Now, this morning's message will
be brought from Matthew chapter 8. The title of the message is
The Sovereign Mercy of God. Let me read the first four verses. When he was come down, that is,
when Christ was come down from the mountain, great multitudes
followed him. And, behold, there came a leper
and worshiped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him, saying,
I will be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was
cleansed. And Jesus saith unto him, See
thou tell no man, but go thy way, show thyself to the priest,
and offer the gift that Moses commanded for testimony unto
them. When the Lord healed the blind,
the deaf, the dumb, the leper, he was demonstrating his power
not just to heal our bodies, but our souls. We need spiritual
healing. We have spiritual blindness.
We need it healed. We have spiritual deafness. We
need it healed. We need our Lord to give us spiritual
healing. I need spiritual eyes to see
God with, ears to hear God with. That's what I need. I know that
it is good to have health, but it's much better to have spiritual
health in the inner man. Paul said, though our outward
man perish, our inner man is renewed day by day. Now, for
the most part, I believe this crowd followed him out of curiosity.
Curiosity always brings big crowds, but need always brings sinners.
Now, there was a leper, he said, who came to him. The multitude
followed him because of his miracles, and because he did not speak
as a scribe, but as one having authority. But this one, who
was full of leprosy, as it says in Luke 5.12, not just a place
on his arm, but his whole body was full of leprosy, he came
out of need. The crowd followed mostly out
of curiosity, The leper came to him out of need. I read a
description one time of a leper. Let me read it to you. It says
his voice was hoarse, his flesh is rotten, the eyes are red and
inflamed, ears are swollen and red, eaten with ulcers, the nose
is sunk in because of the rotting of the cartilage, the tongue
is dry and black, swollen and ulcerated, skin is covered with
ulcers and looks like the scales of a fish. The body becomes insensitive
to pain. He could cut himself and not
even feel it. Eventually the nose, fingers,
and toes would fall off completely. This is the one who came to the
Lord Jesus Christ. This is the one who needed the
true physician. His disease was incurable. That's
why he was sent to the priest and not to the doctor. And all
that the priest could do was pronounce him clean or unclean.
He could not make him clean. The law cannot make us clean.
It can only pronounce things as they are, clean or unclean.
When he was pronounced unclean, he was put without the camp.
He was not allowed in the city anymore, for he is utterly unclean. You can read that in Leviticus
13. He had to go about crying with his hand over his mouth,
crying out, unclean, unclean. He knew his wretchedness. He
was constantly aware of his disease. By nature, this describes everyone
whom God saves. We are nothing but a putrefying
sore in God's sight. That's what it says in Isaiah
1. This was our condition when God saved us. Awful. Sinful. Sinful in ourselves and
polluted in sin. This leprosy that he had permeated
his whole being. Sin permeates our whole being.
Every part of me is sin by nature. Sin is not something that I get
at a certain age. I was born in sin and shapen
in iniquity, as everyone is. It starts inwardly and it comes
outwardly. And there's nothing that anyone
can do for me but the Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior of sinners.
Now notice to whom this leper came. He came to the Lord. He said, Lord, if you will, you
can make me clean. The one to whom he came is indeed
the Lord of Glory. He came to the one who possessed
the power to save, and he knew it. He believed that he could
cleanse him from all his leprosy if he will. If he will. He said, Lord, if you will, we
come to the Lord Jesus Christ for cleansing and healing. He
is the only one who has the power to save me from sin and cleanse
me and make me whole. He's the only one. And the reason
is, he's God. He's God manifested in the flesh.
And he's also a real man with real blood that can cleanse me
from all unrighteousness. Now, why did he come to Christ?
Well, no doubt he heard of the Lord Jesus Christ and his power
to heal. No doubt he heard that. He had
heard that he could save him from his leprosy. A sinner will
come to Christ where he really needs to be saved from sin, not
just a problem, not just a this or that, but I mean from sin.
Need is what brings us to the Lord Jesus Christ. When he came
to Christ, what did this leper do? The first thing he did was
he worshipped him. He did not look upon him as someone
who might be able to save him, he just gave him a try. He recognized
Him for who He is, Lord. He's the Lord. Everybody wants
a Savior. Nobody wants the Lord. He came
to Him as Lord. We are not coming to someone
who makes salvation possible. Jesus Christ did not die on the
cross to make salvation possible. He died on that cross to save
sinners from their sins. That's what He did. And He's
saving them. He's saving them every day, here and there, all
over this world. He's saving sinners. He's not
trying to save them. He's saving them by His blood
and righteousness because He died for them. He put their sins
away. And He's going to save them.
Oh, that God would enable us to fall down and worship the
Lord Jesus Christ who can save us from our sins. Now, how did
he worship him? Well, it says in Luke 5.12, he
fell down on his face. That's a good place for sinners.
