244: Yet A Little While - sermon

In this episode, we share a sermon preached in English at New Life Church of Vicenza. This message comes from the Gospel of Mark, chapter 5, verses 21-43.

In this message, we learn 5 Realities The Christian Must Embrace:

I. Pain and Suffering are Unavoidable, Now
II. Jesus is the Hope of the Hopeless
III. To be Saved We Must Come Rightly to Jesus
IV. As We Come Rightly, We Receive Mercy and Grace
V. Christians are Called to be Compassionate Evangelists

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The Italian Cohort

Transcript

Hello everybody Jesse Schreck with Practical Missions Cohort. In the podcast episode for today we're sharing with you a sermon that was preached at the New Life Church here in Vicenza in Italy, for our brothers and sisters in the US Army. This particular passage comes from the second part of chapter five in the Gospel of Mark, verses 21 to 43. And it's an account of an encounter of Jesus with people that are in hopeless situations. It's a great reminder for us today of who is our Savior, who is our Lord. And we see some very key topics in here as well as far as what Christ has done for us. That is, he came and lived among us as a man of sorrows, understanding our pain, understanding our hurt in this life in this fallen world. And we also see that Jesus Christ died young, in our place though, on the cross enduring a death and pain and trauma that we cannot even imagine, in order to save us from our sins, God the Father's wrath, and to give us new life, real life. May you be blessed and encouraged as you tune in today.

Let me pray for us, and then we'll get into our text for today. Gospel of Mark chapter five. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, as we come to your word now we we give you thanks. We give you thanks that you have given us your word, that it's alive, that it penetrates our hearts, it transforms us and renews us. It's nourishment to our soul, it's salvation for us. Lord, as we continue our worship this morning, we do ask that you sensitize our hearts, the ears of our hearts, to hear your word and to receive your word. Help us to be good listeners. Help me Lord, to proclaim faithfully your word, by the power of your Spirit, trusting in your word, trusting in your Spirit. And work in such a way, Lord Jesus, this morning that each of us finds a renewed vision of how great and mighty you are, how tender and merciful you are to us as well. And how you are the hope, Jesus, that we need. And you are greater than we can comprehend. And you're with us. renew us this way we pray in Jesus name. Amen.

The first half of the gospel or chapter five of the Gospel of Mark. Last week, we saw the first 20 verses in a very dramatic scene of a man who was bound by demons; demonic possession, torture, in anguish, nobody could set him free, nobody could liberate him. He was a lost cause. He was hopeless. It reminds us that each of us in a very real sense are also bound. Are we not? How many things have you wanted to do even this past week, desires of your own things you wanted to do, but you were just limited, unable. And before we came to Christ, we were also bound by our sin, slaves to it, slaves to Satan and held captive by him to do His will. But Jesus came to us and he sets us free just like he did with this man. He sets free lost causes like us, and He gives us a new purpose. And he gave a new purpose to that man as well. To go and to testify and to proclaim what God has done. We also have that same call. We saw how the Lord Jesus has power and authority over the spiritual realm. Jesus was no ordinary man, he was not just a carpenter, he was God in our midst, Emanuel, God with us. 

Today, we're going to come face to face with another very dramatic scene. The second half of chapter five show us real pain, real anguish, suffering, disillusionment, something that all of us can relate to, in one degree or another. We also come into contact today with our Lord Jesus Christ and His great compassion, his compassionate heart, his powerful hand, to transform our circumstances and to make us new. We're going to see how he is our only hope, not just a hope, but our only hope. So we're going to read this passage, we're going to come back through it as I typically do, and we're going to leave a couple comments. It's a longer passage so I won't be able to say as much as I would like, but we're going to, in any case, unpack a little more of the context, what's going on, and see some important things in this passage in these two particular dramas. Then we're going to arrive at five realities that every Christian must embrace. Five realities for us today that we need to just embrace, accept, and take with us. Let's read our passage starting from verse 21.

