the blind see." Matthew chapter
9. Let's read this passage together, and then I'll point you to some
other texts of Scripture and make some comments. Matthew chapter
9, verse 27. And when Jesus departed thence,
two blind men followed Him, crying and saying, Thou Son of David,
have mercy on us. And when he was come into the
house, the blind men came to him, and Jesus saith to them,
Believe ye that I am able to do this. They said unto him,
Yea, Lord. Then he touched their eyes, saying,
According to your faith, be it unto you. And their eyes were
opened, and Jesus straightly charged them, saying, See that
no man know it. But they, when they were departed,
spread abroad His fame in all that country." Very simple text
of Scripture, but a fundamental teaching of the Gospel. We see
in the book of Matthew that the Lord Jesus Christ Heals all manner
of sickness. He sees the centurion's son and
heals him. He sees a leper who comes to
him and heals him. He raises up Peter's mother-in-law
who was sick with a fever. He healed those. He cast devils
out of those who had devils. He healed all manner of sickness.
The Lord Jesus Christ, in the Gospels, He comes on earth and
He sees us in every problem, every condition we have, and
all of our needs. And seeing each of those needs,
He meets those needs. He meets the desperate needs
of people who have exhausted all other resources, who are
miserable in sin, who are even unable to call or come to Him,
and they're brought paralyzed, the paralyzed man, or the the
man who had a legion of devils in him. All these cases teach
us a number of things about the Lord Jesus Christ. Number one,
He saw us in all of our need. He saw us in all of our need.
In every different case we think, does the Lord see really the
depth of my heart's need? Does He see my sin in all of
its ugliness? And in my own nakedness, in the
perversity of my heart, the hardness of my heart, my unbelief, all
those things, He sees it all. And He has seen it all. And He
came in order that He might deliver His people from it. So we see
that. We also see His compassion. He
has compassion on all kinds of sickness and all kinds of maladies
among men. And the sicknesses are meant
to teach us about the nature of our need as sinners. And so
we see that in the Lord Jesus Christ. And here we see, in the
book of Matthew, for the first time, Jesus healing the blind. Now, physical blindness means,
I can't see physical things. That's the definition, and it
seems like an obvious thing to say. Physical blindness just
means, I can't see physical things. In the U.S. they define blindness. It means that if you can't see
any better at 20 feet, what some people can see at 200 feet, then
you're legally blind. Or if you can't see within a
certain radius of a few degrees, then you're blind legally. But
in the Bible, blindness meant you couldn't see. You couldn't
see anything. And so physical blindness means
I can't see physical things. But spiritual blindness means
I can't understand spiritual things. So if we see those two
things compared to each other, then we'll understand the meaning
of this miracle that Jesus did. I looked it up. It's estimated
in the U.S. today that fewer than four people
in every 10,000 are born totally blind. That's not very many,
four in 10,000. And you would think that even
that is sad. But to be blind in a physical
sense is not so common. It's somewhat rare, at least
totally blind. And not many people as a percentage
are born into the world totally blind. 4 in 10,000 is 0.04%. It's a small number. Four out
of every 10,000 people. But spiritual blindness is different. To be spiritually blind means
to be without spiritual understanding. And the Bible says that all men,
without exception, are born into this world spiritually blind. That's why this miracle is so
important. Because we're all born spiritually
blind. in uh... in in in the scripture
to be without understanding is to be spiritual understanding
is to be spiritually blind but the gospel has a promise that
the lord jesus christ came into the world to save sinners to
give spiritual site and life to sinners in john seventeen
three jesus says to know god To know the Lord Jesus Christ
is eternal life. So spiritual sight is knowing
the Lord Jesus Christ, knowing God in Him, and it's life and
light in the soul. Jesus is the light of the world. To have the light of life is
to have the Lord Jesus Christ spiritually perceived in our
souls. Now, When this man in this text
of scripture says that these two men were without sight, they
were blind, they came crying to the Lord Jesus Christ. And
they were desperate in their condition. One thing we see that's
clear, if you just think about what's happening here, just the
facts of the case, these two men had things about them that
we need to have about ourselves. First of all, they knew they
were spiritually blind. They knew they were physically
blind. I'm sorry. They knew they were physically
blind. And God shows us that they knew this. It's plain and
evident. It's like one of the first things you see. A blind
man knows he's blind. And in that sense, that's a blessing. Because to not know that you're
blind has got to be the worst kind of blindness. Isn't it? To not know you're blind and
yet be blind. To think that you know something
when you don't know anything. To be convinced. that you understand
the things of God when you're totally ignorant, that's a real
depth of blindness, isn't it? But that's exactly what was prevalent
in the days of Jesus. Jesus told Nicodemus when he
came to him, he says, Nicodemus said, we know you're a teacher
come from God, for no one can do these miracles that you do
except God be with them. And Jesus said, Except you're
born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God. Spiritually blind. Nicodemus, you are spiritually
blind. That's what Jesus said in so
many words. You can't see unless you're born
of God. And so these two men came, they
knew they were blind. The second thing you see about
these two men, not only did they know they were blind, but they
were earnest and desperate to get to Jesus. And no amount of
objections or objectors could keep them from coming to Christ.
