I'm the one who requested that,
in case you're wondering. And you can do that every Sunday,
as far as I'm concerned. Let's open our Bibles today to
Mark chapter 8. Mark chapter eight and beginning
with verse 22. And he cometh to Bethsaida, and
they bring a blind man unto him and besought him to touch him.
And he took the blind man by the hand and let him out of the
town. And when he had spit on his eyes
and put his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw aught. And
he looked up and said, I see men as trees walking, After that,
he put his hands again upon his eyes and made him look up. And
he was restored and saw every man clearly. And he sent him
away to his house saying, neither go into the town nor tell it
to anyone in the town. The title of the message this
morning is Men as Trees. Men as Trees, taken from the
words of the man that the Lord gave sight to here. when he said,
I see men as trees walking. Before I come to the text itself,
I want to remind us of three truths. First of all, in the
Old Testament, it was prophesied concerning the Messiah, concerning
the one who would be the seed of the woman, who would come
and bruise the head of the serpent, he who would be the promised
Savior, he who was pictured all through those types in the Old
Testament, like the Passover lamb. that he, when he came,
that he would open the eyes of the blind. This was prophesied
of him. And I want you to see one of
these prophecies, if you will, turn with me to Isaiah 35. If you do not wish to turn, just
listen. But in Isaiah chapter 35, we
see one of these many prophecies in the Old Testament, and especially
in the prophecy of Isaiah, that foretold that when the Messiah
came, he would open blinded eyes. Here in Isaiah 35 in verse three,
we read, strengthen ye the weak hands and confirm the feeble
knees. Say to them that are of a fearful
heart, be strong, fear not. Behold, your God will come with
vengeance. even God with a recompense. He
will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall
be opened, the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall
the lame man leap as in heart, and the tongue of the dumb shall
sing. For in the wilderness shall break
out, and strains in the desert. It was prophesied of him that
he would open blind eyes, he would stop deaf ears, loose tongues
that were bound, and he would deliver prisoners, those who
were in spiritual captivity. Something else that we know is
that when John the Baptist was in prison, he sent two of his
disciples to Christ to ask this question. Art thou he who should
come, or do we look for another? And the Lord answered those two
disciples by saying this, go and show John again those things
which you hear and see. The blind, the first thing he
mentioned was the blind receive their sight. And something else,
the Lord Jesus cured many of blindness. But we only know the
name of one. We only know the name of one
man. Some that he healed of blindness, we read that he didn't touch
them at all. He just spoke the word, like
to Bartimaeus. And some he put mud on their
eyes and told them to go wash in the pool of Siloam. And one,
as in our text, he put spittle on his eyes. Those are three
things I wanted to bring out to us before we look at the text
itself. I want us to look at this miracle
of the Lord giving sight to the blind man and with others who
were given sight. I want us to consider these three
truths. This miracle and with this miracle,
other men that the Lord gave sight to. We're not going to
read those other cases, but we're going to consider this miracle
that the Lord healed this man of blindness and others. And
there are three things I want to bring to us. First of all,
there are three things that are alike. In every case, in every
miracle, when the Lord restored sight to a blind man, or gave,
I should say, gave sight to a blind man, there are three things that
are alike in every example, every case. And then secondly, there's
one difference with this man. this healing here. And then third,
I want us to think about a seeming difference. So three things that
are alike, one thing that's different, and then a seeming difference
as this miracle compared with the other miracles. What are
the three things that are alike in every case? First of all,
each one who was healed knew he was blind. Everyone that he
healed of blindness knew he was blind. I think of an example
I've heard over the years. I think it was told of Charles
Spurgeon in his preacher's school. He would call upon men just to
stand up and speak from a certain text. He would give them a text
of scripture. And he gave them a text about
a blind man being healed. And the man stood up and said,
well, first of all, he was blind in his right eye. And second,
he was blind in his left eye. And third, he couldn't see a
thing. That's as good as he could come up with. I had a class like that one time
in Bible school. A few times, a teacher called
upon us just to stand up and outline a text and bring a short
message from it. But the one thing we can say
about every case in which the Lord healed a man who was blind
is they all knew they were blind. That's just a simple truth and
yet it's so relevant. And why is it so relevant? Because
every man by birth is blind. We all come into this world spiritually
blind. One of the consequences, and
there are several consequences that we see in the scriptures
when Adam disobeyed God, but one of the consequences immediately
that we see is he was blind. That is his, not physically blind,
I'm not saying that, but immediately his understanding was darkened. the very thought that he could
hide himself from God who fills all places. We see his understanding
was immediately darkened. And then we read just after that
in Genesis that he had a son in his image. And so we know
that we all come into this world spiritually blind. Our understanding
is darkened. In 2 Corinthians 4 and verses
3 and 4, the apostle said, If our gospel be hid, it is hid
to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world hath blinded
the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious
gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto
them. You see three things in those
two verses of scripture. First of all, lost. and them
that are lost. When we come into this world,
we are lost. Even the sheep of Christ, they're
His sheep. Yes, they are chosen by God and
given unto Him by the Father, but we come into this world lost
sheep. When a person's saved, a goat
doesn't turn into a sheep. No, a sheep is found when one
is saved. But by nature, we are all lost
and the scripture says that we are children of wrath even as
others. Speaking to believers when we
come into this world. The first word is lost. If our
gospel be hid, it is him to them that are lost in whom the God
of this world. Who is the God of this world?
