I don't want to attempt to be
sensational, but I hear preachers read this
passage of Scripture in Mark 5 concerning the woman who was
so very sick, and she finally came to the Lord
Jesus Christ, and He healed her. made her well after twelve years
of suffering. And these preachers say, see,
He healed this woman. He can heal you. Well, He can,
but He may not. He can. There's nothing our Lord
can't do. But He may not heal you. And
then I hear them say, This woman had faith, and she was healed. And if you have faith, I guarantee
you, you'll be healed. But you may have faith, this
woman had faith and was healed, you may have faith and die of
the same disease. Now these stories about our Lord's,
and now listen to me, I'm telling you the truth. I'm not selling
pieces of cloth for a dollar a square inch that I bought for
sixty-five cents a square yard, and getting rich on people's
emotions, I'm trying to preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ that the soul of the sinner who hears this gospel may be
healed. Now these instances in the life
of our Lord And these stories of his power to heal are not
there for us to use them to persuade people that Christ
can heal bodies. That's not there at all. Now
they're there to show his power and to show his authority over
all things. There was a man who came to him
one time and asked him to go and heal his daughter, who was very sick. And the Lord
Jesus said, well, I will come and heal your daughter. And he
said, Lord, you don't have to go to my house. This man had
caught the message. This man had caught what God was showing in the miracles
of Christ. He said, you don't have to go
to my house. He said, I have servants, and I say to this servant,
Go, and he goes, and I say to this servant, Come, and he come.
Now, you don't have to go to my house. You just command that
disease to go, and it'll go. The Lord Jesus Christ has all
authority over the wind and the waves, over the stars and the
sea. He has all authority over the
diseases and over the famines and over the pestilence and he
has authority over all flesh. That's what he said. All authority
is given unto me in heaven and earth. I have all authority,
all power over all flesh, that I may give eternal life to as
many as the Father hath given me. So what this is showing,
it is showing the authority of Christ, the Lordship of Jesus
Christ over all things. That's the first thing that miracles
indicate. Jesus Christ is not going to
heal everybody who has faith, but he's going to save everybody
who has faith. And that's the second thing that
these miracles are showing. They're showing his power. If
he doesn't have power over disease, he can't have power over death. If he doesn't have power over
the plagues, he cannot have power over sin. And so this is showing
his power and his authority over everything and over everybody.
He can heal. He can say to this disease, go,
and it will go, but he can also say to the pestilence, come,
and it will come. And the second thing it is showing,
it is showing His grace to sinners. Now you can take every incident,
every example of healing, and it will reveal to you how God
deals in mercy with the soul. Our message is not to the bodies
of men, but to the souls of men. Our task is not to heal bodies,
but to heal souls. Our task is not to deliver men
from death, but to deliver men from the from the wages of sin,
eternal death. It's appointed unto men once
to die, and after that, the judgment. All men are going to die. So
let's look at this story and see several things about this
woman that pictures the sinner. Now, first of all, look at verse
25. She was afflicted with a disease of longstanding. She had an issue
of blood for twelve long years. This woman had a disease that,
as far as man was concerned, was incurable. Hers was a hopeless,
hopeless situation. She had had this disease for
twelve long years, and according to the Jewish law, she could
not mix in company with people. She was separated from people.
She was, according to the Jewish Levitical law, unclean. And she
could not mix with people. Now do you see the picture there?
You and I are born with a disease. We have a disease of longstanding. And we didn't catch it when we
were twelve years old. We didn't catch it when we reached
the age of accountability. We were born with this disease. Turn to Psalms 51, verse 3. Now listen to David. Writing
under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, David says, I acknowledge
my transgressions, my disease, my infirmities, my sin is ever
before me, constantly before me. This woman's disease was
always with her, always before, always on her mind, always causing
her grief and pain and suffering. She had endured this disease
all these years, long-standing disease. And David said, My sin
is always before me against thee. Thee only have I sinned and done
this evil in thy sight, that thou mightest be justified when
thou speakest, and that thou mightest be clear when thou judgest. David says, My condition is so
clear. that God is justified when He
condemns me, and God is clear when He judges me, and God Almighty
is sanctified when He damns me. He speaks the truth. Now go on.
