Let's take our Bibles and turn
to Mark chapter 11. Mark chapter 11, we'll look at
verses 20 through 26. The subject of these verses, I know
that there's individual things taught, but the main subject
in these verses is faith in God. Mark chapter 11, let's read through
here beginning with verse 20. And in the morning as they passed
by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. You recall
last week's where Christ cursed that fig tree. It had the promise
of fruit, it had leaves, and then when he went up to it, the
leaves is all that it had. It had no fruit and he cursed
that tree. And Peter calling to remembrance,
saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursed
is withered away. And Jesus answering, saith unto
him, have faith in God. For verily I say unto you, that
whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed and
be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart,
but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come
to pass. He shall have whatsoever he saith. Therefore I say unto you, what
things soever you desire when you pray, believe that you shall
receive them and you shall have them. And when you stand praying,
forgive if you have ought against any. that your Father also, which
is in heaven, may forgive you your trespasses. But if you do
not forgive, neither will your Father, which is in heaven, forgive
your trespasses. Peter and the other disciples,
upon seeing the fig tree which Christ had cursed, and they saw
it dried up from the root and withered, They seemed amazed
at what they saw. Now they'd seen Christ perform
miracles before. They were right there with him
the whole time. They saw him raise a young girl,
probably about 11, 12 years old, raise her from the dead. And
they saw him cleanse the lepers. They saw him give sight to the
blind. They saw him enable the dumb
to speak and the deaf to hear. They heard him speak and in his
command the devils come out of certain men or certain women.
And they knew he was a prophet of God and they knew that he
was able to do great things in God's name. But everything that
he had done, let me rephrase that, most everything that he
had done was of a positive nature. He was healing the sick, cleansing
the lepers, teaching men, calling the dead back to life. Everything
was of a positive nature. And they had never seen, this
time, he cursed the tree. This time, he didn't give life,
he took it. He took it. This was something
they hadn't seen. They'd seen this power used to
give life, but never to kill or destroy. And they'd heard
his words in relationship to restoration, but never to curse. And they were having difficulty.
I think they were amazed at what they saw. You know, we do this
all the time, don't we? Slip of the tongue, get angry,
And boy, we'll lay it to somebody. But we don't actually expect
anything to happen to that person. We don't actually expect something
to come to pass. We're just venting, is what we're
doing. But here, and I think that's
kinda how they took that. When the Lord came up to that
tree and he looked and there was no figs on it and he cursed
that tree and he said, no fruit come of thee from now on. I think
they thought he was just expressing his anger. I don't think they
thought too much about it. But then the next day, they came
past that tree, and that tree was dried up from its roots overnight. All the leaves withered on it.
That thing was dead. And they were having a little
bit of difficulty, and at the very least, they were amazed
by what they saw. And the Lord looked on his disciples
and he said these gracious words, have faith in God. Now beloved, the elect of God
have two sets of eyes. I want you to listen to me. They
have two sets of eyes. They have eyes that they were
born with. These eyes. Eyes that can take
in everything within its range. As far as you can see out there,
your eyes can take it in. Eyes that perceive color and
depth and detail. Eyes that take in the moment.
They see whatever time and circumstance manifests before them. They have natural eyes. And then
they have eyes of faith. Believers, Paul said, view their
affliction and suffering with eyes of faith, and when they
view it, here's what they see. They see these things working
for them a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.