And we're going to look at a couple of other cases of blindness that
bring this out in more detail. They did not let Jesus rest until
He gave them their sight. They came to Him earnestly, desperately,
needing mercy from Him. And they cried to Him for it.
It says in verse 27, The blind men followed Him, crying, saying,
Thou Son of David, have mercy on us. They understood that for
Christ to give them sight was a mercy, a mercy from God. So they were earnest and desperate. And the third thing you see here
about these two men is they knew who Jesus was. They called Him
the Son of David. The Son of David means they believed
Him to be the Messiah. The Christ of God. The one God
had chosen, God had appointed, and God had anointed to save
His people from their sins. He's the one that God gave this
covenant and swore in an oath by His holiness that he would
give to the Lord Jesus Christ this covenant in which he would
forever sit on the throne and deliver his people from their
sins. This is what's prophesied in
Psalm 89. So that's the third thing. These two men understood
who Jesus was, the Son of David, the Christ of God, the promised
Messiah from the beginning of the world. He came with God's
blessing. He was the prophet that Moses
promised would come. He's the one to whom God gave
the sure mercies of David, the everlasting covenant that God
would make with his people in saving them from their sins,
making them his children, and giving them this spiritual sight. One of the promises in the new
covenant is that God's people would know the Lord. To know
the Lord is to be given spiritual sight. That was what he said
in Hebrews chapter 8 verse 10 through 12 and Hebrews 10 and
so on. The New Covenant. God's people would know the Lord.
And then the next thing you see about these two blind men is
they actually believed that the Lord Jesus Christ could and would
give them sight. And so they cried after Him.
They kept crying until He gave them the mercy they required.
All who seek to get from God what they deserve, because they
think they have a right to something from God. All who think they
are entitled to something because God must give it to them because
it's only fair, will receive everlasting ruin and blindness. But all who seek mercy from Christ,
knowing they deserve nothing from Him, coming to them in the
nakedness of their need, they receive all their heart's desire. So that's the fourth thing that
I see is that they believed that the Lord Jesus Christ could give
them and would give them sight. And then the fifth thing here
is that they followed the Lord Jesus. They followed Him and
they cried to Him. They didn't just sit down and
wait. They followed Him, they pursued Him, and they called
to Him. That's a sign of their earnestness. And then, in the
sixth place, you see in this, the facts of this account here,
is that Jesus asked them. He said, He said, Do you believe
that I am able to do this? In verse 28. And this is, here
is the question posed to us. Do you believe the Lord Jesus
Christ is able to give you the spiritual sight that you do not
have? understanding in your soul, life
in your soul, to know the living God and to have eternal life.
Do you believe that He can do that and that He will do that?"
And they said, yes, Lord, and He healed them. And then they
went around spreading His fame throughout the country, even
though Jesus had warned them not to do that. So, those are
the facts of the case, and I want you to see those facts. They're
very clear, and if you compare those things to scriptural truth,
you'll see that these two men reflect our condition. Think about this. We don't think
about ourselves as being blind, do we? Blind people know they're
blind. Blind people want, I don't think
that there's a blind person alive who wouldn't desire to be able
to see. Perhaps there is. I've seen TV
documentaries where people who are deaf or other things, they've
gotten used to it and they don't really want to hear because they
feel like it's going to change their whole life and they don't
want that change. But here, God is teaching us that these blind
men knew their condition, and they earnestly wanted to have
their eyes opened. It teaches us we have a condition
that only Christ can address, and we earnestly need to seek
for Him to do that. Now, in the Scripture, In 2nd
Corinthians 5.7 it says, "...we walk by faith and not by sight."
