Mercy Beggars

It's good to be with you this morning Been a little while since I've been able to be here. Your pastor has asked me to come, but there's always something that I've been obligated to do and couldn't do it. But this time I made sure, Lord willing, that I could be here and do this. You have a special place in my heart.

I've preached here many, many years, haven't I? About as long as I've believed the gospel almost. You know, I've believed the gospel nearly 50 years now. I can't tell you what a blessing it is when God saves you when you're young. Oh, what a blessing to know the Lord from your youth, like Timothy. I'm so glad the Lord revealed the gospel to me and my wife when we were both just early, early 20s, barely into our 20s.

And we're still here. Henry came to me when he was here and I'd preached and he came up to me and said, How long have we known each other? I said, about 40 years, Henry. He said, 40 years? And he just hugged me. And I said, you know, that's one of the great blessings. All those years have gone by. And I said this to Henry, all those years have gone by, and we're still here, and we still believe the gospel. I said, the Lord has kept us. We haven't left the gospel. We're still mercy beggars.

I'm 70 years old like your pastor. There's only 11 days between our age. I think he's on October the 11th or October the 1st. I'm on the 11th. That's why he's much wiser than me because he's older than I am. But we're still mercy beggars. I'm still a mercy beggar at 70 years of age. I honestly need God's mercy. Today, as much as I need it when I first began, I need it just as much. You know what mercy is?

It's getting something you don't deserve. Lord, every time I pray, I'm asking for mercy. I'm asking God for something I do not deserve. I'm not asking you this because I deserve it, but because I don't deserve it, but your son does. Your son deserves it. And that's why when we end in prayer, we say, for Christ's sake, in Christ's name, because he deserves what I'm asking for. I don't, but he does. And the title of my message is Mercy Beggars. We are Mercy Beggars.

It says in Mark 1.40, And there came a leper to him, beseeching him, kneeling down to him, saying to him, If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. I'll come back to this verse in a minute, but beseeching means this, expressing or marked by earnest pleading or entreaty. In other words, marked by begging, begging for mercy. That leper knew he did not deserve what he was asking for. And he knew if the Lord clenched him, first of all, if he clenched him, he'd have to save him. And if he clenched him, he didn't deserve it.

It was just an act of mercy. Our God is merciful. He's merciful. Here's a thought that I like, and I've had it for a good while. There's a scripture that says, He delighteth to show mercy. You know He delights to show mercy more than we delight to have it. I delight to have mercy, but not nearly as much as He delights to show it. You see, He's God. Everything about God is infinite. His mercy is infinite. And His delight to show it to me is infinite. Oh, my. Everyone whom the Lord saves is a mercy beggar, every last one of them.

Now, this matter of leprosy, I'm going to look at it as it represents sin, but I'm going to give you a little technical information about it. Leprosy known today as Hansen's disease. That's what it's known as today, Hansen's disease. It's a chronic infection. that attacks the skin. It attacks the nerves, the eyes, and the tissues of the body. In its advanced stages, it causes severe deformity, nerve damage, blindness, isolation, and it slowly consumes the whole person. I went on the internet and I looked up the advanced stages of leprosy.

What a sight. What a sight, what a disgusting sight. And yet when I looked it up and I saw this person, I mean, you have to look it up, you have the internet, look it up. It's such a horrible sight. And I thought about this person, this is a real person. How must this person feel to be so gross, so deformed, and so has such a stench about it?

This is us before God. Don't let the mirror fool you. Don't let that mirror you're looking at fool you. When we see God, this is how we see ourselves. And we don't see ourselves like this until we see Him. Until we see Him. We never know what sin is until we have a knowledge of who God is. And I don't mean just an educated knowledge, but I'm talking about a revelation. When God makes himself known to you, holy, holy, holy. And for the first time in your life, you become afraid of God. If you've never been afraid of God, you've never met him.

Do you remember when Joseph, And his brothers, you remember his brothers when they came to Egypt, they didn't know him at first. But then it says Joseph revealed himself to them. Made everybody leave and Joseph revealed himself to them. You know what they, you know what it says about them? They became afraid. And like, oh. They remember what they did to their brother Joseph, and he told him don't worry. Don't worry. I'm paraphrasing, but don't worry Don't worry.

It's alright You meant it for evil God meant it for good When they crucified the Lord they meant it for evil God meant it for our good That's why you're saved That's why God has saved some of you That's why God saves anyone but for Christ's sake God has forgiven me of my sins for Christ's sake.

