"Jesus Rebukes the Demon" (Demon Slayer Movement / Jezebel Spirit)

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Lord's Day message from April 21st, 2024 -Biblical Text: Matthew 17:14-21

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Let's open up to the gospel of Matthew chapter 17 Matthew chapter 17 we're going to start reading in verse 14 where Jesus Heals a young child
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The disciples are unable to heal him because at this point the disciples are lacking
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Faith and when people lack faith they begin to lose the power of God In their life, so the disciples are unable to heal this child.
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So the boy brings The child to Jesus or the the father the father goes to Jesus and pleads with him directly
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To restore his son to health and Jesus agrees to do it. But before he does
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Christ expresses either maybe anger or Frustration towards what looks like everybody around him which kind of comes as a surprise to a lot of people
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Verse 17 Jesus answered and he he just says kind of to the crowd
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Oh faithless and perverse Generation, how long shall I be with you?
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How long shall I bear with you? Like how long am I gonna have to deal with you people like this again?
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This kind of seems out of character maybe for Jesus. That's the way a lot of people think so Jesus asked
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Okay, bring the child here to me and the Lord does end up Healing him.
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So there's a lot going on in this passage. The father identifies the child's illness as epilepsy, but Jesus identifies the problem as demonic possession and because of that Many have drawn
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Conclusions and it's actually pretty common to find people who believe this that if somebody's sick or certainly if they have any sort of Psychological problem that well, it must be demonic possession.
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Have you ever run into people? They just kind of assume that there's actually a growing movement within churches today we're really everything is blamed on demons, so if somebody has a
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Temptation you struggle with the sin. Let's say you Struggle with gambling. Well, you have the gambling demon or something like that So like I said, this may seem surprising to some of you.
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This is a growing movement Some say if someone's promiscuous they have the Jezebel spirit.
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There's been a lot of talk of that the past week I don't know how many of you are plugged into Christian news, but really this idea just blaming demons for everything
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That's that's not biblical and we need to address Some of this so we're going to talk about this morning the importance of faith.
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That's number one number two We're going to try to correct this over emphasis on demonic activity and then finally the miracle that Jesus performs really has wider implications and points us
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Hopefully will point us to the gospel. So let's start reading Matthew 17 Starting in verse 14
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And it says when they had come to the multitude a man came to him he came to Jesus kneeling down to him and saying
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Lord have mercy on my son for he is an Epileptic and he suffers severely for he often falls into the fire and often into the water
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So I brought him to your disciples, but they could not cure him Then Jesus answered and said
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Oh faithless and perverse generation How long shall I be with you?
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How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to me and Jesus rebuked the demon and it came out of him and the child was cured from that very hour
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Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said why could we not cast it out?
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So Jesus said to them it's because of your unbelief For assuredly
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I say to you if you have faith as a mustard seed You will say to this mountain move from here to there and it will move and nothing will be
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Impossible for you. However, this kind that is this kind of demon does not go out except by prayer and And Fasting now,
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I do want to say about this idea of moving mountains. I mean Jesus is speaking, you know figuratively
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No one has ever even Jesus never actually moved a mountain out of this out of its place.
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So Maybe you can call that hyperbole or figurative language But when looking at any passage of Scripture the first thing
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I try to do when I'm preparing for a message is try to discern What is the main point?
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Being communicated what is the Holy Spirit trying to Tell us here like all miracles the miracles of Jesus were done
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To prove that he was who he said he was so this is why Jesus performs miracle after miracle after miracle
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So the people would realize that he is indeed the Christ the
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Son of God So Jesus worked wonders so that people would believe who he was and they would believe and accept
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His teaching so in that way miracles authenticate the miracle worker
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Jesus came to establish a new covenant That's not something that you can just say that hey the the
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Old Testament the Old Covenant That's over and I have something new you can't say that you have to prove that you are sent by God to to do this remember
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Moses at the burning bush When the Lord told Moses to go to Pharaoh and say let my people go
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Moses is like the people they're not gonna believe me. No one's gonna listen to me and God gave
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Moses the power to Perform miracles and that was the proof that Moses truly was sent by God So it's the same with Jesus Jesus is working these miracles and doing these healings to prove that he is the
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Son of God Indirectly after Jesus heals the boy. Look at what he says next look at verses 22 and 23
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So all of that was to authenticate this message It says now while they were staying in Galilee Jesus said to them the
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Son of Man is about to be betrayed into the hands of men and they will kill him and the
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Third day he will be raised up and they were exceedingly Sorrowful so what this shows us that the miracles are being done not just for the sake of performing miracles
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They are to authenticate the message of the gospel So yeah, he tells the disciples.
