I'm in Acts chapter 9 and we
are going to commence in Acts chapter 9 again at verse 34 and
following. From last week we called your
attention to the fact that Peter now becomes the subject for almost
three chapters, certainly for chapters 9 through 11. He will
officially go off the pages of the book of Acts in about chapter
15. but here abruptly Luke moves
into a narrative here discussing Peter's purpose in verse 32 through
verse 36 and I want to repeat that and then we'll go back and
kind of develop some points that we dealt with last week advance
on that and we might get to our sister Tabitha tonight maybe
not verse 32 and it came to pass as Peter passed throughout all
the quarters, he came down also to the saints, which dwelt at
Lydda. And there he found a certain
man named Aeneas, which had kept his bed eight years and was sick
of the palsy. And Peter said unto him, Aeneas,
Jesus Christ maketh thee whole, arise and make thy bed. And he arose immediately. And
all that dwelt in Lydda and Saron saw him and turned to the Lord. Thus is the reading of God's
word. Last week we made mention of,
as we went through our PowerPoints, that once again the healing that's
taking place by the Apostle Peter is an opportunity for the Father
to glorify the Son. Point number one in your outline.
God hath glorified his Son. What? Again. You guys all have
outlines? Because I don't know. There we
go. God has glorified his son again. And what we emphasized
last week was this, that an informed believer does not fall prey to
thinking that miracles are an end in themselves. An informed
believer does not fall prey to miracle workers. Not a biblically
informed believer. To look for miracles as an end
in themselves is to belie the fact that you have not comprehended
the gospel. And so miracles were always designed
as signs, simeons, to point somewhere else. The soul that got a grip
on or had an opportunity to see an authentic miracle was designed
to lead you to the God who performed the miracle. And so in our outline,
we went through a few points. I talked about the recapitulation
principle, Point number one under your first point under God has
glorified his son, the recapitulation principle. You and I realize
that in the word of God, there's this uncanny process of repetition
that takes place where an event will occur for the first time.
Theologically, we call that first mention or our first event. And
then somewhere down the line, a similar event will occur, if
not almost verbatim, the same event. And when we see that event
in the scriptures, we go, now that's strange. This is almost
like that which occurred the first time around. And I share
it with you how that in the days of Elijah, the superior to Elisha
had performed miracles of which when Elisha took up the mantle
of Elijah, he also performed miracles very similar to Elijah. You guys remember that. Those
recapitulation principles are to reinforce Theological truths
concerning the redemptive work of Christ and not to reinforce
again the fact that God has used in the economy of his revelation
Miracles in order to excite people the miracles were always designed
to teach us larger redemptive truth and if you guys recall
when we looked at 1st Kings 17, 2nd Kings 4, we saw that there
was a death, remember? And that Elijah as well as Elisha
were mediators from God to restore the child to life. When once
you understand the overall account, what you realize is that salvation
is really the resurrection from the dead. that you and I are
like that little boy in both accounts, our young boy in both
accounts that have died spiritually. And that salvation is nothing
less than us being raised from the dead. And that lesson drawn
from that account is important on a theological level, because
if we would assert that our salvation is merely a change of our worldviews,
or just a new leaf in life, or just a resolve to do better,
or the addition of an addendum of theological truth to what
I already know to be true, all of those would be flawed grounds
for what we would describe salvation to be. Does that make some sense? If I tell somebody, well, I know
I'm saved because I'm now going to church. Well, all I've done
is added another activity to my already normative life. That
would not be salvation. Well, I know I'm saved because
now I have a biblical knowledge of God. Well, all I've done is
increased my information database around God. That does not constitute
salvation. Well, I know I'm saved because
boy, I don't use, I don't do what I used to do. Well, now
you're taking away a few things. So you're kind of basically now
deleting things and under that auspices you feel like maybe
you have a right relationship with God, but that's not salvation
either. None of those things depict the real desperate state
of the sinner prior to salvation. None of those really depict the
fact that you and I prior to salvation are dead in trespasses
and sins. So until we recognize that our
problem was such that we were so desperately lost that we were
dead and that God had to initiate the whole of the work of bringing
us out of our former state into our present state by a work of
grace that amounts to raising us from the dead. And thus the
miracle of both of the boys corresponds to the work of the Spirit of
God, hunting down God's people, their spiritually dead state
and raising them from the dead. So Elisha and Elijah become types
of Jesus Christ by the work of the Spirit of God fully embracing
in the whole of the body of the person that was dead. Remember
how they did it? They not only went into the room
and But they put their face to the boy's face, their hands to
the boy's hand. The whole of their body encompassed
the whole of his body, which now we are describing what we
call union with Christ. So that in every aspect of my
spiritual anatomy, I must be brought to life again. I am dead
in every part of my spiritual anatomy. I don't need to just
be quickened in my mind. I need every part of my spiritual
anatomy brought to life, and it can only be brought to life
by the Prince of Life, Jesus Christ Himself. So we are brought
into union with Christ by the Spirit of God, and as He rose
from the dead, so we rise from the dead. I am the resurrection
and the life. Though he were dead, yet shall
he live. And so those pictures there in
those accounts teach us of the radical nature of redemption. And when we get the message out
of the miracle, then we can do what our text is asserting. God
had glorified the Son again. What I did in the Acts account
also is I showed you how that this is the second time Peter
has engaged in the healing of the paralyzed individual back
in Acts chapter 3 verse 13. Look there again. I'm going to
reaffirm these things and then advance our thoughts. In Acts
3, 13, Peter is looking upon the lame
man at the gate beautiful as we talked about remember verse
13 now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John perceived that
they were Unlearned men now what Peter is doing now is actually
explaining to them what happened go down to verse 16 He said unto
them. What shall we do these to these
men for indeed up? I'm jumping ahead I need to get
on down. Let's see here Okay, let me start
back at 3 verse 11. Here's what it said, and as a
layman, which was healed of Peter and John, all the people ran
together to the porch that was called Solomon's, greatly wondering,
and when Peter saw it, here's what he said unto them, why marv
you at this, or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though our
own power or holiness hath made this man to walk? Immediately
he's stopping them from focusing on the vehicle or instrument
by which this is done. And then he says in verse 13,
the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, the God of our
fathers, hath what? Glorified his son Jesus. That's how Peter sums up the
miracles that are taking place. We're going to see this more
tonight. Well, what were miracles designed to do in that first
century apostolic age? Glorify Jesus Christ. It became
a means where now everyone is drawn to Christ or the topic
of Christ, the subject of Christ, the person of Christ. Now they
have to consider Jesus. Jesus is no longer dead. He's
risen and he's on his throne. And his apostles are going about
doing ministry. And remarkably, go with me now
to chapter four. In chapter 4, where Peter has
now begun to pray to God, and Peter is dealing with struggles,
and he wants God to now manifest His glory to him. He says it
again to the rulers in verse 10, Be it known unto you all,
and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ
of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead,
even by Him doth this man stand here before you whole. So now Peter has an opportunity
to preach and we saw in both accounts. That's exactly what
he did. He preached. Now go over to chapter
four, show you something else before we move forward. Over
in chapter four, verse verse 24, this is Peter praying, he's
speaking to God. He says, and when they had heard
that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord and said,
Lord, you are God, which have made heaven and earth, the sea
and all that is in them, who by the mouth of your servant
David have said, why doth the heathen rage? That's the Gentiles. And the people imagine vain things. That's the Jews. The kings of
the earth stood up and the rulers gathered together against the
Lord and against this Christ. This is Jews and Gentiles being
depicted in Psalm 2. You guys know Psalm 2, right?
