Thank you, Adam. I love that
hymn. Let's open our Bibles to Psalm
133. Psalm 133. We're going to be looking at
another miracle of our Lord in Matthew chapter 14. And the people that were or sick
with disease, touched the hem of his garment." Touched the
hem of his garment. Now Aaron surely is a type of
Christ as our priest. And the anointing of oil that
was poured on Aaron's head, the scripture says, dripped off the
skirt of his robe. And the word skirt here in our
text in Psalm 133 is the same as hymn. And so here's a picture
of the anointing oil going onto the head of our high priest,
the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one. And one drop, one drop of oil
off the hymn of his garment is sufficient. So let's read these
three verses together. It is a song of decree, or degrees,
which is a hymn that was sung in worship as the congregation
approached the tabernacle, and they would sing, behold, how
good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in
unity. Whatever differences we might
have, They are not only insignificant, but they're irrelevant when it
comes to the unity that we have together in Christ. What a bond. It is like the precious ointment
upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard,
and went down to the hem of his garment. As the dew of Hermon, Hermon translated means a sanctuary,
and Mount Hermon is on the northern border of Israel, also called
the Mountain of Snow. And the waters that came off
of Mount Hermon where the headwaters for the Jordan River, which provided
water of life for all of Israel. And it's a picture of heaven. Mount Hermon is a picture of
heaven. The place where the water, the source of the water of life.
As the dew of Hermon and as the dew that descended upon the mountains
of Zion, For there, the Lord commanded the blessing, even
life forevermore. And that is the blessing. The
blessing, as we just sang, is life forevermore, everlasting
life. What a blessing. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we rejoice
in knowing that we have a priest, a great high priest who has been
anointed fully with the power of your spirit to accomplish
our salvation. And Lord, we thank you for that,
that oil of gladness that he's been anointed with above his
fellows. Lord, that we might that we might
be able to receive just a drop of that anointing that would
come off our master's garment. Lord, that you would bless us
tonight with your spirit, that you would reveal more of the
glory of Christ, that you would cause us, Lord, to find our life
evermore in him. We pray for our children this
week and for the teachers and ask Lord that you would be pleased
to bless these hours to their hearts and begin to instill in
them the truth of who you are and what you've done and cause
them Lord to turn and to find hope and faith in Christ. For
it's in his name we pray, amen. Let's turn in the spiral hymnal
now to hymn 23. 23, and we'll stand together. Pass me not, O gracious Father,
Sinful, wretched though I be, Though you might in truth condemn
me, let your mercy fall on me. Love of God so everlasting, blood
of Christ so rich and free, grace of God so strong and saving,
magnify them all in me. Pass me not, O blessed Savior,
let me hear your gracious call. I'm a guilty, helpless sinner
Savior, at your feet I fall Love of God so everlasting Blood of
Christ so rich and free Grace of God so strong and saving Magnify
them all in me. Pass me not, almighty Spirit. You can cause the dead to live. Speak the word of saving power. Give me faith. and make me live. Love of God so everlasting, blood
of Christ so rich and free, grace of God so strong and saving,
magnify them all in me. Pass me not a poor lost sinner,
If you will, you can save me. Reach down with your hand of
mercy, Saving others, Lord, save me. Love of God so everlasting. Blood of Christ so rich and free. Grace of God so strong and saving. Magnify them all in me. Be seated. Let's open our Bibles to Matthew
14, Matthew chapter 14. We'll begin reading in verse
34. And when they were gone over,
they came into the land of Gennesaret. And when the men of that place
had knowledge of him, they sent out into all the country round
about, and brought unto him all that were diseased, and besought
him that they might only touch the hem of his garment." That's
the title of this message, the hem of his garment. And as many
as touched were made perfectly whole. The first thing that struck me
in this miracle or miracles and I hadn't really thought about
it so much before but all the detail that's given in the Bible
as to specific locations. You just think about it. The
Garden of Eden, there's no question about where it was located. The
rivers that some of which are still there are all named in
Genesis chapter 2. And exactly not only what those