And when Jesus had crossed again, in the, in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him, and he was beside the sea. Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue Jairus by name and seeing him he fell at his feet, and implored him earnestly saying, "my little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well and live." And he went with him. And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years, and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better, but rather, grew worse. She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd, and touched his garment. For she said, "if I touch, even his garments, I will be made well." And immediately, the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body, that she was healed of her disease. And Jesus, perceiving and himself that power had gone out from him, he immediately turned about in the crowd and said, "Who touched my garments." And his disciples said to him, "you see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, Who touched me." And he looked around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, and fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. And he said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you well go in peace, and be healed of your disease. While he was still speaking, there came from the rulers house, some who said, "Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further." But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe." And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter, and James, and John, the brother of James. They came to the house with the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. And when he had entered, he said to them, "Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead, but sleeping." And they laughed at him. But he put them out all outside and took the child's father and mother, and those who were with him, and went in where the child was. Taking her by the hand, he said to her, "Talitha Cumi", which means, "Little girl, I say to you arise." And immediately the girl got up and began walking, for she was 12 years of age. And they were immediately overcome with amazement. And he strictly charged them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat. He was ears to hear, let him hear. 

In verse 21, to capture our context today and what's going on, before we arrive, at these five realities we need to embrace, we see that Jesus crossed again in the boat to the other side. He just got done, liberating the demon-possessed man, and the people there, contrary to what we see in today's passage, the people there say, "Get out of here, we don't want you around here. We don't like people of your kind. You're bad for our business. Get out of here." And Jesus left. He set the man free, sent him on his way, gave him a mission, gave him a purpose for the rest of his life and he leaves, he departs. And here he is again, the missionary that Jesus is, on the move, actively fulfilling the will of God the Father, proclaiming the gospel, the good news, fulfilling his ministry, and he's on the other side now. And we have a great crowd gathering about him. His ministry again, we see is booming. It's exciting. Never a dull moment in the ministry of Jesus Christ. And for us that follow him wholeheartedly, for us that desire to please our master, to be useful to our master, we can be assured as well, there's never a dull moment. Everything has its purpose as you follow Jesus Christ.

Verse 22, we see that a ruler came one of the rulers of the synagogue Jairus. He would not be a teacher, a rabbi, but he had the role of ordering the worship, overseeing those who are ordering the worship happening in a synagogue. He's an important person in any case, and he comes and he falls at the feet of Jesus. It's a good image for us. It's a way to remember this morning when we come to Jesus. This is what he deserves, our humble adoration. We're entirely dependent on Jesus for everything in this life. Every breath comes from the Lord. All of us are entirely dependent on him. It's he alone who knows the number of our days. It's he alone who sustains us. This man likely heard of the ministry of Jesus Christ, perhaps Jesus was frequenting the synagogue there in Capernaum. In any case, he heard of what Jesus can do, he was aware of it, and this man came to Jesus humbly and full of faith. He believed in what Jesus was able to do. 

He implored him earnestly, we read in verse 23, "My little daughter". It's Luke, or Matthew, who reveals that she is his only daughter. You can imagine what this man has been going through. His daughter, we read here is at the point of death. The agony of this man the pain, the uncertainty he's going through. "Should I leave my daughter alone and go try to find Jesus? Or will it be too late? Did I wait too long? Is there still enough time? Or should I stay because she could be gone at any moment? Every breath is a gift coming to her from God, will she have another one in an hour? I don't know." He's moved in any case, to leave his only daughter behind, not knowing what would happen, to risk everything, not being there for her in the final moments to find this man, Jesus. He pursues the Lord. He says to the Lord, "Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live." We read in verse 24, Jesus went with him. He was happy to meet this request. He had a purpose in this as well. It was not for no reason. They sent him away from the other side. Jesus knew at the same time, there are things I need to accomplish again, back on the other side of the water. Jesus is active in the ministry. A hopeless man comes to him, and he's happy to go with him. But we see it's not so easy. It's not so simple. 

