If y'all would, open with me
to John chapter 4. John chapter 4 beginning in verse
43. John 4, 43. Now after two days
he departed thence and went into Galilee. For Jesus himself testified
that a prophet hath no honor in his own country. Then when
he was come into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having
seen all the things that he did at Jerusalem at the feast, for
they also went unto the feast. So Jesus came again into Canaan
of Galilee, where he made the water wine, and there was a certain
nobleman whose son was sick at Capernaum. When he heard that
Jesus was come out of Judea into Galilee, he went unto him, and
besought him that he would come down and heal his son, for he
was at the point of death. Then said Jesus unto him, Except
ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe. The nobleman
saith unto him, Sir, come down, ere my child die. Jesus saith
unto him, Go thy way, thy son liveth. And the man believed. the word that Jesus had spoken
unto him, and he went his way. And as he was now going down,
his servants met him and told him, saying, Thy son liveth.
Then inquired he of them the hour when he began to amend. And they said unto him, Yesterday
at the seventh hour the fever left him. So the father knew
that it was at the same hour in the which Jesus said unto
him, Thy son liveth, and himself believed, and his whole house. This again, the second miracle
that Jesus did when he was come out of Judea into Galilee. I
was so happy when your pastor called me. Other than the awesome
responsibility and the burden of preaching the gospel, I thought
I'd get to see my friends again. Y'all are just what a blessing
to me. Y'all have been through the years,
and it's a great privilege just to know y'all. And I appreciate
how you greet me and how kind you are to Rebecca and I. Let's
turn back to John chapter 5. I had that portion of John chapter
4 read to us because it begins, John chapter 5 begins in verse
1 with after this. After what? After what? Most
of us are familiar with the first miracle that our Lord did in
His earthly ministry. He turned water into wine at
the wedding. But I had not thought, as it
says in verse 54 of chapter 4, the second miracle that He did,
which was when this wealthy man, this nobleman, came to our Lord
and said, my son is sick. You all ever had a child sick?
That'll weigh on you, won't it? This man traveled all the way
from Capernaum to find the only man on this earth who could fix
his problem. And it was going to take a miracle.
And when he got there, this man found our Lord and he said, he
came to him and he said, my child is going to die. My boy is going
to die. And our Lord didn't have to go
all the way to Capernaum. You know what he did? He said,
he just spoke. He said, your boy's all right.
And as we read, this man, believing God, turned around and headed
for home. And he got about halfway there
and met a servant of his and said, what are you doing here? He said, well, I came to tell
you, your boy's all right. He said, when did it happen?
And he told him. And this nobleman thought, that's
when I spoke to him. And he spoke to me. All the Lord
had to do was speak. And you know what that picture
is? If this morning God speaks, not the voice of this man, but
if the man Christ Jesus If God speaks through him this morning,
you know what he can do? He can heal some of us. He can heal
all of us. Everybody who's here that's sin
sick, he can heal us. He can do for us what no other
man can do. No doctor on earth can take care
of this problem, but our Lord can. So verse 1 of chapter 5
says, after this, after that, there was a feast of the Jews
and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And now there is a Jerusalem
by the sheep market, a pool which is called in the Hebrew tongue
Bethesda, having five porches. Now I suppose if we thought about
it, we'd all know what the purpose of sheep market is. It's where
sheep herders and farmers brought their animals, brought their
sheep, and they brought them for one of three reasons. They
were either going to buy some more or sell the ones they had,
or they were going to have these sheep sheared or they were bringing
them to be slaughtered. You know, to the world, especially
the religious world, God's people who are sheep, you know what
they're good for? Shearing, slaughtering, or buying
or selling them. Isn't that the truth? You don't
have to watch much religion to realize how true that is. That's
the purpose of modern day religion for the most part. You know,
a sheep market, this pool, we may have, from movies, we may
have an idea that it's this porticoed, ivy-covered, spa-like pool. That's not what it was like.
