Thank you, Larry. It is indeed
a pleasure. I speak on behalf of Mindy and
myself. It's a pleasure to be back with
you old friends. I've been coming here a long
time. I told my granddaughters that Bobby Buckner back there
changed my diapers. That's how long no nerve. Thank you, Brother Larry, for
having us. And thank you, ladies, for all
the work you've already done, the food, the hospitality. Thank
you so much. I repeat what Brother Gabe said,
what an honor it is for somebody to ask you to preach for them.
I remember you saying one time that you only had men preach
for you whom you could sit and listen to as pastor. I feel the
same way. And don't just have anybody preaching
our pulpit, do we, Brother Gay? We're very jealous over our pulpit. People hear the truth and hear
it from a true man. So it's quite an honor for a
man to ask you to preach in his pulpit once, twice. Brother Worthen in fact had me
three times recently. And Brother Fortner also said,
blessing, what an honor it is for me to be preaching here with
my son-in-law. It certainly is. I did preach
a few times in meetings with my father. He's a pretty good
preacher. One time, Brother Scott had he
and me up there to preach and the format was the first fellow
would do a 15-20 minute devotional. just read the scriptures and
just a little devotional, what dad went first. It was far from
just a devotional. It's the best message I've ever
heard. I told him later, I said, dad, you weren't supposed to
preach. You were supposed to give a devotional. Brother Brett, his son-in-law
was here last night, Jason. He preached it too. What a blessing. Turn with me to Mark chapter
7. Gospel of Mark chapter 7. Our Lord Jesus Christ performed
many miracles that proved him to be the Christ. One time John sent a couple of his disciples to our
Lord when he was in prison. And he asked him, are you he
that should come Or do we look for another? And you remember
our Lord sent word back and said, go show John again those things
which you do hear and see. The blind receive their sight.
The lame walk. Lepers are cleansed. And the
deaf hear. The dead are raised up. The poor have the gospel preached
to them. And blessed is he whosoever shall
not be offended in me. Our Lord performed many miracles
that proved Him to be Christ. Now all of these miracles, and
these men, every one of these men, have preached on these.
Your pastor many times, and these other men. And it's shown you
clearly, it's shown us clearly that these miracles are pictures
of a greater miracle, the miracle of salvation. Every one of these
afflictions are a picture of man's spiritual condition, blind,
We're all born blind. Blind. Can't see our Creator.
Can't see His hand in anything. Can't see our Lord Jesus Christ,
His beauty, His glory. See no beauty in Him that we
should desire. We're lame. We can't come, won't come to
Him. We're lepers. We have this deadly
disease in us. We're deaf. We cannot hear the
Word of God. Cannot hear. Dead and trespassing
in sin. But in the day that the Lord
saves, like here in this story, the day the Lord comes to a person
in salvation, the new birth, that day is the day of their
salvation. And in that day, Isaiah wrote,
in that day shall the deaf hear the words of the book, and the
blind shall see Adam's obscurity. A man told you recently, Gabe,
he told me that, he said, I didn't know Christ was in all the scripture,
did you? The blind shall see out of obscurity. Look at that. It's all about
Christ. And out of darkness. And they that erred in spirit
shall come to understand him. And they that murmured, I'll
never believe that. I don't like that. shall learn
doctrine. That's the way it is. It's a
miracle. It's a miracle when the Lord
gives eyes to see and ears to hear. Here in Mark chapter 7
and maybe chapter 8 if we have time, there's a story of a man,
a story of two men, chapter 7 and chapter 8. One is deaf and one
is blind. And both were saved the same
way and by the same one. Took the same one, doing the
same thing. to both of them, to give it ears
to hear and eyes to see. Look at, first of all, look at
this, verse 24. He went into this village, that
village, this town, and that town, and he went into Tyre and
Sidon. How far will the Lord go to save
one sinner? A long way. He'll leave the 90
and the 9 to go after one lost sheep. Tyre and Sidon was the
northernmost, furthest most point up on the coast of Israel. It
was the uttermost part of Israel. He's able to save to the uttermost. He goes to great lengths to save
his people. He must. He must. He must bring
them. He came. He went to Tyre and
Sidon. Look at verse 31. And he departed
from them. It's all significant. He departed
from Tyre and Sidon. Our Lord came to this place and
that place and then he left. One place, Capernaum, he stayed
a good while. It was often called his city
because he dwelt there so long. We believe he was there at least
two years or more. He stayed there. Our Lord would come to
these places and he would preach and he would teach and he would
heal and he would save people in great mercy and grace our
Lord would come to these little places for his people. But then he would leave after
a while. There's something for us to learn here. The gospel
has come to Silicon Valley. Came here years ago, didn't it?
