 notice how he's thinking and how he's speaking he says I can do everything through him who gives me strength I can do everything through him and I want to shout down across the tunnel of time hey Paul you know if I weren't in church I would say hey Paul where you smoking dope you know I mean what why in a world would you say something as stupid as that because you're in prison your church planting days are over I don't I don't know of any miracles that happen through his ministry after the writing of the Philippian letter he's he is near he is near execution date and he's saying in that prison cell I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me and I want to say hey what in the world are you thinking and I can I can hear him say back to me oh you don't understand Prison is the hardest thing Jesus ever asked me to do and I found that with his help I can even do this that's what the old things means it doesn't mean I can leap over a mountain in a single bound it doesn't mean I be an Olympic curler isn't that a strange game by the way that is so weird just weird I mean those people's it means that whatever is my lot in life whether it's caring for a disadvantaged child whether it's going through a rendus breakup of a relationship whether it's facing financial exigency which is just so challenging I can do that through Christ it's the language of faith in fact I just felt prompted I didn't do this in the first service but I just felt prompted say that when we are going through difficult circumstances we need to be we need to be as a help to us using the language of Scripture what then shall we say if God is for us who can be against us he who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen it is God who justifies who is he that condemns Christ Jesus who died more than that who was raised to life it's at the right hand of God is interceding for us who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall trouble or hardship or famine or nakedness or danger or sword as it is written for your sake we face death all day long we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered No in other words were not sheep to be slaughtered no in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us the word conquer there is the word literally translated hyper winner's it's someone who doesn't just barely make it across the finish line with a last gasp but someone who keeps running a hundred yards after they've crossed the finish line we're hyper winners through him who loved us and I am convinced that neither death nor life neither Angels nor demons neither the present nor the future nor any powers neither height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord that is the language and the mentality of faith so the language of faith the mentality of faith leads us to the third point which is this woman took the action of faith when she heard about Jesus she came that is she did something she got up she got dressed she got out and she got through to Jesus notice the cycle here what do you think is what you say is what you do is what you say is what you think is what you do is what you say is what you think is what you do the mentality and the language of faith precedes the action of faith but unless faith takes action it just remains parked in language and mentality faith always requires action it took it took faith in action to see the church relocate on their site back in nineteen eighty to eighty two it took faith in action for a young associate pastor by the name of Wayne Tesh to see that there were foster parents in the church here who needed a break and he began became burdened for foster children and the families that were taking care of them by the way the Christian community could solve the foster-care issue in America overnight if we would just get engaged it's no reason for a child to be without a loving home and so Wayne came here I'll never forget Wayne came to me and he said I got this idea and I've talked to with Orange County social services and they said they would give us some family names that they would like to have a break with it he told me some of the heartbreak stories of the foster kids and he said you know we have our own camp here at the church but can we do up can we do a camp for foster kids how much you know pastor concerned with budgets how much will it cost you never asked that do you Jordan know how much will it cost then he said about $5,000 and at that time our weekly income was five thousand dollars all told and in fact I always had the view of the church Treasury don't leave anything for the Antichrist spend it all every week I hope you still have that attitude so so we went we went to the congregations explained the need and took an offering we didn't know what and but people acted gave $5,000 I'll never forget the Sunday night we consecrated the first workers that would go up for the first royal family kids camp in 1985 37 kids by the way I I don't know if you've ever had the chance to hear the testimonies some of those kids that are no adults but it'll it'll make you cry that week changed their lives and now 120,000 kids around the world have experienced royal family kids camp since 1985 but it but it took faith in action waiting could have said we know this would really be a great idea and could have talked about it but unless it got up and did something and unless partners came along too did something that ministry would have never happened to to kids it's all across the board this is this is the case it's one of the reasons why often in church we ask people that some time during a service often let the clothes if you're here and want to confess faith in Jesus Christ today we invite you to come forward or if you have a need come forward what are we doing we're saying you know just don't mentally think about it get your body in motion take an action take a step that symbolizes that forward step you're taking to follow the Lord Jesus Christ the action of faith the fourth point is simply this we must place our faith not in faith but