All right, Brethren, Luke 13. Compassion and pity. There's something about those
words that appeal to our heart. Even unregenerate men are compassionate
toward those that are in need and dire need and suffer. Some
are not. Some are just not. But God's people especially
rejoice because we need it. We need compassion. We need pity. We need the Lord's compassion.
And so we rejoice because we know we need it continually.
And we see this throughout the scripture. In Matthew 14, 14,
Jesus went forth and saw a great multitude and was moved with
compassion toward them. And he healed their sick. On
one occasion, the Lord came to a funeral procession and it was
a widow woman who was burying her son. and the scripture says
the Lord had compassion and he went up and he touched the casket
and spoke and told the child to arise and he arose up and
began to talk and the Lord delivered him to this widow woman. Now
our text doesn't use the word compassion or pity but that's
what the Lord showed to this woman. He comes here to the temple
and he's teaching And there's a woman there that had been bowed
down. She had this spirit of infirmity
for 18 years. And the Lord heals her. He heals her. The Lord had compassion
on her. He loosed her from her infirmity. Hebrews 4.15 says, we have not
a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our
infirmities. but was in all points tempted
like we are. His infirmities have to do, the
word means weakness, has to do with inability, it has to do
with our constant need of him. And he experienced the weakness
of our flesh. He experienced that. I remember
in the Garden of Gethsemane, when he went back to the disciples
and he'd ask them to watch and pray, and they were asleep. And he had pity on them. He told
them to sleep on. And he said, the spirit's willing,
but the flesh is weak. The flesh is weak. But we have
this high priest. He was tempted in all points
like as we are, yet without sin. He knows. the feeling of our
infirmities. He knows the weakness of our
flesh. And our Savior not only knows
this, our Savior is Jehovah Rapha, the Lord that healeth thee. So not only does he know these
infirmities, but he has power to heal us, and he has power
to comfort his people. And the same as our Lord worked
miracles while he walked this earth, from his throne in glory,
through His gospel, through His hand ruling all things below,
by His Spirit, our Lord heals His needy people. And He does
this by the miracle of His grace. Now, I'm just going to read our
text as we go, but I want you to first notice where this miracle
occurred. It says there in verse 10, that
He was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And
behold, there was a woman. Our Lord worked miracles outside
of the synagogue, but he worked all the miracles. When he did
these miracles, he was the one doing them. And he always did
them in connection with his word. He did them in connection with
his word. And he did work many miracles in the synagogue. Here
he is at this synagogue, and this woman has come to the synagogue.
That's where she is. She came there, and he was teaching. And he works this miracle as
he's teaching. This is the most important thing
for us, is to gather to hear the gospel. The scripture says,
after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew
not God, it pleased God. by the foolishness of preaching
to save them that believe. This is beginning to end. He's
pleased to carry us through this wilderness, speaking to us in
this way. It's how he keeps his people
united. It's how he keeps us together,
needing each other and depending on him and experiencing this
grace. It's how he's pleased to save.
He brings his child under the preaching of the word. He brings
his child where he's teaching, just like he did right here.
And he speaks the word and he touches by his spirit, just like
he did when he walked this earth from heaven, he touches and he
heals. This woman had an infirmity for
a long time, a very long time, but it didn't stop her from coming
to the synagogue. She came to where the Lord was.
She came there to hear Him. A lot of times when we have infirmities
and are really bowed down, we don't want to come to where the
Lord's Word is being preached. She did, and seeing what he did
for her that day shows us this is where we need to be. That's
the best thing we can do is get under the true and faithful preaching
of the gospel, be there every time the gospel is preached,
and attend to the things that are preached. Scripture tells
us to not forsake the assembling of ourselves together as the
manner of some, but exhort one another and so much the more
as you see the day approaching. So that's where she was, this
took place in the synagogue, right there where he's teaching.
