Thank you. Now let's go over to Mark chapter
7. Mark chapter 7, as we continue
through the Gospel of Mark. I want to look at two stories
this morning, Mark chapter 7 and a story in Mark chapter 8.
A story of two men who are healed by our Lord. One is deaf, that
is, he cannot hear and he's dumb, he can't speak. And the other
is a blind man. But, as with everything, these
are examples of how the Lord saves sinners. Because all of us, until the
Lord does this work upon us, all of us are deaf. That is,
we don't hear God's Word, don't hear anything in the preaching,
don't hear the voice of God. We're dumb. That is, we cannot
and will not call on the Lord, won't even call on God except
to cuss by nature and sure won't give thanks to God and ask him
for mercy until he loosens the tongue like this man. And we're
all blind by nature. We're blind to see who God really
is, we're blind to see what we are and what we need, and what
the truth is. We're blind. So this is a picture
of how God saves sinners. And both of these are very similar.
A man is dumb, deaf and dumb, he can't hear, and the other
man is blind. Both of these stories are very
similar, and so we're going to take them together. Because I believe that eyes and
ears are connected. If you can't hear, you're not
going to see either. If you cannot hear, you're not
going to see. So here, look at Mark chapter
7. Look at verse 31 and 32. Now again, he departed from the
coast of Tyre and Sidon. He came into the Sea of Galilee,
speaking of Christ. through the midst of the coast
of Decapolis, and they bring unto him one that was deaf, and
he had an impediment in his speech, speech problem. And they beseech
him, or that is, begged Christ to put his hand upon this man
who is deaf and with the speech problem. So they bring him, it
says, to Christ. They bring him, they brought
him to Christ, and if anyone is going to receive spiritual
ears, they're going to receive it from Christ. He's the one
that's going to have to open them. He's the one that said
they have ears to hear, but they don't hear. It's like the one
who made the natural ear. Some people are born, this man
was born deaf, right? Now, God made you that way. You were
born with hearing. You have hearing. Why? God made
you that way. And so it is spiritually. We're
all born deaf. We don't hear the—nobody's going
to hear the truth. Nobody's going to hear the Word
of God unless God gives them hearing. And Christ said, my
sheep will hear my voice, every one of them. And that's the gospel, preaching
of the gospel, his word. Peter said, this is the word
which we preach, which by the gospels preach. Now, the person's
going to have to come and hear, come where Christ is and hear
him, right? They brought this man to where
Christ was. But it was up to Christ to give
him ears. Right? So we know because we know how
it was that we heard. How? We came, sat under the hearing
of the gospel, and one day we heard. He's speaking to me. I need that. We're here finally. And it's the same with anyone.
pleased the Lord by the foolishness of preaching. And some people
sit for a long time and don't hear. It's obvious they don't
hear. But if the Lord is pleased, he can open the ear. He opened
it up. If a person's going to be saved,
they'll do it, they'll be, they'll hear the gospel. Faith cometh
by hearing, and hearing by the word preached, the gospel. They brought him to Christ. And it says that this man was
deaf, verse 32, he couldn't hear, and he had an impediment in his
speech. This is always the case with
someone who cannot hear, right? You've known or know people who
cannot hear, and so therefore they cannot speak plainly. The ear and the mouth are directly
connected according to how well you hear is according to how
well you speak. Well, this is the same thing spiritually speaking, that men and women don't hear
the truth of who God is, so they say wrong things about God. Are
you listening to it? They don't hear. You see, this
is how God speaks. This right here. No other way.
Not through dreams and visions and signs and wonders and all
that. God speaks through his word. This is called the word
of God. If they speak not according to
my word, he said, there's no light in them. And if a person
doesn't hear this preaching of the word, they won't speak right. They'll say things about God,
but it'd be wrong. They'll say things about themselves,
but it'd be wrong. Because God says things the way
they are, one way, the truth. They'll say things about salvation,
but it'd be wrong. You see, they'll have a speech
impediment. Are you with me? You see, if a person has not
heard of, now this is what the scriptures teaches of God, that
God is first holy. God alone is holy. A person who
hasn't heard that will go around talking about their own holiness. They have a speech impediment. A person who has not heard of
God's sovereignty, that God worketh all things unto the counsel of
his own will, this is what God says, this is what his word says.
That God says, I have spoken and I will do it. God works all
things after his own will. It's not of him that will it,
man. Not of the will of the flesh
or the will of man. But it's of God to show us mercy. It's all according to his will.