2nd Corinthians 5.7, "...we walk by faith and not by sight." What
does that say? It says that seeing to our eyes,
or to our body, seeing with our eyes is to our body as believing
Christ is to our soul. through our eyes. It's amazing
if you think about what eyesight is. I can see things hundreds
of feet away, up to a mile away. I can see things. I can see things
moving. I can perceive color and depth and shape and all these
things. How does this work? There's just
information coming, light is streaming in through the eye
gate of my body into my brain and my brain processes it and
tells me what I'm seeing. Sometimes it's true, sometimes
I'm deceived by my eyes, but nevertheless my eyes take in
visual images and process that and I understand. There's a tree,
there's a person, there's a car, there's a dog or the sky and
everything else. and allows me to get around.
I don't stumble. I see where I'm going. That's
what physical eyes are all about. But seeing in the soul is done
by faith. It is faith by which we see.
The second thing we see in Scripture is that faith is the gift of
God. Now, in Exodus, if you want to
turn to Exodus chapter 4, this is a fundamental principle in
Scripture, Exodus chapter 4. Remember, Moses had told God
that he didn't think he was able to go and do what God had told
him to do, to go to the Israelites, to go to Pharaoh, and bring God's
Word. He complained about his own inability,
and the Lord said in verse 11 of Exodus chapter 4, the Lord
said to Moses, "'Who hath made man's mouth?' That's a rhetorical
question, isn't it? He doesn't say. say right away
who it is. He says, "...or who maketh the
dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? Have not I the
Lord?" So the Lord is the one who makes us able to see. It's very simple, isn't it? And
the Lord is the one to whom we owe our eyesight. But more than
that, the Lord is the one to whom we owe our faith sight. Only God can give faith. But
also it says here, who made the blind? The Lord did. If the Lord makes us blind, and
the Lord is good, then what do we do? Well, like these two men,
we go to the Lord and say, Lord, I'm blind. And God is glorified
in giving us sight. In John chapter 9, the disciples
saw a man who was born blind. He couldn't see from his birth.
And Jesus came to him, and the disciples looked at the man,
and they said, Master, who sinned, this man or his parents, that
he was born blind? And Jesus said, Neither this
man nor his parents, but that the works of God should be made
manifest in him, should be declared openly and clearly shown in this
man. Who makes the blind? It's the
Lord. Why? For His own glory. God gives us eyes to see, but
before He gives us eyes to see, He has already given us a lack
of seeing. He's made it so that we can't
see. And our blindness should not leave us in a state of, well,
I've been made blind, obviously. I can't see. God's bigger than
me. He does what He wants. He just pushes people around,
gets His own way all the time. No, that's a self-centered complaining
against God and unbelief. But blindness, knowing that God
gives sight and God makes us blind, should lead us to the
Lord Jesus Christ in order that we might have sight. And then
God's works are made manifest in us that He gives us sight.
So that's the first thing. Faith, our eyesight of our soul,
is the gift of God. in Acts chapter 3 and verse 16. I want to read this to you here.
Faith is the gift of God. Listen to these words. Sometimes
these truths are made known in short little phrases in Scripture.
Acts 3.16, it says, And His name, the name of the
Lord Jesus, through faith in His name, hath made this man
strong, whom you see and know." They're talking about a man who
was lame, and God made him, and the Lord Jesus Christ raised
him up through Peter and John. And he says, Yea, the faith which
is by him hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence
of you all. So faith is in Christ, and faith
is by Christ. Do you see that? And then Ephesians
chapter 2. Look at Ephesians 2. Sometimes
I just quote these, and I know that you're familiar with it,
but it's good to refresh ourselves with these. Look at Ephesians
2 verse 8. For by grace are you saved, through faith, and that,
that faith, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. God has made salvation by grace. And by faith, in order that no
one can boast. Therefore, faith has nothing
to do, can bring you no credit. God's sight that He gives to
His people is a gift of God. And then, the second thing, or
the third thing I want you to know about sight, our spiritual
sight, is that our spiritual sight means that we see that
the Lord Jesus Christ is the object of our faith. And this
is so crucial to understand this. When we talk about faith, in
fact, you watch TV, well, you just have to believe. Or, I've
lost my faith. And they never define what faith
is, because faith is this ambiguous, nebulous, just a I hope so. It's going to happen. I never
lose my hope that things are all going to turn out for the
better. That's not faith. Faith is seeing in Scripture
what God has promised concerning His Son, understanding it and
resting in it. So faith is based on what God
has said and it has Christ as its object. Look at a couple
of verses in Scripture. Look at Acts chapter 20 to show
you this. Some of these things are so common
in Scripture that we fail even to substantiate it. We don't
even go check it out because we've heard it so often, we've
taken it for granted, but we couldn't tell you exactly where
it's proven in Scripture. But look at Acts 20, verse 21.