What a blessing. Came to Crossfield, to Danville,
to Rocky Mountain, now Kingsport. What a blessing. The greatest
blessing of God upon a community of people, isn't it? For the
gospel to come, a preacher of the gospel to come. Winston,
Georgia. But he doesn't stay there. He's
there for a while, in the history of the church. These men that
know the history of the church. All those churches in the Revelation,
seven of them, they're gone. They're gone. And all the sheep
are called into the fold, and it's gone. Our Lord leaves. So
what an opportunity. The gospel is still here, isn't
it? The Lord has given you a faithful preacher, a true preacher of
the gospel. What an opportunity, what a blessing. This is truly
the day of salvation. The gospel is still being preached.
And if you know someone who doesn't know the Lord, like these people,
they had a man, they wanted to hear Christ, and they brought
him to him. You bring him, you bring him.
This was this man's day of salvation. Verse 32 in our story, departed
from Tyre and Sidon, and they bring unto him one that was deaf. They, who were they? Well, all
who come to Christ hear of Christ. These people that brought this
man that was deaf, they had heard of him themselves. How shall
they hear without a preacher? They came, someone told them
about the healer of deaf people, the blind receive their sight,
the leper. And maybe they were deaf themselves. Maybe they had their ears open. Maybe they had their eyes open
by Christ. And so all they did was they
wanted their friend to come. Have his ears open. And in the
next chapter have his eyes open. And so they besought the Lord
in verse 32. They besought the Lord to put his hand upon him.
They bring unto him. They bring this man unto him. Now what is witnessing? Someone
once said that witnessing is just one beggar telling another
where he got food. It's one sinner telling another
who saved him. Our Lord told one After he healed
him, he said, go home and tell what great things the Lord has
done for you. Tell your story. And so whoever
it was, whoever they were, they brought this man to our Lord. They brought this man to Him. They brought this man to Him.
They didn't bring him to the Pharisees. The Pharisees, the
scribes, the doctors, the lawyers, they can't do anything for them.
Perhaps they'd heard these scribes and Pharisees And one time our
Lord, after he preached, we have the sermon on the map, they said,
he preaches as one that has authority, not like the scribes. Have you
ever heard scribes preach? Oh my, they can't do you any
good. They wanted this man to hear from Christ. They brought
him to, not the Pharisees, not the scribes, not the temple.
They didn't bring him to the temple, they brought him to Christ.
It's vain, it's useless. to go to most so-called churches
today, because Christ is not there. The gospel is not there.
To hear philosophers, to hear moralists, to hear legalists.
We don't bring men to Moses and the law. Moses wrote of him.
Bring them to Christ. The law is a schoolmaster to
bring us to Christ. Isaiah said, to him shall all
men come. To him. Jacob said, to him shall
the gathering of the people be. We bring people to Christ. We
want them to hear from Him. He alone is the wisdom they need,
isn't it? He alone is the righteousness
they need, isn't it? He alone is the sanctification
they need, isn't it? He alone is the Redeemer. He
alone is the Savior, the Mediator, the Messiah. He alone is all
they need. Christ is truly all. Is He all?
What do we got to say about that, Gabe? Yea? Amen. All spiritual blessing. If you
want somebody to be blessed, they need to come to Christ.
They need to hear Christ. All the more reason to bring
them where he is preached. He's not preached everywhere.
Do you know what's up? You've heard various preachers
around this area. Are they preaching Christ? You've
heard them, Brother Gary, haven't you, up there? Not many places. This place, this is where Christ
is. This is where his gospel is being preached. So they brought
this man to cry. Because in him alone, his pardon,
his peace, everything that we need. Everything. They bring
him to cry. Now it says in verse 32 that
this man was death. This man was death. They bring
him to cry. He was death. One that was death.