So Peter is referring to Psalm 2 and saying that it's being
fulfilled in his days. Verse 27, for of a truth against
your holy child Jesus, whom you have anointed, here it is, both
Herod, Jew, Pontius Pilate, Gentile, with the Gentiles and the people
of Israel, Jews and Gentiles, were gathered together for to
do whatsoever your hand and your counsel had determined before
to be done. Now watch his request, because
this is going to help us understand the miracles. And now, Lord,
behold their threatenings and grant unto your servants that
with all boldness they may speak your word. First thing he's asking
for is boldness to speak. But now watch what he goes on
to say. I want you to see this. By stretching forth your hand
to heal. Now, this here is actually, this
here is a tandem. This would be a coordinate request. The one is not separated from
the other you might think they are they're not what peter is
saying is give your servants confidence to speak By doing
miracles that will open the door for men and women to hear us
in other words the miracle becomes now the carte blanche the freedom
the Opportunity by which the apostles will now preach the
gospel when the miracle occurs time to preach That's what they're
saying. They're not saying, you know,
just do miracles so people can know you're a God of power. No,
do the miracle and let the miracle be for us a sign that we can
open our mouth and preach Christ now. Let it be a catalyst to
the preaching of Christ since we already have great opposition
in front of us We have their threatenings. We have their imprisonments. We have their beatings. They
want to kill us. That's okay But before they do
Lord work this way Manifest your glory in healing open that door
for us to preach boldly Christ and then we'll be glad in terms
what the outcome will be and this is powerful because That's
exactly what takes place. Now, before it happens, here's
what God does. Look at verse 11. First, let me finish verse
30. By stretching forth your hand
to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done, here it is, by the
name of your holy child, Jesus. So there it is. Here is the whole
portfolio. Here's the whole resume. Here's
the whole of the modus operandi. We're gonna preach boldly when
miracles take place, and we're gonna do it in the name of Christ.
Now these three components are going to be running through the
apostolic ministry all through the book of Acts. Beautiful.
And when they had prayed, the place was shaken together where
they had assembled, and they were all filled with the Holy
Ghost, and they spake the word of God with boldness. And the
multitude of them that believed on them were of one heart and
of one soul, and they went about the work. Go back to our text
now. This is the premise Peter has requested it a door has opened
up and he now is come down to a city near Joppa and And we
are now contemplating again the principles of evangelism First
and foremost by the Apostles, but they will also fall out to
us too Because I really do want to draw out the principle of
mentorship. So under the first point God
had glorified his son again We do all we do in order to glorify
Christ. Whatever you do in word or in
deed, do it all in the name of Jesus Christ, right? Do nothing
that does not have as its ultimate objective, child of God, the
glory of God in Christ. So under the first point, we
see a recapitulation principle. Share with you a couple more
to help you understand what I mean by recapitulation principle.
And you may have some come up in your head too. Remember the
children of Israel in the wilderness complaining about no water. And
what did God do? He caused water to come out of
the rock, didn't he? There's beautiful accounting
around Exodus chapter 15 or so. And that event was monumental
because that water provision was a type of the outpouring
of the Holy Ghost. In a desert land, which depicted
our spiritual condition, both collectively and individually,
the rock points to Jesus Christ. The rock points to the law of
God, which had to smite Christ on Calvary Street in order for
the water to be poured out. And so their souls were nurtured,
not merely by the power of God, but by the redemption that's
in Jesus Christ. So they're going through the
desert with the power of the atoning work of Christ, providing
for them spiritual nourishment. But in God's goodness, guess
what he does? He does it again one more time before they go
into the promised land. So three months into the wilderness,
God smites the rock. A type of the crucified Christ,
out of which when he was crucified, straightway came out what? Blood
and water. And those three bore record right
in first John chapter 5 there three that bear record on the
earth right the water the blood and the spirit right and that's
the work of the gospel and the Salvation of sinners by the atoning
work of Jesus Christ and the cleansing work of the Spirit
of God As they're about to enter into the promised land the knucklehead
children of Israel complain again God's not providing for us now
we don't do that, but they do and and and so Moses and and
his disobedience smites the rock and God still allows the water
to come out. It was wrong for Moses to do it. There was a theological
error inherent in that. Remember, whatever we do, whatever
they did on the Old Testament anointing, they were doing it
with a theological component involved in it. Moses is a type
of the law. He was not supposed to smite
the rock. He was supposed to what? Speak to the rock. which
means him speaking to the rock is to correspond to Jesus Christ
who is the rock by virtue of the law. The law corresponds
to Christ. It bears record to Christ. The
law's job is not to crucify Christ over and over and over and over
again. One time was he crucified. One
time did he die. One time did he offer himself
a sacrifice. And the law should have been satisfied from that
one sacrifice. You see why God could not let
him go into the promised land? because he dishonored his gospel. And yet in God's mercy, he still
allowed the water to pour out because he had to lead the people
in. He had to lead them in. So that's what we call a recapitulation
principle. He did it again and again and
again. And then when you and I saw last week that as we took
some of the Old Testament, New Testament paradigms as Jonah
was in the back of the ship, so Jesus was in the back of the
ship, in the midst of the storm, and God quieted the storm in
Jonah's day, and Jesus quieted the storm in the days of the
apostles, did he not? And when you take those two and
you tie them together, what you understand is that the Jehovah
of the Old Testament is the Jesus of the New Testament, and whereas
Jehovah spoke from heaven to stop the storm in the days of
Jonah, Christ stood up and said, peace be still. the sea immediately
stopped and the wind was muzzled because the second person of
the triune Godhead was there So his deity is manifested in
his direct ability to immediately affect creation by his own word
unmediated That's when the disciples really were shook up. Remember
that these tests and now what kind of do we dealing with here?
