We're gonna go back to some messages
that we started some time ago about the miracles of the Lord
Jesus. I think there are about 37 miracles
of the Lord in the New Testament in Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John.
Some of the books of the New Testament, the Gospels, repeat
those incidences, but some of them only have one of them or
two of them. But today, we'd like to go to what we know as
his second miracle. Now, this is found in the book
of John. the book of John, but I want to read a couple of verses
a little later in the Bible to help us with some background.
And one of them is found in the book of Ephesians. The apostle
Paul, he was known as Saul of Tarsus. He was a mean guy. And the Lord saved him by his
grace. And then the Lord used him to write much of the New
Testament. The epistles to the various churches,
He wrote Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Philippians, Galatians,
Colossians, and several other books of the New Testament. He
was used mightily by the Holy Spirit to give us his word, God's
word for us today. And in the book of Ephesians,
it was a letter written to the church at Ephesus, a group of
believers in Ephesus. And that place is no longer there,
but there was something there then. And he wrote this to them. in the first chapter of the book
of Ephesians, verse 11. Now, it would be well if I read
the whole chapter, but time, time is ornery, isn't it? It
just passes so quickly. So we're gonna not do that. We're
just gonna read verse 11 because it shares with us some things
that we wanna cover in our message on the miracle. It says, in whom
also we have obtained an inheritance. being predestinated according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel
of his own will. Now, God is not dependent upon
our will, but he has everything worked out according to his will. And that's so important to know,
that it's worked out according to his will. He has a purpose,
and he's carrying it out according to his will. Another verse I
want to read is found in the book of Hebrews, and many people,
though it doesn't tell us definitely, but many people feel that that
the Apostle Paul was used to write in. And here in the first
chapter of the book of Hebrews, verses one, two, and three, it
shares this. It says, God, who at sundry times,
that means in times past, in many ways, spoke to us in diverse
manners, spake in times past under the fathers by the prophets.
Now that's how God spoke in the Old Testament, because they didn't
have the books put together. He spoke by the prophets. Now
these prophets, the prophets of God, all said the same thing
about God, because God gave them the message. And he says, half
in these last days spoken unto us by his son. So the writer
is used by the Holy Spirit to share with us that throughout
the Old Testament era, God spoke through the prophets. Jeremiah,
Isaiah, Amos, Obadiah, Jeremiah, the prophets, and they were used
mightily of God to declare God and his purpose. And it tells
us here, but in the last days. Now, after the Lord Jesus came,
and last week we were here, we said, that's the year zero. That's
how I remember it. We have BC and AD. In the year
zero, the Lord Jesus came born of a virgin, born and laid in
a manger, grew up, and we find that his purpose was, he has
spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all
things, by whom also he made the worlds. who being in the
brightness of his glory and the express image of his person and
upholding all things by the word of his power. So we find in the
Bible that the word of God is powerful, all powerful. In fact, the Lord said, all power
is given unto me in heaven and in earth. So God is not a weakling. God is all-powerful. It's hard
for us to imagine someone that has all that power. People have
tried to help us by creating superheroes. Superman? A very small imitation about
the all-powerful God. All right, and he said, when
he had by himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand
of the majesty on high, Now in the passage we want to look at
in the book of John, chapter four, the Lord has performed
his first miracle. He dealt with a woman at a well
in Canaan, or Samaria, excuse me, in Samaria. And after that,
we have this incident of his second miracle. In the book of
John, John chapter four, In the last few verses of that book,
beginning with verse 48, we have this. Now, I read those other
verses to help us understand how he did what he did. God is
a powerful God, all powerful, not lacking in any capacity. He is so powerful that nothing
can be compared to him. Now here it tells us, and the
Lord never went anywhere without a purpose. He always went somewhere. You know, today I walked into
the kitchen and then I got in there and I says, what am I doing
here? What did I come here for? I don't
know if you've ever had that problem. Well, God never has
that problem. He knows exactly what he's doing all the time.
And it says here in the book of John chapter four, verse 48,
then said Jesus unto him, except ye see the signs and wonders,
ye will not believe. And the noble man saith unto
him, Sir, come down, ere my child die. And Jesus saith unto him,
Go thy way, thy son liveth. Now this nobleman is from Capernaum,
and Jesus is in Canaan. This little machine that I have
can tell me how far it is from Capernaum to Canaan in an instant. It's about 20 miles. So this
noble man, which means someone who represents a king, come to
the king. This nobleman, someone who represents
a king, came to the king because he knew this king could do, if
he pleased him, could do what he wanted him to do. Now, he
had a sick child. He had a sick son. He had someone
at home that was sick. And he traveled for about 20
miles from Capernaum to Canaan to meet the king. the one by
the word of his power created the heavens and the earth. Someone
had told him something about the Lord Jesus. Someone had told
him that this one is able to do things that we cannot do on
our own. This king can do great things. He is the King of Glory. He is
the Lord of Lords. He is the King of Kings. And
somehow this man understood that. The Holy Spirit had revealed
the truth about this one and he traveled 20 miles, now probably
by foot, at best on a mule or a horse. So it took him some
time to get there. And I'm sure in the back of his
mind, he was thinking, is my son gonna survive while I'm gone
this amount of time? Will he still be alive when I
talk to this one, if I get to talk to him? Well, he meets up
with him and he tells him, come to my house, please, or my son
will die. And Jesus saith unto him, go
thy way, thy son liveth. Now, how could he perform a miracle
from 20 miles? Because he's God. He didn't have
to be there. He could take care of the problem
from 20 miles away. In fact, he takes care of problems
today from an eternity away, from the glories of heaven away.
