Healing the Lame Man

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If you have your Bibles, and you would, open it up to the book of Acts and the third chapter.
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Book of Acts and the third chapter, and we will be reading a portion of that, and then a portion of the fourth chapter also.
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Before we read from the very word of the living God, let me start and ask you to think about a few things.
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Because there's a saying that most people know, and that saying is somewhat changed a little bit.
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But the saying is that time waits for no one. Time waits for no one.
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Well, you know what, that might apply to the creation. That might apply to the reality of us as creatures, that we are frail and feeble and we grow up as the grass and then we are gone.
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But that saying that time waits for no one does not apply to God. And what
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I mean by that is that time serves God. That you and I are bound by time because God has been pleased to do so.
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Thought about what it says in Ecclesiastes, it says, to everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven.
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And friends, that's the purpose of God, and that's the purpose not only of God, but for God.
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I also want to make a confession at this point. You're not going to get too much, but I'm going to at least let you understand this.
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I must say at times that I struggle with patience.
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Waiting for time, if you will, to come to my aid. Waiting for time to restore what
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I think has been removed or taken or harmed.
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And so I struggle with that at times, and perhaps I'm the only one that does it, but I doubt it.
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I do think that we all struggle with this thought of time, and I thought about what
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Peter says, and let me just read it to you. It says, But beloved, do not forget this one thing that with the
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Lord one day is a thousand years. A thousand years is one day, and the Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness.
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But as longsuffering towards us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
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Well, I admit to you that I at times count delay as slackness, as that which tarries.
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And the result of that in my life, and I would think as you consider it in your life that you might agree,
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I think that this reality of not being able to wait upon God for his time to be fulfilled, that it leads me at times to act in an unwise way.
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Then there are other times when not only do I act in an unwise way, but I go ahead and act in a foolish way, or perhaps in a hurried way, but I think the thing that most troubles me is that because I struggle with this idea of the time that I'm underneath a trial or a tribulation or just a situation of life, that it causes me to live in an unbelieving way.
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And as you read in the Bible, friends, it's easy to see how often it seems that time goes slow, that time seems to work against us rather than for us.
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I'm going to ask you to just think about a couple. Do you remember the man in John 9 who was born blind?
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You know he was born blind from birth, and that he had to wait all those years before Jesus healed him?
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You remember the woman who had the issue of blood, and she waited and had gone to physicians for 18 years until she touched the hem of the
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Savior's robe and was healed. Or if you want to go back further in history, do you not remember how
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Israel was oppressed for how many centuries before God redeemed them from the hands of Pharaoh?
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Could we not recall Abraham, how he waited so long for that promised son, that promised seed?
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Do we not remember Joseph, who spent at least two years in prison, waiting for his time in which
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God would raise him up? How about the suffering of Job? Is that not a pointed example of someone who had to deal with his situation and deal with the things that came from that situation over a long period of time?
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How about the time in between the two Testaments? About those 400 years of silence between the closing of Malachi and the coming of the
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Lord Jesus Christ? And I can go on and on, friends.
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But you see, there's this reality in our lives that many times, because we are unable, unwilling, doubtful, distressed by how things sometimes go slow, that it causes us to, as I said, live in a foolish way or make foolish decisions or unwise decisions.
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And there's a reason why I started this way. I started this way because I want to look at another example of how we have given to us the healing of the lame man in Acts chapter 3.
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So I want to ask if you would to read with me the first 10 verses of Acts chapter 3.
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And then I'm going to read a couple of verses from Acts chapter 4. And then we're just going to ask
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God's blessing. Acts chapter 3. Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.
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And a certain man lame from his mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple, which is called beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple.
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Who seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked for alms and fixing his eyes on him with John, Peter said, look at us.
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So he gave them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. And then
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Peter said, silver and gold, I do not have. But what I do have,
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I give you in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.
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And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up. And immediately his feet and his ankle bones received strength.
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So he leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them, walking, leaping and praising
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God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God. And then they knew that it was he who sat begging at the beautiful gate of the temple.
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And they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.
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And now, if you would, the first couple of verses in Acts 4. Now, as they spoke to the people, the priests, the captains of the temple, and the
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Sadducees came upon them, being greatly disturbed that they had taught the people and preached in Jesus the resurrection from the dead.