Jesus' ministry is booming. And we read the next part, a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And if you think of this verse, and you just ponder it... What a beautiful picture! This is a beautiful picture, a great crowd of people is following and pushing in to get close to Jesus Christ, the master, the Lord, the Creator of all. Everybody needs Jesus, how wonderful it is when we come running to him when his people abide with him, and throng about him. It's beautiful to see this here, this reality, all of God's creatures here coming to him, gathering around Jesus, wanting to get anything they can from him to be with him. And it ought still be this way today. But then we have here a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years, she comes into the picture as well. Another person with great pain, anguish, suffering, desperate, hopeless, yet she still has a little bit of hope. It's probable that with 12 years of this kind of suffering, being an outcast, no longer welcome in the synagogue, no longer welcome among her own family, no longer able to go to temple, it's likely she was tempted perhaps, to take her own life. What is the point of living, we're not made to be alone, we're not made to be in isolation. She was very much in this condition like a leper, or even like a corpse, a walking corpse, to touch her would make you unclean. She had to stay far from all the other people to not risk making other people unclean. To have an unclean status, this is her reality. She suffered much we read here, she suffered much under many physicians. Dr. Luke in his account adds that there was nothing left to be done. Her disease was not curable, at least not at this time with the medicine and the things that were available. It was not curable, what she had and Dr. Luke knows because he's a physician.

She suffered much pain. She spent all that she had. Now when we invest money, when we spend money, we hope it gives us what we desire. It's the worst thing when we spend the little we have instead of getting what we spend, we get the opposite. This is an absolute tragedy that this woman has gone through. The physical pain, the mental and psychological pain, the emotional pain, this woman is very much spent. She didn't get better, she grew worse. It's a true tragedy. True pain. True heartache. Many of us have experienced moments like this. We live in a fallen world, there are all kinds of complexities, nothing quite goes the way it ought to. Rare, if we're honest, are the moments when everything is well. And as we'll see later, even when everything is well for us today, we have to be mindful that around the world terrible things are happening to all kinds of people in many different ways. We'll look at that in a moment. 

Verse 27, that we read she heard the reports, she heard the reports about Jesus. That's the call we have. To be reporting about Jesus, what he's done, and what he's done for you. It's one of the blessings of the testimony time in church to testify what God is doing in our life. There's power in that. The famous John Bunyan, who wrote the Pilgrims Progress. I read a report not long ago that when he was still young in the faith, he had overheard women on a porch talking about the master, talking about Jesus, talking about scripture. He overheard them talking, and he was struck to the heart. He realized how immature he still was in his faith, and it moved him to go closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. There's something very special about when we give time to freely talk about our Master. I encourage all of us, let him have a place at your table, let him be in your discourses, make him the primary focus of each day. As a family, make sure together in one way or another you are coming to the word of the Lord each day and praying together. There's something truly spectacular about that. It makes us salt and light in this dark world. "She heard the reports." And because people were talking about Jesus, her life was changed forever. Reports came to her ear as well. And in her hopeless situation, a glimmer of hope arose. "If I can just get to this man, my life could change forever." And she even says to herself, we read here that if she could just touch his garments, she would be made well. She reasoned this way. But interestingly though, what we see here in the second part of verse 27, is that she came up behind Jesus in the crowd and touched his garment. To do what she's doing, she's actively disobeying the Old Testament ritual laws. She's supposed to be far from people. If people come near to her like that, she has to say, "Keep away." Here she is in the crowd. People are touching her. Who knows how many people she rendered, contaminated, unclean, because of what she's doing here. She's violating Old Testament ritual law coming to Jesus Christ.

And then again, she touches the Rabbi of all people, the Master, the Lord of Glory. But she does it. She has faith. "If I touch even his garments", her faith says to her, "If I touch even his garments, I will be made well." This could be perhaps a little bit of superstition because in this day it was believed that if you touch somebody important or a famous teacher like this, you could be healed, things could happen, you could be blessed. Perhaps it was a bit mixed with superstition. But in any case, we see here even Jesus points out her faith is what makes her well. She had genuine faith. 

And immediately, we see in verse 29, the flow of blood dried up and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. A true miracle here happened immediately, instantly, not the kind of things we see on TV with fake evangelists, not the kind of word of faith stuff where they tell you, "Send us your money and have faith that you'll be healed of all your troubles. You'll be blessed and rich and happy and glorious forever. Oh, it didn't happen to you? Well, you need to send a little more money, show God your faith, and then it'll happen to you." Total charlatans exist today, and they take advantage of poor folks. It's a terrible thing. The Word of Faith movement, there's a lot that can be said about that. But often they'll say, "Well, it's coming to. Your miracle is coming. Your healing is coming. Just give it time, it'll come, it'll come." It's all nonsense! It really is. A true miracle is instantaneous, and God demonstrates, Jesus demonstrates himself to be God by doing an instantaneous miracle here to this woman. 