And then secondly, let's look at this woman's condition. Verse
11, it says, and behold, that's always important, behold, there
was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity 18 years and was
bowed together and couldn't no wise lift up herself. Verse 16
says, the Lord said she was one whom Satan had bound. Now, she
had a spirit of infirmity. Infirmity means want of strength. It means weakness, no ability. Infirmity is weakness. It's inability
of body, inability of soul. She had a spirit of infirmity. It affected her body, but it
was not only her body, it was in spirit. It was a spirit of
infirmity. And she had had this for 18 years,
a long time. She was bowed together, it says,
bowed together. She had a spirit of infirmity
18 years and was bowed together. This woman was bent over. There's
some that's tried to give medical names to this and say what it
was. The Lord doesn't say that, but she was bent over. It was
a spinal issue, obviously. Her eyes always were on her feet. Her eyes were always down upon
the earth. She was so bent over, bent together,
like just completely bent together, so her eyes were down all the
time. Her eyes were down. She couldn't
in no wise lift up, it says. She couldn't in no wise lift
up. She could not lift herself up. She couldn't straighten her
body. She couldn't look. When the Lord
was standing and preaching or sitting and preaching, she couldn't
even lift up to look at him. She's bowed down. Her eyes are
on the earth. She's focused on the earth. And
when it says here she had a spirit of infirmity, More than likely,
in this condition, there was some spiritual infirmity, there
was some depression, and there was some being cast down in her
mind, and cast down in her heart, and she couldn't lift herself
up in spirit either. She had no ability to free herself
from this condition. She couldn't, in no wise, lift
up herself. And Satan had bound her. in this
position. Spurgeon points out, we're going
to see here, the Lord touched her. And he points out that the
Lord never touched anybody who was possessed of a devil. And
that would mean that he had done this to her, given her this spirit
to bind her, but he wasn't like actually dwelling in her as we
see the Lord cast out devils in some. But this picture is
the condition of every unregenerate lost sinner. Every unregenerate
lost sinner comes into the world in this very condition spiritually.
We come into the world with a defiled spirit, a corrupt sin nature,
bowed together, bowed down, so focused on the earth, minding
only earthy things, only being able to behold the earth, just
like she was bent over physically. And we can in no wise lift up
ourselves. We cannot look to Christ above,
we cannot look to Him alone. We can't look to Him, that saving
look of casting it all on Him, and we can't look to Him and
Him only. Picture this woman unable to
look up, unable to raise her eyes up and look at the Lord.
She couldn't even do that physically, much less with the heart. Jesus
answered and said to Nicodemus, except a man be born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. Can't behold Christ, can't look
to Christ, can't enter into the kingdom. He said, no man can
come unto me. except the Father give it to
him. He said the natural man receives
not the things of the Spirit of God. He doesn't receive them,
but he says they're foolishness to him, but neither can he. Neither
can he, because they're spiritually discerned. Christ has to bind
the devil, and he has to free his child. He has to bind the
strong man and free his child. By nature, we are the valley
of dry bones. That's what we are by nature.
And we're responsible to believe. We're responsible to obey the
Lord. We're responsible to give him
all glory. But we don't have the ability to do it. We can't
lift ourself. Christ said, if you believe not
that I am he, you should die in your sins. We're responsible. We have to believe. And if we
don't believe, we're going to die in our sins. Yet no man can
believe on Christ except he be born from above. So why preach
this? Why declare this? Well, because
our Lord told us to. Our Lord said to the prophet
when he sent him into the valley of dry bones, he said, go tell
these bones to live and I will send my spirit into them and
I'll give them life. And that's what the Lord does
through this word. But now if we I only look at
this woman as a picture of an unregenerate lost sinner. This
is going to leave some of God's saints, his believing people,
very much trouble. Very much trouble. Very much
trouble. Some believe, quite a few actually
believe, this woman was already a believer. The Lord said there
to her, He spoke of her as being a daughter of Abraham. one in
whom there is no guile, an Israelite indeed. She did come to the temple. She did come there to the synagogue
to hear him. But whatever the case is, this
is true. God's saints have many infirmities. We have many infirmities. And
we become bowed down, very bowed down. tempted, sifted, buffeted
by the devil, by God's permission, by his permission, just like
Job and Peter and Paul, for our good, for his glory. There were
some of God's saints who suffered great spiritual infirmities. Great spiritual infirmities.
Depression, very, very troubling depression. There are some who
suffer other kinds of infirmities. Many right now that we know are
suffering from bodily infirmities. Very, very serious bodily infirmities. Some are bowed down. Some who
suffer from these infirmities are bowed down spiritually by
their sin. Bowed down by their sin. You
meet with brethren quite frequently that are full of doubt. without
assurance, very weak in faith. Some are cast down in ways nobody
can understand. And you can't understand unless
you've been where they've been and been through what they've
been through. And that's why we have this comfort of knowing
our great high priest is touched with the feeling of our infirmities.