then this this is this is You know, we wanted the water to
settle down, but we didn't want to see this Because they met
God that day and it was really difficult. It was really difficult
for them to actually Witness the sea stopping Immediately
it did not slow down the oceans didn't go It didn't do that it
was like this he said stop and went fool just like that immediately
it just stopped and while they were quietly they wanted peace
while they were quietly making it to the shore they were having
a storm on the inside of their mind because they just could
not get with this man having power over the winds and the
seas because that's That's because he's God in himself. And so these
things are being done to teach us a principle of recapitulation,
but they're also being done to teach us the virtue of mentoring.
Second point in our outline. Staying back there. No, I'm sorry.
Staying back there. Second sub-point in our first
category. Christ's disciples, Christ and
the disciples, the virtue of mentoring. I'm gonna work this
just a little bit. How important are persons in
your life to help shape your understanding and direct you
into your growth in Christ? How important are persons in
the influencing you to grow and mature in your walk with Christ? As we get older, we know now,
don't we? that had we had persons who were
really rooted and grounded in Christ and more mature than ourselves
to walk along with us, there would have been many decisions
that we would not have made back then. Had we had individuals
who really had the wisdom of God and have the insight of God
to help us make very critical decisions in our lives, we would
have been better for it. And so the fundamental point
is, is this, he that dwelleth with the wise, he himself shall
also be wise. And it is critical to have an
upline influencing you, whose character and whose maturity
is reflective of one who is submitted to the will of God, because they
do impact you. Very seldom do you and I as an
individual grow by ourselves in a healthy way. Most of the
time we don't. If you don't actually, by the
grace of God, find someone with whom you admire and you are able
to vet them, that is determine what the biblical qualifications
of maturity are, see that in those persons and then benefit
from their life, you and I will be stagnant in our growth. We
are not meant to grow in a healthy way all by ourselves. Christ modeled that. Elisha and
Elijah modeled that. Moses and Joshua modeled that. Ruth and Naomi modeled that.
I love the story of Ruth and Naomi. We've talked about it
many, many, many, many times of God's magnificent, magnificent
serendipity in that event where Naomi married a brother who thought
he could have the world in Christ too, and it ended up destroying
the whole family. Out of it, however, was birthed
one of God's elect, and that is Ruth. And their love relationship
between mother-in-law Naomi and Ruth was so phenomenal that they
were able to get through the hell that they... Talking about
marriages in hell. Well, let's keep going. They
were able to negotiate their way through all that mess back
into the blessings of God, because Ruth was clear when God had called
her out of Moabite darkness into Judaism, that that woman, Naomi,
was her mentor. And she got out of Naomi everything
she needed to negotiate her way right on up into the line of
the Messiah. Now, isn't that the kind of mentoring
we want? She helped that sister get hooked up. Wonderful account. Wonderful. Cause Gentile woman
end up slipping right on in line and becoming the great, great,
great grandmother of the Lord Jesus Christ, simply because
she obeyed her upline. That's exactly right. Just obeyed
her upline. And so we move to John chapter
14, a couple of verses in John 14 that I just want to share
with you along these lines. And as I get older, I'm even
more convinced of the importance of these things of which I'm
speaking to you now, that if you and I are going to get everything
out of our life and our calling that we are supposed to, It's
not going to be done by being a lone maverick. As John chapter
12, by the way, except to see going to the ground and die,
it abides alone. And there's a sense in which
you have to die on a level of humility when you submit yourself
to a kind of mentoring process by persons who are human and
fallible, just like you, but are further down the line than
you are and can really tangibly and effectively speak into your
life. When they tangibly and effectively speak into your life,
you know it because God's in it. And your life is better when
your relationship is healthy with that person than what it's
not. But sometimes we'll kind of try, you know, we run with
them for a while and then we'll separate and say, we can do it
on our own. Things start falling apart. And then we realize we
got to get back into that relationship because they have some insights
forged into them through experience that we don't have. and we need
those insights. That's just part of the process
of growth, saints. God never meant for us to grow
on our own. He never meant for us to grow
on our own. Two are always better than one. And this is a truth
that will work all the time. He never meant for it to happen.
That's why immediately upon beginning his ministry, Christ got a bunch
of brothers around him, immediately. Here's what he says in John chapter
14, verse 12. As he's speaking to Philip and
Nathaniel and the rest of the brethren about his return to
the Father, he says in verse 12, verily, verily, or truly,
truly, I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that
I do shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do,
because I go to my Father. Now watch this. And whatsoever
you shall ask in my name, Is that what Peter doing? Is that
what Paul and Barnabas are doing? And whatsoever you shall ask
in my name, that will I do that my father may be glorified. Watch
this in the sun. Whatever you ask in my name,
because you are my disciple, and because you take the mentoring
process with me seriously, therefore your motive is gonna be right
when you ask. Your asking is going to be to
glorify the Father through the Son. I am gonna do it for you,
and my Father is gonna do it for you. In fact, the whole book
of Acts is a fulfillment of this particular promise. The whole
Book of Acts is the fulfillment of this promise. Every time a
healing takes place in the Book of Acts, think about John chapter
14, verse 12 and 13. Every time the disciples get
into a situation where they need the Lord's mercy, His providence,
the intervention of His power, think about John 14, 12 and 13.
What's taking place here? He says, verily I say unto you,
he that believeth on me. Now again, if we deal with this
as seriously as it ought to be dealt with, contentually to believe
on Christ is not to simply take up his doctrine into our brain
or into our cranium. To believe on Christ is to observe
the whole of his person. He has revealed to us both in
his life his walk and his doctrine and then to Inculcate that in
our life as disciples. So I'm gonna say that again Mm-hmm.