We find that this one is all powerful. He can do great things. He can perform great feats. And
the greatest feat that God has ever performed is to forgive
us our sins. And he can do that from a distance
because he's powerful, all powerful. The noble man said, please help
me with my son. And he says, go your way, your
son liveth. And the man believed the word
that Jesus had spoken unto him and went his way. Last week,
we mentioned the name, Jesus, what it means. The definition
of the name Jesus means savior. That's what his name means. And
when he was given that name, his stepfather, Joseph, was given
this. You shall call his name Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins. That's why you're
going to call his name Jesus. He's going to have the ability
of saving his people from their sins. Now this is just a very
small type, a picture, a shadow of what he can do. He healed
a young man from 20 miles away. You know, we studied not too
long ago about the Lord Jesus staying away from Lazarus. And
you know what Lazarus went ahead and did? He died. And then the
Lord went to him and raised him from the dead. This young boy
is at home and we find Jesus said unto him, go thy way, thy
son is healed. And as the noble man was going
home, he had some of his servants coming towards him. You know,
as soon as something happened with the son and the father's
headed home, as soon as that happened, they're headed to him
to say, we have good news to tell you. Your son's fine. What a story, what an account
that those servants had to tell this father. Then he says, and
as they was now going down, his servants met him and told him
saying, thy son liveth. What good news that dad had.
He went on a mission. He went because he was concerned
and he went because he believed that this king, the Lord Jesus,
could raise his boy from this illness, from this sickness.
Well, the Lord just simply said in passing, Go your way, he's
okay. You know, we don't have an account
that they ever cross paths again in their lives, but we have this
account that Jesus crossed paths with this man and this man made
a request and Jesus Christ took care of it and did it from 20
miles away. It says, and he inquired of them
the hour that he began to amend. Would you tell me when he started
to get better? Well, I'm sure they knew. because
they've been watching over this boy very attentively. You know,
sometimes their employment depended upon the health of the children.
And so they knew exactly. And he says unto them, they said
unto him, yesterday at the seventh hour, the fever left him. Now,
if we were to translate that into our time, it would be one
o'clock in the afternoon. So at one o'clock in the afternoon,
somebody was there, observed him, and he got better at one
o'clock in the afternoon. And they sent somebody to catch
the dad and say, he's doing well. Well, yesterday the fever left
him, so the father knew that it was the same hour in the which
Jesus said unto him, thy son liveth. So there was no question
at all in this man's mind. You know, some people might say,
well, he was going to get better anyway. There was nothing happened. Well, this man understood that
it was exactly the same time that Jesus said, your son will
live. The same minute, the same second,
20 miles away, the boy became healthy again. And He believed
and his whole house. And this again, the second miracle
that Jesus did when he came out of Judea into Galilee. So the
Lord, he came down to this earth for a purpose, and that was to
lay down his life, a ransom for many. But on his way, step by
step, every day, he had things he was going to accomplish. And
one of those things was this very thing, and that was, he
knew about that boy. He knew about that dad. He knew
they were going to meet because Jesus had made a divine appointment.
I must go meet this man. And when that man came to him,
Jesus simply said, your boy's okay. And left, you know, because
God is all powerful. He can do things for us from
20 miles away. You know, he sits on his throne.
I heard the gospel one time and I was very upset about it. And
I told my wife, I hate that man that brought me the gospel. Because
you know what he explained to me? In no uncertain terms. That
the religion I had was not gonna help when I stood before God.
Wasn't gonna help. It isn't by our works of righteousness. It's by his grace and mercy he
saves us. So our works of righteousness
are really worthless. but his grace and mercy is all
powerful. So the Lord demonstrated that
to hear. How many people understood that?
How many people heard about that? We don't know, but by the very
words, thy son liveth. A miracle was performed that
demonstrates what God can do from a distance. He can give
us new life in Christ Jesus from a distance. I had a very dear
friend of mine who was a pastor. He said, don't come to me about
your salvation because I didn't die for you on the cross. Come
to Christ, come to Christ. Okay, Brother Mike, if you'll
come and we'll have a closing hymn.