They desperately wanted this man, whoever it was, a brother
or friend to them, they wanted him to hear. And they wanted
him to hear Christ's voice. They wanted him to hear Christ
speak to him. He was deaf. He could not hear. He couldn't hear if he wanted
to. He couldn't hear anything. One
time our Lord said, in John chapter 8, he said, why do you not understand
my speech? He says, because you cannot hear
my word. Most people who are deaf are
born that way, aren't they? Like many people in scripture
that were blind, they were born blind or lame. Most people that
are deaf are born that way. The truth is all of us are born
this way, deaf. We're all born deaf. We cannot
hear the truth. We cannot hear the Word of God. We will not hear the Word of
God. Obstinately deaf. Most are born
that way and all of us are. I know. I know it's so because
that was me. Was he it? I could not hear. I would not hear. I sat and Brother
Britt will attest to this, preacher's kid, sat and sat and heard and
heard and didn't hear a thing. Having ears to hear, our Lord
said, but they hear not. Eyes to see, but they see not.
That was me. I love to tell my story. You've heard it, but I've
got to tell you what great things the Lord has done for me. This
preacher's kid played the prodigal. Not only could he not hear, but
there came a time when I would not hear. I rose above that old-fashioned
foolish religion of my father and even told my friends such.
Oh, am I ashamed of that now? But I not only could not hear,
I would not hear. That's even worse. There's no
greater proof of man's depravity. Now you can talk about the wickedness
of man, all of the murder and rape and just all that goes on
by man. But there's no greater proof
of the depravity of man that he will not hear the Word of
God. He refuses to worship God. It's painful to get an unbeliever
to come and sit and just thank God, just to hear the Word of
God. He'd rather do anything. Men
and women would rather do anything than sit and hear the Word of
God. There's no greater proof that
you pray with me. That was me You know, I can't preach the gospel
without these two words but God But God man will hear fools A
lot of foolish talk today, a whole lot of talk, a lot of voices
and people are ready to hear anything and everyone but the
Son of God who is wisdom personified would rather listen to and heed
anything anyone says but Jesus Christ. Now that's depraved.
That's depraved. Look at verse 26 in this. Remember
this story, a woman, a Syrophoenician woman came to our Lord. Sheba
sought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter.
In another place she said, my daughter is grievously vexed
with the devil. Brethren, it's so of all of our
unsaved children, isn't it? They're either indwelt by the
Spirit of God or another spirit. They may not know it. And the
reason we know they're vexed with the devil is because we
were. Bring these to Him. Bring them
to Him. How do we bring people to Christ?
Now these people, these friends of this man, they didn't save
this man. They couldn't give him hearing.
That's why they brought him to Christ. They didn't really do
anything for him, but they just brought him to where Christ was
so that he could hear from Him. How do we bring people to Christ? We call upon Him. You know anybody
that will not hear the gospel? You know anybody that you have
a burden for? A spouse, a father, a mother,
a son or a daughter? You know anybody that just, you
have a brother that will not hear? I do. I pray for him all
the time. I can't do a thing for him. Is
there anyone that you've spoken to until you, like we say, you're
blue in the face and they just won't hear you? I'll tell you who they will hear
if he gives word. So we bring them in prayer. We call upon the Lord in prayer.
We bring them by witnessing, talking to them about the gospel.
The CDs and tapes and all of these things are the means which
the Lord uses for people to hear his voice, aren't they? And literally
bring them into a place like this where the gospel is prayed.
And if God is pleased, they're going to hear his voice. Well,
this man was deaf. He was deaf. He couldn't hear
a thing. He's not deaf. My wife, all you men, your wives
accuse you of having a selective hearing. Don't. That's what mine
said. You only hear what you want to
hear. It's not so, honey. I listen intently to everything
you say. Just I'm a little bit hard of
hearing, right? Terry, right? This man couldn't
hear anything. He's deaf. He couldn't hear anything.
It's a thunder. didn't shake him. No fear. If music, beautiful music was
playing, something melodious, a sad tune, didn't affect him,
saddened him. Happy tune, got no joy out of
it. I preach to people every Sunday
and every Wednesday. I pipe to them and they won't
dance. I mourn and they don't They haven't
heard. It's obvious to me. What's it gonna take? Well, I'm
constantly bringing them to the Lord. Lord, I can't do anything. I'm doing what you tell me to
do, but you're gonna have to open their ear. You that made
the ear, you'll have to give ears to hear. You that made the
eyes, you have to make it sing. How do we know this man was deaf?