He has experienced what we experienced. He can have compassion on us.
He has been there. Remember when he went to the
Garden of Gethsemane, he said, now is my soul troubled. His soul was troubled. He said,
he said he was in great agony, great pain. He knows what those
bodily infirmities feel like when you have so much pain, you
can't hardly stand it. But He knows all the feeling
of our infirmities and yet without sin. So He can have compassion
on His people. He can. And He's powerful to
comfort us too. Powerful to comfort us. When
we're in that place and we're in a spiritual, with spiritual
infirmities, it's just like this woman is in right here. You can
in no wise lift yourself. You can in no wise save yourself
out of it. And something I think the Lord's
teaching me is when somebody's going through these things and
going through some great trouble, so often I want to go to them
and tell them something. It would be wise to go to them
and ask them what the Lord's taught them. This is how he teaches
his people. And you can say a lot of things. They could have said to this
woman, lift up yourself. If you keep walking around like
that, you're just going to get worse and worse. She couldn't.
She just couldn't. If you've never been there, you
don't know what that's like. But if you have, you can have
compassion, because you know what that's like. Let's say you
suffered from depression. And that's a powerful thing. And if you've never experienced
that, you don't know what that's like. But our Lord does. But if you have, you can be compassionate. A child of God, if that's you,
go where this woman went. She went to the Lord's house.
Go to his throne of grace. Go into His Word. Plant yourself
under His gospel and at His feet in His Word. Just like she did.
You can just picture this poor woman bent over. And I mean,
all she can probably do is just shuffle with her feet. And she
shuffled herself to the synagogue. And she was there when the Lord
spoke this Word. And notice what the Lord did
for her. It says, verse 12, and when Jesus saw her. The Lord
saw her. from the foundation of the world.
He saw her before he ever made anything. The Lord saw her. She's
a true daughter of Abraham. That's one of God's chosen. That's
one of his elect, not just, there was lots of daughters of Abraham.
She's a true daughter of Abraham. She's a true daughter. He entered
covenant to save her and all his elect before this world was
made. He's seen us from the beginning. The Lord saw her perfect in His
righteousness. That's how He's seen His people
from the beginning. The Lord saw her sinless in Him,
by Him, being her surety, standing righteous and perfect in Him.
And the Lord saw her those 18 years. Those 18 years, the Lord
carried her, He sustained her, He protected her, He got her
her feet to His house that very day. You know, the Lord, you
think, well, what about a believer that goes a long time suffering
infirmities? Cowper wrote some of the best
hymns we have, and he suffered all his days through these infirmities. And who carries you in that?
When you're in unbelief, who's sustaining you and keeping you? and giving you those times to
be able to behold Him and look upon Him and have rejoicing in
Him. Well, the Lord permitted the
devil to touch Job. He said, if you consider my servant
Job, for his good, for God's glory, took away 10 children
in one day, took away all his riches, took away even his health,
He did all of that. He permitted the devil to touch
him. Who sustained Job through that
whole time? The Lord did. The Lord was keeping
him. The Lord saw him through all
of that. The Lord kept him. Peter, the
Lord permitted Peter to, the devil to sift Peter. Peter had
become become too confident in himself. All these other disciples, they
will forsake you, Lord. They'll leave. I won't do that.
I'll die with you before I do that. And the Lord said, the
devil's desire to sift you is weak, Peter. He already had begun.