They don't just see the affliction, they don't just see the circumstance,
but they understand why. They might not know every detail
of it, but they know because of the promises of God that that
thing is working a far more eternal way to glory for them. And listen to this. This is 2
Corinthians 4, 17 that I just quoted to you, and this is verse
18. While we look not on things which
are seen. Now I want you to just think
about that statement a minute. William, you're looking at something,
he said, that you can't see. How do you look at something
that you can't see? You ever think about that? The
only way you can do it is by faith. By faith. We look not on things which are
seen, but at things which are not seen. For the things which
are seen are temporal. That's what these natural eyes
perceive, the temporal. But the things which are not
seen are eternal. So faith looks, the eyes of faith
looks at things that the natural eye can't see, the natural eye
can't determine. And it was not so much the dried
up fig tree or even the fact that his word came to pass, but
why it was cursed. This is what he was telling them,
have faith in God. Faith perceives the will of God. Faith understands what God's
doing. And it may not, like I said,
I liken this one time under a thousand piece puzzle that somebody throwed
on the floor and you pick up one piece and look at it, you're
not gonna get a vision of the picture of that puzzle looking
at that one piece. But we know by the promise of
God what these things are for and what he's doing with them.
And so we see these things by faith. But here he, he sees the cause
of it, and he sees what these things have to do with the Son
of God. The disciples didn't see this yet, but our Lord was
telling them this, have faith in God. Have faith in God. Now let me give you a few things
to consider about faith in God. First of all, let's just consider
what faith is. People have all, somebody in
the Armenian circles, I was not satisfied at all. They told me
to come to the front of the church and they told me to kneel down
there and pray the sinner's prayer and they all gathered around
and they prayed with me and I went back and sat down and he said,
now is everything all right, Brother Pruitt? And I said, no,
no it's not. All I did was come to the front,
go to the back. Everything not all right. And
I didn't know why. I just knew it wasn't all right. And they said this, just believe. Believe what? You can't just believe. Faith
cometh by hearing, hearing by the word of God. You got to see
something, perceive something, understand something. In Hebrews
11 verse one it says, now faith is the substance of things hoped
for. And it's the evidence of things
not seen. That's what faith is. It's the
substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not
seen. Now how is faith the substance
of things hoped for? Because faith believes God. You can't see something that's
unseen unless God fills in the blanks. You see what I'm saying? We believe God. Paul could say that these things
work for you a far more weighty work of glory. They're working
on your, how come? He also said this, and we know
that all things work together for good, to them that love God,
to them who are the called according to his purpose. So we know that.
I don't know how it does it. I don't, I vision in my mind
the gears and a clock. Walk inside the big bin over
there in England, Booking all them gears, and this gear's doing
this, and a little tiny gear, and a great big gear, and a flying
gear, and this is going, and that's the way these things are
in God's providence. But I do know that I don't understand
how it works, don't know, but I just know it works. And I know
it's working together for our good and His glory, no matter
what it is. It's the substance of things
hoped for because we believe God. It believes in God and it
believes the God it believes in. By faith, he said, we understand.
This is the next verse in Hebrews 11. By faith, we understand that
the worlds were framed by the word of God. Now that doesn't
just mean that we understand that they were framed because
God spoke them into existence. That's the way most people take
this verse. But this verse is also saying we understand that
he spoke this world into existence by the word of God. In Genesis
it says in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
In the Psalms it said he spoke and it was done, he commanded
and it stood fast. So we know by the Word of God
that this is what took place. You understand what I'm saying? Faith believes God. And he says
here that we understand that the worlds were framed by the
Word of God so that the things which are seen were not made
of things which do appear. We believe this because we believe
God. Scientists want to take a rock
and by carbon dating and this and that and the minerals and
the makeup and all of this stuff and they try to work their self
backwards to find a reason for creation. You can't do that. Faith understands that the things
which are seen were not made of things which do appear, but
they were made from nothing. God took nothing and made something. And that's exactly what he does
with every sinner. He takes nothing and makes something. And you can't work backwards
in the sinner. I did this, I did, no, no. He just does the work and all
of a sudden it's there. It's there. One day you don't
believe, another day you do. And you can work backwards all
you want to and you just can't, you can't find the beginning
of it. There's nothing tangible, nothing
physical, nothing else you can go to for evidence. The only
way you can know these things is by the testimony of God. And
His Word is both the substance and it's the evidence of faith.