Let's say that again. So what the what the Lord knew
that he was saying to those 11 boys was this I Called you from
your vocation to follow me. Remember that I is what we're
learning in evangelism class. Those of you who came out with
me at Progressive, one of the things I explained is evangelism
is not so much what we say, it's what we are. It's not what we
do, it's who we are. You are evangelical when you
are a Christian, because when you are a Christian, you are
a disciple. If you are a disciple of Christ,
you are mimicking Christ. And if you are mimicking Christ,
you're doing it with the objective of telling men and women the
good news of the gospel because of how it impacted your life.
Now, here's what happened. Jesus came along the seaside
of Galilee and he saw three men fishing. And he says, fellas,
I got doctrine. I want to teach you. If you learn
this doctrine, you'll have the keys to life. Is that what he
said? No. He said two words. Follow me. Right. And so what I share with the
Saints at Progressive was this. That day, nothing about their
doctrine changed. Their ethic changed, their lifestyle
changed, they dropped their nets. and started following Jesus for
three and a half years. That's how they became disciples.
They didn't become disciples by signing up in an evening class. They became disciples by their
whole life being abandoned their former life and walking with
Jesus for three and a half years. You know what that means? A comprehensive
experience with Christ brought them to the place where Christ
now could send them into all the world. How powerful was that? How powerful was a three and
a half year, almost 24 seven lifetime spent with the master
in preparation for them to go into all the world. That's what
I mean by discipleship. So now they get to see how he
sleeps, how he eats, what his habits were, what his prayer
time was like, how he dealt with people in terms of relationship
skills, how he masterfully handled all of the temptation by all
of the carping enemies that he had, how he preached the gospel,
how he brought about healings. They saw a complete panoramic
of the person and work of Christ. Guess what? It penetrated their
whole being. You know what happened? As soon
as he went up and the Holy Ghost came down, Jesus is all over.
He's doing the same thing all over again through them. You
guys see that? That's what we mean by discipleship.
So I've said this before because sometimes people are loose with
the whole concept of discipleship. You and I are not called to make
disciples after ourselves. Don't ever tell people I'm here
to make you a disciple. Christ is the one who makes disciples.
In fact, he doesn't call us to make disciples of ourselves.
He calls us to make disciples of him. Christ is the model. He's the mentor. You follow that? We are becoming disciples of
Him. We become learners of those who are disciples of Him. But
we're becoming disciples of Him. And so whenever you are seriously
taking the life of an individual into consideration as something
to learn from and to follow and to take on their pattern, what
Paul said is, follow me as I follow Christ. Follow me as I follow
Christ. So now you have the litmus test,
you have the barometer, you have the foundation, you have the
framework, you have now the grounds of determining the true from
the false. So to the degree that Paul follows Christ, we are following
Paul. Am I making some sense? But Paul
would never say you are my disciple. Now in religion, we turn that
upside down all the time. Paul would not say that. You
can be a son or daughter in the faith. That's not the same as
a disciple. A disciple is a person who is
committed to his master and is ready to die for his master.
No healthy thinking teacher, elder, mature mother or father
in the faith would ever tell another believer to die for them.
You would never develop a relationship with another child of God where
you had their allegiance towards you so absolutely deep that they
would die for you. Are you guys following what I'm
saying? Now that believer may die for you, but it would be
for Christ's sake. It wouldn't be because you have
such control over their mind and their life and their finances
and all the other stuff that cults do when they seize the
whole of people's lives and bring them into subjection to them
and make them over in their own image and destroy anything healthy
in that soul. A true disciple of Christ would
never create a situation where the relationship between them
and another believer is a tyrannical control over the conscience and
heart of that believer. Am I making some sense? It's
critically important for you to know that because like we're
learning in marriage class, we're needy creatures, aren't we? And
you know what happens when we are in a vulnerable state? We
end up committing allegiance to persons and people and things
and institutions and they abuse us and take advantage of us.
And we look up and we realize we weren't following Christ at
all. We were following a man, following an institution, following
people. So this is very important, what I'm getting at, the mentoring
process is a critical process. So under God has glorified his
son, the principle of recapitulation, Christ's disciples, the virtue
of mentoring, we see it marvelously worked out in our account. And
the messianic era then is continued. I won't go through too many of
these verses here, but we see that in the book of Acts. Thus,
we can go to our next point, because I want to now develop
the next important thing in our account. Go with me back to our
text. Acts chapter 9. Something else we need to note
then under the rubric of Peter, now a marvelous example of Christ. When the Spirit of God enters
in, He can do for us in terms of forming us into the image
of Christ and causing us to mimic Christ in those capacities in
which we are to mimic him, in ways in which we couldn't do
it ourself. And Peter certainly is that. Here we read in verse
34, and Peter said unto Anais, who was sick with the pulse for
eight years, he said unto Anais, Jesus Christ makes thee whole,
arise and make your bed. I know that seems simple. But
going back to the idea of the mentor, Peter is called down
to this little area called Saron by the saint because, well, no,
I better stop. That's another account. Peter
now is here in this area and he meets this man in this. And
what Luke does not do, Luke does not tell us what the context
of this situation is. He's going through, as we learned
in verse 32, all these areas, probably just strengthening the
brotherhood. That's right. Verse 32 says, and he came down
also to the saints, which were at Lydda. And there he found
a man named Anais, who had kept his bed at years. And Peter said
unto Anais, He said unto him, Aeneas, Jesus Christ makes thee
whole, arise and make thy bed. So now, what is Peter doing here? What's taking place here? What
gives him the authority to just go over to the man, call his
name, and then tell him, you're whole, get up. First of all,
we can say the spirit of God prompted him to do it. Peter
could have easily surmised that as he ventured through these
different cities, he probably was Performing these kinds of
miracles all throughout that process. These are what we call
apostolic miracles He probably understood that he's at litter
now, which is right next to Joppa. That's our next account. I'm
trying to Rain myself in and not get into that account yet
because it will be a marvelous account He probably is aware
that while he's there to strengthen the Saints that are there There's
still a good group of people who have not come to know the
Lord He looks upon this man, Aeneas, and probably in the same
fashion that him and John looked upon the lame man at the temple
beautiful, the spirit of God prompted Peter to react. And he calls this man by name,
Aeneas, Aeneas. He didn't say, sir, he says,
Aeneas. And then upon saying to Aeneas,
Aeneas calling his name, he doesn't enter into a conversation. Immediately
he says something that's striking. Jesus Christ is making you whole. Powerful, powerful, powerful.