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I'm gonna die and I'm gonna be crucified. I'm gonna rise from the dead and You know, that's true because I just worked this wonder.
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I'm from God. Okay, you get it So here is a good work that he is doing Jesus heals this child and you can just imagine the relief this father, you know, there's this is self -destructive behavior
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The demon the father doesn't know the child's demon possessed But the the demon is throwing the child into the water into the fire
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I mean the father figures my son could die any day now and when the child is healed
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This is a great relief and he's very thankful. But before Jesus heals him. He kind of gives this scathing rebuke
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That seems to be directed at everybody around him. Maybe even the father himself
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And what is the rebuke that this generation of people is? Faithless that this generation of people they are what's the word begins with a
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P Perverse now, do you think Jesus offended a few people in the audience with this?
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I Wonder what he would say today If he were if he were here, would he have similar things to say but the
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Greek word translated perverse is The astrafo and it refers to corruption like this is a corrupt
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Generation. This is a generation and the word refers to people that oppose God that fight against God It also refers to people who instead of going down the right path in life.
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They're going down the wrong path So all those things are included in this word for perverse
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Certainly the scribes and the unbelievers around Jesus. They were plotting against the Lord. They were opposing
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Jesus's ministry. That's true They didn't just lack faith. They were fighting against God That's why
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Jesus later calls them children of the devil, but even the disciples who? Generally, you know hat they had faith they believed
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But those disciples they remember when Jesus told them about his crucifixion, what did
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Peter say? Back in chapter 16. Remember Jesus told him the first time he told him that he had to die on the cross
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Peter's like no That's not gonna happen and Peter's like I won't allow it and if you recall
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Further on in the story when these soldiers come to arrest Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane Peter isn't gonna allow it
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He takes out his sword and he starts Swinging so even even though they don't look at it this way.
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The Apostles are really They're kind of fighting against The gospel if you will they are fighting against this idea that Jesus is going to die and rise again
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So even they are not really walking in the fullness of faith at this
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And of course, there's all sorts of people in between that are on the fence. They don't they don't Believe Jesus is the
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Christ. They don't reject it They just don't know so Jesus kind of just to everybody who's within earshot.
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He calls them a perverse Generation so faith is important.
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I would say if there's one guy in the story that's probably on solid ground It's probably the father, but I don't
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I don't even know about that But faith is important. The disciples are lacking faith the scribes and the
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Pharisees Certainly, they have zero faith and Jesus has something to say about it and here's the thing when when you lack faith in your life and Listen, even if every person in this room says
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I believe in Jesus. I believe he's the Son of God I believe he died on the cross. I believe he rose from the dead we still have those moments of doubt don't we there's still those times where we
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Encounter something read something in the Bible and yeah, we lack trust Maybe we know in our head the right response, but we don't do it or we just question things for whatever reason
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Here's the thing when you lack faith you lose The power of God that's in your life
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God his very presence the Holy Spirit within us brings us and it gives us power
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So when you lack faith you lose that power The disciples had an even greater amount of power to work miracles and could they heal the child?
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No, so they're they're lacking faith and they're losing the power of God Upon their life.
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So this shows us the great importance of faith in the life of a believer later on in the passage
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Jesus says to them if you have faith like a mustard seed Which is like that the smallest seed they knew about if you just had a little bit of faith
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You would have been able to move mountains Basically, you would have been able to cast out the demon
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So here's the first point I want to make when we lack faith when we disobey
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God when we doubt when we lack trust we lose The power of God in our life not the power to work miracles because last time
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I checked I don't have that power and you don't Have that power, you know, if you can work wonders come talk to me later on.