On a side note, though, with the Word of Faith movement, not too long ago, maybe a year and a half ago, there was a young baby who died; a two or three-year-old. And in a well-known church, where the Word of Faith movement is growing, and they do all this kind of stuff. They were believing this girl will be resurrected because that's obviously God's will that we should all live, be healthy, be happy, and all the time. And so they're all making chants and acting by faith trying to show God they believe that she's gonna rise from the grave. For about a week or 10 days, they went on just constantly praying and singing songs, trying to show God their faith because it's obvious if they have enough faith this girl will come back to life. As we know, the girl didn't come back to life. God is the one who sovereign. He's the one who's in control of when we live, how we live, how long we live, and when we go. He's the author of life, and these things belong to Him. It's not expected that we'll able to heal everybody and anybody. It's not expected that we'll be able to raise people from the dead. 

When we understand the gospel, we see we have been spiritually dead, and he raised us, when we were born of the Spirit of God, raised us to new life. We have eternal life. We'll still experience pain will still experience suffering now, but we have the blessed hope. This is the glorious gospel. We walk by faith. We know what is to come is far better than anything we can imagine now. If we have life today, we want to give it to the Lord. We want to render ourselves useful to the Lord. We want to live for him and for His glory, knowing, yes, we will die one day, but we live forever. We live on because Jesus is the Lord of our life. He has redeemed us, he has purchased us, he has put his Spirit within us. 

In any case, a true miracle happens here. Jesus perceives that power went out of him. And he says, "Who touched my garments?" This is a great topic here for theological debate, but we won't get into it because we don't really need to today. Did he not know? Or did he know? The hypostatic union. Fully God, truly God, truly man at the same time. How did that work? Nobody fully understands. It's a mystery, but it's astonishing. The Lord Jesus said he doesn't know when will be the day of his second return. Yet he's God. He knows, but he doesn't in his flesh. He doesn't know and it's a similar situation here, perhaps. Most likely, in any case, what is happening here is he wants to give, I believe, an occasion to bless this girl, this woman, even more. She suffered so much. He could have just let her be healed and pretended he knew nothing about it while she went on her way healed and happy while he continued going to meet the need of Jairus to save his daughter. He could have just ignored it, let it happen, and moved on. But he made a point of this. He had more to give this woman. Perhaps she would have gone on otherwise thinking to herself, being healed and well, and years down the road looking back, feeling guilt. "You know, I really shouldn't have done that. I'm happy that I'm well, but I was causing other people to be unclean that day. I was sinning. I wasn't doing right..." So Jesus here finds an occasion to have her come out of the crowd and give her additional blessing to speak words of comfort to her as well. The disciples were perplexed though. They said, "You see people all around you and you say who touched you? What are you mad? Did you have too much coffee this morning? Are you jittery? What's going on? Everybody's touching you." Right? Jesus looked around to see who had done it. 

The woman knowing what happened, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him. She comes knowing it actually happened. This man actually caused me to be well. "I have to come out and say." But she came in fear and trembling, and she fell down before him. And I think here's another beautiful picture that we all need to remember when we come to Christ for salvation, and when we continue to come to Him as our Lord as our Savior. Are we coming in this way? With holy fear and a proper fear Trembling and falling down before Him? Do we give him the reverence that's due to his name? Or do we treat him more like a Santa Claus or something like this? A genie in a bottle. Many of those in the Word of Faith movement, unfortunately, treat him like a genie in the bottle. If they rub him the right way, they think, they'll get what they want. They make donations and contributions thinking, "I'm gonna give $1,000 and that means, God will give me $5,000 back, you know, that's fantast I'm making an investment with God." But a true giver gives sacrificially. It hurts to give to the Lord. But we do it by faith knowing that what we need, he amply supplies. What we actually need, he'll give us. She came trembling and fell down before Him with reverence. She told him the whole truth. It's a beautiful picture. 