That's why Peter was making this boast. But the Lord said, I've
prayed for you that your faith fell not. And so the Lord kept
Peter the whole time. The Lord permitted the devil
to buffet Paul, lest he should be exalted by the abundance of
revelations. The Lord has all, he knows what's
best for his people. We're not excused because of
our sins. We're not excused because of
our unbelief. We're not excused when we don't
come and seek the Lord, or any of
these things that infirmities can cause, we're not excused
by those. We're responsible to believe
Him. We're responsible to walk after Him. We're responsible
to add to our faith virtue and self-control and the things our
Lord spoke here. Have you ever been in a place
where You're begging God to free you, you're begging God to strengthen
you, you're begging God to get you out of whatever it is that
you're bowed down under, and He didn't at the time? Well, you're asking Him to, you're
begging Him to, but He hasn't. The psalmist, when the psalmist
was looking at all those, the wicked, and he was seeing people
that were being blessed and prospered, and he was saying, Lord, you've
forgotten to be merciful. Is your anger going to be upon
me forever? And he couldn't get himself out
of there. He could not stop thinking that
way. And the Lord said to him, made
him come to himself to say this, this is my infirmity, this is
my weakness. But when Paul was brought down,
he allowed Satan to buffet him, permitted him to be persecuted,
permitted him to have bodily infirmities. All these various
things, but all the while, the Lord's teaching them, my grace
is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in
your weakness. And that's really good news,
because the Lord sees his people. He knows them that are his. He
knows them that are his. Believer, you might have a lost
child, If you have a lost child, if he's a child of Abraham, God's
elect, God's chosen, he will cause that child to hear this
gospel. He will bring them unto this
gospel and he will speak it and he will make them to hear. We
can tell them to believe, we can tell them to lift up themselves,
we can tell them to free themselves from that. They won't be free
from it till the Lord speaks into their heart. And if you're
going through trouble and infirmity, and you're underneath a burden
and a load, and you desire to be free, you want to be free, you're responsible to lift up
yourself. There's times you can't. I'm
being honest. There's times you can't. but
underneath of the everlasting arm. Your times are in His hand. He saw her. He saw her. He sees
you. And the Lord saw her, and what
did He do? Verse 12, He called her to Him,
and He said unto her, Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity. He was teaching everybody in
that synagogue that day, and that call was going out. Everybody
was hearing it. just like it's going forth right
now, but then he spoke into her heart. He said to her personally, he
called her to himself, and he said, woman, thou art loosed
from thine infirmity. He hadn't touched her yet. She
hadn't straightened up yet. But he said, thou art loosed
from thine infirmity. Present tense. You are. He's
eternal God. He's the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. How could He be the Lamb slain
from the foundation of the world when He hadn't been to the cross
yet? How could He say He is the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world when He hadn't gone to the cross yet? He said, I
am that I am. He's eternal God. He's eternal
God. Whatever He's purposed, it is.
What has been, what is, and what shall be, it's all one eternal
present with our Lord. And when God says it's done,
it's done. She had been loosed by His electing
grace. She'd been loosed by His blood,
even though He hadn't been to the cross yet. He's the Lamb
slain from the foundation of the world. That's why He's doing
for her what He's doing for her. Before God's judgment seat, she'd
been loosed. And he comes and he says, loose
him and let him go. And he's the only one who has
the power and the strength. And that word comes in power.
And when he does, that's when he'll be loosed. And look what
happened. And then the Lord touched her. He touched her. This shows something extra of
the compassion of our Lord, in addition to the spiritual things
that it shows us. But you know, when you speak
to somebody, that's comfort. But to touch them. That's even
more comforting. Well, this is not like the phony
faith healers that put their hands on people. This touches
life. This touches righteousness. This
touches strength. This is power. This is God touching
her. Substitution is in this touch.
When they laid their hands on the head of that sacrifice, there
was a transference, a picture of the transference of sin to
the sacrifice and the righteousness to the person. And there's a
picture of that right here. Our Lord bore our infirmities
and took our sicknesses and went to the cross and paid every sin
that caused them. And he gave us his righteousness.
He touched her. He touched her. He's taking her
sin and her infirmity and He's given her His righteousness.
There's inseparable union in this touch. He that's joined
to the Lord is one Spirit. When our Lord touches us, He
touches us in Spirit and makes us one with Him. One with Him. And there's healing in this touch.
When the Spirit enters in and gives life and virtue and heals,
He heals you. There's a new man created. Perfect. Perfect. Because Christ dwells
there. Born of incorruptible seed. Can't
be corrupted. Perfect. Absolutely perfect. And that perfection's in Him.
He's the righteousness and the holiness of His people. And what
was the result now? Now He's spoken to her. He's
called her to Himself. He has said, Thou art loosed. He's touched her. Now what's
the result? And immediately she was made
straight and glorified God. 18 years she was bowed down.