rivers were but where they flowed to. Very specific about where the
Ark landed on Mount Ararat. That mountain exists today. And
men are still beautifully looking for Noah's Ark. Abram, the scripture tells us,
came from the Ur of the Chaldees. And very specific details are
given in God's Word about his journey. from there to the promised
land. Specific details. On the road
to Gaza, where Philip met the Ethiopian eunuch. Over and over
and over, great detail with roads and mountains and nations and
cities. When you read the book of Acts, we read Paul's missionary
journeys and The Lord even tells us what side
of the island the ship landed and what direction the wind was
blowing and how they got from one spot to an exact same spot. And we can trace those travels
by the locations that are there today. And I thought, why is the Lord given
us such detail on these locations and the only thing that I can
conclude is that the Lord manifest His grace and His glory
in very specific places. We just sang that song, Pass
Me Not. How many places and how many
people in this world the Lord has just passed by? No mention
of them? They are insignificant. The Bible
says they are a drop in the bucket. They are a speck of dust on the balance
scale that the nations aren't worthy to be burned. And yet
when the Lord visits a place, he gives very, very specific
detailed information about that place saying to you and me, that
there are very special places that I go to. And it behooves
us to find out where those places are and be where he is. He has manifested his grace and
his glory in his word, that's That's a place. We go to the
place of God's word in order to find out who he is and what
he's done. And so it is with the gathering
of God's people where two or three are gathered together in
my name. There I am in the midst of them. When we come together,
we've come here tonight because this is the place where the Lord
has has been pleased to show forth his grace and his glory. So many places that the Lord
has not revealed himself. Our God is omnipresent, we know
that. We know there's not a place on
the face of the earth that he's not. But we're talking about
how the Lord throughout the Bible, in every instance, gives very
detailed, specific locations whenever he does something, whenever
he manifests himself, whenever he shows forth his grace and
his glory. You know, when Ruth The Lord
wasn't going to manifest his glory in Moab. Naomi had to bring Ruth to Bethlehem
before she could meet her kinsman redeemer. There was a specific
place, Bethlehem being the house of bread, that was the place
where the Lord was going to show forth his glory and his grace
and he was not going to do a work of grace in Moab. Lord, I want to find a place
where the Lord is. And I just want to be there. When they were gone over, they
came into the land of Gennesaret. And when the men of that place
had knowledge of him, how would they have had knowledge of him?
You know, I talk to people all the time who have no interest
in meeting with God's people. They have no interest in being
where the Lord is because they have convinced themselves that
God is meeting with them privately and personally, and God is speaking
to them in ways that makes them very special. That's not consistent with what
the Lord has given us in his word. The Lord didn't just, when
the scripture says, and when the men of that place had knowledge
of him, nobody got a vision, nobody got a direct word from
heaven saying that the Lord Jesus is over there or he's coming.
How would they have gotten knowledge of him? They would have heard
about him from someone else. Someone would have spread the
word. that the Lord Jesus is coming and that he's here. And that's still how we find
out. How we have the knowledge of him is by the testimony of
others that have seen him and have been with him. Beginning,
first of all, with the testimony of the penman of scripture. And
then the testimony of God's people. and the testimony of God's called
preachers. This is where we hear. We heard about him. And when
the men had knowledge of him, when they knew something about
where he was, how shall they believe on him
in whom they've not heard? Heard. Thomas insisted when the
Lord appeared to the disciples and Thomas wasn't there. And
then Thomas came. And we learn in that example
a lesson of what's missed when we miss being in the place where
the Lord is showing forth his grace and glory among God's people. Thomas was left, Thomas has been
known ever since as Doubting Thomas. And Thomas was rebuked
by the Lord because Thomas said, unless I see him and touch him,
I will not believe. And so when the Lord appeared
next time, Thomas was there. Thomas, here's my wounds. Reach forth your finger. And
Thomas fell at our Lord's feet and said, oh my Lord and my God.