On their face. Prostrate on the ground. Lying
in the dust where he belonged. He worshipped him in humility.
True humility. He knew what he was. He knew
how loathsome and awful he was. How detestable he was. He knew
that. Oh, that God would make us to know that. If he would
make us to know that, we'd have followed his feet too. That leper
knew that he had no right to stand in his presence and demand
anything from him. He's in the presence of the Lord.
And he's a wretched leper. And he knew it. He knew it. And
know what he said, Lord, if thou will, thou canst make me clean.
He recognized his sovereign right to do with him as he will. Lord,
it's not a matter of your power, he said, but it's a matter of
your will. It's a matter of your will. Christ is sovereign in
salvation. And we need to preach that. We
need to make every sinner know that they are in the hands of
the sovereign God of heaven and earth. And what did this leper
know? Here's what he knew. The Hopkins
made me clean. How much does a sinner need to
know to be saved? Well, it's not how much I need
to know, it's who I need to know. Paul said, I know whom I have
believed. He knew that the Lord Jesus Christ
could make him clean. He was not a theologian, he was
a leper. Theologians do not come to Christ, sinners do. I know
by the Word of God and the Spirit of God that Christ can save me,
save my soul, and make me whole. I know that. I know that. Now
what did our Lord do? He put forth His hand and touched
him. There is not a person here, there
is not a person listening to my voice who would have touched
that mass of putrefying flesh. But He did. The Lord is not afraid
to touch sinners. He loves sinners. He embraces
sinners. He died for sinners. Find me a sinner and I have good
news for you. I have good news for sinners.
You've just got to find them. Spurgeon said a sinner is a sacred
thing for the Holy Spirit has made him so. Go to the prisons,
they're all full of excuses. This world is full of excuses.
A sinner is a man or a woman who cries guilty with no excuses. That's a sinner. He touches sinners. He saves sinners. He loves sinners. And he makes sinners whole through
his blood and righteousness. Now, back in the Old Testament,
it says, if anyone touched a leper, they were unclean. Our Lord was
not afraid to touch that leper. He touched that leper, and here's
what happened. He gave that leper his wholeness, his righteousness,
and he took his leprosy. He bore our sins and our sicknesses.
He bore our sorrows and our griefs. He bore our sins in his body
on the tree. He really did that. He gave me
his righteousness, and he took my sinfulness and put it away.
That's what he did. I imagine that when that leper
walked up to our Lord, that the crowd all backed off, afraid
that they might touch him. But Christ didn't back off. He
reached for him. He reached for him. And he spoke
to him. And he said, here is, listen,
the sovereign God of heaven and earth says, I will. This is my
will. Be thou clean. Scripture says,
where the word of a king is, there is power. Power went forth
with his spoken word to heal that leper. And if he speaks
the word of the gospel of power to our hearts, we'll be made
clean too. And notice the results of him
speaking and touching him. And immediately his leprosy was
cleansed. Departed from him, it says in Luke, Christ does
not put us on probation. He saves us immediately. Salvation
from sin and cleansing from sin is something we possess now.
He was not pronounced clean. He was made clean. You can't
pronounce something clean until it's made clean. That leper did
not ask him to pronounce him clean. He asked him to make him
clean. Salvation is more than Christ
pronouncing you clean. It's Christ making you clean. And note what he tells him. Tell
no man. Tell no man. Because he made himself with
no reputation. He did not heal him to get a
following from the crowd. He healed him because he loved
him. Scripture says that as many as needed healing, he healed
them. He says, show thyself to the priest and offer the gift
that Moses commanded for testimony unto them. First, listen, first
the law was still in effect, and he would not break the law.
He always honored the law. He says, show yourself to the
priest. If Christ has made us clean, we do not have to be afraid
of the law examining us. This leper would have to go before
the priest. He would have to strip down and let the priest
examine him for leprosy, and that priest would pronounce him
clean who was unclean. Only God can bring a clean thing
out of an unclean. Nothing that Christ does in saving
a sinner is contrary to the law of God. He was not afraid of
that leper showing himself to the priest, for just as that
priest pronounced him clean, even so God's law pronounces
us clean in the Lord Jesus Christ. Through his blood, his righteousness,
his person, we are made clean. Then he said, Offer the gift
as a testimony, not as a cause for your cleansing, but as a
testimony. And the gift that we offer now is praise and thanksgiving. Under the law it was a blood
sacrifice. Now it's thanksgiving unto him who loved us and gave
himself as a sacrifice for our sins. Lord, if you will, it's
not a matter of your power, it's a matter of your will. Not my
free will, but Lord, your will. If you will, you can make me
clean. I tell you this, he never ever
turned away a sinner who needed him. Until next time, may God
bless.