Paul says in verse 20, I kept back nothing that was
profitable to you, but have showed you and have taught you publicly
and from house to house." What did he say? What did he teach
from house to house? What did he publicly declare?
Testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance
toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. The faith
that's by Him is the faith that's in Him. And it's the faith that's
toward our Lord Jesus Christ. Christ the Lord is the object
of our faith. These two blind men knew that.
They believed that Jesus was the son of David. They believed
that He could open their eyes, and so they called on Him for
mercy. Look at John chapter 3. This
is said over and over again in the book of John, but in John
chapter 3 it seems like it's very prolific. Look at this,
John chapter 3 and verse 15. Jesus said to Nicodemus, Whosoever
believeth in him, in him is the Lord Jesus himself, in him. He
says, the one that, as Moses lifted up the serpent, in verse
14, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, the serpent
was lifted up, Moses was commanded by God, to take some brass and
heat it up and beat it out and hang it up on a pole and fashion
it to make it look like a serpent, because the serpents had bitten
the Israelites for their sin and unbelief and they were dying. And God told Moses, make a serpent,
hang it on a pole. Everyone who looks at that serpent
will live. And they looked and they lived.
Because there was teaching that the Lord Jesus Christ would be
lifted up with the sins of his people, cursed of God. As they
had been bitten, the Lord Jesus Christ would be cursed by God.
The curse would be upon Him and all who looked in faith to Him.
would spiritually live. And so he says in verse 15, "...that
whosoever believeth in Him..." You see where the object of our
faith is? It's Him. And look at verse 16, "...for
God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whosoever believeth in Him should not perish." And in verse 18,
"...he that believeth on Him is not condemned." And then in
verse 36, "...he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life."
You see this? Faith is seeing. Faith is a gift
of God. And faith, when it's given to
us, is faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the object of our
faith. And any other object is a false
faith. It's a false gospel. Faith is
not a decision. How many times do you hear this
today, is that people who want to be saved, they make a decision
for Jesus and therefore they're saved, but that's not faith.
Who ever said in the Bible that faith was a decision? In fact,
it's the exact opposite. It says, we're born not of the
will of the flesh, not of the will of man, and not by our blood
inheritance, but of God. We're only born by God's decision,
by God's will. That's what faith teaches us,
is that it's not my decision, it's Christ's decision to save.
These men came seeking mercy from Jesus, and they looked to
Him. And so faith is that. Faith teaches us that salvation
has been accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ for those God
chose in His eternal election. And that life is given to us
by His Word, teaching us, convincing us, persuading us that Christ
is all of our hope. This is what faith is, and this
is what spiritual sight is. Faith is God's sovereign gift,
as we read in Exodus 411. It's God who makes the seeing.
It's God who makes the blind. God gives this faith to chosen,
redeemed sinners in the gospel, in preaching the gospel that
Christ is a substitute for His people. And this is the truth
of it. Look at one more verse in 2 Corinthians
chapter 4. 2 Corinthians 4. When the world
was made, God commanded light to shine. When God wants to save
a person, He commands light to shine in that person's soul through
the preaching of the gospel. He says in verse 3 of 2 Corinthians
chapter 4, "...if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that
are lost." When something's hid, you can't see it. And that's
what blindness is. And if the gospel is hid, it's
hid to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world has
blinded the minds of them which believe not. You see how faith,
the lack of faith, is a blindness of the mind? Lest the light of
the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should
shine to them. For we preach not ourselves,
but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus'
sake." If you listen to anyone preach the message of the gospel,
if they preach themselves, they're not preaching the gospel. The
Catholic Church preaches the priests, they preach the Pope,
they preach the Vatican, they preach all kind of baloney. And that's the kindest word I
can think for it. It's damnable heresy. And all who preach their spiritual
achievements or their spiritual gifts or their spiritual blessings. They talk about what God has
done for them and how they've attained a certain spiritual
status. They preach themselves. There's only one message that
saves. It's the preaching of the Lord Jesus Christ. And all
who truly preach Him preach themselves as the servants in preaching
the gospel for Jesus' sake, in order that he might receive the
glory and you might receive salvation in hearing." So in verse 6 he
says, in 2 Corinthians 4, he says, "...for God, who commanded
the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts." How
did he do that? He commanded the light to shine
in our hearts. And what was that light? Well,
he says, "...to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. How do we see the glory of God?