A person who hasn't heard God talk about his own will will
go around talking about man's will. They'll go around talking about
man's free will. They have a speech impediment.
A person who has not heard of Christ's righteousness being
the only one that God will accept, like God's holiness, like man's
depravity, Christ's righteousness alone, as our acceptance, is
all through That's all this book says, people. You know that? That's basically, or three things
that this scripture says, four things. Number one, God is holy. My pastor asked it Wednesday
night, didn't he? How can he be clean? That's born
of woman. How can God be just and justify? Man is depraved. Try as he will, he can't be good
enough for God. Christ's righteousness alone
is the only hope of anyone. The fourth one is Christ's blood
alone atones, pays for sin. Well, a person who hasn't heard
of that, there's only one thing that will pay for sin, will go
around talking about how they're, I'm going to make amends. I'm
going to turn over a new leaf. You see, they've got a speech
impediment. So this fellow couldn't hear, and so he had a speech
impediment. A person who hasn't heard of
God's absolute purpose will talk about luck, chance, accidents. Even religious people will do
that, who claim to believe God, but they also believe a little
luck. It can't be both, people. It
can't be both. Luck is, I don't know what luck
is. What is luck? It's got to have
it, though, if you're going to be lucky. Well, either God works all things and
everything's working together according to God's all-wise purpose,
everything bad and good. is working together according
to God's purpose, there's no luck or chance involved whatsoever
that God is absolutely, absolutely in control of every minute detail,
or he's not God. You can't have God in luck. A person who hasn't heard of
God's immutable, sovereign purpose, well, talk of luck, I've got
a speech impediment. Like that one athlete, they asked
him what he attributed to his success. He said, a lot of prayer
and a little luck. Yeah, I pray all the time, but
I've got this rabbit's foot here just in case. Oh my, how ignorant. That's a
speech impediment. You see, they've got a problem.
He asked the person who's heard the truth, heard from God, heard
the Word of God, what do you attribute to all things? Very simple speech. Therefore
seeing we have such hope, Paul said we use great plainness of
speech. Alright? Do you know somebody
who's deaf to the gospel? Do you know somebody who will
not hear it? Sure you do. Do you know somebody
who has not heard it? Who you hope to hear it? Who
you want to hear it? What's their hope of hearing
it? Christ alone. Bring them to Christ. Now what
does that mean? I'm going to win that fellow
to the Lord. No, no, no. No, it means you bring them to
hear the gospel. Give them a tape or take them
to the Lord in prayer. Call on Him. Lord, I cannot open
His ears, her ears. I cannot make mama or daddy or
brother or sister or my son or daughter I cannot make them hear
what I heard. Only you can do it, Lord, please.
Would you please give her ears to hear like you've given me?
Would you give him ears to hear like you've given me? Lord, please.
But look at this. It says, verse 33, He took him. He took him. Lord, would you, this man is
a friend of mine and he can't hear. Lord, would you, would
you take him and lay hands on him, would you take him and heal
him? He took him. Hey, he took him. He took him. That gives me hope
for somebody. Is it you? I know some people
that They're deaf. They just won't hear. That gives
me hope. The Lord might take them. Look how he took him. Verse 33,
it says, He took him aside from the multitude. He took him aside
from the multitude. See, the Lord doesn't save in
big Holy Spirit revival meetings. He doesn't save in big camp meetings. He saves individuals. I know
there was Pentecost. I know that. But that was God's
purpose, and you just don't see that after that. No, you see individuals. When
the Lord went around speaking to people, it was individually,
wasn't it? He went around individually and found a woman sitting on
a well. And a man sitting up in a tree. And on and on. The fellow's in a boat. He saves
individually. He saves individually. He takes
us, the first thing he does to someone is takes them away from
the crowd. You see that? Took him aside
from the multitude. Alone with himself. It's just
him and the man. That's how the Lord deals with
people. That's how he's got to deal with people. And that's
what needs to be done to our friend, to us, to get away from
all this. You see, this power of religion,
I know I say a lot about it. I know that. I know I say a lot
about it. But it's a mess, people. It's
never been more of a mess than it is now. Never. Would you agree? So many voices. There are more
voices now than ever before. And it's absolute confusion.
