As I said a little while ago,
we have in this section of Mark's Gospel the question that's before
people all the time is, who is Jesus? Who is this carpenter
born of a suspect marriage in a despised part of Israel? A carpenter, a man so poor he
had no place to lay his head. Who is this Lord Jesus? We see the Lord Jesus in Mark's
Gospel continually showing people who he really is. The first words
of the scriptures in terms of God's activities are Let there
be light. And the Lord shines a light. He shines the light of who He
is in the lives of His people. And in shining that light, He
exposes the darkness of humanity. The darkness of humanity left
to themselves. In John 3.19 the Lord said, This
is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and
men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds
were evil. And so we've seen in the previous
weeks that the Lord Jesus takes his disciples across the Sea
of Galilee And it's a striking, striking passage of scripture. He goes all the way across the
Sea of Galilee. He is met there by a group of
Pharisees who come out to test him. Imagine the pride of man. There is their creator. There
in their midst, standing before them, is their God. And they
come out seeking to test the Lord Jesus. And they can test
him in their own minds because of their righteousness. Their righteousness that they
believe that they have achieved by their law-keeping, by their
activities. If you'd asked these Pharisees
when the Lord Jesus left them and hopped in that boat again,
If you'd asked them who was right and who was wrong, who is living
in light and who is in darkness, the Pharisees would have said,
and they would have justified their actions, they would have
said, we are the ones who really see. We are the ones that have
put this imposter to the test. We asked him for a sign from
heaven and he couldn't give us one. And they would have gone
on. They would have gone on in their
self-righteousness. They'd stitched their fig leaves
together and they were clean to them. And the Lord Jesus in
judgment just leaves them. In fact the word is that he abandoned
them. And there's never a word in the
scriptures that causes us to have any hope for them whatsoever. But the Lord Jesus takes his
people across the Sea of Galilee and he takes them to Bethsaida
in this passage before us. Bethsaida is a place that is
already condemned by the Lord Jesus. In Matthew 11.21 he says,
Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bestsider! If the
mighty works which you have done anew had been done in Tyre and
Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
But I say to you, it will be more bearable, more tolerable
for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment than for you. And
you, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down
to Hades. For if the mighty works which
were done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained
to this day. But I say to you that it shall
be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment
than for you." These are serious words from the Lord Jesus. So dark is the darkness. So dark is the darkness of human
hearts, isn't it? These men thought they could
see. Lord Jesus makes an assessment of them in Luke 11.34. It's on
your notes there. The eye is the lamp of your body.
When your eye is clear, your whole body is also full of light.
But when it is bad, your body is also full of darkness. Then watch out that the light
in you is not darkness. But this is a great story. In
the midst of this darkness, the light of the Gospel of the Lord
Jesus shines. It's a great story. So let's
follow the Lord in the healing of this man. And as I said earlier, this is
a remarkable miracle. The miracles in the scriptures
are pictures of who God is and particularly pictures of how
he saves, chosen, redeemed sinners by his almighty power and by
the grace of his Holy Spirit. And the proposition I'm putting
before us all today is that there is no salvation unless the Lord
Jesus comes to you personally and opens your blind eyes to
see reality, the reality of who He is and who you are. As the Lord Jesus Himself said
in John 6.40, this is the will of Him who sent me, that everyone
who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life
and I will raise Him up at the last day. So the first thing
we need to say in this passage is that it is the Lord Jesus
who does the coming. He is the one that goes to Bethsaida. And always it's the case that
if anything spiritual is going to happen, the Lord Jesus must
come and it must be His doing. And so here's the blind man.
The blind man is typical of all of humanity. Without the light
of the Gospel, all of humanity is blind. Without the light of
the Gospel, all of humanity is dead. No matter how brilliant they
think they are, 1 Corinthians says that by their wisdom they
do not know God. They can be brilliant intellectually,
They can be scholarly, theologically, but if they haven't met Jesus,
they are as blind as bats. The Pharisees had God standing
before them. They had God personally speaking
to them, and they didn't have a clue who it was. As far as
they were concerned, it was an upstart carpenter from Nazareth. Someone who they thought was
doing all of these mighty deeds by the power of the devil. So there is none that understand,
none that seek after God. The natural man cannot receive
the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him. Neither can he know them, because
they are spiritually discerned. But this man wasn't left alone.