And the Lord rebuked him. The Lord said, Thomas, It's good
that you believe now that you've seen, but blessed are those who
have not seen and yet believe. They're gonna believe on your
testimony. They're gonna believe. They're gonna believe by the
word. These men in Gennesaret had knowledge of Christ because
somebody told them about him. Somebody saw him, somebody heard
him. And the Lord says to us, you shall be my witnesses. The
Lord, you know, the fact that the Lord uses means to accomplish
his sovereign purpose only gives him more glory. that the Lord
would use that we talked about prayer this past Sunday. And
if God is sovereign and he's already determined to all things,
why pray? God has ordained the means as
well as the end. And the fact that he would be
pleased to use the means of prayer to accomplish his already predetermined
purpose only makes only makes him more glorious because it
brings into the equation many more factors in accomplishing
his purpose, does it not? Compared to the fact whether
or not God would just, without any means, just do something? He could. But you see, it only
makes our God more infinite and more glorious, the fact that
he would use so many means. Men are free to make choices
every day and the multitude upon multitude of choices that are
made by men all around the world and yet
every one of those choices fits perfectly into God's preordained
purpose. That's glorious to me. I don't have any problem with
saying that our God uses means to accomplish his purpose and
he uses the testimony of his church. Yes, the Lord could do
for every one of his children what he did for Saul of Tarsus.
He could just arrest them one-on-one, speak audibly to them from heaven,
cause a light to shine from heaven, but that's not the means that
he uses. He uses the preaching of the
gospel. He uses the witness and the prayers of his people. And
these men who had knowledge of the Lord Jesus had obviously
been informed through those means that the Lord was there. When the scripture says in John
chapter 4 that many of the men in Sychar believed. What was the means that the Lord
used to bring those men to himself? Was it not that woman who was
too ashamed to go to the well in the morning and be the talk
of the town? She'd been married five, no telling
how many homes she had broke up in that little town. And now
she runs back down to Sychar and shamelessly announces to
all the people of that town, come meet a man who told me everything
I ever did. Boy, that would have perked up
a lot of ears in that town. Because a lot of those people
knew the things that she had done. But now they're gonna meet
a man that told them everything that she had done. Yeah, and
he's gonna tell you everything you've done. Everything you've
done in your own sin and everything that you've done in Christ. Because
everything that you've done is sin. And everything that Christ
did is credited to your account. And he tells us everything that
we've ever done. And God used her testimony to
cause those men to come and to listen and to believe. In the early chapters of John,
the Lord appears to Philip and Philip goes and gets Andrew and... Andrew, I'm sorry, Peter, and
Philip goes to get Nathaniel and it's just word of mouth.
Word of mouth. The knowledge of Christ. always
leads to a desire for others to have that knowledge. We don't
pray and witness and support the ministry of the gospel out
of duty or obligation. We've had an experience that
we want others to have. We've met the Lord Jesus Christ
And we've experienced the forgiveness of our sin. And we have the hope
of eternal life. And we know what it is to not
have that. And we want others to have that. So when the scripture says, and
when the men of that place had knowledge of him, they sent out
into the country round about and brought unto him all that
were diseased. They desired others to know him.
They wanted others to have the hope of eternal life. They wanted
others to experience the freedom from the law and the love of
God shed abroad in their hearts. They wanted others to experience
the joy of salvation and the comfort and peace that only God
can give. And the purpose that they now
had as a result of knowing him. They went and told everybody
else. Who did they talk to? Who did
they, who specifically did they round up? Well, all they that
were diseased. The deaf, the blind, the halt,
the crippled, the leper, the one with the palsy, the ones
with the issue of blood, the lame, those who had an urgent
need, those who were suffering, those who could find no help
from physicians. And the Lord Jesus said, I did
not come for the well. They that are well need not a
physician, but they that are sick. I didn't come for the righteous. The gospel of God's grace that
goes out from his people is for those who are diseased with sin.