Behold, I was shapen in iniquity. I was formed in iniquity. And
in sin did my mother conceive me. Now, I don't know when a baby in the womb actually becomes
a person, and I'm not sure that anybody else does. I cannot say
at what day or what week or what month it actually becomes a living
individual, but I can tell you this. When the seed is conceived
in the womb, it's a sinful seed. I know that the sin goes back
even farther than the life. I know that the very beginning
of all flesh is a sinful beginning. That's what this scripture teaches
right here. It does not teach that the mother
sinned when she conceived the child. It's a sin not to want
children. It's not a sin to beget children. It's a sin not to want them.
And when his mother conceived him, it's not that there was
an act of sin in the conception. The sin came from the sinful
father and was imparted to the child. You can't get clean water
out of an impure fountain, and therefore a sinful father can
only sire a sinful child. So that's where our sins start.
Turn to Psalms 58. In the 58th Psalm and verse 3,
listen to this. The wicked are estranged from
the womb, separated from God from the womb. They go astray
as soon as they're born, speaking lies. Now that's how old your
disease is. That's how old your infirmity
is. That's how old your evil is. That's what God says in his Word.
They go astray as soon as they're born. speaking lies. You say, you believe babies go
to hell? No, I don't believe that. And I don't believe anybody
with good sense believes that. But I do believe babies are sinners.
And I believe they need to be saved by the blood of Christ.
I believe there's a propitiation that needs to be made for them
through the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ. I don't believe
that anybody becomes a sinner when he commits his first sin.
He commits his first knowledgeable and responsible sin, because
he is a sinner. That's what the Word of God teaches.
Now turn to Isaiah chapter 1. Listen to this, Isaiah chapter
1, beginning with verse 4. Isaiah 1, verse 4. Now listen
to the Scripture. Our disease is one of longstanding. It started when we were born.
That's what God's Word And in Isaiah chapter 1 it says, oh,
verse 4, listen, O sinful nation, a people laden or heavy with
iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corruptors,
they have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One
of Israel under anger, they've gone away backward. Why should
you be stricken any more? You will revolt more and more. Your whole head is sick. That's
the mind, that's the thought, that's the imagination. Your
whole head's sick. And your whole heart, that's
the affections, faint. From the sole of your foot, even,
to your head, there's no soundness in you. nothing but wounds and
bruises and putrefying sores that have not been closed, neither
bound up, neither mollified with ointment. That's the condition
of all men, all natural men, from the sole of the foot to
the top of the head. That which is born of flesh is
flesh, and in the flesh no man, no woman can please God. in my
flesh dwelleth no good thing." Now let me read you something.
This is all Scripture, and I'm going to start at the top of
your head and go clear to your feet, and I'm going to describe
you as you look before God. Now listen to this. God says
the natural mind is enmity against God. Your thoughts, He said,
are not my thoughts. And God looked down from heaven,
and every imagination of man's heart was evil continually. Your eyes, having eyes full of
adultery, they cannot cease from sin. Your mouth, God says, is
full of cursing, and speaketh lies. Your throat, God says,
is an open sepulcher and smells like a dead man's grave. Your
lips, under your lips, is the poison of snakes. Your heart,
deceitful and desperately wicked. Your hands, with wicked hands,
He said, they crucified the Lord of glory. Your affections, without
natural affections. Their tongues have used deceit,
and their feet are swift to shed blood." Now this woman in Mark
5 had a disease of longstanding. It had been with her a long time.
And that disease of sin, which has permeated and affected and
contaminated every faculty of your flesh, is a disease that
you got when your father conceived you, and when you were begotten,
and you were conceived in sin, and shapen in sin, and brought
forth in sin, and your flesh has been a sinful flesh since
that time, and nothing you've ever done in the flesh apart
from Christ has ever pleased God Almighty." Now, I know that's
hard to swallow. And the reason you can't swallow
it is your sinful throat won't let God's Word by, and your natural
reasoning will not bow to the Word of God. God can't be pleased
with anything the flesh has to offer. Turn to Isaiah 59. Listen to this. Isaiah chapter
59, and I'll begin my reading with verse 1. Now, I said this
woman had a disease that rendered her unclean. That's what the
Levitical law said, she was unclean. And she was to be separated from
the people, and she was to not come in with any company, any
crown. She couldn't fellowship at all.