There were gates into the city of Jerusalem from the outside
for different purposes. And the purpose of the sheep
gate was to bring those sheep in. It was not a spa. This was
one nasty place. Nobody wiped the sheep's feet
clean before they brought them in. And, you know, farm animals,
they don't much care whether they're inside or outside. When
the time comes, they're going to take care of their business.
It's wherever they are. This was one nasty place. And there just happened to be
a spring that ran through it, and they captured water there
in a pool for those animals to drink from. The floor of this
place was unclean. And that's exactly the same shape
that the Lord Jesus Christ finds his people in, unclean, dead
in trespasses and sin. And the name of this place is
Bethesda. Literally what that means is
a place of flowing water, but it's a house of mercy. It was
merciful to be right there at the gate because these animals
and the people that brought them when they came through that gate
from out there, they were thirsty. They wanted water. And it was
merciful that it was right there. You know, God's spirit in time
always makes all his sheep be thirsty. And then he brings them
to the house of mercy. He brings them to the place of
flowing water, not to be sheared, not to be slaughtered, not to
be bought and sold. He brings them there that he's
gonna quench their thirst once and for all. He's gonna shed
his blood that they might never thirst again. He told that woman,
he said, you drink this water, you'll never be thirsty again.
And notice that there's five porches here, not one, not two,
not three, five. That's a lot of porches. You
know why that is? There's a lot of people there.
The house of mercy of our Lord has plenty of room, all the room
in the world, and the water of life never runs dry in this place.
Look at verse three, it says, And in these porches lay a great
multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting
for the moving of the water. Hold this and turn over to Colossians
chapter 2. It says there was a great multitude.
A lot of them had come with our Lord. They'd heard He was doing
miracles. They knew of two. And they were
with him. But there was already a multitude
here. There was a mob in these five
porches. You say, what were they doing
there? Well, they were waiting. They were waiting. You know,
I wonder how Christ got in this place. There were so many people
there. How did he get in there? He came up to the gate, and here's
all these sheep trying to get in, and there was all these people
with Him, following Him, and all these people packed in these
five porches. How did He get in there? I've got a better question
for you. How does Christ get in a person?
How does He get in His people? Well, we're going to see that
in just a minute, but the other question is, if this place was
so full, how did Christ get in? If he wants in a place, he's
coming in. He's coming in. He's not waiting
for us to open the door. He's not waiting for us to be
begged. No, no. He wants in, he's coming
in. It's like Don Fortner says, he'll tear down the door, bull,
balk, jaw. Joyce, he'll tear it all down
and come in. He's coming in, he's coming in. Look at Colossians
2 verse 9. For in Him, in Christ, dwelleth
all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. If God the Father, God
the Son, if all of God could be in this body of the Lord Jesus
Christ, you suppose there's room for one of us? Plenty of room
in Him. Don't ever try that excuse. Well,
I wanted to come, but there wasn't room for me. There's room here.
Come on in. Come on in, Crossville. There's
room in here. We'll sit chairs in the aisle.
We can sit on the floor, can't we? Come on in. Look up at Colossians
1 verse 19. For it pleased the Father that
in Christ should all fullness dwell, and having made peace
through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things
unto Himself. By Him, I say, whether they be
things in earth or things in earth, And you that were sometimes
alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now
hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death to
present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight.
There's only one thing keep us out of Christ. That's our sin.
But if he puts it away, we can come in. We can come in. Well,
turn back to John 5 and look here what it says. In this place
was a multitude of impotent folk. Now, I like this word, folk.
Listen, would anybody here, you know, I hope that the owner of
the big plants here in town are here. I hope there's, that won't
keep anybody out. But I do, I can look around here
and see who's in here, because I recognize some of you. You
look just like me. You're folk. You're just folk.
Just folk. We're not putting on any pretenses.
We're not here to prove anything this morning, except we're just
folk. That's the best thing we can be. And if you look that
word up, it's a word, if you were a boy, it meant you'd been
beaten with impunity. You'd been mistreated all your
life. If you were a girl, it described you as a girl folk
was a servant or a slave. I tell you, sin does enslave
us, doesn't it? That describes us all. But we're
just folk. I tell you, we might ought to
be glad we're not the rich and the noble and the famous, because
there's not many of them. But this place was thronged with
folk, with folk just like us. And it describes them. It says
they're impotent. That means they're feeble, they're
diseased, they're without strength. All these folk got serious problems.