our faith in the person faith has an object Jesus if a teenage kid discovers you know I'm in love I am in love well who are you in love with I don't I don't know I'm just in love with love well what good is that you know I mean love requires an object it requires another person at least I think it does so first US I have faith where you have faith in Y have faith in faith well that's that's kind of amorphous that doesn't have meaning in reality have faith in an objective person that person happens to be Jesus who lived a blameless life Dittus a death for our sins took our sins upon himself he took action he did stay up in heaven and say you know be a wonderful idea if these people could find a way to have heaven as their eternal home he took action though he was in the form of God he took upon himself the form of a servant and became subject to death he took action for this woman took action in fact one of the really neat things about this story and I've already kind of alluded to it is she Jesus has already had an interruption this ruler of the synagogue has interrupted his walk I don't know Gospels doesn't tell us where he was going but it was in an eruption in fact all of Jesus miracles and much of his teaching were interruptions there wasn't a single day he got up and looked at his daily planning schedule and said hmm see today I got a dude I need to do at least three miracles today I think I'll heal a blind person maybe I'll heal a lame person and I'll heal the deaf person that'll be it for the day all the miracles were interruptions Jesus loved to be loves to be interrupted I mean that the thief on the cross says you know he wants to be with Jesus and and what does Jesus do he says to him today you'll be with me in paradise he doesn't look across that the man and say you know what I'm dying for the sins of the whole world I really don't have time for you today his love particular arises and so this woman comes along and she is an interruption to the interruption she had gotten to Jesus and in doing so she had had to ply her way through the crowd pushing people aside which meant from again a Old Testament point of view that she was ritually defiling people left and right until she got to Jesus the Holy One the rabbi the miracle man and I wonder if she didn't at the last minute think wow if I touch him I originally made him a impure or - but here's where the situation changes under the Old Testament law if the ritually impure touches the richly pure it defiles the ritually pure that's the flow of energy if you will but Jesus reverses that when the ritually impure touches the ritually pure the richly pure purifies the impure or to put it in another language when the contaminated which this woman was ritually defiled when the contaminated touches the uncontaminated which is Jesus the uncontaminated decontaminates the contaminated and you look at what happened what happens on the cross of Jesus Christ I see Jesus hands out standing extended like this and it's it's an invitation come stream to me all the sins of all he died for all streamed to me all those sins I will take them into my body and as a result of my sacrificial death and subsequent resurrection from the dead I will then stream out to you righteousness and wholeness and purity there is a transfer that's taking place our Trent our sins are transferred to him and his righteousness and his life and his purity are transferred back to us it's an amazing gift amazing gift so she took the action of faith that's what we must do in every circumstance in life whether the faith calls is asking the Lord for a change in our circumstance or our faith when our circumstances aren't changing is that God is with me and my unchanged circumstance and he is working for the good everything else may be working against me but I know there is always one who is working for me he is working for the good to those who are called in Christ Jesus so Jesus says to this woman two things he says who touched me he obviously knew who touched him but he wants her to come forward and identify herself Jesus senses when we have faith he senses when we've taken the right action he knows it and then he says to her daughter your faith has healed you it's it's like he gives her the credit even though he's the source isn't that like Jesus so kind doesn't what a human doesn't humiliate the woman and said honors her even though her faith without him would have just she had to go in a way still sick in fact it's very interesting since that she'd spent all she had on doctors and got only worse Luke who is a doctor himself and in his gospel he he kind of defense doctors and says well basically no one could help her now her condition was hopeless so if she just had faith in faith she had gone away but it was Jesus who transformed her and yet Jesus in his kindness says who are your faith this wouldn't happen if you hadn't got up and got to me if you hadn't been thinking if you hadn't been saying if you hadn't been acting your faith has made you whole and he calls her daughter it's the only person we have recorded in Jesus ministry who has given a family name daughter he calls no one else in the Gospels daughter she is the only one he ever called daughter indicating immediately that he was seeing her in a family relationship and that's what he does for each one of us he sees us not as strangers he sees us not as visitors he sees us not as objects he sees us as members of his precious family his sons and his daughters Jesus will always treat you like a member of his family and he honors our faith and he honors our love for him and we honor him because what a difference he makes in our life cannot imagine having lived life without Jesus I would never want you to live your life without Jesus he makes all the difference in the world Jesus changes everything [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: Mesa Church

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Id: 0vfKb7TmS3Y

Length: 33min 22sec (2002 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 28 2018