Now it says here in Isaiah 59, what's it got to do with me and
my sin? Listen, Behold the Lord's hand
not shortened, that it cannot save. His ear is not heavy that
it cannot hear, but your iniquities, have separated you and your God. You're out of fellowship. You're
out of communion. You're out of touch. You're separated
from God. Your iniquities have separated
between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from
you, and He will not hear. For your hands are defiled with
blood, and your fingers with iniquity, and your lips have
spoken lies, and your tongues have muttered perverseness."
We're in real trouble. And as I said, this woman's disease
would eventually bring upon her death. And this disease of sin,
which we have, is eventually going to bring us to an eternal,
eternal death. In verse 26 of Mark 5, let's
look at this. And this woman had suffered many
things of many physicians, and she spent all that she had. Now,
my friends, back in those days, the science of medicine did not
exist, and physicians literally tortured their patients. The
surgery was horrible. You just have to read some of
the things that so-called self-styled physicians did in those days.
And the concoctions and the drugs that people were called upon
to take was indescribable. And this woman had spent everything
she had and gone to all of these quacks and surgeons and physicians,
and they tried to heal her. And instead of healing her, she
was now broke, bankrupt, had nothing, and she wasn't any better. She had suffered so much at their
hands that she was farther away from healing than she was when
she started. Now there are plenty of soul
physicians that have set up shop to deal with the disease of sin. Old Dr. Ceremony. He's going
to make you whole, so he sets up his candles, and he sets up
his baptismal founts, and he sets up all the uniforms of religion,
and he bids us come and be healed by the ceremonies of religion. And then Dr. Ordnance, he sets
up the table with the wine and the bread, And he says there's
salvation in that wine and bread, because the wine actually becomes
the blood of Christ, and the bread the body of Christ. And
the sprinkling of the water on the head, and the burying of
the body beneath the water, all of these things will make you
well, and they'll heal your soul, and they'll put away the disease.
That's what these doctors told this woman. And she came to them,
and she gave them everything she had. She spent everything,
and she went away still sick. And Dr. Law comes, and he gets
out the whip of do's and don'ts, and he sends us through all these
resolutions and pledge cards and all this penance and all
this grief and all this suffering and all this mourning and all
this self-denial, and we're no better. And then Dr. Good Works
comes along and says, if you'll serve the Lord, and if you'll
go to church on Sunday, and if you'll give your time, and if
you'll read your daily Bible reading, And if you'll get out
and serve the Lord, if you'll knock on doors, if you'll witness,
if you'll do all these things, you'll be made whole. And then
Dr. Decision comes along and preaches
some doctrine, and he says, if you believe my doctrine and join
my church, you'll be made whole. That's what these men told this
woman. And she tried everything they told her to do, and she
spent every dime that her husband had given her. Evidently he was
dead, and he left her a little savings, and she spent it all,
and she tried everything, and she was no better. She was just
worse off. And these so-called soul physicians
behind the pulpits today cannot help the sinners because, number
one, they don't understand the disease. The average preacher
doesn't know where sin came from, he doesn't know what sin is,
and he doesn't know the wrath and anger of God against sin.
And these so-called soul physicians are prescribing outward medicine
for inward woe. Turn to Matthew 23, here Christ
gives us an example of that. In Matthew 23, verse 25, the
Lord Jesus said, "'Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, you preachers.'"