It says they're blind. They actually cannot see. It
says they're halt. That means they're crippled.
They're lame. They can't get from here to there
the way they'd like to. And it says they're withered.
They're all shrunk up. They're shriveled up. This place
is full. It's packed with desperately
sick and dying people. That describes us pretty good,
doesn't it? were dead in trespasses and sin. Just most folks don't
know it. But God's folk, those in Christ,
He shows us that in time, that we're dying. Well, what were
they doing there? It says in verse 3, it says,
they were, last phrase says, they were waiting. They were
waiting. We don't like to wait much, do we? That's why the psalmist
said, wait, wait I say on the Lord. And they were waiting.
What were they waiting for? The moving of the water. Water
moves. Turn over to hold this and turn
over to Genesis chapter 1. And while you're turning to Genesis
1, the very first chapter, first verse, while you're turning there,
I'm going to read the next verse in John 5, which says, that says
they were waiting for the moving of the water. It said because,
in verse four, an angel, when the water moved, an angel went
down at a certain season into the pool and troubled the water.
Troubled it. Now, an angel in the scriptures
can be one of three things, people. It can be Christ himself, it
can be the Holy Spirit manifested as an angel, or it can be an
angel, one of those heavenly beings. We're not told here who
comes down, but whoever it is, it's a representative of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And the important point is that
God came down to man. Do we know that's what that whole
thing in Bethlehem about the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ,
what that's all about? That is God manifesting himself
as a man, as a man, and coming to this earth as a man. Now y'all
remember I'm making this a lot about God became a man. It's important. It's so important.
And God always makes His presence known to His people. He does
it in different ways at different times. You remember Paul was
riding down the road to Damascus, and God threw him off His horse,
and there was thunder, and he hit the dirt. And you remember
the fellows around him? They went, it's thundering! There must be a storm! You know
what Paul did? Paul went, there's somebody in
this. That's not thunder, that's the
voice of God. Don't we hope this morning that
the voice of God can come in this place? Or if he might speak
to somebody here this morning, the man Christ Jesus might actually
speak to another man. I know he's spoken to some of
us already, hasn't he? Oh, want to hear it again though,
don't you? Want to hear it again. You know, these folks who were
sitting in the sheep gate when that water was rippled, the sheep
herders were coming through with all these sheep and things, and
they looked over there and saw the water doing this, and they
thought there must be a breeze in here. There's got to be a
draft coming through. It's windy in here or something.
But you know the people, the folk who were sick, laying there,
you know what they knew? God's come down. He's come down
in the pool. God's manifested himself in that
pool. I got to get in that pool. Do
we see the difference? I realize when I'm preaching,
it does not offend me if you're not listening. I'm not worthy
to be listened to. But I tell you what, if the man
Christ Jesus is coming at this place this morning, we better
listen. He has something to say to us. And these folks here,
these blind, impotent, halt, withered, they were waiting until
he came down. Look at Genesis 1. It's always
been this way. In the beginning, God created
the heaven and the earth, and the earth was without form and
void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. Sounds like
a description of me. Without form and void, full of
sin, darkness, but look. And the Spirit of God moved upon
the face of the waters. God came down. And God said in
verse 3, let there be light, and there was light. And God
saw the light, and it was good. If Christ comes into this place,
if the man Christ Jesus comes into this place, it'll be good.
It'll be so good this morning if he'd come into this place.
God saw the light that it was good, and God divided the light
in the darkness, and God called the light day, and the darkness
he called night, and the evening and the morning were the first
day. All right, turn back to John 5, verse 4. Thank God he
manifests himself to men, to his sheep. Look at verse 4. For an angel went down at a certain
season. Well, what's that mean? Well,
did we ever think I'm just too wicked. God won't have mercy
on me. How can he have mercy on me?