And this principle follows faith all the way through the believer's
life. Faith believes God. It's not faith and my experience. It's not faith and some physical
proof or anything else. Faith believed God, period. Abraham believed God, and it
was counted to him for righteousness. And it was not written for his
sake alone that it was said unto him it was imputed to it, but
for our sakes also who believe in him who raised Christ from
the dead. So strictly. Speaking. And think about this. The scriptures
are so strict on this point that Paul said, let God be true and
every man a liar. I don't care what a man says,
I don't care how well he can explain it. Doesn't matter, let
God be true, every man a liar. That's how we're supposed to
look at this thing. That's how faith sees. It sees by the word
of God. So faith, strictly speaking,
is believing God and believing on the God that we believe in.
And then secondly, I want you to see the nature of faith. Faith
in the scripture is personified. Did you ever notice that? It
speaks of faith as a man. All the way through the scriptures.
When he talks about faith, he talks about faith speaking. He talks about faith seeing.
He talks about faith walking. He talks about faith understanding. It sees, hears, perceives, walks,
eats, drinks, lives in this world. And faith understands. John said,
we know that the Son of God hath come and given to us an understanding.
we may know him that's true, that we're in him that's true,
even in his son, Jesus Christ. And we know our election of God,
our predestination in Christ, our acceptance in the beloved,
and his redemption and forgiveness through the blood of Christ.
We know all these things because God hath abounded toward us in
all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery
of his will. God's will's not some twisted,
changeable, variable thing. Not one thing today and something
else tomorrow. God's will is his redemptive
will. That's God's will. His will is
to manifest his glory and the salvation of a people through
the person and work of Christ. This is the Father's will which
hath sent me, Christ said, that of all which he hath given me
I should lose nothing. But raise it up again. at the
last day. Faith is not blind, it sees. It's not dumb, it understands.
And it walks according to what it knows. And the nature of faith is set
before us of God as a man, as a man. He personifies this faith. He calls it a new man, a new
creation. And he describes it as a perfect
man. And there's only one perfect
man, that's the God man, isn't it? The goal of true preaching, according
to Ephesians 4, 13, is to edify the body of Christ, his church.
To edify the body of Christ till we all come into the unity of
the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, now listen,
unto a perfect man. Faith sees Christ. Where is the perfect example of faith?
Christ. Christ. It's unto a perfect man, unto
the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. And the
nature of faith was manifested in the body of a man, manifested
in a person of Christ. And it's his faithfulness that
constitutes our righteousness. He's the end of the law for righteousness
to everyone that believes. And this faith not only perceives
what God is saving, but also what God is cursing. This fig tree was but a figure
of the curse of Christ, which was about to be manifested upon
Israel. Next week, the Lord willing,
we'll talk about those things. When he walked into that church,
he sat down and plaited a whip, and he beat those money changers
out. He overturned their tables. You imagine a preacher doing
that? That church looked like a flea market. It had tables
all over it, money changers, people selling does, people trying
to make money on the worship of God. And he walked in and
he looked it all over and then he went out to Bethany and spent
the night and come back in and the first thing he did is walk
right past that fig tree where his disciples could see it. And
that fig tree is just a figure of what he's about to do to Israel. back to our Lord on another occasion. And you'll remember this in Matthew
11. He said, woe unto thee, Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum. If the
things that were done in thee were done in Sodom and Gomorrah,
they'd still be here today. He pronounced a woe on them.
He cast a curse on them. The disciples were Trying to warn him, I suppose
that is the right word to use. They were trying to warn him.
He said, did you know that the Pharisees were offended in what
you said? What did the Lord say about that?