That's who these men were, they were preachers. "'Woe unto you
preachers, hypocrites! You may clean the outside of
the cup and the platter, but within you're full of extortion
and excess.'" This woman's trouble was inside. And these fellows
gave her all kind of baths to go through, and hot springs to
go through, and all kind of medicine to rub on her body, and all these
different things. And that's what these preachers
are saying. They're saying, do this, and do that, and do the
other. Christ said, listen, Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first,
purge first that which is within. that the outside of them may
be clean." Our trouble's not hand trouble or skin trouble,
it's heart trouble. And these men don't understand
the disease, and they're prescribing outward medicine for inward disease. And they're prescribing remedies
which the sick sinner cannot possibly perform. Turn to Matthew 19. Listen to
the Lord Jesus here. In Matthew 19, verse 26, it says,
When his disciples heard it, they were amazed, and they said,
Who then can be saved? And the Lord Jesus said, With
men it is impossible. The disease is incurable. The problem cannot be dealt with. There is no church under heaven
that can put away sin. There's no ordinance given to
man that can put away guilt. There's no preacher or apostle
or evangelist or missionary or priest or bishop or cardinal
or pope who can forgive any man's sin. There is no ordinance, there
is nothing in this world that can deal with sin if it has anything
to do with men. With men it is impossible. Who
can be saved? With men it's impossible. Who
can be saved? With men it's impossible. All right, let's notice the third
thing. This woman, had been sick a long time, and she'd tried
everything people told her to do, and she wasn't any better.
She was worse. And I'm saying this. I'm saying
that the average church member is worse off than he was when
he started the church when he was five, six years old. He suffered
so much at the hands of self-styled apostles and so-called preachers
of God. And these self-styled physicians
who are quacks and soul butchers, that people are worse off right
now because they're worshiping a God they do not know. And they're
claiming a salvation they do not have. And they're looking
forward to enjoying a heaven they'll never see. And that's
tragic. And that's what Christ is saying.
That's the reason this is in here. These physicians, they've
got no conscience. They've got no heart. This woman
came to them, she had some money, and so they'll give her a cure.
It won't cure her, but they'll give her something to do. And
she'll go out and try it, and she'll do it, and that's the
way these religious hucksters are today. You're just a body
to them, you're just a number to them, you're just another
church member to them, you're just another baptism to them,
you're just another dollar to them, and they don't care if
you go to hell or not. That's about the size of them. And you're worse off. A man out
there who's never heard of the gospel, who's never heard of
God, who's never heard of Christ, is better off than a man who's
wrapped in a false religion and tied up in a false profession
and hiding in a false refuge, waiting for the wrath of God
to rout him out at the judgment and send him to hell, crying,
Lord, I prophesied in your name. I cast out devils in your name.
I did many wonderful works in your name. I did everything they
told me to do. everything. All right, verse
27. When she heard of Jesus, brethren,
that's the reason the Apostle Paul said, I'm determined to
know nothing among you save Christ and Him crucified. With men it's
impossible, but with God all things are possible. When she
heard of Jesus, I don't know where she heard of Perhaps she
heard somebody talking who had been healed by Him. Perhaps she
heard somebody talking who believed that He was the Messiah and said,
Did you know the Messiah has come, that Christ has come, the
one of whom Moses wrote? Perhaps she heard of the miracles
which He had performed. Perhaps she heard somebody give
a testimony who had been healed by Him. I don't know, but she
heard of Christ. She didn't hear of the great
evangelist who was coming to town, she heard of Christ. She
didn't hear about the fastest growing church in the world,
she heard of Christ. She didn't hear about a program,
she heard of Christ. She didn't hear about a doctrine,
she heard of Christ. When she heard of Christ, she
came in the press behind him and touched his garments, for
she said, if I may but touch his clothes. If I may but touch
His clothes." The emphasis is not on her. The emphasis is not
on her. It's not on her touch. It's on
Him. There's power in Him. There's
salvation in Him. There's fullness in Him. There's
virtue in Him. There's strength in Him. If I
can touch Him, if I can make a contact with Him, I shall be
made whole. It matters not what my uncleanness
may be. It matters not what my character
may be. It matters not what my state
of mind. If I can but touch Him, Him. It's not reach out and touch
the radio and establish contact with a minister. Brother, it's
reach out and touch the Lord. touch the Lord. In Him there's
strength. Salvation is in Christ. The power
is in Christ. The life is in Christ. The strength
is in Christ. The beauty is in Christ. The
grace is in Christ. That's what she's saying. If
I can but touch His clothes, anything about Him, I shall be
made whole. We've got to get men to Christ,
not to the front of the church, not to the mourner's bench, not
to the baptismal waters, not to our revival meetings. We're
going to have to preach men to Christ. We're going to have to
preach so that the law will strip them, and the law will slay them,
and the law will humble them. and the law will knock all the
foundations of flesh out from under them, and stand them out
there naked and miserable and hopeless with no help and no
hope except in God's mercy, and have them cry out, Lord, save
me or I perish, if I can but touch Him. We're going to have
to preach so that people will become upset with and dissatisfied
with modern religion. and phony doctors and phony preachers. We're going to have to preach
so that men and women will see the difference in what we're
preaching and what they're preaching. Rather, who we're preaching and
what they're preaching. I don't preach of what, I preach
of who. I preach Him. I preach Christ. I'm not preaching
any magic in our doctrine or any magic in our name or any
magic in our denomination or any magic in anything else. The
power is in Christ. And if you miss Christ, you'll
go to hell. I don't care what else you have or what else you
know or what else you do. If you miss a personal, vital
contact with and vital union with Jesus Christ, you'll go
to hell. I don't care if you're a preacher
or an elder or a deacon or a Sunday school teacher or what you are.