Look at verse 32. It says he had an impediment in his speech. This was a dead giveaway. Because
he couldn't hear certain sounds. Now I'm not, I would not by any
means make light of belittled people who are deaf or hard of
hearing in their speech. I am hard of hearing. I have hearing aids that don't
wear them, but I have them. But I went, the lady who fitted
me for hearing aids is deaf. And yet, she tried to speak to
me. She had an interpreter the whole
time who was speaking to me, but she was trying. It's so obvious
when people cannot hear certain sounds, certain consonants, certain
vowels and so forth. If they cannot hear certain sounds,
they cannot repeat those sounds themselves. And their speech
will give them away that they cannot hear clearly. an impediment
in the speech. And so it is with the irreligious
and the religious people of the world that don't know the Lord.
They're irreligious. They have an impediment in their
speech. Unsaved, their speech gives them away, doesn't it?
I mean, when men call upon God and blaspheme God with every
breath, God's name is upon the lips of even little children
today, isn't it? It's not funny. It's very serious. Oh my God. God said he will not
hold them guiltless, who takes his name in fact, didn't that? My wife, in very great concern
for a young lady who's a member of a local grace church, who
wrote her and put OMG. And Mindy, in very great concern,
wrote her back and said, do you understand what that means? And
she got greatly offended over that. She's just trying to warn
her. It's taking God's name in vain.
People that take God's name in vain. David said, the transgression
of the wicked saith within my heart there's no fear of God
before their eyes. Men can't fear God if they use
his name like that. Children. Irreligious, blasphemous name.
They flatter themselves. A proud person cannot know God. You can't know God and be proud.
Can you? The religious are worse though.
What the religious say today about God is worse, isn't it?
And it clearly tells me and tells us that they don't know God,
they haven't heard you, they have a speech impediment, the
things that they say about God. And I hesitate to repeat some
of the things that you see on these signs and so forth. Did you ever think you'd hear
and see some of the things that you're seeing? in religion today.
We were down in North Carolina on the beach at one of these
so-called churches. The sign out front said, God
doesn't just love you, he really likes you. In Orange Beach, one said this
out front of a Southern Baptist church. He said, God is madly
in love with you. That clearly tells me they don't
know God. The impediment in speech is a
dead giveaway. The speech. Everything they're
saying about God. God loves everyone. Jesus died
for everyone. Won't you let him... Here it
is. Here's the impediment in speech. It's a dead giveaway
of everyone that you talk to. Whether or not they know the
Lord or not. Here it is. The impediment in speech. I. I. Their profession, their hope,
There everything begins this way. I accepted Jesus. I let him into my heart. I made
him Lord of my life. I, isn't it? Isn't it true? I
often ask people, one of the first things I ask them, when
I find out they're religious, they find out I'm a preacher,
they want to tell me how religious I am. And the first thing I ask
them is, what is your hope of eternal life? And people, out of the abundance
of the heart, the mouth speaketh. Whatever you believe, or rather
who, will come out of your heart more. And every time, these people
will say, I won't do it. I accept Jesus. That's an impediment. That's a dead giveaway. One time,
a man came to me, a man who gave him a hand of no will. And he
supposedly got religion. She met him somewhere downtown,
and he came up all excited and said, I got saved. And Mindy said to him, I'm sorry
to hear that. And he was shocked. He was shocked. What do you mean by that? And
she said wisely, she said, if the Lord had saved you, you would
have said so. Let the redeemed of the Lord
say so. Brethren, if the Lord saves you,
that's what you'll say. The Lord saved me. If you got
saved, that's what you'll say. I got saved. If someone died
saving you, say you were drowning and someone went out and saved
you and they laid down their life saving you, would you talk
about how you let him save you? Would you? Would you not sing
that person's praises? We're talking about the Son of
God who came and laid down his life for his people. And those
whom Christ really died for, that's what they say. What's
your hope of salvation? Christ died. What's your hope
of eternal life? Christ, his righteousness, his
shed blood, his redemption, don't they? Those who haven't heard his voice,
haven't heard the truth, they have an impediment in their speech. Verse 32, and it says that they
besought him, the Lord, to put his hand upon him. Lord, please
lay hold of him. Would you take this man? Would
you please accept him? You see, you hear these men say
that, I just said it, that you don't accept Jesus as your personal
savior. That's not in the scripture.
He's not up for acceptance or rejection. Well, the fact is,
all men reject him. He's despised and rejected by
men. All men, all of them, by nature. But we're the ones up
for acceptance or rejection of him. It's his divine prerogative
who is accepted. Isaiah said, here's the good
news. Isaiah said, we proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.