Satan is. He usurps that place as God. He is the God of this world who
has blinded the minds of them. And we know that he's the one
who tempted Adam in the garden. He's the one who came to them
with the temptation and Adam succumbed. He disobeyed God and
he brought blindness upon himself, spiritual blindness. His mind,
his understanding was darkened. And then that text says they
believe not. So if we turn that around and
just look at it in the opposite direction, they that believe,
our minds are no longer blinded. If they were still blinded, we
would not believe. And because we believe and our
understandings have been opened, then we're no longer lost. We're
saved. I like, you know, as they were
singing that hymn all ago, or that, yes, that hymn. I could
not help but rejoice in thinking, what a privilege, what a blessing
God has bestowed upon me all these years to be able to stand
up and preach the gospel to sinners. It's like that woman that came
to the well. Her life was in ruins. And when
we come into this world, all of us, our lives are in ruin.
ruined by the fall. One day, after giving sight to
a man who was born blind, the Lord Jesus said something that
may sound strange at first. If you look in John chapter 9,
just look over here in John chapter 9, this man our Lord gave sight
to was born blind in John 9. The Lord asked him, does thou
believe on the Son of God? And he said, who is he that I
might believe? 9, chapter 9, John chapter 9 in
verse 36. He answered and said, who is
he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And Jesus said unto him,
thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee.
In other words, the Lord revealed himself to this man who was born
blind, He had healed him. Do you believe? Do you believe
on him? And he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. And that's
always the fruit of those who believe. We worship him. We love him. We desire to serve
him. If a person says, oh yes, I believe
in Jesus, but they have no love in their heart for Christ, have
no desire to live for him, have no longing to be with Him, to
see Him, to be like Him, that faith is probably a dead faith. No, God's people, when we believe,
truly believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, we worship Him. But notice
He said, and Jesus said, for judgment I am coming to this
world, that they which see not might see. And they that which
see might be made blind. Now the Lord never caused anyone
to be physically blind. He never looked at a person who
had sight and said, be ye blind. He never did that. What is he
talking about here, this blindness? There's a judicial blindness
that when men refuse the light and refuse to see and believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ, refuse to confess the truth about themselves. Because notice what he goes on
to say. And some of the Pharisees which
were with him heard these words and said unto him, are we blind
also? Are you saying that we are blind?
Preacher, you just said that we all come into this world spiritually
blind. Yes, that's exactly what I'm
saying. Jesus said unto them, if you
were blind, you should have no sin. But now you say, we see,
therefore your sin remained. Clearly, he did not mean that
they were not blind spiritually, that they had somehow escaped
the fall. No, but if you knew, if you knew,
if you recognize your blindness, then there would be hope for
you. Your sins might be forgiven. They might be taken away. But
first of all, you must recognize your need. The blind that our
Lord healed, they all knew they were blind. You didn't have to
convince them. You're blind. No, they knew they
were blind. Suppose those who were born blind
denied that there really was anything like sight. They'd never seen, they were
born blind and someone says, well, their mother, their dad
tells them, you know, we can see, we can see your face and
we can make, I don't believe that. I don't believe that. I don't believe there's anything
like sight. They'd never seen anything. I
don't believe there's such a thing as sight. No, all of them knew
that they were blind. And they all knew that there
was such a thing as sight. In a spiritual sense, there are
those who deny that they are sinners. They deny the fact that
they are sinners and guilty before God. All men will admit they've
made some mistakes, sure. Like that one man said, I made
a mistake once when I thought I'd made a mistake. All men will
confess they've made some mistakes. That's not the issue, is it?