Remember what Moses prayed? Lord, show me your glory. Show
me your glory. Moses knew that if God didn't
make himself known, he could not see him. So he prayed, Lord,
show me your glory. Did God show his glory to him
in his holiness? Did he show him his holiness?
If he showed him his holiness, what would have happened? God
is a consuming fire and Moses would have been consumed. Did
he show him his great power? If he would have shown him his
great power, Moses would have been terrified. He would have
hid. But he showed him his glory in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Because only in Christ can sinners
see the glory of God. He showed him his grace to sinners. His mercy to the guilty. The
fact that he sovereignly saves. and forgive sin by what Christ
has done. This is the glory of God. Jesus Christ is the brightness
of God's glory because in Him we see how God can be gracious
to sinners. and open our eyes and show us
His glory. Salvation is not seeing what
I must do. It's seeing what God has done
in Christ, and seeing that, and standing amazed that all that
God requires and looks for from me, He receives from His Son.
He's provided in His Son and given it to us in Him. That's
spiritual sight, and that is what we see. And those few verses
there in Matthew chapter 9. Now I want to look at another
place with you. Look at Revelation chapter 3.
Because here's the sad fact. There's a sad fact and a comforting
truth in what we're going to read here in Revelation chapter
3. The sad fact is this. That we are naturally, spiritually
in the dark. In Ephesians 5, 8 it says we
are not just in the dark, but we are darkness itself. We're
darkness itself. We define what it means to be
in darkness. In our minds, our minds are totally
devoid of spiritual understanding. Can a dead man understand? A
dead man has no ability. He can't think. He can't see.
He can't do. He can't do nothing. That's what
we are, spiritually without any ability. Spiritually without
any understanding. But in Revelation 3, verse 14,
the Lord Jesus Christ comes to the church of Laodicea. He comes
to many churches and He speaks to them. But the church of Laodicea
is the worst. Unquestionably, this church is
the worst ones that He speaks to. But I want you to listen
to the grace of God here in Revelation 3, verse 14 and following. He says, unto the angel of the
church of the Laodiceans write, these things saith the Amen,
the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation
of God." That's the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one who created
all things. He created them by Himself. He
created them for Himself. All things consist by the power
of His own Word, and are upheld by the active will of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Everything God wills to happen,
the Lord Jesus Christ is bringing about by His own will and Word. That's what this is saying. He's
the true witness. He cannot lie. He speaks from
God. And he's the Amen. He fulfills
all of it. In verse 15, he says to them,
I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would
thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm,
neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. He's
describing this church as leaving him nauseated. I'm going to spit
you out. But he doesn't say, I have spit
you out. He says, I'm about to spew you
out. And that's why he's coming to
them. So in verse 16 he says, I'm sorry, in verse 17 he says,
this is why you're lukewarm. This is why I'm about to spew
you out. He says, because you say, I am
rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing. And
knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind
and naked. You see what the Lord is saying
here? And I've said this last week
and hopefully many times. that our condition naturally
is blindness, and here the Lord is describing an entire church.
And the attitude of this church was, we have everything. We don't
need anything. We're rich, not just physically
rich, but our physical riches and our comfort has left us without
any spiritual need. We can't even see our own condition. And the Lord says, I'm about
to spew you out of my mouth because you don't even know that you're—you
think you're rich, and you don't know you're wretched, miserable,
poor, blind, and naked. This shows us that the sad thing
is that we cannot see our own blindness until the Lord shows
us our condition. Until we see our need in the
Lord Jesus Christ, we'll never cry to Him and we'll never appreciate
that need being met by Him. And so he comes to this church
and he tells them, look, you think you are something when
you're nothing. You think you're rich when you're
poor. You think you can see, but you're blind. You think you're
clothed with fine clothes, but you're actually naked. You think
you're happy, but you're the most pitiable because you don't
see your blindness, your nakedness, and your great need. And because
you don't see them, Because you don't see them, you receive nothing
from me." Because in order for us to receive from Christ, we
have to have a need that meshes with all that He provides. There's
a one-to-one correspondence between us as sinners and Christ as the
Savior. That's what the gospel is saying.
And so when the Lord comes to us, He always tells us what we
need, and then He tells us what He has. He's the Savior of sinners,
and He tells us we're sinners in need of a Savior. And it's
that grace that brings us to Himself to find everything in
Him. A fundamental principle in the gospel is until we see
our need in Christ. Our need in ourselves and our
need met in Him will never receive from Him all that He provides.