This gospel is the declaration of acceptance with God. There
is acceptance with God. God is accepting all applications
for mercy. But only those who are guilty.
Only those who need mercy. But God is accepting all who
apply to him for mercy. Isn't that good news? What's
unfair about that? Nothing. It's mercy's grave. And granting to everyone it applies.
So they kept beseeching him like that Syrophoenician woman. She
kept coming to the Lord. She kept coming. Now don't be
surprised if you ask the Lord if he will accept somebody that
he takes them. Look at verse 33. He took him.
He was up to the Lord to take this friend of theirs, this brother,
this whoever it was. Lord, would you lay hold of it?
He did. And he did. He took him. He laid
hold of this man. How old was this man? He doesn't
say that. He may have been 40 years old,
50 years old. He may have been 60 years old. He may have been
70 years old. My wife's grandmother was 70
what? 70 years old. She would not hear, she could
not hear the gospel. And her son, the Lord, I'm going
to tell you about him in a moment, me and his dad, but her son brought
his mother to hear, died in the womb, Methodist or first Beth
Methodist? And she would not hear. She'd
sit there, just shake her head like, I don't believe that. They'd
murmur, you know. And he'd do that, and Dad said,
And a little while she's gone. And those arms unfold, those
shoulders sagging. How old was this man? No telling. There are no impossible cases.
No one too old. I have a brother 69 years old. He has no use for this gospel. He's heard it. He heard it as
much as I did growing up. I hope we're not at Jacob and
Esau. Could be. It's the Lord. But he's not,
he seems impossible to me. With man it's impossible. I've
talked to him. Nothing's impossible with God.
Wouldn't that be something? Me and his brothers, wild as
a Red River steer. Wouldn't that be something? Not
impossible. He took him. He took him. He's got his hands
on him. He's gonna do something for him.
And look at what the Lord did. Verse 33. He took him aside from
the multitude. He took him. The Lord took him. Oh, if the Lord takes hold of
us, we're in good hands, aren't we? He looks good for us. And
he took him. Where did he take him? He took
him aside from the multitude. First the Lord took him to be
alone. Just him and the Lord. Preached
a message not long ago, Genesis 32 on things. Lessons learned
alone. Where Jacob was left alone. Left
alone. And that's when the Lord came
and wrestled with him. Lessons learned alone. The Lord
deals with people individually, doesn't he? One on one. Not saved
in a big camp meeting and saved on the brother system were saved
alone with the Lord. Like the woman at the well. She
was left alone with the Lord. The Lord had to speak to her
personally. He had the disciples leave on
purpose while he sat there and waited on that woman. This was
an arranged meeting. These men, whoever it was, they
brought this man to Christ, but Christ sent him. They brought
him to Christ's Senate. This was a divinely ordained,
predestined meeting that the Lord had determined to happen,
and he came. All that the Father gives me
shall come to me. And that woman at the well, he
was sitting, waiting on her, and he dealt with her alone. And when the Lord takes hold
of us and speaks to us, we're going to hear His voice. I was
trying to recall today what year it was, What year did you go
to Danville? What year was it? 80. 80, okay. Okay. Me and Eric, I got married in
79. Remember, we came back after our honeymoon and spent the night
with you all. Look out. Well, 1978, right before then,
the Lord, through her, was dealing with me. She knew the Lord. I did not. I'm the prodigal son.
And I started coming back to church because of her. I had my eye on her. I didn't
know the Lord had his eye on me. But at any rate, 1978 or 9, the preacher there at that time had
my dad down to preach in a meeting. Now, I had heard my dad preach
many times. And I sat there like my granddaughters
are sitting here and their granddad sitting here hearing their dad.
And I sat and I heard for years, that's my dad. That's just my
dad. Yep, that's my dad. There was
a time I was very proud. That's my dad. He's a good preacher. He sure is. That's my dad. About
78 or 79. It wasn't my dad. It wasn't my
dad speaking. It was the Lord speaking to me. How many of you have told your
preacher after a message, you were just speaking to me, weren't
you? That was for me. That was for me. When the Lord
takes someone, he deals with them alone. He said, my sheep
hear my voice. He speaks through a preacher.
Thank God. I'm thankful for preachers, but it's not the preacher. that
we must hear. It's his voice. And he does.
He speaks to his people through this gospel, through his word.