As we continue on, and we'll go fast through this next part, there is something here worth noting though. She says to her these words of comfort, "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed of your disease." Daughter. Clearly, Jesus wasn't married, he didn't have kids. This isn't his actual daughter. But perhaps this is indicating that she was a daughter, a true daughter of Abraham, a daughter of the promise. Not everyone who was of Israel, not all the Jews were actual Jews, of God and of the promise. Many lived in the land. Many of the Pharisees, for example, knew the Word of God, knew the things of the Lord but didn't accept Jesus as the Messiah. They weren't true Israelites in that sense. But the true children of God, in one way or another, their faith, one way or another, is made evident. It's visible, it becomes real. And this perhaps was an occasion for her faith to be solidified. "Daughter. Your faith has made you well, your faith is authentic, you risked it all to get to me, knowing I can change everything," Jesus says. He gives her those words of comfort here, "Go in peace." Take into account that this woman, for 12 solid years, likely did not have one full day of peace. She's an outcast. Her own family she had to stay far from. They probably disowned her. She's unable to go to synagogue to worship, unable to go in temple to worship. No peace. And Jesus says to her, he didn't just let her go, he speaks words to her. The words of Christ, the words of God, transform us. "Go in peace. Go in peace." What a joy this woman now is experiencing. 

And while he was still speaking, verse 35, there came from the ruler's house, some who said, "Your daughter is dead." Feel the pain here. Feel the anguish. Feel the drama. If you're a parent, you know, these are the absolute last words you ever desire to hear in your earthly life. Nothing could be more painful than to hear, "Your daughter is no more." All hope this man had is now lost. He took the risk. "I'm gonna leave my daughter behind. I don't know if I'll see her alive again. But I'm willing to take the risk because I know this man here Jesus can change everything." He goes by faith. And then he hears, "Don't trouble the Master anymore. She's already gone." His heart fell to the floor. There's nothing left. He probably just broke into tears, weeping in despair, knowing he's hopeless. What he feared the most just became his reality. 

And we read the next verse. But overhearing. Jesus, he hears. He overhears. He hears what's going on. He's aware. And in a very real sense, if you belong to Jesus Christ today, he hears and sees what's going on in your heart. He knows your anguish. He knows your difficulty. He knows your struggle. He's ever living to intercede for us. And he says to him, "Do not fear, only believe. I know you're overwhelmed. I know you're terrified. Don't fear. Listen, I'm not done here. My plan with you is not finished. Keep trusting me," Jesus says. Imagine the man. The Lord of Glory looking him in the eye and speaking these words, "Keep believing. The end is not here. There's something more you're going to see today. This is no ordinary day for you, Jairus."

And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James and John, the brother of James. He gets a small group, his inner circle, and they go. They came to the house, the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. A real drama unfolding. Now there were also here paid or professional mourners. Professional weepers This is a new thing for me. It's so fascinating. Everyone in this time, in this place, in this people would be required to have professional mourners at a funeral. Much more even for an important person like Jairus, a synagogue ruler involved there in overseeing things. These people would come and weep and play the flute and wail and create a commotion. And Jesus says to them, "Why are you making a commotion and weeping? This child isn't dead, she's sleeping." And they laughed at him. Likely hear these folks who have seen death many, many times, and they've never seen anybody rise from death. They knew she was dead, truly dead, fully dead. "You can't talk like this. You're out of your mind," they laughed. These people here, likely were not true children of Abraham, children of the promise. They showed it that they weren't this day anyway. They didn't really believe Jesus could do anything to change the circumstance. 

He put them all outside. They go into the room, we read in verse 40. And in verse 41, Jesus does the unthinkable again. To touch a corpse would render you unclean. Just like touching a leper, just like touching this woman who's unclean. And he extends his hand and not only touches this girl. What does he do? He takes her by the hand and he says to her, "Little girl I say to you arise." God Almighty. No one can bring people back from the dead, but God Almighty. Jesus, here we see, is Lord over our lives, over life, over death, and he can bring people back to life. He does it here. It's an image of the resurrection and of what he would do for us, and ultimately what awaits us in the life to come and his return when we will be raised to new life. We also see a beautiful picture of regeneration, of what happens to all of us when we come to Christ to be saved from our sin and saved from the wrath of God, the Father. We are born spiritually dead, all of us. And Jesus, according to His will, according to His timing, by the work of the Holy Spirit, causes new birth, regeneration. He brings us to life. In Italian, we say, "ci vivifica". He brings us to life. It's a beautiful thing. We see here a speech act of God here again. He says the word and that's all it takes. Everything transforms just like when he spoke and the world came into being. This is our Jesus. 