The Lord Jesus came to him, but he also had some friends. This
man didn't know who Jesus was and couldn't have seen him, but
his friends did. He did not believe in the Lord
Jesus, but his friends did. He would never have come to Christ,
but his friends brought him. Not only did they bring him to
the Lord Jesus, they were men of prayer. They brought the blind
man to Jesus and they implored him, they pleaded with the Lord
Jesus to touch him. It wasn't necessary for the Lord
Jesus to touch to heal. We have many examples in the
scriptures of the Lord Jesus healing from great distances. But that's what they thought.
Their faith might not have been accurate, but their faith was
in the right place. They pleaded with Jesus. True friends bring those they
care about to the Lord Jesus. We bring the ones we love to
the Lord Jesus. We bring them in prayer. And
true friends continue to pray with passion. Then we have a
beautiful description of the intimacy that is necessary for
salvation. The Lord Jesus took the blind
man by the hand. He personally came to this man
and He personally took his hand. How their hearts must have leapt
when they saw the Lord Jesus doing what they had pleaded for
Him to do, that He took this friend of theirs by His hand. And as we'll see in all of the
scriptures, If he takes and comes to people and takes them by the
hand, he will open their blind eyes. His one reason for coming
and touching someone is that either he will be defiled by
the sin of the leper or the bleeding woman. or he must heal. When
the Lord Jesus touches, he heals. So if he's going to touch this
man's hand, he will heal him. And if he takes you by the hand,
he'll never ever let you go. We need to turn our Bibles to
John 10. These are just such beautiful
promises from God. My sheep, John 10, 27, my sheep
hear my voice. I know them, relationship. They follow me and I give them
eternal life. Eternal life is not earned by
anything man does. It's a gift from God. They shall
never perish, neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand. My
Father who has given them to me is greater than all and no
one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand. Colossians
3 says that the lives of God's people are hidden in Christ,
in God. He wants us to know the security
that believers have. He will never let them go. God's
children are perfectly safe. Nothing is going to touch them.
Nothing is going to touch them when they are wrapped up in who
the Lord Jesus is and they are wrapped up in the love of God
the Father. And the reason the Lord Jesus
takes this man by the hand is because this man had belonged
to the Lord Jesus from all eternity. In fact the Lord Jesus took this
man by the hand before the world began. He was always His. He always belonged to the Lord
Jesus. When the Lord Jesus comes and
takes redeemed sinners by the hand, He will always lead them. And so often we read in the Gospels
that the Lord Jesus led His people out He led them out of the camp,
He led them out of the town. When the Lord Jesus saves His
people, He calls them out of this world. And He calls His
people to come to Him outside of the camp. He transfers His
people from a kingdom of darkness to a kingdom of light. And so
they'll go outside of the camp. of human religion. They'll throw
away their fig leaves. The religion is based on the
will of man, the work of man, the worth of man. As the Lord
Jesus demonstrates in this passage, he left those people on the other
side, those Pharisees on the other side, with their self-righteousness,
and their law keeping, he left them as a witness to his disciples
that this is what they are to do. When it comes to people who
want to impose works and rules and regulations upon God's children
who have the liberty of the gospel, Jesus says continually, cease
my son, don't join with them, run away from them, flee from
them. If you turn in your Bibles to
Romans 2, you'll see what these people that Jesus left, causes
them to leave, based their faith on. In Romans chapter 2, we have
in these three chapters of Romans a great description of all of
humanity, both the Jews and the Gentiles. Indeed, in verse 17,
you are called adieu and rest or rely on the law and make your
boast in God. This is exactly what the Pharisees
did and they continued after the death of the Lord Jesus,
they continued after the resurrection, they continued after Pentecost,
they continued to harass God's churches wherever they could
go. They travelled over land and
sea, resting on the law, making their boast in God. and they
claim to know His will and approve of things that are excellent
being instructed out of the law and are confident that you yourself
are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness. This is what they thought they
were. They were the lights. They thought they were the lights
of God's light in Israel. Instructor of the foolish, teacher
of babe, having the form of knowledge and truth in the law. Therefore,
you therefore who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You
who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You
who say do not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who
abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the
law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law? The answer
to that question is yes, because This is a description of the
land we live in today. The name of God is blasphemed
among the Gentiles because of you. When we hear the name of
the Lord Jesus blasphemed, blasphemed on our televisions, on our radios,
in our streets, in our workplaces, The question that God says to
us is where are the law keepers here? Where are the people imposing
law? Where are the Pharisees that
have led this to happen? It should grieve us. But the