Those who can't find anyone else to help them. And unlike a physical
disease, these people that these miracles are relating to obviously
were were painfully aware of the diseases that they had and
they were excited to hear that there was a healer. But unlike
physical diseases, those who mind the things of the flesh,
the spiritual disease of sin is not as easily detected until
the Lord makes it known to you. And when the Lord makes it known
to you, it's just as real as any physical disease that the
body could ever be afflicted with. And it's just as urgent
and it makes one just as needful to be spiritually blind, to be
spiritually deaf, to not be able to stand in the presence of a
holy God, to be leprous from head to toe. These spiritual
conditions are are, well, they're made known to the
heart by the Holy Spirit and it's a picture of the Lord's
church. It's kind of like that ragtag
army of David that we read about in 1 Samuel, those that were
distressed and those that were in debt and those that were discontented,
they were the ones who gathered at the cave of Adullam, Adullam
being justice, with David, their commander. And the same thing's
true. Those who were afflicted with
the spiritual disease of sin, when they hear that there's one
who is able. We're like that woman with the
issue of blood. We've spent all that we have
on physicians, and we're worse off now than we were before.
I'm sure the medical practice of that day would have been bloodletting,
which was the last thing that that woman with the issue of
blood needed for a doctor to do to her. And yet, is that not
exactly what the law does? When we try to solve this sin
problem by going to the law, by going to religion, by going
to works, we only aggravate the problem. We only increase our
guilt and our sin. This miracle of healing is for
those who are diseased. Verse 36, they brought these people to
Christ and they did not say to him, I know you've been looking for
these folks and we found them for you and you've been wanting
to heal them and now they're here and they're gonna let you
do it. I mean, how absurd is that? And yet, isn't that what
the freewill gospel preaches? And the lepers, when they came
before the Lord, they said, Lord, we know that thou canst if thou
wilt. But the freewill gospel says
God wills to save all men, but he can't unless man lets him
have his way. No, look at verse 36. They besought him. They pleaded
with him. That word means to beg. They
beseeched him. They came before him and said,
Lord, we are completely dependent upon you if we're gonna be healed.
You don't owe us anything and we don't have anything to give
you. You're gonna have to take this all on yourself. Lord, if
you don't heal me, I won't be healed. Lord, save me. Lord, forgive me. Lord, put away
my sin. We're never, ever presumptuous
in coming before the Lord. Yes, yes, in Christ and in the
sight of God as he is, so are we. And there's a great hope
there and a great comfort there and there's great peace there.
But at the same time, we've still got that old sinful nature, that
old sinful man. And as you receive Christ Jesus,
the Lord, so walking in him, you see, as a believer, we never
get beyond beseeching him to make us whole, beseeching him
to forgive us, beseeching him to save us. We don't say, well,
you know, don't need to worry about that anymore. You know
that's all, I'm in Christ and I'm perfect in Christ, yes we
are. And yet we still have until as
long as we're in this body of flesh we're going to be beseeching
him. when the children of Israel were
in the wilderness with Moses and God sent fiery serpents into
the camp. And Moses made that brazen serpent
and put it up on a pole. And if anyone looked, they lived. And the Lord Jesus interpreted
that when he said, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,
so much the son of man be lifted up. And Christ on Calvary's cross
was made sin that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him. And all the fiery serpents that
have stung us, stung him. And he satisfied divine justice
once and for all. But to go back to that passage
in the Old Testament, the scripture doesn't say if anyone was bitten,
and if they looked, they were made whole. The scripture puts
it like this, all that were bitten when they looked were made whole. Same thing's true today. Only those who are bitten by
the fiery serpent of sin, only those who have been made sinners
Oh, that's the work of the Holy Spirit, isn't it? When He comes,
He will convict the world of sin because they believe not
on me. So much unbelief that we still
have. Lord, I believe, but help Thou
my unbelief. That's the root cause of all
of our sin and the Spirit of God convicts us of that. And
so we're always coming before the Lord. We're always beseeching
Him. We're always looking to Him.
for the hope of our salvation, for the forgiveness of our sin.