Not just because I asked Him, but because Jesus Christ died for me. He paid for those sins I'm asking forgiveness for. And His blood answers. This will give you peace now. His blood answers for the sins I'm asking God to forgive me for. God cannot and will not forgive anybody without atonement, without being appeased for the sins being asked. Lord, forgive me of my sins. And he can do so because the blood speaks on my behalf.

Isn't that good news? That's good news. Now, leprosy here, as I said, is a picture of sin in the scriptures, and it's a picture of my soul before God. My soul, me. I am a soul. God breathed into the nostrils of Adam, and he became what? A living soul. I am a soul, and this is the way I look before God outside of Christ, apart from Christ. This is me. It really is me. It's me, and it's you.

Now, leprosy may begin small, but eventually it affects the entire body. You know, sometimes it'll begin like a little white spot. It may not seem like much, but it affects the entire body. Seeing works the same way. What appears small in the beginning eventually reveals itself throughout the whole person. Look at an infant. They look so innocent, don't they? Don't be fooled. Don't be fooled.

The poison of asp is under their tongue. But as you watch them grow up, as I grew up, as you grew up, sin began to reveal itself stronger and stronger and stronger as you grew up. You see, leprosy looks, it may start out small, but eventually the whole body's taken over. It's taken over. Sin has taken us over. It literally has taken us over. The only problem I got is sin. Do away with sin and there's no barrier between me and God. Jesus Christ took away that barrier. There's no barrier between me and God. Isn't that amazing? That's amazing.

No one was allowed behind the veil. And that tabernacle, and then the temple when they built it, but the high priest. No one was allowed, or they'd die. But that veil's been rentin' too. And you and I are literally, oh, if we could just get ahold of this, we are allowed into the presence of God. We're allowed into the Holy of Holies. Because Jesus Christ made a way. He not only made the way, he is the way. And you and I have been made kings and priests under God, and we're allowed to come into his presence by what we have in Christ.

Now Luke says of this man that he was full of leprosy, full of leprosy, in its advanced stages. That's why I said go look and see what that looks like. And you'll see what you look like before God, spiritually, spiritually. Sin does not merely affect us outwardly. We are sinnered by nature and therefore we are full of sin. From the top of our head to the bottom of our feet, we are full of sin. And the reality of this, when the Lord makes us to know this, is painful. It's painful. And it causes us much pain. It does. It really does. If it doesn't, you'll never go to Christ. If sin never really bothers you, you'll never go to Christ.

I promise you. We feel our uncleanness. Unclean, unclean. David said this, my sin is ever before me. It's not ever before God. Christ put it away. Our sins are gone, but I see them. I know them. I know I sin. I thank God that he put them away. There's things that I've done in my lifetime, I wouldn't tell nobody, and you wouldn't either. I wouldn't want you to tell me, and I don't want to tell you. But I remember them. I do remember them. But I also know this, and I know this, the very core of my being, the Lord Jesus Christ put them away. He suffered the hell of God's wrath for my sins.

Every one of them. Not just a group of them. I mean every one of them. If you commit a crime, if you commit three crimes, let's just say you commit three crimes today, and you go to court, you're going to be tried for what? All three crimes. Jesus Christ died for every one of my sins. Every one of them. Here's the amazing part of grace. He died for every one of my sins, and I'm going to commit every one of them. I'm going to. Because he did not die for sins I have not committed. He didn't die. He says he died for our offenses. He's not going to. He didn't die for an offense I didn't commit. I'm going to commit every one of them. And yet, he loves me. He saved me. And he's called me by his grace. The only reason God Almighty can have anything to do with me is because of His Son standing in my behalf. That's the only reason.

I'm just as wretched in myself as I've ever been. You know, there's still just as much sin in me as when I was born. But thank God there's another nature there that's born of God, that loves God. that wants to be here this morning. My parents had to make me go to service when I was a kid. I hated to go. When they quit making me go, I'd never went again. And now I want to be here. I honestly want to be in the worship service. I want to hear the gospel. That's the work of God. That's the work of God.

We feel our uncleanness. We feel the pain of it. Sin affects our, you know, sin affects the mind. One day we're going to have full use of the mind. We're going to have the mind of Christ. But right now our mind is just, it's so affected. It's so affected. I know a person who is schizophrenic. See things that's not there. Talk to things that's not there. The mind, so affected. That's sin. You know, you say, that person's crazy. No, that's sin. I could have the same mind. God has just not let that happen to me. I could have the same mind.