People, who do we listen to? I'll tell you what you do. Don't
listen to anybody. Don't listen to anybody. Go home
and get in your closet. That'd be good advice. Quit listening to anybody. and go home and get in the closet
and say, Lord, you kill me. That would be good advice, wouldn't
it? Well, anybody really seeking,
ask the Lord. Don't go to anybody. Get away
from the maddening crowd and all the clamor and confusion
of religion. Go home, get in your closet,
ask the Lord. That's what Barnard said to that
young lady one time. Ralph Barnard preached a meeting,
and there was a couple there who had a daughter who was a
wild rebel. And they asked Brother Barnard
if he'd speak to their daughter, and he did. And all he said to
her was, young lady, he said, Bernard used to say this, he
used to say, I double dog dare you. He said, young lady, I double
dog dare you. You go home tonight and you get
in your clothes. You get alone. You get by yourself.
You ask the Lord. You call on the Lord. You ask
him, Lord, show me myself. Show me myself. Do it." That's
all he said to her. He didn't try to win her to Jesus. Well, he left town. And he came
back to that same town. I forget how much later it was. Sometime. And he came back into
town and that girl's parents said to Brother Barnard, you've
got to come speak to our daughter. Ever since you left here, she's
been torn all to pieces. She's torn all to pieces. We
can't help her. She's just a mess. She's a wreck.
So Margaret did. This is all he said to her. He
said, Honey. He used to talk like this. Honey,
I double-dog marry you. You go home tonight, and you
get in your closet, and you ask the Lord to show you Himself. That's all he said. And he left. He came back again,
that girl sitting on the front row with a big old smile on her
face. The Lord takes his people apart
from all this mess. Look at it. It says he put his
fingers in his ears. You see that? Verse 33? He put
his fingers in his ears. Come here. As if to say, don't listen to
anybody else. Don't listen to them. There was
a couple up in Ashland, Kentucky, who was religious. Don and Audrey
McGinnis. And they were in the Methodist
religion, and he was Big Dog in Methodist religion. And Big
Don, Big Dog. Tell him I called him that. Big
Don Dog. Somebody, you know, probably
a big giver is what he was, Ron, a big giver. So they made him
big dog. And Audrey was head of the Women's
Missionary Society. They were, you know, both real
religious. Well, one of our men gave them
a tape or something of it, my pastor preaching the truth. And
they both heard it and the Lord began to work on them. And they
asked for more tapes, and they began to hear it. And finally,
they went up to their preacher. Don approached his preacher.
He told him, he said, I'm finally hearing the gospel. He said, I'm finally, he said,
I'm hearing some truth. He said, I haven't been hearing
it here. The man said, you mean I'm not preaching the truth? And Don said, and I'm not going
to sit here and listen to this anymore. I'm going where the
truth is. Goodbye. And he left. I'm not going to hear this anymore.
I'm going to go where I really hear something. And he did. That's what the Lord does. He
makes it a person where they can't stand. I can't stand what
I'm hearing around here. I've got to hear something, the
truth. Isn't that right? And those of you who hear the
truth, oh man, anything contrary to it now is like noise. They
wonder why we don't put up with this modern gospel music and
all that, because it's noise. It's absolute noise. Might as well listen to acid
rock. They've even got that kind of gospel music, don't they?
Christian rock? I don't want to deal with that.
Well, that's noise. Why? Because you can't hear the
message in the mess, can you? You can't get the message out
of that mess. Or like old Ezra said, we can't
build a wall here, there's too much junk lying around. If we
get rid of all this junk, we'll lay a foundation. Get rid of
this and that and all this trimmings of religion, all this, these
props, and get all this flesh out of the way, we'll lay down
some truth here. We'll start preaching the word,
get all this flesh out of the way. Well, so the Lord put his fingers
in this man's ears and said, you come out of town with me,
you and me. Don't listen to anybody or anything
else. And it said, look at this, this is good. Verse 33 says,
he spit and touched his tongue. In other words, our Lord created
some saliva in his mouth and touched his own tongue and touched
the man's tongue. Now remember, the man is deaf
and dumb. He can't hear and he can't speak
right. He's got an impediment of speech. Our Lord, the first
thing He does to make him hear right is shut up his ears. You've heard all wrong. I'm going
to have to teach you to hear all over again. Don't listen
to anything you've been saying. What was the next thing he heard,
Brother Dan? What was the first thing he heard? No man. You've been listening to me all
this time, now what do you hear? And he touched, what, you see,
what, look at this. He looked up to heaven, verse
34, and he sighed, and saith unto him, Epithet, that is, be
No one's ears are going to be open unless Christ says, open.