So then he says in verse 18, I counsel thee. He doesn't beat
them. He doesn't whip them and cast
them out. He doesn't command them to get
busy. He says, here's what I counsel
you to do. Buy. of me gold tried in the
fire, that thou mayest be rich, and white raiment, that thou
mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not
appear, and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve that thou mayest
see. Everything that they needed,
He describes here. You're naked. You need white
raiment. You're poor. You need gold that's tried in
the fire. You're blind. You need eye salve. And all these things He's describing
to them that they need. What does He say? Come and buy
it from Me. Come to me. That's where you'll
find all that you need. You have great need of soul and
spirit. Where are you going to find those
needs? In the Lord Jesus Christ alone. And this is what the gospel
teaches us. We have eternal needs in our
soul and only the Lord Jesus Christ can and has met those
needs in himself. And that's what we see. In Christ
is all my salvation. And then in verse 19, notice
the grace of God. Again, this is a church that's
the worst of all that he's written to in Revelation, and he says,
"...as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous, therefore,
and repent." And how would they repent? They would see the nakedness
of their need, and they would go to Christ and buy. And what
would they purchase it with? What we read in Isaiah 55, come
buy wine and milk without money and without price. The only way,
the only currency that you can come to Christ and buy with is
nothingness. You come with nothing in your
hand, nothing in your soul, and every need you have, you have
to admit, this is what I am, barren, a leper, unclean. Devil-possessed, blind, dead,
paralyzed, all the things that God has described in the Gospels,
I come. Lord, look upon me. Have mercy
upon me. Find in me a corresponding need
for all that you are in yourself and all you've done and meet
my need in your own person. I counsel thee to buy of me this
gold, this white raiment, And it's basically saying, come and
buy salvation. With what? With nothing. Because
if you come with something, you're going to be rejected. If you
come thinking that you can buy the Eternal God, to order all
of time in history for His glory, and give His Son, up to death
under the wrath of God because the sins of his people were laid
on him, and then coerce God to give you life from the dead by
what you do, then your thinking is all wrong. You have to come
with nothing as a poor and miserable and helpless and sad sinner. Say, I'm spiritually Without
value. Spiritually, I can do nothing.
I bring nothing and I need everything. Lord, save me. That's the attitude
that he's trying to get us. Come and buy from me. As many
as I love, I rebuke. And then in verse 20, look what
he says. Behold, I stand at the door and
knock. Now we think of it as like a
gentleman, you know. That's not the picture that God
is giving here. If you look at it in the way
that it's written, in the original language, it means that Christ
is pressing against the door. And with importunity, He's knocking,
knocking, knocking. And not just knocking, not just
pressing, but He's been standing there a long time. And He's calling,
calling to the sinner. This picture is entirely different.
It's a picture of sovereign grace coming to us in the blindness
of our need, pressing against the door of our conscience and
our heart, knocking and calling to us and saying, come and buy
from me. And what's the result of that? Sovereign grace. Well, God's
grace does not take no for an answer. He comes and He stands
to this church who is the worst. They're rich and they're self-confident
and they have a misplaced opinion about their own spirituality
when they're absolutely nothing. When they compare themselves
amongst each other and other people, they see nothing but
goodness and contentedness. And the Lord is saying, no, you're
miserable, poor, wretched, naked, blind. And I cancel you to come
and buy salvation from me, to clothe your nakedness and open
your eyes. And I'm standing and knocking
and pressing against the door. And when the Lord Jesus Christ
sends his gospel to our hearts and gives us life, do you know
what the response is? It's the response of these blind
men in Matthew chapter 9. They follow after, they call
to Him, Lord, Son of David, have mercy. And so there's that one-to-one
correspondence where the needs of the sinner have been aroused
by the grace of God and the Gospel. And they come to Him, I'm blind,
I'm helpless, I'm guilty. I'm under the wrath of God. I
have no spiritual value or ability to come to you. I need everything
from you. I need eternal life. I need faith.
I need repentance. I need everything. I can't follow
you because I'm such a perverse sinner. I'm proud and I can't
help myself. Lord, save me. And then you find
a perfect match between Christ and His all-sufficiency as our
Savior and our need. And it's as if we run to Him,
and we call to Him, and we embrace Him. And so He says, if any man
will open the door, I will come into him and step with him, and
he with me. And so we see this communion
between the Lord Jesus Christ in all the fullness of His mercy
and grace as our Savior, and us as sinners sitting with Him
like the publicans and the harlots in the house of Matthew. accused
by the Pharisees, accusing Jesus and Him taking the accusation
and glorying in it, I came to show mercy to sinners." And so
he says that. Matthew chapter 9. The Lord Jesus
Christ tells us where to find mercy. He says in Isaiah chapter
55, He says, Hearken unto me, hear, and your soul shall live.