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And if you would just read with me, in the end of the chapter, in the middle of the chapter, when
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Peter responds to them, and in verse 22, we read this, for the man was over 40 years old, whom the
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Lord, whom this miracle of healing had been performed. But let's just ask
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God's blessing. Our Father in God, again, we come to you in that name, the name of the only begotten
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Son of God, the one who so loved us that he gave himself for us. And Lord, we come to you now and ask you to do something that only you can do.
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Take your word, Lord, and transform us by your grace. Cause us to see great and wonderful things out of your word.
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Enable us to see by the power of the Spirit within us, things that we have yet to be seen.
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And that it would change our lives, that it would transform us. Lord, help me to be clear, help me to speak the truth.
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And Lord, may the words of our mouths and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight for you alone are our rock and our redeemer.
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And we ask it all in Christ's name. Amen. So I want to deal with this in three ways, if you will.
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I want to first think about the tragedy of the lame man, or if you will, his situation.
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And then secondly, the triumph of the lame man, or if you will, his healing.
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And then thirdly, the testimony of the lame man or the results of his healing.
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So we have the tragedy, we have the triumph, and we have the testimony.
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And as I said to you in the beginning, there's a reason for thinking about how often it is that we begin to think that time is really not on our side.
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That God is perhaps forgotten us, that God has left us on our own.
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And as we consider this man this morning, and as we consider his situation, here's a man who has been lame in his feet for over 40 years.
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The tragedy of the lame man. And maybe you think, well, he must have done something in his life to deserve this.
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Or there must have been something that caused this. And some would even go as far as saying,
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God wouldn't do that, would he? But if you think that way, let me just remind you of what
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God told Moses. You remember when Moses was to go to Pharaoh after Moses had spent, what, 40 years tending
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Jethro's flock? And then Moses is sent by God to go and to speak to Pharaoh on behalf of his people.
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And Moses is hesitant, and Lord, do you really want me to go?
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And here's what God said to him. And the Lord said to him, who has made man's mouth?
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Who makes the mute, the deaf, the seeing, or the blind?
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Have not I the Lord? So let me just make sure that this is said in our minds and hearts.
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God does whatever he pleases to do with whomever he pleases to do it, for as long as he pleases to do it.
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Now, I don't want to deal with the sovereignty of God in that sense for our time together.
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But there are people who oppose the truth that God is sovereign.
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And yet, if you think about it, we can't do a single thing about it apart from God's grace.
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This man was born blind. This man is born lame. He has no strength in his ankle or his feet.
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And so you see, he who is boundless at times binds according to his purpose.
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He who is boundless at times binds according to his purpose.
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Now, I don't want to jump ahead too far, but as we will see, the healing of this lame man takes place at a very pivotal point.
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And we'll bring this up later. But it takes place at a very pivotal point in the history of the early church, and is used greatly by God to promote the spread of the gospel.
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Let's think about this. Let's be honest. If you and I are under a trial, whether real or perceived, well, you and I are in a situation that we need to come out of.
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If we're under it for even a few days, I don't know about you, but I know it for me.
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If we're in a situation for even just a few days, we begin to become unraveled.
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Now, if you're really spiritual, maybe you last a little longer. But you see, as creatures of time, at times, we feel as if things are just not going to ever get better.
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I want us to think about this lame man. This man was crippled from the womb.
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Could you imagine what went through his mind every day? He never played like other kids.
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He never ran around like so many others. I would say he was most likely made fun of by other kids.
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I wonder how many nights he sat up thinking, why me?
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Why me? Why am I afflicted? What did I do wrong?
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Have you and I ever said that? Maybe not so in words, but in thoughts.
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Why me? I always try to answer myself when
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I say that in my heart, in my thoughts. Why me? And the answer sometimes comes very clear and with great volume.
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Why not? Could you imagine this man, though?
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And even as he began to grow up, I wonder how many nights he sat up thinking, what did
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I do? I wonder what his mother thought.
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I wonder what kind of hardship it put on the family. Because at some point, they began to lay him at the gate.
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And in my way of thinking, that tells me that they weren't that well off.
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And that he was forced to beg. Let's think about it from a parent's perspective.
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How many of us would be thankful if our kids grew up to be a beggar? If that would cause you to rejoice, then you need counsel.
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So I wonder what went through the mother's mind, or the father's, or the brother's, or the siblings.
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But particularly him. How many of us would begin to think along those lines of why me?