answer from the scriptures is to walk away from them, to run
away from them, to go outside of the camp of human religion,
to go outside of the camp of worldly ambition, to go outside
of the camp of sin's dominion. But more than that, God's children
go outside of the camp of whatever it is in this world that attaches
them to anything other than the Lord Jesus. We go out to be with
Him. We go out to be intimately close
to Him. In verse 23 we have the healing. The Lord Jesus, after spitting
on his eyes, laid his hands on him. He touched him. We might be horrified at the
thought of the Lord Jesus spitting in the eyes of someone. It's
not something that happens these days. Revelation 3.18, counsels God's
people to buy from me gold tried in the fire, that you may be
rich, and white raiment, that you may be clothed, and that
the shame of your nakedness will not appear, and anoint your eyes
with eye salve, that you may see. Such is the intimacy of
the children of God in their relationship with their Saviour. that we eat of his flesh, we
drink of his blood, he and us become as one. And so what is
horrifying from a human perspective is a touch of amazing intimacy,
isn't it? That something of the very person
of the Lord Jesus touches this man's eyes and he touched him
with his hands as well. Also, I think it's just a picture
of the fact that God is absolutely sovereign. God, our God, can't
be put in a box. He cannot be limited by men. He heals some people gradually
and others instantly. Some with spit, some with spit
and mud, and some with nothing at all. But all saved sinners
trust the same Saviour. All saved sinners have the same
intimate experience of the Lord Jesus. They all experience the
same grace. They all believe the same Gospel. But we do not all experience
grace in the same way. The Lord Jesus does something
unique with this man. And this man's eyes are opened. but he doesn't see clearly. He looked around in verse 24
and said, I see men. So he saw that they were men.
This was not a man who was born blind, this was a man whose blindness
had come upon him in his life. For I see them, I see men like
trees walking around. And then again he laid his hands
on his eyes and he looked intently and was restored and began to
see everything clearly. It's one of the wonders of saving
grace, isn't it? It's a restoration, it's a healing. And the Lord Jesus shows us, I think, as He healed
this man gradually, that His works of grace in the lives of
His chosen sinners are going to be personally suited and fitted
to their particular need and their particular circumstances. And once the Lord has begun a
work in someone's life, the work is an ongoing work. The work
is a work where our eyes are opened to see, and then they're
opened again to see more and more and more clearly. And as
we go to the Word of God, we see more and more of who God
is, and we see more and more of who we really are. God brings to us in measured
amounts so that we can cope with what he's bringing to us, we
might see that our deeds are sinful. And then we'll see something
that horrifies us, that our sin is not just the outside things
we do, the sins we do come from a corrupt, a defiled heart. Yes, our deeds are sinful, but
the source of the sinfulness is horrifying. It's us. We'll see initially the wonderful
suitableness and the wonderful ability of the Lord Jesus to
redeem and to save. And then we'll see that he saved
me. We'll hear from the Word of God
that forgiveness is finished and the Lord's people are perfect
in His sight. But then we need to experience
that forgiveness. It has to be a living experience
of our lives. We'll hear that the Gospel is
good news and then we'll understand that the great truths of the
Gospel, there is a depth to the wonder of the Gospel of the Lord
Jesus which is infinite, it's like this amazing jewel that
we turn, and each time we turn it we see more light and more
light, and it has an infinite number of facets. That's why
eternity goes on forever, because so big is the Lord Jesus, so
glorious is the Lord Jesus, that we need eternity to come to any
understanding of who He is. But this man does see clearly,
the son of God never does his work partially. What he's promised
to do in the beginning is something that he's promised to complete
in the end. He says it is finished. It was in his purposes finished
from eternity. It will in his purposes be finished
perfectly on this earth. And one day God will open our
eyes and we'll see how perfectly finished it really is. Once he begins, he must complete
it. He is sovereign. Also I think the partial healing
of this man just shows us what it is for us to be God's children
in this world. We just do see through a glass
darkly. No matter how much we know our
scriptures, no matter how much we devote ourselves to understanding
the Lord Jesus, we don't see Him clearly. It should grieve
us, but we don't see Him clearly. Just like this man, we need ongoing
revelation, we need ongoing light and revealing from God. But there
is a great day coming when we will see Him clearly. There will
come a time when our eyesight will be absolutely perfect. I
just love that verse in 1 John 3.2. Just let me read it to you. Beautiful, beautiful scripture.
Amazing promise from God. Beloved, now we are children. We are children right here and
now, with our weak and pathetic eyesight. And it has not yet
been revealed what we shall be. But we know that when He is revealed,
when the Lord Jesus returns and we see Him in His glory, we shall
be like Him. A promise from God. We shall be like Him, for we
shall see Him as He is. There will come a day when our
eyes will be perfect. There will be no shadows. We
will see Him as He is. But to see Him as He is, we have
to be like Him. And that's His purpose in coming.