You don't see it in the original language, but in the original
language is what we call the present indicative verb form.
Here's what Peter says. Aeneas, right now, Jesus is making
you whole. That's amazing. Which means Either
Peter was given that insight by the Spirit of God or just
the unction to say it under inspiration of the Spirit of God because
the Spirit of God was going to work at that moment to bring
about that healing in order for Peter to do what he really came
to do, which is preach Christ. But stay with us now. Can you
imagine this? You are walking and going about with your entourage
and your boys and the Spirit of God sets you on a person and
you know their name immediately. Well, Christ knows Ananias or
Aeneas because Aeneas is one of Christ's sheep. So the Spirit of God is speaking
to Aeneas like he has spoken to many of us. Jesse, you can
put your name there. Jesus Christ is making you whole
right now. It's amazing. I'm blown away
by it because the implications are just... See, actually, there's
a dynamic here that's just astounding to me. So Peter is just a vehicle. We talked about that last week.
We'll hear more about it on Sunday. When we talk about just being
a vessel of the Lord, we're simply talking about being an instrument,
a dumb instrument that has absolutely no personal qualities by which
we make ourselves qualified to be God's vessel. I mean, a vessel
is a vessel. Is empty is inanimate has no
knowledge. It can't do good or bad. It can't
do right or wrong It's not immoral. It's amoral A vessel is a safe
thing to be Right But a vessel is helpless Unless the owner
takes that vessel and employs it So we would love to actually
be able to have that kind of relationship with the lord where
he can use us anytime And he would have to overcome all of
our human inclinations to want to help him. Right? So to become a vessel really
requires the grace of humility to be submissive to the will
of God in any moment, at any time, without qualification.
We don't know who Anais was. He could have been one of the
ruffians of the group. The Spirit of God prompted Peter to say
to him, Anais, Jesus Christ is healing you right now. And what's
so profound about the way the construction is laid out watch
this watch this peter said a demon is jesus christ is making you
whole Get up and make your bed This is actually one continuous
sentence This is one continuous sentence And so funny because
really, you and I might be inclined to want to break this up in parts
and kind of see some kind of negotiation, some kind of conversation,
some kind of dialogue, at least on Anais's part. Peter, man,
don't you know I've been here eight years? By the way, you're
telling me to make up my bed. I ain't never made up my bed.
It's been eight years. I don't know how to make up a bed. And
now you're going to tell me to make up the bed, but I ain't
got up in eight years. So none of that went on. I just
want to show you something. This is the dynamic of the account.
Remember what we just quoted in John chapter 14 verse 12?
He that believeth on me, truly, truly, those are what we call
swear words, truly, truly, he that believeth on me, the works
that I am doing, he shall do greater works than these. He shall do greater works than
these. So I know we're dealing with a minutia, kind of an acute
detail, but I want you to focus in on it. So this is amazing
because jesus also raised paralytic people, didn't he? John chapter
5 gives us a glorious account where he did the same thing rise
up and make up your bed and walk Boom, there go peter all over
again Rise up make up your bed and walk go show everybody what
the lord has done for you with that same strong imperative but
not as powerful or tight as he has allowed the Spirit of God
to work in Peter's exhortation or command to Aeneas. Aeneas,
Jesus Christ right now is making you whole as I am speaking to
you. I am speaking to you and the
Spirit of God is making you whole and while he is making you whole,
right now, get up. And while you get up, get your
bed up, fold your bed up right now. And the man doesn't hesitate,
he does it right away. It's amazing. It's amazing. You know, in your con churches,
you know, they go through the drama. The organist start to
play in and people get the action up and the brother gets up a
little bit and go back down, gets up a little bit, go back
down, gets up a little bit, kind of shake a little bit. Then get
one leg going, get the other leg going, get the other, and
then start running around like they finally got healed. They're
liars. And you need to know that. Liars. Cons. Crooks. And true believers ought to only settle for the
authentic work of God and nothing else. True believers ought never
to settle for knockoffs, for inferior, spurious cons that
even the unbeliever can see through when you work through the machinations.
What was taking place here in Acts 9.34 is so powerful and
so quick that it forced all of the people who saw it to immediately
inquire, who is the Lord that has done something like this?
That's how powerful it was. See, again, this was not about
the miracle. I'm just taking my time to exegetically
explain to you the dynamic of the Spirit of God. While Peter
is talking, he's telling the man, you're being healed right
now. Get up and make your bed right now. He does it immediately.
Look what the text says. And he arose immediately. He
arose immediately. He did not hesitate. He arose. King James goes straight away.
Immediately. That's the word for immediately.
No hesitation. So the man gripped with the command
of the presence of God Qualified him to experience whether or
not was so and there was so much of God's power Present there
that he gets up without even the slightest trepidation and
does everything Peter says Available to that man was a complete healing
immediately Here's our next word which we'll play with for a little
bit tonight And there's whose name in the Greek literally means
praise of God And there's the Lord Jesus Christ is making you
whole right now. Oh Oh It's an amazing turn Wish
I had my board up here so I can just do some some explaining
to you how? Fascinated I am by the word whole
as it is used in the New Testament There are several words in the
New Testament that speak to completeness and wholeness and perfection
and total restoration of that which is marred or broken or
flawed. And the word whole is something
that you see attached to the work of Jesus Christ all through
the gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, right? And he made
them whole every way, right? Go with me in your Bible to Luke's
gospel. Let me show you something right
there And I'm gonna just cause us to meditate on it on this
thought of wholeness for a moment because it's important for us
as children of God who are presently presently in the process of being
made whole Those of us who are presently in the process of being
made whole Luke's gospel chapter 6 I want to show you something
and I want to just call your attention to a couple of two
or three concepts that have been resonating in my brain for the
last several months even years now around Being made whole just
I want you to think about it with me as we work through the
idea of what salvation is Now I want you to watch this
account Watch this now. This is Luke's gospel chapter
6 verse 18 and 19. Are you there? Let me start back at verse 17.
And he came down with them and stood in the plain in the company
of his disciples and great multitudes of people out of all Judea and
Jerusalem and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon which came
to hear him Here it is. And to be healed of their diseases.