And when we are bitten, we will look, and when we look, we'll
be healed. And all that were bitten, when
they looked, were made whole. People that weren't bitten by
snakes had no need to look. They had no need to look. only those that were bitten looked,
and all those that were bitten looked. And this is a faithful
saying, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and
he saves every one of them, and he only saves sinners. He only
saves sinners. When the men of that place in
Gennesaret, a very specific place, heard and they had knowledge
of the Lord Jesus. They went out into the countryside
and they gathered up everybody that was diseased and they brought
them to Christ and they besought him. They beseeched him, they
prayed, they asked him, they pleaded with him. Verse 36, and they besought him that they
might only, only touch the hem of his garment. You know, in this world, little
is little and much is much. If a person has a lot or they
have a little, That's easy to measure in the world. But with
God, little is more than all this world has to offer. Oh,
if I could just touch the hem of his garment. If one drop of
the anointing oil could come off of Aaron's robe and fall
my way, that That poor Syrophoenician woman, she was just waiting and
watching for one crumb to fall from the master's table. A crumb
from his table is more than all the food that this world has
to offer. Oh, if we could just but touch
the hem of his garment. A little bit of his grace is
more precious than all the riches of this world. A little bit of
His love is more glorious than all the pleasures that this world
has to offer. Just a little bit. A little bit
of His light. A little bit of light. as to
who he is and who we are and how it is that God's pleased
to save sinners is more than all the knowledge that this world
has to offer. Just a little bit. If I could
just touch the hem of his garment, that would be sufficient. A little bit with God is much. That's centurion. who had a servant
whom he loved that was on his deathbed. And the Lord said,
I will come. What did that centurion say?
He said, I'm not worried that you should come under the roof
of my house. Only say the word. One word from you, Lord, is all
I need. Just one word. I don't need you
to do anything. Just speak the word and my servant
shall be healed. One word from God. Oh, to have
the ears to hear one word. The Lord said, if you had the
faith of a mustard seed, you could say to all the mountains
of sin, be buried in the depths of the sea of God's forgetfulness,
and they will all be put away. One little mustard seed of faith.
You see, brethren, I think a lot of times we think like our natural
man when we think that we've got to have a whole bunch. We have to have a, what I mean by
that is, I just, I want, we want more of him. We want to understand
more. But Lord, if you'll just speak
one word, that'll be hope, that'll be comfort. If I know the words
from you, it's all I need to know. Scripture tells us in the
book of Proverbs that the honey of God's word is to be taken
in small portions. Sometimes we think, well, if
I just had a full understanding of all the things of God, then
I would be, you know, no. Little by little, line by line,
precept by precept, here a little, there a little. That's the means
by which the Lord grows us in His grace. And the growth of
grace is slow. It's slow. You know, weeds grow
fast. Trees grow slow. And they've
got to put roots down. So, you know, if we could just
touch the hem of his garment. I love that the scripture says
the manna, and we know that that's Christ, the manna that came from
heaven was a small white thing. A small white thing. Oh. Lord, give me my daily bread.
Lord, just let me have a taste of thee. If I could just touch
the hem of your garment, that'd be sufficient. Elijah, after three years of
drought, prayed and the Lord sent rain in a cloud the size
of a man's hand. A deluge came from a very small
cloud. And when he left Mount Carmel
and ran back to Mount Hermon or Mount Sinai, I'm sorry, and
hid himself in that cave and the earthquake and the rocks
rent and the fire and the wind and the Lord wasn't in it. You see, this is what I was trying
to say earlier about if we just had a great experience, if we
just had this inexplicable amount of glory that would just fill
us with measures beyond measure and what I'm saying is that all
those great demonstrations of God's glory and power and the
Lord was not in it. And then when God spoke, it was
what? A still, small voice. Just a little. I think that's
the significance of this miracle. It's saying to you and me, Lord,
if I could just touch the hem of your garment, one little piece
of you, is more than all the world has to offer. God brought down the most powerful
country in the world with things like lice and frogs and fleas
and dust. The churches have always been
a very small remnant. God's churches have always been
small gatherings of people. When the Lord fed those 5,000,
five loaves of bread and two small fishes. I remember listening
to a message about Todd preached on that passage and he kept calling
the fishes sardines. That's pretty small fish. That's
pretty small fish. You know, I think of those little
bream that they probably had. A little dried up little bream. Two small fishes. And they gathered
up 12 fragments of leftovers afterwards. You see, in the hand
of God, little is much. Little is much in the hand of
God. And then we start thinking like
the world when we think, well, I just gotta have a great amount
in order to be satisfied. No, Lord, just feed me with the
bread that is convenient for me, is what David said. In other
words, that amount of bread that I need today to sustain me. You know, we want to sit down
and we want to enjoy this great feast. And no, no, the manna's
going to be a small white thing. The honey's going to be on the
tip of the rod, not in a jug. You know, it's going to be line
by line, little by little. Lord, just speak one word. One word, that'll be sufficient.