That all of His children will be presented wholly blameless
and spotless, with perfect eyes, a perfect record before Him. There's a final note that's a
sad note in this story. He sends this man home as he
left the Pharisees on the other side of the lake and did nothing
to save them. He sends this man back to Bethsaida,
condemned Bethsaida, for Bethsaida to be left in darkness. He doesn't
forbid the man to tell other people about what's happened.
But he forbids this man to say anything in Bethsaida. Those
who have despised Christ's favours have forfeited them forever.
Like the Pharisees on the other side of the lake, these men in
Bethsaida were left by the Lord Jesus. It's our prayer, isn't it? Continually
our prayer should be that the Lord would open our eyes, that
we might see the Lord Jesus, that he might open our eyes,
that we might see who we really are. The Lord might come and take
us by the hand, touch our eyes, be intimate with us, Take us
outside of this world that we're born in. Take us away from our
fig leaves and expose us as we really are. The story here is
a story of God's salvation, isn't it? We cannot believe in Him
unless we have seen Him. In John 9 there's a great healing
miracle and a wonderful testimony from the blind man. Jesus knew
that this man had been rejected by the religious world and cast
out, and he says to this blind man, Do you believe in the Son
of God? He answers and said, Who is he,
Lord, that I may believe in him? Jesus said to him, You have both
seen him, and it is he who is talking with you. Then he said,
Lord, I believed and he worshipped him." The end result of seeing
the Lord Jesus is that God's children see him, they believe
him and they worship him. And for those who don't, the
Lord Jesus goes on to deal with the Pharisees. For judgment I
have come into this world, that those who do not see may see,
those who see may be made blind, those who think they see clearly,
think they see clearly without the light of the Lord Jesus,
the light of the world, without the light of the scriptures.
Those who think they see may be made blind. Then some of the
Pharisees who were with him heard these words and said to him,
Are we blind also? Jesus said to them, If you were
blind, you would have no sin. But you say, We see. Therefore your sin remains. They are chilling words from
our Saviour. Sin remains and remains forever
unless it's taken away by the Lord Jesus. Unless He comes and
opens our eyes to see who He is and what He's done and touches
us personally, there is no salvation. We must see Him. Matthew 7 says,
keep seeking, keep asking, keep knocking. God's people see him. Simeon was handed an eight day
old baby in the temple and he said, I've seen your salvation,
I can go to my death now, I have seen him. The thief on the cross
saw the Lord Jesus. He who had been cursing him that
day saw him and knew that he was a king. He says, you are
a king who is inheriting a kingdom. You are a king who's going to
live beyond this event. You're coming into your kingdom,
remember me, he saw." The Lord Jesus is seen through the eyes
of faith. And there are some things that
must be seen about the Lord Jesus. To see him as he really is, to
be saved by him, is to know him in his real character. If you
turn to the book of Job, it's just before Psalms. Job was a man who saw reasonably
well, but Job was a man who was put through some difficult times. When God's people see God, They
will see him on a throne. They will see him ruling everything
absolutely. Job answered the Lord and said,
verse 2 of chapter 42, I know that you can do everything, and
that no purpose of yours can be withheld from you. You asked,
who is this who hides counsel without knowledge? Therefore,
I have uttered, says Job, what I did not understand, things
too wonderful for me which I did not know. Listen please and let
me speak. You said I will question you
and you shall answer. I have heard you by the hearing
of the ear, but now my eyes see you. When God's people see God
as He really is, they see Him on a throne and they see something
else with great, great, great clarity. Therefore I abhor myself
and repent in dust and ashes. To see God in His glory is to
see us as we really are. Nothing but guilt, nothing but
shame, nothing but sin. I'm not going to defend myself
any longer, says Job. I put my hand to my mouth. God's perfect glory reveals our
shame. God's perfect love reveals our
selfishness. God's perfect humility reveals
my pride. and His grace reveals the hardness
and malice of my heart." We have a great God who comes
and opens our eyes to see who He is. What a miracle of grace. But to see ourselves as we really
are, is a great, great miracle of grace that he should condescend
to come and take up his residence in the likes of us and to dwell
with us, to be with us now and forever, to take us by the hand,
to hold us close to his heart and to carry us through this
world. We have a great and gracious God. May He open the eyes of
all of us here to see Him afresh this morning. And for those who
don't know Him, may He not just give light, but give eyes to
see the light of who He is. Amen.