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What have I done? I want to use this as an example. I worked for a man years ago. And he was my boss at that time.
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And he had a daughter who had cerebral palsy. And I remember this man.
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My wife knows him and his wife. And he and his wife carried that daughter around everywhere all the time.
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And I remember him telling me one day in a conversation how it was, in that sense, physically killing his wife.
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Because as the daughter grew and became more desirous to do things, that the mother was forced to almost physically carry her from this place to that place to this place to that place.
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And that went on as far as I remember until she was able to get herself into an electronic electric wheelchair.
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And then now she drives and she has a handicapped vehicle. And all those wonderful things.
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But I remember him. And I thought about that as I thought about this lame man. And just think about it.
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This 40 years of this man having to go through this situation.
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I wonder how many restless nights he spent. Did he pray for healing?
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Was he continually praying for God, if you will, to do something?
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Have you and I ever said, why don't you do something, Lord? You know what?
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And I want to just make this side point. We're so often so callous about the many blessings we have.
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And that we're able to walk and talk and hear and speak and to do things that so many others get the privilege to do.
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Sometimes we're so hard -hearted and we're so caught up in our own situations and our own perplexities and our own unbeliefs.
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And we forget to be thankful for the ability to function.
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And this lame man, from the time he was born, he's so dependent.
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He cannot be independent. He cannot even take care of himself.
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One of the things that I admire about the veterans and the organizations that help.
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And you ever hear some of the testimonies of those that have been at war and come back and they're maimed and they're halted and they're given things to take care of themselves.
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And you know one of the things they say more than anything else is that it now gives them a sense of independence.
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That they can even take care of themselves in the simplest of ways.
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Think about this lame man. So I went and I did some figuring.
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You know what 40 years is in the amount of days?
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Do you know that's almost 15 ,000 days? Let that settle in.
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This man for over 15 ,000 days has been unable to even take care of his very self.
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And has been forced to depend on everyone for just about everything.
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He needs assistance to do even the simplest of things. You ever see the movies when the castaway is in a cave or a prison and he starts marking the days on the wall?
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And of course you do four marks and then you do the fifth. You come across and I wonder if he actually thought about this or maybe he didn't.
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Every day he woke up put another mark on the wall. 15 ,000 days.
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Like I said I get the sniffles for two days and I'm ready to call it quits. 15 ,000 days.
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At some point he gets carried out to the beautiful gate.
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And by the way most likely that was the eastern gate. And it was called beautiful because it was made of such
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Corinthian brass and all those things. But that's incidental at this point.
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But that's when they begin to lay him at the gate. I wonder how many just walked by him.
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I wonder how many helped him. I wonder how he felt at the end of every day as they carried him home.
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To get up the next day and do the same thing. You see my friends we so often think time is working against us.
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But as we will see God is never early.
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God is never late. And God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask.
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All we think. Because time serves
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God. So let us just think for a few minutes in the second place.
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That's the situation of the layman. And I hope at least we can begin to get some sort of mental picture of what this must have been like for him.
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And by the way let me let me just say this before we move on. As you read the scriptures it's good to try to understand what is being said.
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And to meditate on it. Not just please don't misunderstand me.
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Speed reading the Bible might have some profit in it. But it's really not what will cause us to praise and worship
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God. Then we need to to get a pick and a plow.
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And dig up the Word of God. And digging up the Word of God will allow us to dig up our own hearts.
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So even such a simple as we would think such a simple account of a layman.
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And you could multiply this out throughout the scriptures as I said. We could spend hours on how people were put in certain situations.
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And that they weren't necessarily the cause of the situation.
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But they were stuck down in that situation. Well let us begin now and let us think about in the second place.
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Not only the tragedy or the situation of the layman. But his triumph or his healing.
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And this is where it gets good. Here's another day.
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I'm begging. Let's just say what I said about 15 ,000 days and being close to 40 years.
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And here it is. It's the day of the 15 ,000 and first day. And perhaps he even got up and marked the wall on the 15 ,000 and first day.
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Thinking that here we go again. Somebody's going to carry me out to the gate.
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And I'm going to beg. And some are going to help. And some are going to walk right by me.
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And then soon, sooner or later, somebody's going to carry me home.
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And that's his expectation at least for the last 40 years. I wonder if he really had any idea that this day was going to be a day that would change his life.