One crumb for your table, one drop of oil off the hem of a
garment. The Lord said, lest you become
as a little child, you should not enter the kingdom of heaven.
That's a newborn baby. That's pretty small. And the greatest example of all
is when God Almighty left the glories of heaven and came into
this world and was conceived in the womb of a virgin and delivered
in a stable in a little town as a baby that was completely
dependent upon the woman that he had made to care for him. Oh, here's what God says. Despise
not the day of small things. In the world, big is big, much
is much, little is little. With God, it's not so. God uses
little things to bring to himself great glory. When those disciples
were brought before the Sanhedrin, they looked at them, fishermen,
and they despised them. They said, these are ignorant
and unlearned men. And yet they turned the world
upside down. Psalm 2. Kiss the son, lest he
be angry when his wrath is kindled but a little." Just a little. God doesn't have
to, you know, he wrote the unchangeable law of God on tablets of stone
with his finger. You see, over and over and over
again, not only do we see very specific details given in God's
word as to where he manifested his glory, but when he manifested
his glory, he always did it in ways that were unimpressive to
the flesh, unimpressive to the natural man. And the only time
that the Lord's full display of His power and glory is going
to be seen by this world is when the trump of God sounds and the
eastern sky splits and the Lord Jesus comes riding on that white
horse and His angels with their sickle gathering up the harvest
and casting into the lake of fire the chaff and all men running
for the hills and fearing that the rocks would cover them, that
the Son of God, His glory will be on display one day. But right
now, right now, it's one drop of oil at a time. It's one crumb
at a time. It's one little portion of honey
at a time. It's just touching again and
again and again and again the hem of his garment. That's how the Lord works. I think of Gideon when the Lord
raised up Gideon to be his prophet. Gideon's hiding from the Midianites
behind the wine press. And Gideon confesses to the Lord
that he is the least member of the least family in the least
tribe of all of Israel. And God said, yep, and you're
my man. You see, the Lord doesn't do
things the way we do things. He uses the smallest, most insignificant
things. Why? That no flesh would glory
in his presence. Rahab, the harlot. Ruth, the
Moabitess. Mary? That young girl who was amazed
that she would find grace in the eyes of the Lord was used
of God to bear the Son of God? Oh, you see, brethren, this is
an encouragement to me. I hope it's encouragement to
you, because we're pretty insignificant, but that's a good place to be.
Because whenever somebody thought they were somebody, God had to,
in order for God to use Moses, he had to spend 40 years in the
backside of the desert before God could use him. He left Egypt
believing he was somebody. God had to knock Saul of Tarsus
off his high horse. God makes us nothing before we
can be used by him. The hem of his garment. And just
in closing, let's look at this last phrase in verse 36. And
as many as touched were made perfectly whole. The Lord never
heals sin part way. He took all of our sin in his
body upon that tree. And he put all of our sin in
the depths of the sea. And he put every sin underneath
his blood. He doesn't heal partially. He
heals wholly, completely, perfectly. He makes us perfect in Christ.
In Hebrews 12, verse 23, speaking of the church, says that it is
the spirits of the just men made perfect. Perfect. Everyone that touched the hem
of his garment were made. perfectly whole. Nothing lacking. Our Heavenly Father, thank you. Thank you for being specific. Thank you for revealing your glory through
the testimony of your gospel and the word of your church and
your... Lord, we thank you for causing
us to see the disease of sin that we have and making us, Lord,
needy and causing us to beseech thee and then making us perfectly
whole in Christ. Lord, what hope, what comfort,
what grace. Amen. Adam, what are we gonna
say? 168, 168. We'll close the hymn with 168,
and let's stand. Lord, I hear of showers of blessing. Thou art scattering, full and
free. Showers the thirsty land refreshing. Let some drops now fall on me. Even me, even me, let thy blessing
fall on me.