They came to do two things. What? Hear him and to be healed
of their diseases. This was a lot of folks, ladies
and gentlemen, tens of thousands of people. There's not a few
hundred people, tens of thousands. Here's what he says. A great
multitude of people out of all Judea, Jerusalem and from the
seacoast of Tyree and Sidon which came to hear and to be healed
of their diseases two things hearing and healing hearing and
healing Hearing and healing and the Holy Spirit is saying to
us that these individuals Respected what he had to say and they respected
what he had the capacity to do right They respected what he
had to say, and they respected the capacity for him to do what
he has been known for doing. Ain't nobody else doing this. This is only Jesus. This is what
we call the era of the Messiah. Only Messiah is healing and preaching. No one else. The rest are cons
and crooks. See, the word has gone out. This
dude is real. Okay, he's real. So, so, so the
evidence is in and people are now moving towards him. Well,
because we all have a need. We all have a need. So these
needy people are coming towards him. Now watch this. And they
that were vexed with unclean spirits. I'm going to talk about
that a little later. If I had my board up, the word
I would write is unclean because unclean is the antithesis of
being made whole, which is a critical, Contemplation in our present
generation in a world that I basically consider an unclean world Our
present generation is a generation of uncleanness Both in the church
and out of the church. It's unclean Unclean We are in
an unclean state Just like Israel was just like jury rust just
like side on and Tyree were they were all in a state of uncleanness
now watch this, but they had enough sins and to go to Christ. Our generation doesn't. We'll
play church, but we won't come to Christ. Do you know how far
these people traveled to get to Jesus? They went a long ways. And I would too, if I knew he
was real. Not like the cons we have in
the British Isles and England and Definitely Africa and India. Cons and crux. Virtually all
of them are cons and crux. I say that with a sense of both
indignation and pity because they're masterful at keeping
the people deceived. Masterful. They have the gift
of gab. And they know how to sidetrack
you from a central biblical doctrine that would give you discernment
on their hooksterism, their cons, and the getting caught up in
esoteric ideas and concepts that have nothing to do with the glory
of God or the gospel of Christ. Some special knowledge, some
special insight. If you get these, you're going
to make it. If you can get a hold of these keys, but then they
play you like a fiddle until they get every penny out of you.
and still don't give you the keys. It's sad, but that's the culture
we're in. The culture that we're in. And
it's because people are in need. And they go through the whole
demonism thing and it's a mess. And Jesus is never preached as
a sovereign, saving, redeeming, truly healing Lord. But this
great man of God and great woman of God roll in and roll out wealthier
than when they came in. I despise them. So here's what
it says. And they were vexed with unclean
spirits and they were healed. And they that were vexed with
unclean spirits and they were healed. They came to hear him
and to be healed of their diseases. And they were vexed with unclean
spirits. That's the other problem in our
generation. Are you ready? Our folks are filled with unclean
spirits, but they're not vexed. See, until you're vexed, you
won't see your need of Christ. These folks, you know when something
vex you, it's intolerable, you can't live with it. Y'all know
what I'm talking about, husbands and wives. Y'all know what I'm
talking about. The neighbor vex you. Your children
vex you, your dog vex you. You know what I mean by
vexation? Just drive you crazy every day. Make you want to step
out of character, right? You know, that's how you know
you vex. You want to step out of character. Watch this. And the whole multitude sought
to touch him, for there went virtue, that's power, out of
him, are you ready? And healed them all. Crazy. It's crazy. So see, some didn't get healed
and some not. Some didn't want to get healed
and some not. Some didn't like it. Most of
your phony miracle crusade meetings, those poor ignorant souls want
to get to the man of God, a woman of God and, and the show's over. They didn't do what they did
and they got to come to the next meeting. Meet me at the next
meeting. Maybe I'll catch up with you. Right? Or some actually
got a hold of him and didn't get healed, but it's their fault
because they didn't have enough faith. Now watch this. There was no
propositional, Dialogue. There was no propositional exchange. There was no relationship on
a propositional level between Jesus and those that got healed.
They got healed because Jesus was available. They got healed
because he was near. They got healed because they
touched him. That's all they did was touch him. Boom, healed.
They didn't get healed because they were qualified for healing,
because they had enough faith. It's amazing. Now watch this. And every one of them, every
one of them, some crawl, some ran, some jump, some hopped,
some wobbled, some were carried. It didn't matter how they got
there. They touched him, got healed like that because the
virtue was coming out for the healing in an unqualified fashion. Cause you know what the son was
doing? Glorifying the father. The son was glorifying the father.
This wasn't about healing. He was fulfilling Isaiah 53.
He is the Messiah. The river is flowing. Healing
is available. He's inexhaustible in his capacity
to heal all who need it. But I'm just saying the superfluity
with which he did it was so massive that there wasn't questions going
on in the audience. Man, did you get healed? I think
so. I don't know. I'm quite. I know I had a real
bad headache before I came, but the headache went down. I mean,
it's still there a little bit, you know. but it's getting better. I think I did get healed. No, see, none of that. All healed, unquestionable, undeniable,
incontrovertible healing. That's what our master did. Powerful,
powerful, powerful, powerful, powerful. And so go back to me,
go back with me to your text a few more minutes. Let me just,
let me just share with you some thoughts. So what is this healing
business is all about? It's about pointing to Christ.
It's about pointing to the Father. It's about the source of all
recovery, essential for everyone. That's what healing is all about.
It's not about liver quivers. It's not about thrills. It's
not about an opportunity to make money. It's not about you showcasing
your healing. This is not about that. So think
about how this went as we looked at Luke 6. Jesus didn't have
them stand in a line, neither did he have them position themselves
in a fashion where he could turn this into a model for healing,
a method for healing, right? We have no method here. We have
no method at all. Whatever way they came, however
way they came, they came and got it and went, right? No method,
no requirements, no techniques. Because it wasn't about Christ
capturing a moment of people in need and taking advantage
of them so he could sell it as a package down the road. Just
absolutely phenomenal. So what Christ did in the healing
of these people really is symbolic of what the gospel's claim is
in the healing of our sin sick world. I'm just latest proposition on
you for a little while the healing of our sin sick world Our world
is sin sick, isn't it? We're getting ready to Traverse
down into the cavernous dark dark dark Terrain of Romans chapter
1 and let Romans chapter 1 show us the reality of a broken corrupt
vile sinful world from God's eyes, a text of scripture that
causes hell to shake, of which cultures like ours, this humanistic
culture, which basically depicts mankind as good, despises Romans
1. But Romans 1 really gives us
the true condition of all of us. We're broken. We're diseased. We're perverted. We're vile. We're putrid. That's humanity. That's what
we are. There's a sickness that goes
down into our very DNA. It's in our marrow, in our bone.