What the Lord opens is open. And no man can shut it. You know, the religion would
have us quit listening to this. Wouldn't it? I guarantee you,
folks, if you, this probably happened to some of the People
tell you, don't go there. Don't listen to that. That fellow down there preaches
election. Don't go there. That's Calvinism. Don't go there.
That's hyper-Calvinism. Don't go there. Anywhere but
there. Don't listen to that, right?
But now what the Lord opens, no man can shut. And what the
Lord shuts, no man can open. Roy Poole and his wife, they're
the ones that start going to the old church. You remember
that story, don't you, Tammy? The old church, you heard that?
You hadn't? Okay, good. Somebody hadn't heard
it. There was this couple who moved to Ashland, Kentucky years
ago, 40 years ago. And they were looking for a place
to go to church, and this man worked somewhere, insurance or
whatever, and he said, He said, where's a good place
to go to church around here? I said, go, well, about anywhere. He said, go anywhere but 13th Street. Don't go there.
Anywhere but. And where they ended up? And another couple, this was
the other couple, the old church. went to work, and they said,
Where do you go? Go to church. And the man said,
I go to 13th Street Baptist Church. And they said, Oh. The old church. Where do you
go? First Baptist or First Methodist
or Our Lady of the Sanhedrin Synagogue, Sweet Sarah Sue the
whatever. Oh, that's wonderful. Oh. No more needs to be said. Oh. What the Lord, you see, what
the Lord, but you know, when the Lord finally opens the ears,
you're not going to go anywhere else. People can't understand. And
I'm not building this church up. I'm building the truth up.
People can't understand, though, you go someplace, would you go,
why don't you go to my, I'll make a deal with you, you go
to my church, I'll go to your church. Well, you know, I wish you'd come hear
the gospel, but I'm just not going to go there and hear that.
I'm not going to go, I can't stand it. Same as they can't
stand the truth. Well, too bad. But what the Lord
did now was put his fingers in this man's ear, and what he did
was touch his own tongue and then touch this man's tongue.
In other words, what came from the mouth of Christ is what opened
this man's mouth and made him speak right. It's the only time
a man and woman will begin to speak right when they speak according
to God's Word, right? You'll notice some light in him,
John, if they speak according to the Word. See, whereas before
he had a speech impediment, he was saying, I accepted Jesus,
I made that decision, or I did this, I turned over a new leaf,
I quit, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
I, I, I, I, I, I, I You see? This is what the Scripture says. This is the language of Scripture.
Answer Him! Everybody in Gloria right now
is saying, Him! While all the most people out
there are saying, I! But when the Lord, from His Word,
touches the tongue, you say, Well, He did it, didn't He? I
had nothing to do with He. And every song you sing is a
hymn. Right? A hymn. If it doesn't
bring glory to Him, we won't sing it. We won't sing it if
it brings glory to mama or man or this. It's got to be the hymn.
We've got to sing a hymn. And everything you see in the
scriptures from there on is hymn. Your ears are open. Everything
you hear, there's Christ there, isn't it? Everything you hear
is Christ, Christ, Christ. This man, after this happened,
he could never get enough of hearing a cry. Huh? Every time somebody bring up
Christ, Brother Henry says, What? Where? Where is he now? Oh, I
love it. Oh, that's my Lord. That's my
Lord. That's my Master. That's my Healer. That's my Savior. Now, how was
it again you were healed? He did it. Well, what about you? Didn't you have anything to do
with it? I was deaf and dumb, man. I was deaf and dumb. What
could I have to do with it? He healed me. Well, straightway his ears were
opened and the string of his tongue was loosened. He spake
plain. He spoke of Christ. Look over at chapter 8 now. Here's
the other story. Chapter 8. I might make it today. About 30 minutes. Chapter 8 is
the story of a blind man. Verse 22. It's very similar. He comes to Bethsaida and they
bring a blind man unto him and ask the Lord, would you touch
him? I just don't see it that way.