Come unto me, all you that are thirsty. Why are you spending
your money on what's not bread? You're self-deceived. You're
spending all your labor on things that cannot satisfy. Your soul's
need is not for things. It's not for security. It's not for pleasure. It's not
for pursuing independence from all this world. It's not safety
in this world. It's not the things of this world.
It's in Christ. It's in Christ. And that's what
He's telling us, coming by you who are needy, you who are empty,
you who are blind and needing God's salvation. Our salvation
by our Savior is all to the glory of God. We're blind in many ways. The first thing we're blind to
is our own blindness. our own sin. Paul, before the
gospel came to him, said, I was a Pharisee of the Pharisee. I
was of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews. I did
the law. I took confidence in everything.
He was blind. He was absolutely blind. When
the Lord saved him, he had to go to Ananias in Damascus and
have him pray in order that his eyes might be opened. Scales
were removed from his eyes. He was blind. The woman at the
well, Jesus said, if you knew the gift of God, you would have
asked. And he would have said, he would have given you living
water. And then he showed her who she was and revealed himself
to her. Remember the blind man in John
9? Look at John chapter 9. John chapter 9. This is a powerful,
powerful, and it's not just powerful in what Jesus did is powerful
because it teaches us a basic principle here. Look at John
chapter 9. Here's a whole chapter. You can
read it. It's easy to read. Read it. Look at it. Think about
it. John chapter 9 about this blind
man. Look at verse 25. The blind man answered his accusers.
He says, Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not. One thing
I know. Whereas I was blind, now I see."
You see that? And look at verse 39. Jesus said, "...for judgment
I am come into this world, that they which see not might see."
Isn't that a blessing? The gospel is a judgment. It's
a judgment from God for His people. that they which see not might
see, and that they which see might be made blind." That's
the judgment of God. In Isaiah chapter 6, verse 10,
God says to Isaiah, go and preach to this people, and when you
preach to them, They're going to harden their hearts, and I'm
going to shut their eyes, lest they should see with their eyes,
and believe with their hearts, and be converted." Just like
we read about in Revelation 3. Christ comes, He gives us the
gospel, He regenerates us and gives us life, and then we're
converted, and we run to Him. We're given faith to believe
Him, and we run to Him. We embrace Him. But the sad thing
is, God says the sad thing for sinners who obstinately refuse
to hear the gospel, obstinately refuse to see their need, even
though it's plain and should be clear. He comes with messengers,
with men who are sinners themselves, and tells them, this is what
we are. Brethren, flee to Christ, and
he says in Isaiah 6.10, make the heart of this people fat.
make their ears heavy, shut their eyes, lest they see with their
eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart,
and convert and be healed." And so Jesus says, for judgment I'm
coming to this world, that they which see not might see, and
they which see might be made blind. And some of the Pharisees
which were with him heard these words and said, are we blind
also? Jesus said to them, if you were
blind, you should have no sin. But now you say, we see. Therefore your sin remains. So
I have just a few things I want to say to you now. And this is
what I'd like to say in exhortation to you and me also, not just
to you, but to me. I want you to take these words
from John 9, and what we saw about these two blind men that
ran after him. And then there's this account
of Bartimaeus, which I haven't read to you, but it's familiar.
Where Bartimaeus hears the crowd, and they're going past him. And
he asks someone, what's going on? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. And he goes, whoa. And he starts
calling. And I can hear the trampling
of the crowd as they're passing by. And here Jesus is out in
front, already past him, on his way to Jerusalem, to give his
life for his people, on his way to the cross. And Bartimaeus
hears about it. He goes, the crowd is coming.
They're going by. And Jesus is going. This is my
only chance. And he raises his voice. He says,
Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. And the people tell him,
be quiet. And he didn't listen to them.
All the objections that all the people could raise, he wasn't
going to let them get in the way. Jesus is here. He can heal
me. And he cries again, Jesus, son
of David, have mercy. And the Lord calls him and asks
him, what do you want me to do? Lord, that I might receive my
sight. The first thing I say therefore then is, don't be proud. Don't be proud. God blinded the
Sodomites who tried to break Lot's door. Elisha prayed and
God blinded the Syrian army. And Isaiah prophesied that God
would blind Israel for their willful rejection of Christ.