It has affected our minds, the way we think and what we think of. My soul, what we think of. It's amazing. It's affected our bodies. We're growing old, aren't we? Vicki and I talked about that this morning. I said sin is just like growing old, just like we're melting, just like we're going down. It affects the body, our aches and pains.

But I want to tell you this. This hit me some time ago and it's just been a blessing to me. This is to every believer. God's going to heal you of every disease, every sickness. Now, you may have to wait till you die, but it ain't going to follow you after the grave. It's not going to be on the grave. God's going to heal every one of us from every one of our sicknesses, our pains, our sorrow. It's just for a little while and it's over.

So whatever I get, I know this. In a little while, God's going to heal me. He's going to heal all of his children of all of it. The sin affects the mind, the body, the soul, my whole person. Affections, oh, the things we love. The things we are drawn to. So that's what sin does. We know our inability, all our righteousnesses, our filthy rags. We see sin for what it truly is. It is a disgrace, a danger, and a disgust to God, an abomination to God in whatever form it comes in.

Now when our Lord, I want you to get this, when our Lord cleansed this leper, when he saved this leper, In the scriptures, he gave sight to the blind. He gave hearing to the deaf and speech to the dumb. He enabled the lame to walk. He raised the dead.

I am all of these. Spiritually, I'm all of these. He didn't come into this world just to show us what He could do, that He could heal a body. What does it matter if He heals your body in this life or not? Christ said it's better to be halt and lame and enter into glory than to be made whole and go straight to hell. It's more important that I be saved spiritually, my soul be saved. That's what's important. Our Lord didn't come into this world to show us that he could heal a lame, a broken leg, or a no, no. These are just, these are things that we can learn what he does for us spiritually. Spiritually.

And this leprosy had no human cure. At that time, there was no cure for leprosy. The law could not heal him. The law could only say clean or unclean. That's all the law can do. You go to court. You rob somebody and you go to court for it. The law can't heal you of that robbery. It can say guilty or not guilty. You know, you can go to court and be guilty of a crime. The judge can pardon you. You can be forgiven, but there's one thing you cannot be. Justified.

Only God can justify a guilty person. Only God can make me and you absolutely not guilty. Nothing on the books. Only God can do that. Only God can do that. The world can pardon me, they can forgive me, but they cannot justify me, but God can do that. So when I stand in glory, I stand in glory justified. Just as just as his own son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The law cannot cleanse, it can only It can only say what's there and what's not there is what it does.

Now Leviticus 13 and verse 44 and 46, this describes the leper. It says his clothes were to be rent. You see, he could have a white spot or leprosy on his back and on his arm. He could wear a coat. You'd never know it. But he said, no, you're not going to walk down there and hide your sins. You're going to be rent. Your clothes are going to be torn.

You see somebody walking down the street and their clothes are all torn, what do you know? Something's wrong with that guy. Something's wrong with that guy. If your clothes are all torn, it's like there's something not right here. His clothes had to be rent. His head had to be bare. He had to cover his lip as he walked down the street crying, unclean, unclean. That's what he had to cry continually.

He had to live outside the camp, separated from others. He couldn't hug his wife. He couldn't touch his children or any of his loved ones. Do you know what that'd be like, to never be able to hug, to touch? I tell you, we don't understand the power of a touch.

You can take somebody who's broken hearted and you can walk over beside them and not say a word and put your hand on them. And what is communicated with that is powerful, powerful, more powerful than words, more powerful than words. I remember when Henry's daughter, Becky, passed away and he was, I walked up to him and his eyes were, he was just in tears and I couldn't say a word, but I did hug him.

And that's all that needed to be said. Powerful. Powerful. He had to live outside the camp. He couldn't be touched. Couldn't touch anyone. But what a picture of us this is. Separated from worship. Separated from God. And separated from fellowship with God. That's what sin has done. Listen to Isaiah 59-2. Your sins have separated between you and your God. Sin takes away everything good from us, doesn't it?

You know, I've not known anything get better as I age. I'm not getting younger. I'm not getting younger. I'm falling apart. But Jeremiah 5.25 says, Your iniquities have withholden good things from you. Oh, it's withholding good things from you.

And just as Christ could remove, let He only could remove leprosy from this leper, Naaman, you remember the story of Naaman? Only Christ can cleanse the sinner from sin, only he can sanctify us. He can justify us and he can make us clean. I mean clean in God's sight. Now this matter of leprosy, something interesting in my studies that came up, I said it was incurable, humans could not come up, at that time there was no human cure for it. But leprosy at that time was considered a mark of divine displeasure. It was a mark of judgment.