Couldn't He have freed her from that 18 years ago? Our Lord could
free us right now and give us a perfect body if it was His
purpose. He could free you and free you
from all this body of sin if it was His purpose. He could
free Brother Cyril and make him perfectly well right now, if
it was his purpose. He could do a lot of things. He's God. He can do all things. But here she was, bowed down
for that spirit of infirmity and couldn't lift herself, but
immediately when Christ freed her, she was made straight. And
you think about this, this is, here's a woman who'd been bowed
down, and you know, if you've ever had a cast or anything like
that, it doesn't take but four or five weeks, and you have to
go through exercises to use your muscles again, just in that short
a time. This woman had not stood up in
18 years. But when Christ spoke, the strength,
his strength, gave her muscles ability that she had not used
in 18 years. He does this in regeneration
and conversion, and He does the same for believers with our infirmities
and our weaknesses and Satan's buffeting. This really is what
we're learning, this is what we're going to know in the end.
Anything you did, anything you did that was considered by God
to be a good work, to be anything that He commanded in this Word,
through his apostles and through those that wrote these scriptures,
anything he commanded that you did. You could have spoken any
one of these words to this woman and told her to lift up herself.
She couldn't do it. Anything you do, he did it in
you. She lifted up. She lifted up. When he said, you're loosed,
immediately, when he touched her, she lifted up. She did it. When he gives you faith, you
believe. Why didn't you believe before that? When you're in unbelief,
and as a believer, and you just can't believe God's working all
this for good, and he's going to bring good at it, when you
can't believe, when you finally come to the place where you believe,
why did you do it? Why didn't you before? When we get carried away thinking
we got some strength and we're going to work and we're going
to do and we lose sight of the fact that we've run way past
and gone way beyond and we're not following Christ and looking
to Christ. And then he brings you to yourself
and he turns you from that and makes you to see and you just
weep over your sin. Why not before? When we do anything we're commanded
to do, why didn't that man with the withered hand stretch his
hand forth before the Lord said, commanded him to stretch it forth?
Because it's by his power and his strength. That make men too
much like puppets? I want to be his puppet. I want
the life in me to be him. I want it to be him. That means,
brethren, That doesn't excuse you and me when we can't lift
up ourselves, but it also means when we do, we have to do exactly
what she did. She glorified God. She glorified
God. He did it in a way that made
her know all the glory went to Him, and she glorified Him, and
He makes us know that too. He makes you know you could in
no wise do it yourself, that He's your strength, and we give
Him all the glory. He told his apostles, he said,
with men, this is impossible. But with God, all things are
possible. With God, all things are possible. He giveth power
to who? To the faint. To them that have no mind, he
increases strength. Only to them that have no mind,
He said, it's not by might, it's not by power, it's by my spirit,
saith the Lord. But there's something else the
Lord did. Look at this next thing, and I'm just gonna read this,
but verse 14, he defended this woman. The ruler of the synagogue
answered with indignation. Somebody said that the spirit
of infirmity that was in her went out of her and went into
him. He already had it. The synagogue, he answered with
indignation, because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath day. And
he said to the people, there's six days in which men ought to
work, and in them, therefore, come and be healed, and not on
the Sabbath day. And the Lord then answered him
and said, thou hypocrite, you're pretending zeal for my word and
for my house. We can get so caught up in our
religion and building God's house and doing the things we're doing
and miss when Christ has shown mercy right in our midst and
fail to see it. That he has healed and miss it. He said, does not each of one
of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or his ass from the stall
and lead him away to watering? And ought not this woman, the
word is, must not this woman, it's even stronger than ought
not. The word is, must not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham,
whom Satan hath bound, lo, these 18 years, be loosed from this
bond on the Sabbath day? These men in their religion,
they had more compassion on their animals than on a sinner Christ
had delivered. They couldn't rejoice. But Christ
is not only our savior, he's not only our strength, he's the
defender of his weak people. He defended that harlot from
Simon the Pharisee. He defended his disciples from
the soldiers. He said, you're seeking me, let
these go free. And right here he defends this
weak believer from these Pharisees. And what happened? Again, his
people rejoice and give him the glory. Verse 17, and when he
had said these things, all his adversaries were ashamed. And
all the people rejoiced for all the glorious things that were
done by him. Now let's close with Hebrews
4. Now listen to Hebrews 4.14. Seeing then that we have a great
High Priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of
God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not a High Priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly
unto the throne of grace, this throne where we're given what
we don't deserve, that we may obtain mercy, mercy, and find
grace to help in time of need. Amen. All right, really great.