Don't be proud. Come as a sinner in all the nakedness
of our need, in all the blindness. You have no spiritual ability. Who is expecting you to bring
anything? Christ is all. Therefore come
to Him for everything. Isn't that a mercy? Whenever
we in religion try to do what we think we ought to do to be
Christians, you know what we do? We accumulate some kind of A bank account which we rely
on and we point to and say, I've made progress. And all it does
is serve to blind us more and more to the truth of God's free
grace in Christ. The only ones who are saved are
those who have nothing and receive everything God requires in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And how do they receive it? By
simply looking to Him and seeing that He's accomplished everything.
This is the truth of the gospel. Don't be proud. That's the first
thing. The second thing is this. Don't
delay. Call upon Him while He is near. Let Seek ye the Lord while he
may be found. Call ye upon him while he is
near. Today is the day of salvation.
Don't delay. The blind men didn't wait. They didn't say, well, he's gone
by today. I'll wait another day. It's no problem. He'll heal me
if he wants to. No, don't wait. Don't be proud. Humble yourselves and don't delay.
Call on the Lord Jesus Christ today. Do you feel Sometimes,
you know, we hear the gospel and we rejoice in it and then
time goes by and it grows just every day to us. We've lost a
sense of the preciousness of Christ, our great need, and His
great supply. That God would send His Son from
heaven, take our sin, crucify His Son in order to bring us
to Himself, make us His sons, and conform us to His image. These things, they just become
stale doctrines over time. That's blindness. That's what
he's describing in Revelation chapter 3. Don't delay. Call
upon him. Come and buy all that you need
from Christ. And secondly, I would say this.
How then can I be saved? If I'm blind, if I'm dead, if
I'm ignorant, if I spiritually have no ability, no obedience,
I'm unable to face God in judgment, how then can I be saved? Well,
the fact, as I mentioned before, is that there's this perfect
one-to-one correspondence between my need and everything I need
is in Christ. It's not an accident that everything
a sinner is not in himself and everything he is an offense to
God's justice is perfectly met in the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ
is all. I'm ignorant. He's the wisdom
of God. I'm disobedient. He's the righteousness
of God. I'm a sinner under the wrath
of God. He has borne that wrath in himself. I'm proud. He is merciful. He is humble. Everything I need, I find in
Him. And so I look to God and I say, Lord, receive me in Him. Receive Him for my sake and me
on His account. Give me His righteousness. I
have nothing and I need all things. That's the third thing, is that
what am I to do? Find in Christ all that you need. I'm lost. He's the shepherd who
finds the lost sheep. And this should make us rejoice
with joy unspeakable and great confidence that I never have
to find something in me. I find it all in Him. If we could
just understand this, that God's grace is so rich and so free,
And so we should rejoice in it, and we should take confidence
in it. The question is often raised in song, I don't know
why God ever had mercy and grace on me. I can never find something
in me. Of course you can't, and you never will. The whole reason
is found in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's in God himself. And so we
find this great grace. What am I to do? If God saves
by Christ's work, and He saves those who are blind and ignorant,
dead spiritually, then why does He do this through faith? Why
does He enlighten my eyes to my need? Why does He give me
a sight of Christ alone as all my salvation? Why does He lay
me in the dust, low and honestly, admitting my case and continually
claim my place as nothing before God? Why does He do this? He
does it so that He will get glory. And He does it so that He can
give us eternal life. That eternal life is in knowing
Christ. Finding Him to be the glory of
God because He's given Himself for our sins. Isn't that what
Paul says? I live by the faith of the Son
of God who loved me and gave himself for me. And that was
the spiritual sight. He found all his need, all of
his satisfaction, his comfort, and everything in Christ. May
God give us this spiritual sight. In Jesus' name, amen. Lord, we
thank you for your word. Thank you for the Lord Jesus
Christ. Thank you that in him we have all that we need. Our
souls are satisfied with him. But Lord, sometimes we pray as
with the psalmist, open my eyes that I may behold wondrous things
out of thy law. Because we lose sight and we
thank you that even in Ephesians, for your people, you prayed.
Through Paul, you gave us this prayer that the eyes of our understanding
would be opened to the knowledge of Christ, enlightened to see
your great power toward us who believe. that we might see your
great eternal glory in our Savior. Lord, help us to see our need
as sinners, that we have nothing and we stand in need of everything
and Christ is all. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.