She got up began walking. 12 years of age, we read. Everyone overcome with amazement, and rightfully so. And all of us if we're born of the Spirit of God, I encourage you today be again overcome with amazement of what God has done for you. Yes, things are not going the way you desire in your life. Yes, you're limited in so many capacities, but he made you new, he gave you new life, he made you a new creature, Your sins are forgiven, your debt is paid. You have the Spirit of God in you. Be overcome with amazement again by that. And interestingly, as we close the passage, he charged them that no one should know this. Another time here when we see the Messianic secrecy of Jesus. He has the timing. He has the plan. He doesn't always want his name and who he is to be revealed to everybody because then he can't fulfill His ministry, the exact plan that he has to fulfill. "Keep this to yourself for now." Unless they forget to feed their daughter because of the excitement. "Give her something to eat." If it was in our day today he might say, "Give her a hamburger or something." She really is alive. 

 As we close today let's look at five realities. If you take notes, you can write these down. Just five realities that I really believe we all need to embrace and take hold of as they will transform our lives as we live for the Lord this week. 

Number one, pain and suffering are unavoidable, now. Seal that in your heart. Remember that smooth sailing is not a reality yet. Difficulties and challenges will arise. We live in a fallen world. It's cursed. It was good. It was perfect in the beginning. Man chose to disobey God, a curse came upon the land. Now you cut your grass and you sweat like an animal. Now you have heart palpations. Now things don't work out the way you want. Now people get sick. Pandemics happen. Viruses happen. Plagues. All because sin entered the world. It's fallen. This is a reality.

Forget not your present realities. As you're living here to honor the Lord, as you're living and walking by faith, forget not your present reality. Illness is here now. Death is part of this life. Pain, sorrow, despair, regrets, fatigue, anxiety, sweat, separation, isolation, loneliness, emptiness, confusion, worry, sadness, all these are part of our present reality. Embrace it. Understand it. Understand why it is that way. Even this woman here who was healed and Jairus' daughter who was brought back to life, astonishing things. But what do we know? Because they live in this fallen world, surely, in the time to come, this woman would be sick again. This girl would fall ill again have difficulties, troubles, and struggles in life. And both of them would eventually also suffer death. They couldn't avoid that. It was coming one way or another. It was only prolonged a little bit for them. And I want us to take into account also this. Those of us who are comfortable in our walks with Christ. Till now persecution has been little. We need to remember, for us even when things are going well, and I pray things are well for you and for your soul and they will be most of the time. But even when things are going well, don't be ignorant of what's happening all around this world today right now. Abortions... 1000s of babies slaughtered and ripped apart every single day. Since Roe v. Wade, I think over 60 million babies have been ripped out of the womb and ripped to pieces. This is happening all over the world. Wars are happening. Illness, cancer, starvation, and on the other end of starvation, in America, we have lots of people eating too much. We're obese. It's a real thing. And then we eat stuff that was not made to be put in our bodies; refined sugars and things like this that actually kill us secretly, and we don't even know about it. All this is part of what we're experiencing. Rape is happening. Abuse, corrupt political agendas, we're seeing that now, aren't we? Persecutions and all kinds of things are still the present reality in this world. When things are going well, don't forget, it's still happening. Many people are in this great sorrow, anguish, and pain today. 

Second Reality that we need to embrace as a Christian: Jesus is the hope for the hopeless. He's the hope of this world. Recall the gospel. Meditate upon the gospel. He lived among us. How did he live among us? The Bible says that he lived as a man of sorrows. He knows the pain of this woman, he knows the pain of Jairus and his family, he knows your pain. He lived among us as a man of sorrows, while fulfilling the law of God on your behalf and on my behalf. And then he endured the cross. He died young, only 30 some years. He died young, in your place and my place to save us from eternal death, eternal punishment, the wrath of God the Father. That's the gospel. He's the hope for the hopeless. He's restoring. He's making all things new. We have the blessed hope. If we're Christians, if we're united Christ, we have the blessed hope. Abide in Him every hour. Every day abide in him. We need him. We need to flock to him as they did in this passage. Let that be your priority this week. Flocking to him. And the truth is, we have him. If we repented of our sins, we've trusted in Christ, we have the Lord of Glory. We have the blessed hope. 