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We'll make you the pastor of the church. Okay, but until then So we're not talking about the power to work miracles
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Jesus gave that power to his disciples, but what's the power that we lose when we start to doubt
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God? When we're walking in the flesh, well, we lose we lose the peace That that power of God that's in our life that we can have peace even in the midst of trials
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We lose that peace The power of God that the joy of the
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Lord is your strength. There's not what the scripture says That's one of the first things to go is the joy of the
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Lord so you lose that you lose your strength when we lack faith we lose the ability to be a witness to other people so the only solution is to become as Jesus said elsewhere to become like a little child and of course this is
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It requires you to be humble to be like a little child and what does that mean? It means you believe whatever
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God says You come across something in the Bible. You just you just believe it
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You know how a three -year -old believes whatever mom or dad says mom or dad tells them about the
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Tooth Fairy or the Easter Bunny and You know, I don't there any little kids in here like as ridiculous as all that is.
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I'm sorry, but They they automatically believe it because they have a full trust
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For their parents. Well, that's the way we need to be with God. Whatever God says Yes Yeah, but what about yes, whatever he says
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Yes, and we're willing to follow it through. So that's the only solution to This lack of faith again,
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Jesus told Peter and the disciples. I'm gonna die I'm gonna rise from the dead and they said no we don't accept that So the disciples have lost at least temporarily they have lost the power of God Upon their life now this quick statement about His word about prayer and fasting the disciples had probably devoted a lot of time to prayer and fasting
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Which is a good thing, but it seems now maybe they had become a little complacent They were letting the spiritual disciplines kind of slip a little bit.
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And by the way, this is what I'm preaching on tonight So if you want to come out, I'm gonna be preaching on the spiritual disciplines.
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So Bible reading prayer church attendance and just kind of those basic things that you do to kind of Maintain your walk with the
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Lord. I mean those things and other things give us give us power So they're lacking all of that.
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All right, look at verse 15 so the disciples can't heal the child So the father goes directly to Jesus the disciples that wasn't working out verse 15
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He says have mercy Lord have mercy on my son for he is an epileptic
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And he suffers severely for he often falls into the fire and often into the water
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So I brought him to your disciples, but they could not Cure him now.
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It's important that we read this very carefully Notice it's it's not Jesus that identifies the problem as epilepsy
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It's the father that says that right? Did you see that? It's not the narrator of Scripture that says the child has epilepsy
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It's the father and the father could be wrong just because the Bible says something You know people in the
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Bible can say the wrong thing at time or maybe they just don't know this word Translated epilepsy because we don't want people to jump to conclusions here.
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The King James Version Translates it as a lunatic. So whether it's lunatic or epilepsy
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Basically, it deals with any condition of the mind or any condition of the brain back then that the people just didn't
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Understand. So the point is it's not necessarily Epilepsy as we think of it today
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And that's very important because we we can't jump to conclusions About these things so it would be totally wrong that if somebody has epilepsy today to think
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Oh, well based on this story. They must be demonically possessed like that'd be a totally wrong
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Assumption. I mean, is it possible in some circumstances maybe but you can't just assume that type of thing
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It took the discernment of Jesus to be able to identify
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Demonic possession just out of curiosity. How many of you have encountered someone who's demonically possessed?
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Raise your hand if you have encountered someone who's Do you think they are or would you state your life on it?
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Like do you know for a hundred percent? Like I believe that probably this one time
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I was in the presence of someone who is demonically possessed, but I can't say that I know that a hundred percent
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So here's the thing only Jesus knew that and then he gave that power to his disciples
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The Greek word That is translated here as epilepsy. It refers to someone being moonstruck.
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So the Greeks believed that the moon affected people's mind and Mental condition it's not like unlike today in hospitals and facilities when there's a full moon
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Some of the doctors and nurses Attest to the fact like it seems like people act a little crazier during a full moon.
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Other people say that's Superstitious, but back then that's what they believed either way
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Jesus Recognizes what the true issue here is with the child and he knows it's a demon.
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He knew that because he's God's Son But doesn't mean that you and I can always figure that out
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So when addressing this subject, this is kind of a difficult topic of demonic activity and demonic possession
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What you need to know this is something that's totally unique to the ministry of Christ and his disciples
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You don't even really see this much at all in the Old Testament. You have King Saul who had
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Presumably a demon maybe he was possessed, but you don't really see it in the
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Bible much at all Except with Jesus and his disciples
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So what does that mean? We are not to have a ministry of casting out demons
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And I probably you guys aren't trying to do that or involved in that but a lot of Christians are these days
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They'll talk about that more in a second. But basically what are Christians told to do? What's what's the instruction for us about Satan and demons?