Miriam, remember Miriam, Moses' sister? Her and Aaron's complained against Moses and said, can we not speak for God? You speak for God, can we not also do that? He says, God heard him. There's a scripture that says, God hears your murmuring. You think nobody's listening? He is. Well, here's what God did. He turned Miriam into a leper. And then Moses prayed for her, and then she had to be separated for seven days, then she was brought back into the camp. You remember the story of Gehazi? That's the servant of Elisha? Remember when Naaman was healed, and Naaman wanted to give all these riches to Elisha for the healing, and Elisha wouldn't take any of it.

Well, unlike today's televangelist, he just said, no, because I'm not going to profit off freely you've received, freely give. Don't charge for that. He said, I'm not going to charge for that. That's of God. I didn't do anything. I just told you to go down to the river and dip. I didn't clean you. I just told you what God said to do.

It's about Gehazi. Being covetous, he went out after they was gone and caught up with him. I'm going to paraphrase. He said, the people have come since you left. And my master sent me and we want to give them some goods. And so he gives them to Gehazi. And Gehazi goes back and he lies. He said, did not my spirit go with you? I know what you did.

And the leprosy that was on Naaman was on him. God put it on him. What about the king Uzziah? He went in to offer incense in the temple, and the priest was stood him, and he got mad, and they started to argue with each other, and God turned him into a leper, and he had to live in a separated house until the day he died. They thought it was an act of judgment. And they thought it was unlawful for any Jew to attempt to heal anybody from leprosy.

But our Lord, our Lord can do it. Our Lord can do it. He can heal. Now let me just deal with a few verses, deal with this verse for a few minutes. And there came a leper to him. There came one to Him. He came because of a desperate need. Those who come to Christ with a desperate need. Lord, I need my sins put away. Lord, I need cleansing. Lord, save me. Save me.

He's never turned a sinner away that ever came to Him who needed Him. None. Ever. Ever. None ever. This man was driven to Christ by misery and necessity. I can say by experience that's why I came to Christ. Nobody talked me into a profession. Nobody tried to get me to accept Jesus as my personal Savior. They did before I heard the gospel.

But I tell you what, when the Lord, when the Lord speaks, when the gospel comes to a sinner in power, Just move out of the way. Just move out of the way. Because the one he needs is not you. It's Christ. It's Christ. I had a young man talk to me two or three years ago, and he would just tore up. And he kept calling me and talking to me about it.

And I finally told him, I said, I'm not going to give you peace. The Lord gives you peace. I'm not going to do it. You keep seeking the Lord. for mercy and for peace and for pardon and forgiveness, I'm not going to say don't worry about it, you're all right. You're not all right. Until he says you're all right. Until he says it. This leper believed the Lord could cleanse him and his faith was proven by the fact that he came. He came.

Those who never come to Christ are those who never truly believe. I've seen people sit under the gospel for many, many, many years and leave, finally leave. They never believed. They never did believe. Salvation is an urgent matter. Is it that way with you? Is it really an urgent, urgent? I mean, nothing in this life is more urgent than that. Nothing.

Mike Bartram, I've had him sing this song many, many times. Give me Christ or else I die. When you come to that point, you can be sure the Lord's worked on you. The Lord's done a work of grace in you. You see, He not only does a work of grace for us, He does a work of grace in us. It's an urgent matter. Then he submitted to the Lord's will, if thou wilt. The leper acknowledged Christ's authority and his sovereignty.

I can tell you the first thing, the first thing a sinner will realize when God saves that sinner is this, he can save me or he can leave me alone. For some years, I heard some people trying to witness to me, the Lord wants to save you if you'll let him. Would you accept Jesus as your personal savior? Well, when I did hear the gospel from my pastor, Henry, I was 22, 23 years old. For the first time in my life, I realized he may not save me. I was scared to death. First time ever I was afraid of God. I was never afraid of God until then. He didn't have to save me. Now, that's when you've met God.

Not the God of this popular Christianity, so-called. He wants to, if you'll let Him, but the one who, if He will, He can save me. But He can also damn me. But He's never damned anybody who came to Him for mercy. Salvation is of the Lord. Salvation is not a cooperation between me and the Lord. It's the Lord. It's the Lord. You know, the Lord saved me and then I wanted to be saved. Go figure that out. The Lord saved me and then I said, Lord save me. He gave me life. I didn't even know I was dead. Not until he gave me life. I didn't know I was blind until he gave me eyes to see. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. This leper knew Christ had cleansed others. Why not me? Why not this sinner? But I know this, if he was to be refused, he would be refused by Christ himself and nobody else. He would not allow anyone to stand between him and the Savior.