Men are guilty before God and they are blind. Let me ask you,
if you've ever had an experience like this, suppose you're sitting
in a room And you just turn in a certain
way, and the light from the window is shining in from the sun, shining
in through the window. And you recognize, you see, you've
been sitting in that room all this time, and all of a sudden
you see, this room is filled with particles of dust. Now,
it's always been there from the time you came into the room,
but you couldn't see it. Why? Because you didn't have
the light. And a person must have light
to see. Men, by nature, are blind to
the spirituality of God's law. They look at the word of God,
they look at the law of God, and they say, well, I can do
that. No problem. That's what the Israelites said,
wasn't it? When Moses came down with the Ten Commandments from
the mountain, they said, oh, we'll keep that. This is a covenant
that God will make with you. We'll keep that. Absolutely. We're in. It wasn't any time
before they had broken the covenant. Man, by nature, he doesn't understand
that the law of God is spiritual. That rich young ruler came to
the Lord, and there was many good things about that young
man and his coming to Christ. There was many good things. He
came running. He kneeled down. He's a good
master. He addressed the Lord in a good
way, didn't he? Remember this, he said, all these
things, when the Lord quoted several of the commands of God,
he said, all these things I've kept from my youth up. The man
was spiritually blind. He was blind to the fact that
the law of God doesn't just deal with the outward actions, but
it deals with the thoughts and intents of the heart. By nature, men are blind to the
holiness of God. They believe that God will accept
anything. The best they can do, God will
accept. No matter how it is, God's obligated
to accept. That's the very best I can do,
but it's not good enough. That's the problem. And a lost
man who's spiritually blind, he can't see that. And men by nature are blind to
the filthiness of sin. You hear this quite often, or
I do, well, this is the way God made me, excusing all kinds of
sin. What if a man was accused of
robbing a bank and he stood before the judge and said, well, this
is the way God made me? Do you think the judge would
have any mercy, any pity upon that? People say, well, this
is the way God made me. No, it's not. No, it's not. Read the Word of God. Adam was
made in the image of God. Yes, morally upright, holy, pure. But after he sinned, he did not
bring forth a child in the image of God. He brought forth a child
in his own image. And it's now a fallen image.
God made man upright. Man sought out many inventions,
the scripture says. I'm so thankful that I remind
all of us that the Lord Jesus Christ came into this world to
save sinners. Or as the Lord said, if you were
blind, if you were blind, if you saw your need, of a Savior,
if you saw your need of the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse you,
if you saw your need of that perfect righteousness that God
will accept, you would have no sin. But first of all, see your
need. All of these were alike in this
sense. They all knew they were blind.
And second, each one who was healed of blindness was healed
by Jesus Christ. He alone healed men of their
blindness. It was not the mud. You know,
he spit on the ground and made some clay or something like that
and put on that man's eyes. There was no healing efficacy
in that mud. Go wash in the pool, that pool
had water in it like every other pool. Nothing clean or meritorious
about the water, just like Naaman. Who believes that Naaman was
healed of his leprosy by the waters in the River Jordan? It wasn't anything about the
water that had any healing power. It was God who healed Naaman
of his leprosy. And the same thing is true concerning
each and every one of the blind men to whom the Lord gave sight. It was Christ who healed them.
Remember the case of that woman who had an issue of blood and
she came behind the Lord and she said, if I may but touch
the hem of his garment, I shall be made whole. And the Lord Jesus
Christ said this, virtue is gone out of me. When she was ill,
virtue is gone out of me. He didn't say virtue's gone out
of my robe. No, virtue has gone out of me.