And he spoke to this man. He took this man aside. Scripture
says, let us go forth unto him outside the camp. He took him
aside from the multitude. He took him out of town. Christ
is not in mainstream religion. You won't hear the gospel preached
in these mega churches. He's not there. Wherever you
see a multitude of people, wherever you see the world flocking to
go, Christ is not there. You go the other direction. You
find you a little brown skinned tabernacle in the wilderness.
Like that tent out there in the wilderness. That's where the
Shekinah glory of God is in it. Like a little building in Kingsport,
or Danville, or Rocky Manor, right here. Most people drive
by this place, don't they? The Jebusites, the Hivites, the
Hittites, the Parasites, all these hikes would go by that
tabernacle. That brown skin, there's nothing
to it. It doesn't look beautiful on the outside. What's there?
There's just a few no-good Jews in there. Look at our temples
up here. There's nothing there. Oh, yes,
God's there. The truth's there. Christ is
there. That's where you're going to
hear from Christ. That's the only place. That's where you
have to go. Aside from the multitude. That's
where he took this man. Well, look at this. And he put
his fingers into his ears. That's a strange way to get someone
to hear it. Put your finger in there. Is that what you do if
you want somebody to hear? Put your fingers in there? That's what the Lord did. I'll
tell you what the Lord is doing here. Now these are the fingers.
Let me remind you whose fingers these are. These are the fingers
of him that wrote the law on the tablets and gave them to
Moses. This is the one who wrote the law. Aren't you glad that
the one who wrote the law can justify you freely from all things
by which you cannot be justified by the law? Ask the woman caught
in the act of adultery. He stooped down to where she
was and wrote with his finger in the dirt. and cleared everybody
out of there. Everybody in there was condemned
by him, righty, with his finger, but one guilty sinner, and he
justified her freely from all things. He put his fingers in his ears.
You know, when the Lord begins to open our ears, what he will
do is stop your ears from what you're hearing. He began to make you tired of
what you're hearing. make you discontented. David
was down in a cave of Adullam one time, and men came to him,
the scripture says, who were in distress, who were in debt,
and discontent. They were discontent where they
were. They were distressed by the bondage they were under,
by the rules they were under. A few people come out of legalism,
out of reform, the so-called religion, come to here and they're
just rejoicing in the freedom they have in Christ. See what
bondage they were under. They were in debt, they were
in distress, and they were discontented. And they came to David. I know
the first thing David did. You know what he did? They were
in debt. You know what he did? I know exactly what he did. This
is what the Lord does. I freely absolve you of all debt. No one owes one thing. And that's
what you hear in the gospel, don't you? Freely forgiven, freely
redeemed. All sins are gone. The sins of
iniquity, you quote, I remember no more. What do you say to that?
yay and amen. He delivered them of all their
death and their distress. He said, you need not be in distress.
You're with me. I'm your captain. I will save
you. Just rest. And they were discontent. They became content. Let me tell
you a story I love to tell. And my wife loves to tell it,
too, about her father, Ed Ballard. Most of you may know him. My
dad used to love to tell this story, told it all the time.
But he was brought by another man to hear the gospel. And before he came, he was a member
of a so-called Christian church. And he did well, humanly speaking,
did well for himself, made some money in construction. And one
of the biggest givers, of course, in this big Christian church,
so-called. But he began to be discontent
with what he was hearing, or rather not hearing. And he went
to this so-called preacher, and he said, whatever his name was,
he said, I don't know what I'm not hearing, but I'm not hearing
something. Those are his exact words weren't
they? I don't know what I'm not hearing. He said, I'm not hearing
something. And he told the man, he said,
I want to hear some hell's fire damnation or something. I'm not
hearing something. You know those mealy-mouthed,
pin-headed, effeminate fellas that are not saying anything.
Pleasing everybody, back scratchers, ear tickling. They're not saying
nothing. They're so shallow. And this guy, my father-in-law
was a man's man. And he wasn't hearing anything.
And somebody brought him to hear Henry Mahan. A man's man. A man
that preached with authority, wasn't he? And here's what his
comment was when he first heard Henry Mahan preach. He said,
I don't understand a thing he's saying, but he's getting it out
of the Bible. I know this. He's preaching it
out of the Bible. He's getting something. He still
wasn't hearing. The Lord makes people discontent.