Leave them alone. Isn't that what he said? That's just another manner of
curse, isn't it? Leave them alone. Leave them
alone. Don't preach to them, don't talk
to them, don't witness to them. Leave them alone. If the blind lead the blind,
they'll both fall in the ditch. Leave them alone. And then he thanked the Father
right after that. He thanked, I thank thee, O Father,
Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from
the wise and the prudent and revealed them unto babes. So
there's as much an understanding of faith concerning that which
Christ is cursing in this world as it is what he's saving. When you see the things that,
I'm talking about my own experience being drawn out of Arminianism,
called out. When I saw those things to be
a curse of God, I didn't want any more part of it. I saw those things as satanic
religion because that's how God testifies of them. Any other man come, even an angel
from heaven, Paul said, and preaches any other gospel other than that
what I preach to you, let him be cursed of God. These men appeared outwardly
to be godly, like a godly fruit tree, but they had nothing but
leaves, that's all they had. Just an outward show. And as
true believers, we're to see by faith what our Lord has cursed,
and then see them being used in the hands of our sovereign
for our good and his glory. You know, one of the things that
men leave out when they talk about Christ today is the fact
that Christ is a sovereign and he's God. God judges men. God is the only one fit to judge
men. He's the only one who knows the
thoughts and intents of men's hearts. And he's able to judge. And Christ is God our Savior. And what he cursed, God cursed. And what he saved, God saved. And then lastly, I want us to
consider the true fruit and evidence of faith in God. Faith comes to chosen sinners
as the saving means ordained of God. I've quoted this to you
so many times, you ought to be able to quote it back to me,
2 Thessalonians 2.13. Paul said, we're bound to give
thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord,
because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through
sanctification of the spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto
he called you by our gospel. Beloved faith is given to perceive
the salvation of God brought out by Jesus Christ. And in so
doing, it experiences the grace of God, and the mercy of God,
and the love of God. It's not just a doctrine. It's
not just another argument. It may appear that way to you.
I'm not saying that it doesn't. But to the believer, it's more
than an argument. All of a sudden, he can see how
God saves sinners. And he can see the possibility
that God's gonna save him. Why? Because this salvation's
for sinners and I'm a sinner. You don't have to be a brain
surgeon to understand that. But to believe it in your heart
is a whole nother thing. To see yourself accursed of God.
God oughta send me to hell. All of a sudden you find yourself
on God's side cursing yourself. That's what David said. That
thou mayest be clear when thou judgest. Huh? Sure, he was on
God's side in his own condemnation. Job did the same thing. Well,
he said the moon and the stars and the sun are not clean in
God's sight. How much more abominable and
filthy is man that drinks iniquity like water? We experience the grace of God,
the mercy of God, the love of God. You take an old homely girl.
We don't have any in here today, but an old homely girl. We've
all known one somewhere. Teeth crooked, hair's all stringy. Homely. Nobody wants anything
to do with her. They just make fun of her all the time. But
then along comes a man and sees past all that. And sees into
her heart. And loves her. You think she
won't love him back? Huh? All my soul. You bet she will. But what about
us? Is there anything homelier than
a senate? Anything uglier than a sinner?
You look at yourself and my righteousnesses are as filthy rags. My heart
is enmity against God. Anything uglier than that? And we're like that baby over
there in Ezekiel 16. They just cast it out, that little
baby girl. They just cast it out. They didn't
cut it straight. little navel, they didn't salt it, they didn't
swallow it, they didn't clean it up, they just threw it over
in the sand. And then the Lord said when he
passed by, what'd he say about that? It was a time of love. And he saw past that rejected,
hated, despised baby. Who knows how it came about,
I don't know. But he took that little baby
and he could see that baby fully formed, fully dressed, cleansed. His bride made her a princess. You think she didn't experience
love? You see, that's where the fruit
of faith comes in. It experiences the love of God. He that loveth not knoweth not
God because God loved. When God comes into your life,
you experience that love, you experience that grace, you experience
that mercy, and nobody's gonna walk away from that unaffected.
They're gonna bear that fruit. They're gonna bear that fruit.
Those who haven't experienced are all leaves. Outwardly, outwardly. Everything
you see is outward, outward, outward. No heart for God. All right, that's enough. I want
to pass my time. Thank you.