And it rises up like those volcanoes in Hawaii. Just comes up. Everywhere and and destroys everything
in its way. That's how bad humanity is from
God's standpoint and the world and the devil masterfully Depicts
the world as alright Do you know how they do it? They sell us
a lie They sell us a lie and guess what Saints we buy it We buy it I heard a preacher
last week in his preaching. He made the statement. I said,
Lord, I have to forgive him because he, he probably the product of
some of these schools of thought around here. I have to forgive
him. I hope he gets it right one day.
He said now, you know the Lord he he knows there's something
good in you And that's why God uses you because he see when
nobody else sees anything good in you God sees something good
at you Y'all hear that all the time in your religious circles
songs are sung that way When he didn't see anything when they
didn't see anything good to me. God saw something good at me.
Am I telling the truth? Aren't there songs sung that
way? That's what a highfalutin song particularly in our african-american
culture. You don't want to call that theologically humanism is
contrary to the biblical doctrine. So like, the assumption is, is
that God sees something good in you, but he doesn't see it
good in somebody else? Or does he see it good in everybody?
Does he see good in everybody and therefore, because he sees
good in everybody, everybody's blessed? You see the logic? You see the syllogism? You see
the argument? If in fact he sees something good in me, then either
I'm better than the next Joe, Whom he didn't see anything good
in and their life is a mess and they end up in hell And I go
to heaven because I'm better than them or God sees something
good in all of us Our God sees nothing good in any of us Nothing
but now if you use that basic argument in your Anthropology
you're going to be going against the whole tide of the present
culture even in the church. I Cause the church always holds
out. I talked about it last Monday.
63% of professing Christians believe that mankind is basically
good. And we'll use that language.
No, God sees something good in you. Will you hear me? God sees
nothing good in any of us by nature. There's nothing good. There's nothing good in us. Now
think about that. Think, think about how, see now
what we're going to learn is that the notion that we are good. We're getting ready to learn
this. This is a deception, but we're getting ready to learn
this as we go into the cavern. The notion that we are good utterly diminishes the importance
of what Jesus did. It assaults the magnitude of
His effort to apply His grace to a people who are undeserving. Because now we're deserving because
we have some goodness in us. And so all Christ is doing is
meeting us halfway. You see how the cross is diminished.
You said the sacrifice is diminished. So, you know, now all God is
doing is what is expected of God. Because verily, some men
will lay down their lives for good men. Romans five. Right. So when we say, honey, God sees
some good in you, we're lying on God. Am I telling the truth? We're lying on God. So now let
me use the analogy to get back to my point. We'll pick up on
the ministry of reconciliation through the power of the gospel
next week. I only got 10 minutes to go. So as I'm contemplating
this notion of wholeness, and I realize and informed by the
Bible that we are broken, I realize that you and I have an incurable
disease. That's Jeremiah chapter 5 and
following. An incurable disease. And I realize that the more I
examine the disease that you and I have, that that disease
has actually captured the whole of our being. That even though
we're living physically, we are a corrupt nature. That every aspect of us Is bad
in its origin and it's actually getting worse if it's not arrested
by the grace of god Does that make some sense? If it's not
arrested by the grace of god And so when the bible talks about
being made whole It uses three prominent words in the new testament
And all three of those words ladies and gentlemen are words
that are used in the medical field for the restoration of
broken bones, for the purging of diseased body parts that are
afflicted by maladies like cancer and tumors and things like that.
Catharsis is one of our words, cathartic. We use the word in
a sort of a new age sort of Mumbo-jumbo when we talk about well, that
was cathartic for me. It was healing for me healing for me
Well, the word really is a medical term for a body part limb that
was suffering some kind of disease and it was a very radical Process
that had to take place by which healing would begin to take place
and there would be a complete healing that would occur for
that body part That's what Jesus said in John chapter 15. Now,
are you cathartic through the word which I've declared unto
you? Cleaned. Healed. Completely healed. The other word that's dominant
in the New Testament, the word that's here in our text where
we use the word whole in chapter 9 verse 34, Christ make it the whole. It's
only used two times in our text, in our Bible, in our New Testament.
The word here is a holoclerion. It's a compound word. Holos is
the word for whole that we also have in our English word. Clerion
is the word for lot or inheritance. Crazy compound Greek term. Crazy compound. We're in a Greek
class. I'll show you guys how it works. But the word simply
means this. Jesus Christ now is making you whole by by virtue
of the inheritance that he's accomplished for you at Calvary
in other words the inheritance Demands that all who are part
of the covenant be completely restored to a state of pristine
wholeness crazy There it is holocaust The ministry of reconciliation
through the power of the gospel Now that word is an amazing word
cause it's used again in first Thessalonians chapter five, verse
23. Pull that up for me for a second.
So I'll play with that for a minute and then get back. It's actually
a complex sentence here in the original language, but it's fairly
simple. And this is one of our promises
is God's promise to us. Are you ready? Listen to what
it says. Now go back to verse 22 cause the end here is a conjunction
abstain from all appearance of evil. I said in period. Crazy. So you can see why I am
compelled for us to take our time and walk through these dark
caverns in Romans chapter one. Because our world is a world
full of evil. And you can see the love of the
father to his children to abstain from that. To abstain from that. Every form of it. Listen, every
form of it. Every mode of it. Every every
every kind of it every form of evil abstain That's the imperative
now here comes the promise verse 22 watch this verse 23 and the
very God of peace See that so now again peace has as its ultimate
objective complete wholeness That's what peace means. So again,
this is the Old Testament concept concerning Elohim Shalom. The
very God of peace set you apart, cleanse you, uses you completely. See the word holy and the very
God of peace sanctify you wholly, completely. So he's talking about
a promise with a process. Are you guys ready? And the very
God of peace will set you apart. That is sanctified you completely.
A complete sanctification process. Completely. He didn't say in
part, he said completely. This is a medical term. Watch
this. And I pray God, your whole, do
you see that? Now it's not whole spirit. It's
whole being. Spirit, soul, and body. be preserved. See the word blameless. Now that's the legal term. That's
the legal term. That's the legal term. So one
of them, one of them is forensic. And that is our position in Christ
and our ultimate testimony on the last day as children of God
in this world, justified freely by his grace, kept by his power,
walking in the spirit of God, doing what he's called us to
do in the process, him sanctifying us, conforming us to his image,
making us whole. I believe in being made whole
because of his preserving work, which will go on until the day
that Jesus comes. Are you guys following that logic?