It's Christ and he alone who has the power to heal, to save,
to cleanse. To cleanse from sin, the waters
of baptism, They can't wash away your sin. You remember this story told
about Sam Houston when they finally convinced him to join a church
and get baptized. The preacher said, all your sins
are washed away in this baptism. He said, God have mercy on the
fish. There's no power in water. to take away sin? Every one of
the blind men who was given sight, they were all healed in the same
way by Jesus Christ and Him alone. Each one who was healed of their
blindness was healed by Jesus Christ alone. He healed them
individually. Notice He took this man apart. They brought this man to Him,
but the Lord took him apart. The Scriptures are very clear
that there's one gospel, one Savior, one atonement for sin,
and those who trust in anything else or anything less than Him
are lost. And everyone was cleansed or
healed. himself individually. On the
day of Pentecost, those people asked, what must we do? They
asked Peter, what must we do? But the response was, repent
ye, individually. Each one had to repent himself. And every person must believe
in Jesus Christ for himself. And third, each one who was healed
of blindness was immediately healed. Now some, like Bartimaeus,
we're told, Saul immediately, we're actually told that. But
though this is not said of all, it was true of all. Just like
when the Lord raised the dead. A person's either dead or alive. There's no middle ground. There's
no middle ground. When he called Lazarus out of
the grave, he was dead, and then he had life. So those who were
blind, they were blind and then they saw. Every miracle was performed
immediately. There's no progression in the
performance of the miracle. And the same thing is true about
salvation. A person is lost, saved. There's no in between. A child of God, or lost, one
or the other. You say, well preacher, what
about this case? This case was like every other case. The Lord
asked him the question, if he saw ought, and you see his answer
was, he said, I see. I see. You either see or you
don't see. You either have sight or you
don't have sight. You're either saved or you're
lost. one or the other. We don't progress into salvation. We don't work our way into salvation. Men are called and given life,
and it's instantaneously. And that brings me to the second
point, one thing that is different. They did not all have the same
experience. Not all of these blind had the
same experience. Some he touched, some he anointed
with mud. This man he put spittle on his
eyes. And this, no doubt, is to teach
us that we shouldn't all expect the same experience. That God's children will not
all have the same experience in the way they are brought to
know the Lord Jesus Christ. And I've told you this before,
but What if after the Lord's death, they had a convention
in Jerusalem, and it was a convention for all the blind people who
the Lord had given sight to come and meet together. And if the
first man who stood up to speak said, the Lord gave me sight. He put mud on my eyes and he
told me to go and wash in the pool. And I went and watched,
and I saw. I came back seeing. And someone
else sitting over here, that's not so. That's not so. That's not the way the Lord gave
me sight. He gave me sight by putting spittle
on my eyes. You see, they didn't all have
the same experience in this sense, but in some ways, they all had
the same experience. They all were blind, they knew
they were blind, they were all healed in the same way by Christ,
and they were all healed immediately. And the third thing, I want us
to think of a seeming difference. And here, I'll use this man's
experience to declare this truth. This man at first did not see
clearly. He saw, don't ever miss that. He saw, but he did not see clearly. But he came to see more clearly. And I'll just use that to point
out the truth that when a person is given spiritual sight, those
who are born again and trust the Lord Jesus Christ, We're
not full-grown believers. There are babes in Christ. The
proverb says, the path of the just is as a shining light that
shineth more and more unto the perfect day. A person who is recently saved
many times is tempted by false teachers and by people who try
to convince him of something that that isn't true, and he
may listen to that for a while, but the truth is the light becomes
more clear. The longer he lives in this world,
the clearer his knowledge of Christ is, and his knowledge
of salvation becomes. None of us are born knowing everything. I had a pastor for years, and
he had a favorite saying, He used to say, if ignorance was
heavy, we'd all weigh two tons. We'd all weigh two tons. And
there's not any of us who could say, I've arrived. I mean, the
more the Lord reveals unto you, the less you realize that you
truly understand and know. We're all growing. We start off
in kindergarten, don't we? or preschool probably. And we
grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, just
like this man. At first he saw men as trees,
but then as he saw, as the Lord spoke to him, he was able to
see more clearly. For every child of God, the light
he has in comparison to when he was blind is great. for every
child of God, for the babe in Christ, the light that he has
today in comparison to what he had before, it's great, but it's
nothing, it's nothing in comparison to the light that we will have
when we see Christ. We see through a glass darkly
now. You know, that's a mirror, isn't it? A glass darkly, and
their mirrors were made out of brass, You looked into the mirror
and you couldn't see a whole lot. We see through a glass darkly
now, but when Christ comes or when we meet him, we will see
him face to face. Then the light that we have will
be much greater, but it will continue throughout eternity. Throughout eternity, we will
continue. He is infinite, and we are always
going to be finite, always. Even glorified, we're finite
beings. He's infinite, and that's part
of the joy of heaven. As we see more and more of Him,
and the joy of the Lord is increased throughout eternity. How long
is eternity? There's no limit, is it? When
we see him, what a day that will be, the songwriter said. What
a day of rejoicing when we see Christ our Lord. I want us to
sing this hymn, Look and Live. That's the message of the Word
of God, isn't it? Look to Christ. As Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up. And whosoever believeth in him
shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Let's stand as we sing
number 195. Look and live.