You have to realize, if you go back to that time, you have to realize it was dangerous for him to leave and walk out abroad and to come to Christ. He had to stay in that camp. He was staying in that camp. Submission to the Lord's will is the beginning. It's the beginning. of a true coming to Christ.

I cannot come. That leper knew that. He said, I cannot. I cannot heal myself. I cannot come of my own. I can't do this. But Lord, you can. You can. You can save me. You can make me clean. Because he was pronounced by the law unclean. But he knew to be pronounced clean, it had to be saved. It had to be made whole. He knew that.

This leper, he simply came, he worshiped, he bowed down, he placed himself entirely into the hands of the sovereign Christ of God. I mean, you know the Lord, we are in the hands of Christ. He's not in our hands. God placed everything into His hands, and what better hands to be in than the Lord of mercy. What do we see here? We see misery in the presence of mercy, humility pleading with grace, faith appealing to faithfulness. That's what you read in Lamentation. Helplessness bowing before power.

And Christ says, and Jesus moved with compassion, put forth his hand and touched him. I mean, a person around there would have touched that man. He was so gross. And of course, they knew what the law said. You touch him, you're unclean, too. And he said unto him, I will be thou clean.

Can you imagine him standing there and his body transforming from that advanced stage of leprosy to a completely healthy body? Can you imagine that? Can you imagine seeing that? We are completely whole in Christ. We're going to stand amazed, you know? I stand amazed. When we stand in his presence, oh my soul. I tell you this, every one of you who believe, The second you die and you're standing in glory, you're going to realize, I had nothing to do with this. I had nothing to do with this.

The Lord was not repulsed by the leper. He was repulsed by the Pharisees. Others avoided him, but Christ touched him. Just put his hand on him. I'm sure that leopard didn't expect the Lord to just reach out and touch him. You know, he could just speak the words. But the Lord shows he's not afraid to receive sinners. He reached out and he touched him.

And boy, the power of that touch! It's like he took Peter's mother-in-law, took her by the hand, she had a great fever, and just lifted her right up. The power! Oh, the power of his touch. He touched blind eyes and he gave him sight. He touched deaf ears and loosened tongues. Just by touch. Don't ever underestimate the power of a touch. Especially his. We sing a song, He Touched Me. Oh, He Touched Me. That'd be a good song to sing.

And here he touches the leper and immediately he's cleansed. Immediately, salvation is immediate. We're not gradually, we're not, we're not gradually saved. We're saved and we're saved completely. But now I do know this. Here's the process of salvation as we know it. I have been saved. I'm being saved and I shall be saved. Someday I'll be saved from the presence of sin. I'm saved from the power of it, the guilt of it, but not the presence of it yet. But in a little while, and I do mean a little while, and that's for every one of us really, I'll be saved from the presence of sin. Immediately the leprosy departed from him.

And Christ said to him, there in verse 44, go thy way, show thyself to the priest. You see the ceremonial law was still in effect. Now over in Leviticus chapter 14, whenever you get time, go home and read that. You'll see what this man had to do. But the law was still in effect. Christ hadn't died yet. He had not died yet. He kept the law. He honored the law. He didn't say don't worry about the law. Still in effect, he said, you go show yourself to the priest. And the priest looked at him and pronounced him clean. I'm sure he did. Christ, and I'm going to close, the Lord Jesus Christ has never turned away a sinner. Oh, he's never turned away a sinner who came to him for mercy, cleansing, and salvation. Lord, save my soul. Save my soul. Save me from myself. Save me from my sins. There are many, but you know, like I said, he died for all of them, even the ones I've not even committed yet.

That doesn't make a believer. want to sin or give them a license to sin, that makes you so humble before God and so thankful that He's so merciful. The only person who would think that way is someone who doesn't know the Lord. They've never tasted that the Lord is gracious. Listen to Isaiah 118.

Let us reason together. You know, you say, I don't know if the Lord's ever saved me or not. Sometimes I just struggle with that. Well, come now. I come every day. I come to the Lord every day. I don't look back on past experience as a hope, as my hope. Christ is my hope. I can look back on past experience as a reason to praise Him and give Him thanks. But not as my salvation, I look to Christ and Him now. Come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, and though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

Isn't that good news? Mercy beggars. Everyone, you know, God was going to save a number that no man can number, and every one of them are mercy beggars. Not one of them good. God doesn't save good people. There's not any. That's what he said. He said, there's none good, no, not one. All right.

Mercy Beggars

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Mercy Beggars

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