He put his fingers in this man's ears. Stopped his ears from hearing
the noisome pestilence. That's the religion today, isn't
it? Noisome pestilence. And look at this, verse 33. He
spit. He took something from his mouth
and opened this man's mouth and touched his tongue with it. So
what the Lord did to open his ears and loose his tongue was
he took something from his mouth. What is it that will open the
ears of a sinner? One thing. The Word. That's what
it takes. Every time. And he's gonna have
to do it. You know, how many times have
we one-on-one is you know you know we witness to people we
testify of people I've never won anybody to Christ one-on-one
anybody I haven't talked to them but when they come to hear the
gospel and you can be telling them this and telling them this
and but they come and have sit down and shut up and if the Lord
is pleased to open their ears through the preaching of the
word and that's the way he does it every time no other way through
the preaching of the word for the foolishness of preaching
and he's the one who speaks to them, and he opens their ears
to the preaching of the word. We have this treasure in earthen
vessels, but the excellency of the power is going to be of God.
We're going to know that. So often we preachers preach,
and we aim at, and we think about this person over here, we aim
an arrow over there, don't we? We say, boy, this fella needs
that, and I sure hope he hears that. I got a message for him,
pow, pow, and he's shooting arrow after arrow, and boom, they're
bouncing off, bouncing off. I'm a failure. Right over here,
this fella. The arrow hit him. Why? No flesh is going to glory in
His presence. But what's the power of God? He ain't the preacher.
It's not by might, not by power, not by excellency of speech or
ability to preach or my persuasive word. It's the Word of God. That's
His power. And when He gives the Word, about
a year, a year's going to be over. That's what we're waiting
on, isn't it, Bob? That's what we're waiting on. The Lord to
give the Word. Just open their ears. That's what that centurion
said, Lord, if you just say the word, you'll be healed. Well,
he did. He opened his ears. Verse 34,
in looking up to heaven, he sighed and said, Epiphatha, that is,
be open. He sighed. Doesn't the psalm
say, for the sighing of the prisoners, I will arise. Oh, isn't that
wonderful, the Lord sighed. to hear the groaning of the prisoner,
to loose those who are appointed to death, to declare the name
of the Lord in Zion. Oh my. In all their afflictions
he was afflicted. They're sighing, he sighed. He
hears every sigh. And he himself sighed, groaned
in spirit. Lazarus' tomb, and here he sighed
again. He sighed. We sighed, he sighed.
We groaned, he groaned. And he sighed. But this was the
breath of God. sigh of redemption. And it opened
this man's ear. Behold. And straightway his ears
were opened. And the string of his tongue,
look at verse 35, the string of his tongue was loose and he
spake plain. He spake plain. What did he say?
It's not written. I know what he said. Everyone
whom the Lord opens their ears. This is what they say. I know
what he said. You know what he said? I know what he said. He
said, salvation's of the Lord. Didn't he? With the impediment in the speech
of unbelievers, those that don't know the Lord, I, I, I, I. The
language of God's people is very clear and very plain about who
does the saving. Everyone in glory is saying this.
He hath saved us. He hath washed us from our sins.
He hath redeemed us. He hath chosen us. Who did the
choosing? He did. Who did the saving? He
did. Who did the redeeming? He did.
Who's the saving? He is. What's your hope? He is. It's a language that the
world doesn't know, that they don't speak. But we understand
it, don't we? And the minute we hear one of
our brethren, we can go someplace and talk to somebody. Can't you,
Gary? You can talk to somebody. It doesn't take long for you
to recognize somebody that speaks your language. The language of
the redeemed. They speak plainly, they speak
clearly of the salvation that's in Him and Him alone. Yeah, that's
what he said. Well, very quickly, Mark chapter
8, just I want you to see this. I mentioned this blind man, Mark
chapter 8, look at him. Verse 22, I believe it is. Yeah, he comes to, Mark chapter
8, verse 22. He comeeth to Bethsaida, another
city, blessed of the Lord. And they bring a blind man unto
him. Somebody had a friend who was
blind. Where'd they bring him? To cry. They wanted him to come
to cry. And they besought him to touch
him. Lord, would you heal his eye?
What'd he do? He took him. He took the blind
man by the hand. Where'd he take him? Out of town. Siphoned the boat. Let's get out of here, you and
me, and you're going to leave this place seeing my glory, hearing
my voice, to the praise of the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you know
anybody? Do you know anybody? Bring them to Christ. Seek the
Lord. He's still taking sinners today. Okay, may the Lord bless you.