Which will go on until the day Jesus comes. Go back to our PowerPoint. One more word. He said the whole,
do you notice what he said? He wants to keep the spirit,
the soul and the body. Now, if you hang out until Sunday,
you're going to see how this collaborates. Because the one
area in which we are negligent to understand
the comprehensive nature of God's sanctifying work in our life
is the area of our body. We are utterly negligent of understanding
the body's role in this process of sanctification. And we're going to see that the
devil loves to keep us ignorant about this. And so retain the people of God
and everybody else in a state of uncleanness because the body
is not sanctified. The other word is hegeneos, from
which we get the term what? Hygiene. Hygiene. Now you know what hygiene is.
If you are not hygienic, you stink. The word is, the antithesis to
the word hygienos is the word unclean, unclean, unclean. So hygienos, and that's a root
to a number of variations of the word, is a word that's used
in the New Testament for Sound sound To be sound is to be complete
when a thing is sound it's complete to be sound Like I believe that
this is the word in acts 316 watch it. There's a term in acts
316. Look at what acts 316 says Here's
how Peter puts it and I've got five minutes few minutes this
will be good I'll just I'll just Draw your attention to it. I
want you to think it through now In Acts chapter 3 verse 16 verse
15 Peter now preaching to the rulers about the man who was
healed says in verse 15 and you guys killed the prince of life
Whom God hath raised from the dead whereof we are witnesses
now watch this and his name That is Jesus Through faith in his
name, faith has as its object, Jesus Christ, watch this, hath
made this man strong. See the word strong there? That's
our Greek term, steros, from which I've told you before, steroids. So a lot of our Greek terms have
cognates in the Latin, which becomes a lot of our medical
terminology for the medical field. So here's what happened. Watch
this. When Jesus healed the layman at the gate, beautiful, he strengthened
him. through and through, reversing
the paralysis. His limbs were effete, his limbs
were shriveled up, you know that, because of a lack of muscular
use, a lack of blood flow, all of that. He was strengthened
in his limbs so that he stood up, but the text says not only
did he recover strength, watch this, whom you see now, yea,
the faith which is by Jesus, how do we get our faith? By Christ.
The faith which is by Christ has given this man, here's the
word, perfect soundness in the presence of you all. So let me
show you how this worked. When the spirit of God entered
into that lame man, he did not use canes to get up and was walking
around on canes. We would have been happy for
that. Look at the Lord healing the brother. We would have been
happy for that, right? Any advance. I mean, maybe the
spirit of God is just cut the water off. Maybe he just cut
the faucet down, whatever. But because the father was glorifying
the son. What you see is what we call
super fluidity. An outflow of the presence of
the spirit of God that so recovered the man. That he became whole
through his whole body. That's the reason he jumped up
and ran through the temple leaping and jumping and leaping and jumping. Some of us ain't paralyzed and
we can't leap and jump now. Isn't that what he did? Look
at it. Verse 6, 7 and 8. Then Peter
says, silver and gold have I none, but such as I give unto thee
in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, wise up and walk. Took
him by the right hand, lifted him up, and immediately his feet
and ankle bones received what? There it is again. And he leaping,
stood and walked and entered into the temple, walking and
leaping. Walking and leaping walking and
leaping and praising God and all the people saw him walking
and praise. Do you see it? Completely strengthened
Made completely sound so what we have here is a picture of
full restoration This is a picture of full rest. No one in glory
Will be if feet are weak in any capacity of their being We're
talking about a complete restoration So what the Bible warns about is remaining in an unclean state. Because uncleanness is the grounds
and cause for all of the malady, all of the sicknesses, all of
the disease, all of the malfunction of our physical anatomy, our
emotional anatomy, our psychological anatomy, our spiritual. Do you
guys hear what I'm saying? The unclean state is being outside
of covenant. Outside of covenant. Outside
of covenant. Listen to me, ladies. I'm telling
you something. You probably haven't heard this
before. It's outside of covenant. When you are outside of covenant,
you don't have the available mercy for healing because you're
outside of covenant. You are in the cesspool where
all the diseases are. That's called being unclean.
So like right now, brothers in Libya, right now, Liberia, they
are suffering an uncleanness, which means we don't want to
go there because we would be smitten by it, wouldn't we? Sierra
Leone and other places because of the outbreak. Is that true? That's the human race by nature. That's the human race by nature.
That's the human race by nature. So there are two categories of
people, clean and unclean. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? Clean, unclean. And on a profoundly spiritual
level, you and I have to work through what the call is. What
has God called me to? Has he called me to uncleanness?
cleanliness has he called me to an impotency of spirit and
soul and brokenness and in a level of continual corruption and Are
you guys hearing what I'm saying? Or has he called me to be healed?
And it's the believer on a trajectory and pathway of healing continually
by the grace of God because of the work of the Spirit and setting
us apart and sanctifying us and with the objective of making
us whole one day. That's it. That's it. That's
a theological consideration. You've got to work through. You've
got to work it out because I can tell you now when we get into
Romans chapter one, you're going to feel really, really bad because
it stinks. After verse 18, it stinks. Now we got some light flying
through it, but it stinks and it hits everybody. It hits everybody. Let's close in prayer. So Father,
thank you for this time. Thank you for the word. Thank
you for our consideration. And as Anais, whose name means
praise. So you have called the people
to yourself, to the praise of the glory of your grace. Yes,
you have. And you have called us out of
darkness where sin and disease grows and matures, develops and
terminates as well. You've called us out of that
which is unclean to that which is clean. You've called us to
soundness. soundness of doctrine Soundness of teaching that actually
leads us into the light that heals us by and by As folks around us need healing
we need healing we need healing of our mind We need healing of
our motives we need healing of our manners We need healing of
our methods so God we need healing in our mind motives manners methods
we need healing we're not what we ought to be. We thank you
that you have begun to work in us, but we need you to continue
until we are whole, able to leap like our brother leaped, stand
and be a witness like and may us was immediately rising up
and taking up his bed, folding it up, putting it under his arms,
letting everyone know this is no joke. God saved me and may
we Be able to say that to others, too. As objects of your mercy,
this is no joke. God save me. Have mercy upon
your people. As we go our way, give us traveling
mercies, oh God. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. God bless you.