You miss Christ and you miss life. because of the powers in
him. She said, if I can but touch
him, his clothes, if I can but get from him strength and power,
if I can maintain some communion with him, with him And I'm telling you, my dear
friends, when that woman came in the press behind him, and
she reached out with trembling hand, and I'm sure that it was
just skin and bones. She'd been sick so long, and
these butchers, these body butchers, just like these soul butchers,
had put her through horrible experiences. And she reached
out with a trembling hand, and she somehow, reached out and
got in contact with the robe of Jesus Christ. And the Scripture
says, listen, listen, and straightway, right now, immediately, her blood was dried up, and she
felt in her body that she was healed of the plague. Her faith
didn't save her, her Lord saved her. But her hand reached out,
and the deed was done. She wasn't saved by faith. She was saved by the Lord, but
she wasn't saved without it. She was not healed. She was not
healed by her faithfulness. She was healed by His power,
but she wasn't healed without her faithfulness. Her hand reached
out and touched him. She wasn't accidentally shoved
against him. Listen to it. And the Lord Jesus
said, listen in verse 30, He said, And his disciples said,
ìWhy, Lord, everybody around here has bushed against you and
leaned against you and fell against you, the crowd throngs about
you.î He said, ìI perceive that virtue or power is gone out of
me.î Thatís what it says in another scripture, ìI perceive that power
is gone out of me.î Her touchólisten to this nowóher touch, not every
contact with the Lord brought healing. only that contact of
faith. And her touch was her own distinct,
intentional, voluntary act that was performed under the persuasion
that if she got to Him, she'd be healed. Her faith brought
her to Christ, and Christ made her whole. Is that clear? Do you see what I'm saying? Her
faith brought her to Christ, and Christ made her whole. If I can but just touch Him,
if I can establish some contact between the Lord Jesus Christ
and this old empty, helpless, sinful, hopeless, depraved, hell-deserving
sinner, if I can maintain, if I can establish some contact,
I'll be made whole." And brethren, that's exactly what our Lord's
teaching here. If you can, by faith, if you—this
woman was convinced that if she touched Christ, if she came in
contact with Christ, she'd be made whole. Are you convinced of that? Other
foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, Christ the
Lord. There is none other name unto heaven given among men whereby
we must be saved. I am the way, the truth, and
the life. No man cometh to the Father but by me. I am the door. By me, if any man enter in, he
shall be saved, and go in and out, and find pasture." Christ,
He's the Savior. He's the Savior. Our Father in
heaven, show us our need, make us unhappy with our sins. Let
us say with David, all my sins are always before me. I was shaped
in an iniquity, conceived in sin, brought forth speaking lies. In my flesh dwelleth no good
thing, and I am sick and tired of the remedies of the world,
the remedies of religion. I am tired of all of these things
that the world has set forth to make our flesh acceptable
to God. With me, it is impossible. O
Lord, that I may win Christ and be found in Him, that I may reach
out with the arm of faith, that I might look with the eye of
faith, that I might believe with the heart of faith, and receive
from Him His strength and His merit and His righteousness and
His power. and establish a living, personal,
vital union with the Lord Jesus Christ, who is my righteousness,
my justification, my sanctification, and my redemption, and I am complete
in Him. We ask it in His name and for
His sake. Amen.