I am so wicked. I'm the, Paul said, I'm the chief
of sinners. Remember this, look at the specific words in verse
four. It says, he came down and troubled
the water and whosoever, you see that word? Whosoever, is
that excluding anybody in here? I don't think so. Whosoever,
then first after the troubling of the water, stepped in, was
made whole of whatsoever. I think that covers most sins,
doesn't it? Whatsoever. Don't sit there and think, I'm
just too wicked. I've done too much. Not room
in Christ for me. It says right here, whatsoever
you've done and whosoever you are. I think that covers it all.
Look, it says also at a certain season. Some think that was once
a week, once a month. Most think it was just Whenever
in God's purpose, he determined to come. That's when he troubled
that water. The important thing, folks, turn
to John, turn the page back to John 3, is that when the water
was troubled was not the issue. The issue is who troubled the
water, who troubled the water. Look at John 3 verse 5. Jesus
answered, Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a man be born
of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom
of God, unless when the water was troubled you got in, you
didn't get well. Verse 6, that which is born of the flesh is
flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel
not that I said unto you, you must be born again. The wind
blows where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but
canst not tell whence it cometh. and whether it goeth, so is everyone
that is born of the Spirit. Somebody told, I don't know if
it was Brother Henry or Brother Barnard one time said, well,
why don't you just, if God just saves the elect, why don't you
just preach to them? And he said, well, I don't know
how to recognize them. He said, if you can put an X
on their forehead, he said, okay, that's what we'll do. But the
wind blows where it will. God troubles the water when he
will, with whom he will. as he will. God's folk, they
know, you know, they may not know when, whenever, they don't
know. But they do know this, I'm a
whosoever that got cured of my whatsoever. And they know who
did it, it was the Lord Jesus Christ. This man, when it's all
said and done, you all know he's going to cure this poor man,
don't you? You know he is. And when it was
done, this fellow didn't leave there talking about when it happened
or how it happened. He left talking about who it
was that did it, as we'll see. All God's people will know it
certainly did happen. All these folks knew it was happening
and wanted it to happen to and for them. They knew when that
water was troubled, if they got in, that they were made well.
The sign of the angels coming was the pool of water was troubled. A sure sign, a messenger of God
is at hand. Men and women get troubled, become
aware of sin. You know what false prophets
do? Now you listen to them, maybe not, but what they say is this. These fellows who claim they're
preaching the truth on TV, you listen to them. You know what
they try to do? Calm you down. Calm you down. If a loved one of yours gets
trouble, let's not necessarily just try to calm them down. That
could be the worst possible thing. God will trouble his folks. If God's spirit calms, that's
a permanent solution. And it's gonna be well in Christ.
But if we or someone else calms us down, that's just postponing
a very real trouble that's coming. If we see that Christ took our
trouble at Calvary, that'll calm us down, nothing else will. Look
at verse four again in chapter five. For an angel went down
at a certain season into the pool and troubled the water.
Whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped
in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. The first to
step in, when that happened, can we imagine how happy somebody
got? I don't care what your problem
is. We all think our problem, whether it's a hangnail or cancer,
we all think that's the most important problem I got right
now, don't we? And it bothers us. I'd like to
have that hangnail fixed. When somebody knew they were
dying, let me ask you this. If you had been 38 years and
you couldn't walk, you ever wonder how this guy got there to the
pool? Somebody had to put him on a, it says bed, it was not
the pediatric, what do they call that thing? Those beds now, they're
so good. This guy was either on a board
or on some kind of canvas thing, and he had to get somebody to
bring him there. He could not walk. And he'd been
that way 38 years. You think he was ready to be
well? You think he'd be happy if he got well? We know he would.
Somebody was going to be happy. Somebody. Somebody. Whosoever. You know, somebody is a scriptural
term. Do you remember the woman with
the issue of blood? She could still walk, but her
issue of blood was her problem. She knew she was going to die
if she didn't get this stopped. And on her hands and knees, she
came crawling through the dirty street the filthy feet of those
people with him, and reached out and touched his garment,
believing that if she could just touch him, this fellow believed
if he could be the first one in that pool, he'd be made well.