Mom? Son? Daughter? Sister? That's
not the way I see it. Flying. They brought him to him. Have you tried to make people
see? Huh? Have you, Mary? Have you tried
to make your relatives see? Don't you see? Can't you see? That's what my
dad did to me. Son, let's sing here. Do you see? Yes, yes, I do see. So he let go of me. Say anything. We can't make them sing. The
Lord's the only one. Can't you see? And let's not get mad at people because
they can't see. I'm guilty. Aren't you? Spurgeon said it. People that get mad at those
that can't see the truth are like a man who was down in a
ditch with a bunch of people. He was down in a ditch, couldn't
get out. And somebody came along and pulled him out of the ditch. He couldn't have got out. But
somebody came and pulled him out of the pit, and said for
him to get mad is like that man to take a stick and start hitting
those people in the head. What's wrong with you all? Get
out of there. Get out of there. Somebody pulled him out. What
do we have that we haven't received? Well, they brought him to Christ,
and it says in verse 23, look what happened. And he took the
blind man by the hand and led him out of town. Let's get
out of here. Let's get away from this mess.
Get away from this crowd. You're not going to see anything
in all this mess. I'll tell you who you got to
see. And only one thing you got to see. Me, Christ said. Me. Christ is
the only one. Come unto me, all ye that labour
and have your laden. Not to the church, not to the
Baptist. Come to me. I'll give you rest. Me. You've got to see him. Well, he led him out of town,
by the hand, verse 23, and when he had spit on his eyes, came from his mouth. The only
thing that's going to open anybody's eyes is the word of God. I don't know when I'm going to
learn this, Brother Sam. I don't know when. I still don't
have learned this yet. I talk, I talk, I talk, I talk,
and people don't see. There's one thing, the word of
God. And we'd do better, really, we
would do better to find one verse of scripture that says the gospel
and go to somebody that doesn't see and just quote that verse
of scripture, Jeanette, and leave them alone. Don't talk until
you're blue in the face. Brother Kelly, I haven't learned
that yet. I wish I would. Maybe someday
I'll, in talking to somebody, I'll say, Behold the Lamb of God. And walk
off. Not argue. Not cast pearls. This is it. This is the only
thing. Only thing. He touched his tongue and read
on. Verse 23. And he put his hands
on him and asked him if he saw anything. Now, he looked up and
said, I see. He did see. The man was blind,
but now he saw. What did he see? I see men walking
as trees. He didn't see very clearly, did
he? No? He did see. Something. Like the blind man before. Remember
the blind man, John Nye? Remember him? What about this
one? I don't know much, he said. I
do know this. I was blind, now I see. And this fellow said,
well, what do you see? He said, I don't see men. They
look like trees. He did see something. You see, this is a gradual work.
It really is a gradual work. You begin to see. And we shouldn't
expect people to know everything right off the bat. And I tell
you what men and women do begin to see at first, when God begins
to open their eyes. the basic things that they see.
They see God is God. God's God. And they might not,
Brother Henry, might not be able to really put that into words,
you know, but they know, what do you mean God is God? I mean,
He's God. I mean, He's not trying to, but
He is God. What else? They see men as trees,
dead wood. They see themselves as man's
helpless. God's God, man's helpless. Man
can't save himself. What do you mean by that? Well,
because he's just dead, that's why. What do you mean dead? I can't. He just is. And he sees, you know, Christ
is That's about it. Is that you? Was that you when
God first began to reveal the truth to you? If somebody would
ask you, well, what about this? What about that? I don't know
a whole lot. I just know that it's God, the
man's dead, and Christ is our only hope. Is that eyesight? You better
believe it is. You better believe. It is. All right, look at verse, and
I'll quit, verse 25, after Christ put his hands again upon his
eyes. You know, the only place where you're going to get eyesight
is from Christ, from his Word. And where you're going to get
more light is the same place. So we come and we hear the gospel. Faith telleth by hearing. Well,
how do you grow in faith? How do you get more understanding,
more knowledge? The same thing. And Christ has got it through
his Word, keeps speaking to you. I'm really starting to see now.
Read on. Then it says he looked up and
he was restored and he saw every man clearly. He saw every man clearly. I see
now. I see very clearly. But now,
who was the first man he saw? Huh? Who was the first man he saw,
and therefore saw all men clearly? You see? He saw Christ, the holiness,
the righteousness, the only holy man, and then he saw all men
clearly. You get that? When you see Christ as the only
one, you'll see yourself, you'll see everybody else very clearly.
We're all just a bunch of sinners here. He's the one. That man
can't do anything for me. He's the one. All right. Let's sing, there's only one
song to sing, 236. I once was blind, and now I see.
236. Sherry, come up. 236. Amazing grace. This was written by an old blind
man, John Newton. An old wretch whom the Lord saved.
Stand with me. Amazing grace. 236. Amazing grace, how sweet the
sound that saved a wretch like me.