Third reality as we close today: To Be Saved, We Must Come to Him Rightly. We need to come to him rightly. And how did these folks come to him? They came humbly. They came with real faith, and they came with fear and trembling. Are you truly saved today? Have you put your faith in Jesus Christ? Have you turned from your sins? Have you repented? Put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ? Many presumed to be saved, because of what they do or don't do. They presume this. Many come to Jesus, as I mentioned in those Word of Faith movement places, they come to Jesus, the Jesus of their imagination for a healing, or a physical blessing. They want to get something from him. That's why they love him. That's why they come. They don't want him really. They want what he has to offer. And many I would say as well confess Christ, without actually possessing Christ, and there is a difference. To be saved. You got to understand who God is. He's holy, what He requires of us perfection, righteousness. We don't have it and what we deserve. We deserve condemnation. We need to understand who Jesus is, he's God, he's the Lord. We need to understand what he did for us. He lived perfectly for you. He died in your place. And when you repent, and you believe, you put your trust in Jesus Christ, you receive His righteousness, the great exchange happens.

The fourth reality to embrace is that As We Come Rightly, We Receive Mercy and Grace. Many people came to Jesus Christ, and he says, "I don't know you get away from me." Other people came, "Look how good I am Jesus." "Yeah? That's, that's interesting. Why don't you sell all you have and come to follow me, since you're so good." "Hold on, I gotta go check something at the house. I'll be back later..." He never came back. Many come to Jesus Christ. But when we come rightly, as these folks did, we do receive mercy and grace. And remember that today what you have received, you've been cleansed. You've been made righteous. The righteousness of Christ now covers you. You're justified, sanctified, you've been forgiven of all your sins. Your greatest need has been met. Eternal life you have, abundant life, new life, peace, joy. You have a new family, you've been adopted. You are truly free. Really. And you have the Holy Spirit. Astonishing. Remember that today. 

And lastly, a reality you need to embrace: Christians Are Called To Be Compassionate Evangelists. To be like Jesus in this. Compassionate evangelists. Most people today are living with false hopes, and they don't see their need for a savior. They have countless idols that render them happy, that saved them from despair. Whatever it may be: money, success, power, drugs, all kinds of different things. All false hopes. And people, we need to know this, are made aware of their need to be saved, how? Through the faithful proclamation of the Lord's people. That's us. We need to be in one way or another faithfully proclaiming the word. That's how people realize, "Oh, these things won't save me. I can't save myself. I actually am hopeless. And he's the hope for the hopeless? Okay, now I see that I need Jesus. Thank you for telling me. Thank you for pointing that out to me." Our job is to help people see. 

So with our eyes fixed on eternal life with Jesus, I encourage us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus, when we'll be free from pain in the future, free from anguish, despair, and sorrow that blessed hope. Fixed on that, go. When we leave today, go and be compassionate. Point people to the Lord, to our Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Final words today from the apostle Peter. He wrote this to a group of people suffering in despair, that had to leave everything behind and go to another land. People who were ill-treated. Peter encouraged them, and in 1 Peter 5:10 he said to them, "After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you." 

Let's pray. Father, we're not coming to the Lord's table this morning, but we come to Jesus Christ by faith in prayer now. We thank You, Jesus, for your word. We thank you for what you have done for us. You lived as a man of sorrows, in this world among us sinners. You endured much. You fulfill the law of God in our place, something we just can't do. You were perfect, you are perfect, you're glorious. And then you went to the cross dying young, like this girl who died young, you died young. You did it out of love for us, to save us from our sin, to save us from the wrath of God the Father. Jesus, you are everything. We thank you for who you are. We thank you for what you've done. Move in our hearts to such an extent that we are overwhelmingly amazed by you today and all this week, and all the days that you have still for us to live in Jesus' name. Amen.