And she reached out and touched the hem of his garment. She was
made well. And you know what our Lord said?
Somebody touched me. Not like he didn't know who it
was. He was just going to make her say, it was me. It was me. And if God ever comes to us,
troubles the water for us, and we're one of his somebodies,
one of the folk, we'll be so glad. We'll be so glad when that
happens. Look at verse five with me. And
a certain man was there which had an infirmity 30 and eight
years. Most folks think that this man
was 38 years old, that he'd been born with this. And that fits. You know why? Where'd our sin
come from? We were born with it. When Adam
died, when he sinned, we all did. We're all guilty. We've
had it from the day, I probably shouldn't say this, I got a two-year-old
grandson right now. You know what his favorite word
is? No. No. What makes him like that?
He was born with it. He doesn't know it, but his granddaddy's
favorite word and his daddy's favorite word was no. No. We're born with it. So how old
was this fella? Probably 38. And just like us,
we're born in trespasses and sin. Look at verse six. When
Jesus saw him lie and knew, notice the Lord knew all about him,
knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he said unto
him, will you be made whole? Now does that not sound like
the most ridiculous question in the world? If somebody in
here today has had cancer for 10 years, You've been fighting
it and having surgeries and chemo and all the stuff we go through.
And some physician walked in to you and said, would you like
to be well? You think, what an absurd question
to ask somebody in that situation. Of course, somebody that sick
wants to be well. The question is, do we know we're
sick? Does everybody in here realize
we're sick, nigh unto death? The sickness we got, if you have
cancer, it may kill you and it may not. I don't know. But I
know what will kill us all, and that's a thing called sin. And
the question remains, would you like to be well? Oh, I'd like
to be well. I'd like to be well. You know
what modern religion asks? They're asking the wrong question.
They're saying, would you like to be rich? Would you like to
be wealthy? Would you like to have a successful
walk? Would you like to be happy? Folks,
I'm sorry, happy's got nothing to do with it. It's got nothing
to do with it. We'll be full of joy if the Lord
does something for us. But whether we have to go the
rest of the way happy or not happy's got nothing to do with
it. It's the wrong question they're asking there. Look at verse 7.
The impotent man answered him and said, Sir, I have no man
when the water's troubled to put me into the pool. But while
I'm coming, another steps down before me. Of course this man
wanted to be made whole, and he thought he knew how to get
whole, but realized better than most two things. He knew what
it took to get in that pool, and the second thing is he knew
was he couldn't do it. Does that make sense? He knew
what it took. He had to get himself in that
pool, and he knew he could not do it. Does that describe anybody
here? Have we figured out yet? My problem is sin, and there's
not a thing I can do about it. Not a thing. Have we figured
out what this man did? Do you see what he said to our
Lord when the Lord said, would you be made whole? He said, I
got no man. I got a man brings me here. I
got a man takes me home, but I got no man that can get me
in that pool. He said, every time that water's troubled, I
start for it. I'm going for it. Listen, don't
believe these modern religionists. I'm telling you, they're lying
to us. They're lying to us. It's not up to me for me to get
me out of my sin into some kind of righteousness that I can do
on this earth. And this man's problem was he had no man to
get him in that pool. Salvation from sin, what it takes?
We can't do it ourselves. We need a man who can do it,
and that man is the man Christ Jesus. This man was making an
effort. We can imagine how he clawed
and struggled and drug himself and tried to, and I tell you
what, it was like somebody nailed his feet to the concrete. Didn't
matter how much he tried, he couldn't get there. He'd been
trying for 38 years, clawing to no avail. He said, while I'm
coming, with all his might, he tried. and another stepped in
before me. He could not get where he wanted
to be on his own. What was this man's free will
worth to him now? Don't you know he willed to be
in that pool? He wanted to be in that pool.