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Resist it, you know stay away from it We're told to resist the devil and he will flee from us
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So that's what that's what we're supposed to do. We are never told to cast out demons and Unless you're an apostle you're powerless to do that.
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You don't have that ability. I don't have that ability You don't you can pray for someone and that's about it
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But ultimately has to be the Lord who does it mark it down? There is no New Testament passage that instructs
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Christians or teaches Christians that this is to be an ongoing ministry of casting out demons
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You probably know this by movies the people who do this What if they get a crucifix some holy water and they go through this like that's that's
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Hollywood, man I mean, maybe the Catholic Church does And get involved in some of those things, but there's nothing in the
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Bible that Christians should be doing that today So here's why I bring this up and like I said a lot of you are not plugged into Christian news
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You don't necessarily know what the the new movements are, but I can assure you this is a big thing.
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It's growing It's very popular online and it is in some of the local churches around here, even if it's not here
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It's important to bring this up because there's a growing movement right now within charismatic Pentecostal Christianity, especially
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Popular on the internet where people it's called the demon slayer movement who's at least heard something about this demon slayers
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Yeah, you can't slay demons. They're spiritual beings You know, the Lord is going to cast them into the lake of fire one day and that's about it.
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But Christians, you know, you're playing with fire when you get involved with this stuff and I have a lot of concern for This this growing movement, but they say that local churches
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Every local church should have some sort of ministry where you're casting out demons and healing the sick
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So we should have services I went to a Christian festival one time and they had a healing tent if you ever seen stuff like this a healing tent
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So you go in and someone lays hands on you and I'm not against praying for people and if you want to lay hands on Someone while you're praying fine, but the idea that there's somebody that you can go to that will miraculously heal
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Your ailments. I mean that listen the Apostles had that power nobody today.
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There's no Apostles today There are no prophets today much of that stuff is fake.
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Some of it is just an outright scam trying to get your money So I again I would just say stay away from that kind of thing
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But here's the argument people will say people who say that Christians should be casting out demons.
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They'll say well, it's in the Bible Therefore it should be in the church today. It was in the church back.
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Then should be in the church today That's one argument and I would say well, there's a talking donkey in the
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Bible, right? But if you told me you had one on your farm, I'd be concerned about your sanity
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Just because it's in the Bible doesn't mean it's happening right now Or if it's a one -time thing back, then
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Moses part of the Red Sea doesn't mean that you can part the Connecticut River They could you know, you have to rightly handle
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God's Word here But there's yeah, there's no Apostles today the ministry of Jesus to heal the sick cast out demons
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That was unique to Jesus was special you get that right his
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Apostles were special Jesus and the Apostles are not here today
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So you don't see that kind of stuff, but this is the claim coming out of many Pentecostal ministries charismatic ministry and since Pentecostals And listen,
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I'm not against Pentecostals and charismatics. I have friends who are in these movements, but since Christian television 99 % of the praise music it's all controlled and written by Charismatics so their their influence is very widespread
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This is a growing movement that says yeah You need to cast out demons and they're even going to such an extreme to say that even
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Christians can be demon possessed I mean let that sink in for a moment. Listen a house divided against itself cannot stand
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Jesus said you cannot cannot be indwelt by the Holy Spirit and indwelt by a
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Demon But this is what people want to say and they take it to the extreme
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They say basically any illness every bad habit if you struggle with anything
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It's a demon You're dealing with a demon. I mean, it's kind of that who is the guy that said the devil made me do it
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Flip Wilson some people called this flip Wilson theology, right? Hey, whatever you do
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It's not really your fault the devil a demon made me do it. Listen, that's not true.
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It's our own flesh. I Agree, there is demonic influence out there. Here's the thing.
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We don't know we know nothing about it. It's yes, they exist there are demonic temptations
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I did a Study on it a few months ago But we don't know more than we do know and again
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You're you're playing with fire when we get involved with this stuff. So No, there is no
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Jezebel spirit. There is no The demon of gambling the Dean the alcohol demon and all that No, it's you and your flesh that that can be overcome by the power of God in your life
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You need to trust God and have faith and seek his will but you can't blame it all on demons
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Okay, so let's just move on beyond that point Back to the story about the child
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Jesus did cast out the demon and this father here he
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And again, it's questionable whether Jesus is upset with the the father or he's not when he says it's a perverse generation
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But here's a bigger point Matthew 16 verse 4. What does Jesus say a wicked and adulterous?