I don't know if any of us have ever had that much want to in
our whole lives. Can you imagine 38 years wanting
one thing, wanting one thing, and you can't do a thing about
it. Whatever this man's efforts were, they're just like good
works are worth to the folks today in religion. He had no
man to help him, and he couldn't do it himself. Look at verse
eight. Jesus said, the Lord spoke to him. He just spoke. The Lord
said unto him, rise, take up thy bed, and walk. Our Lord said,
rise. If Christ ever speaks to us,
we'll rise. We'll rise. We'll go from lameness
to walking. We'll go from sickness to health.
We'll go from blindness to seeing. And we'll go from death unto
life. All it takes is for our Lord
to speak. Don't we wish he'd just speak
to us this morning? He'd just speak to one of us
this morning. Tell us who he is, who we are, what he's done,
why he did it, where he is now. Well, what happened to this man's
lameness? Where did he go? Where'd it go? It didn't go in
the pool, did it? No, he couldn't get in that pool.
His lameness didn't go in that pool. You wanna know where it
went? Now listen to me. Our Lord Jesus Christ walked
up that hill, laid in that cross, and they nailed his feet to that
tree. He became lame that this man
could walk. Whatever our problem is this
morning, if we get to the man, he can fix it. He can make us
well. I don't care what your sin is.
I don't care what mine is. He can make it better. Make it
all go away. Our Lord took this man's infirmity
and took it away at the cross and gave him in his place his
perfection. This man, who for 38 years couldn't
walk, jumped up. And not only could he walk, the
Lord said, pick up that bed. And he said, OK. Off he went.
Off he went, look at verse nine, it says, and immediately, and
this man didn't have to do anything, all he had to do was just get
up. And immediately the man was made whole and he took up his
bed and walked, and on the same day was the Sabbath. Now was
the Lord done with this man? Not quite, not quite. Verse 10,
the Jews therefore said unto this man that was cured, it's
a Sabbath day, it's not lawful for thee to carry your bed, it's
against our rules. for you to carry this bed. And
the man answered them, he that made me whole, the same said
unto me, take up thy bed and walk. Then asked they him, what
man is that which said unto thee, take up thy bed and walk? Now
listen, and this man said, He that healed was not who it was. He didn't tell me who he was.
For Jesus had conveyed himself away, a multitude being in that
place. Our Lord came and swept into
that place, spoke to this man, healed him, made him well, told
him to take up his bed and go, and the crowd swept him right
back out. And this man said, I don't know who he was, but
I know he made me well. Is this where the story ends?
Look at verse 14. Afterward, after those Pharisees
got all over this guy, afterward, Jesus find him in the temple
and said unto him, behold, thou art made whole. Isn't it interesting
that the Jews didn't marvel that a man, they all knew this fella.
They knew who this fella was. Not a one of them said to him,
you're walking. After 38 years, you're walking. How'd that happen? No, you know what they did? They
said, What are you doing carrying your bed around? You're breaking
our rules. I'll tell you what, if we ever see Christ, who he
is, what he's done, why he did it, where he is now, those won't
be the questions we're asking. We'd be going, who did this?
Who did this? We want to know. We don't want
to know what. We want to know who. And our Lord, in his great
mercy, we know there's demands on him. There's such a crowd.
They're crowding him around and sweeping him through the sheep
gate with all that. You know what he did? Somehow
he just said, Y'all hold it. I'm gonna go find that man. Now
he knew where he was. And isn't it interesting where
this man went? He went first thing after the Lord healed him.
He went to the temple. My guess is to thank God for
what he did for him. If God ever heals us of our sin,
you know what we'll do? We'll thank God. We'll thank
God. We may not know all there is to know about Christ. There's
a mighty lot to know, isn't there? But we know this. We know now
I'm well. I was sick and now I'm well.
I don't know who did it. And our Lord went looking for
this man. He already knew where he was. He knows where we are. He knows everything. He knows
whosoever we are. He knows whatsoever we've done.
But if we're his, he knows where to find us and he will come to
us. He will come to us. He was in the temple. Look at
verse 15. Afterward, afterward, Jesus found him in the temple
and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole. Sin no more,
lest a worse thing come unto thee. And the man departed, and
told the Jews that it was Jesus that had made him whole. And
therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus, and sought to slay him,
because he had done these things on the Sabbath day. This man,
he spent the rest of his life telling anybody who'd listened
what his problem was and who fixed it, who Christ was and
what he'd done for him. And so will we. So will we. Just about done. This poor man
never got from this place, the pool at Bethesda, he never got
from that place what he went for. What he went for was to
be healed physically. What he got was salvation from
his sin. He got a righteousness that he
could never have accomplished. I tell you what, a fellow laying
on a bed lame for 38 years isn't doing too many good deeds, is
he? He's not working too much for Jesus, is he? That's not
the solution. No, no. He never got anything
from this place because salvation's not in a place. By the way, you
know these five fortunes? I looked this up. They're gone.
The gate, the Sheep Gate of Jerusalem, nobody can find it. Nobody knows
where it is now. This pool, if it exists, it's
a dry cistern. It's just a dry hole in the ground.
But the Lord Jesus Christ, I know where He is. He's seated at the
right hand of God the Father. I know who He is. He's the Son
of God. He's my Savior. He's the only
Savior. And I know what he's doing. He's
getting some poor, dead, lost sinners like Donny Bell and some
cripples like me to come in and tell you who he is and what he's
done and why he's done it. You know what the purpose is?
To make us well. To make his people, his sheep,
to make them well. I want to show you one more thing
and we'll be done. Look back up at verse 7. The
Lord said to this man, he said, will you be made whole? And this
fellow's answer in verse seven is, sir, sir, I have no man. He needed a man, that's obvious.
Is it obvious to us that we need a man? By nature, spiritually,
we need a man to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves, and
that's live a righteous life and to put away our sin. We cannot
save ourselves from sin to righteousness any more than this man could
get from that stinking floor into that pool of water. He couldn't
do it himself. But the man Christ Jesus came
to do. what this man could not do. And
he came to do it for all his sheep. Are we a sheep? Is that
too low? We won't be identified with those
sheep. The question of questions is, do you have a man? Do you
and I have a man? Let me show you someone who had
a man. Turn over to Psalm 23 with me. There was a man named
David who was one of the Lord's sheep. One of the Lord's sheep.
And do you know what David would have answered had this man said,
I have no man. David would have said, I have
a man. I have a man. And look who he
is in Psalm 23. He said, the Lord, my man, my
man, he's my shepherd. I'm a sheep and he's my shepherd. He's the man that watches after
me. Look what he says this man did for him. He said, this man,
verse 2, made me to lie down in green pastures, took all my
worries away, all my sin away. He leads me beside the still
waters, the water of life. This man, the man Christ Jesus,
he restored my soul. I was dead in trespasses and
sin, he made me alive, made me a righteousness. He leads me
in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Verse 4, yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear
no evil. Why? My man, my shepherd, is
with me. His rod and his staff, they comfort
me. This man, I have a man, he prepared
a table for me in the presence of mine enemies. He anointed
my head with oil, and my cup runs over." And verse 6, "...surely
goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and
I'll dwell in the house of the Lord forever." I'm going to dwell
in the house. I got a man, and I'm going to
dwell in his house all the days of my life. When Donnie called
me, as I said, other than the burden of preaching the gospel,
And what comes with that, I was so happy. You know why? I spend
more and more time, now I'm an old man, I spend more and more
time thinking about my home. And I'm not talking about this
building that Rebecca and I live in in Kingsport. I'm talking
about my long home. And when I came in here this
morning, you know what I saw that gave me so much joy, and
I was thinking about it when Donnie called? All my brethren. There's so many of you here,
and it's sort of like coming home a little early. Get to see
you again, and one day, one day, we won't have all the burdens,
and we'll be just like this fellow. They'll be all washed away. All
my sins washed away. Well, thank you for having me.
It's been a real blessing to me to be here. May the Lord bless
you.