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generation seeks after what a Sign right now go back to Matthew 17, but I wanted you to see that so people that are just seeking out signs
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They're seeking out miracles. You know, I think the problem is a lot of people are bored with the
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Bible I think this is the problem in a lot. They know what the Bible says and they're just not interested in it
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They're bored with the Bible. They're bored with verse by verse preaching through the
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Bible So they're they're seeking out signs and wonders. They're seeking out miracles. They're seeking out
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You know demon slayers in all the rest. What does Jesus say? It's a wicked and adulterous generation that is seeking after these things here
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Jesus Performs this miracle cast out the did did that make the crowd believe in Jesus?
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No, it didn't All of these faith healing Crusades where people are supposedly healed which it's pretty much been documented
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Nobody's getting healed at these places, even if the few were Do the people all are they all solid in their faith from that moment forward?
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No, it's a constant revolving door people come in and out. Here's the point miracles. Don't save anybody
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Do you realize that signs and wonders again much of it's fake some of it's a scam
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That's not what saves people what saves people You know, it's not your it's not the issue of demons demons are a problem.
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We don't understand it. That's not the real Battle that we face.
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What is the battle? Well, the battle is our own flesh our own sin and Jesus came the first time to deal with that.
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He's gonna come a second time to finish his work But here is the bigger issue not just this this young child who is sick
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How does this point us to the gospel? Yeah, the young child was sick, but you know what?
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We're all sick. We're born into this world. Maybe not with epilepsy
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Maybe not with demonic possession praise God But we're all born into this world with a sickness
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God's Word teaches that every person is born with a malady that we call
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Sin, it is the result of the curse. It shouldn't be hard to see right if mankind is so wonderful and God is so happy with things
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Why is the world filled with death and destruction and disease and pain and suffering and death?
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Why and yet the the the mantra is
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God is love. God is love God and God is love and There is good news in the gospel
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But a person first must understand the bad news that every person is born with this sickness
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Called sin, so we need to get beyond the the demon stuff We need to get beyond the miracles that happened back then and it all happened for a reason we can learn from it
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But where this applies right now is that we have a sick your loved ones your friends your family members they have a sickness
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Here's what the Bible says the Word of God teaches us that because of our sin we are
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Separated from God. This is man in his natural condition Romans 3 23 says for all have sinned and have come short of the glory of God And the penalty for sin is what?
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death Romans 6 23 for the wages of sin is Death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our
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Lord But praise God the penalty for sin was paid by Jesus Christ Romans 5 8
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God Demonstrates his own love toward us and that while we were yet sinners
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Christ died for us and the scripture teaches that if we repent and trust in Jesus Christ by faith
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We will be saved from sin and its penalty Romans 10 9 through 13 says if we confess with our mouth the
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Lord Jesus and believe in our heart that God has Raised him from the dead We will be saved for with the heart one believes unto righteousness and with the mouth
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Confession is made unto salvation For the scripture says whoever believes on him will not be put to shame
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For there is no distinction between the Jew and the Greek for the same
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Lord Overall as rich to all who call upon him and then verse 13 this great statement.
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It's as simple as this All who call upon the name of the Lord Shall be saved.
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That's the gospel. You know, if you know someone who's sick, maybe someone has epilepsy some other
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Condition, maybe you suspect someone is Demonically afflicted whatever it is. Yes pray to God and don't get me wrong
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Don't ever walk out of here and say pastor grant doesn't believe in miracles or that I don't believe that someone
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I believe there are demonically possessed people in the world I think there is deliverance for them pray for them
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You need a miracle pray God may do it. He may not But all of that aside, here's the one thing
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I know our mission The church's mission is to preach the gospel Not to pretend we're
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Jesus and try to do things that were unable to do we can preach the gospel of salvation
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That's our message. So if there's somebody listening this morning who has never put their faith in Jesus This is what you need this is the cure and if you do have any physical conditions any sort of disease or Illness, here's the thing there will be full healing in heaven