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Listen, friends. Expect God to do great things because he's a great
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God. This man gets up and it's just another day.
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Does he know he has come to the kingdom for such a time as this? Do you remember that with Esther?
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That's what old Uncle Mordecai told her. How do you know if you've not come? She was supposed to go before the king.
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And she's concerned because if the king doesn't acknowledge her, it's whoop, next queen.
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And Mordecai looks at her and he says to her, how do you know you haven't come to the kingdom for such a day as this?
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And does this layman have even the slightest idea that he's come to the kingdom to this day?
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And that God was going to take him from, listen, he's going to take him from desperation to jubilation.
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Ain't that cool? Ain't that cool that God does that?
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That he takes from a desperate situation and he turns it into an amazing situation that God can take the vilest offender who truly believes and make him anew in Christ.
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And so the narrative goes on and they ask Peter and John and they're coming up to the temple.
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Verse three, who's seeing Peter and John asking to about to go into the temple to ask for alms and he fixes his eyes on him with John.
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And Peter said, look at us. So there he is, this is his expectation. I wonder if they will give me some help.
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I wonder if they will offer me some assistance. His expectations are to be far exceeded.
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Like I said, he's to go from basically nothing to everything.
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And so they notice him fixing his eyes on him with John.
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Peter said, look at us. Verse five, so he gave them attention, his attention expecting to receive something from them.
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That was his expectations at this point. At least the way I understand it.
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And he's going to get, he's going to get something. Well, I'll tell you what he's going to get.
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He's going to get exceedingly abundantly above what he asked or thought. Of course, look, look at verse seven or look at verse six.
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Peter said, silver and gold, I do not have.
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Boy, if that's all he said, I wonder what the lame is. Oh no, I'm not going to get nothing here.
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Dude's already telling me he's broke. But what
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I do have, I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.
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He took him by the right hand and he lifted him up and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength.
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So he leaping stood and walked and entered the temple with them walking and leaping and praising
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God. And the writer makes a point of telling us immediately.
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Picture it. There he is laying on the ground. He's begging as, as he always has. And he sees these two disciples of Christ walk by and he asked for help.
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And what Peter tells him is, is absolutely life changing. Rise up and walk.
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We see Peter doesn't do that in his own power, does it? Does he? He doesn't say, well,
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I'm Peter. And by the way, I'm Peter and this is John. And you know, we're apostles of Christ and no, no.
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He says in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.
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And his feet and his ankles received strength immediately. Now I want to say this.
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I'm so tempted to stop at this point because to me, this is such a picture of the gospel and the results of the gospel by the power of God.
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Here comes God in his kindness, in his mercy, in his grace, in his compassion, in his pity to a man who's unable to do anything for himself and by the power of God, by the word of the
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Lord Jesus Christ and his truth and by the power of the spirit, he's raised the newness of life.
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I'm going to ask you a question. Can you remember the day when
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God came to you and raised you up to newness of life in Christ?
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I'm not asking you if you can remember all the trials and tribulations you went through. And I know you've gone through trials and tribulations because we basically entered the kingdom through much tribulations.
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But can you remember the time that you knew that you were no longer crippled spiritually, but that you were alive in Christ?
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Now to some, I would agree that it might not be as vivid as you think others might have.
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Maybe you were saved like a soul to Paul, or maybe you came to newness of life like a
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Lydia whose heart, it says the Lord opened. It almost reminds me of a gentle breeze just blown by Lydia and God had opened her heart.
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But can you and I recall when all of a sudden we no longer felt dependent dependent to secure our own position before God, but we were raised to newness of life, to go from the bondage and tyranny of sin.
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You know, sometimes we lose sight of that, what we've been saved from. We've been saved from death, eternal death to eternal life by the power of God, by the name of Jesus Christ, by the power of the
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Spirit. We've been given strength to worship
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God, to be saved from such a terrible master.
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Listen, friends, you and I have served some terrible masters, haven't we?
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Some of us have stories and accounts of what we were and where we were that we won't even share with others.
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But God, just like Peter, silver and gold I have none, but what
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I do have I give you in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.
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And he took him by the right hand and he raised up. And it's such a description, isn't it?
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Of his overwhelming joy. Listen, look what it says. He took him by the right hand, verse 70.
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He lifted him up and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength. And so he leaping up, he stood and he walked and he entered the temple, walking, leaping and praising
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God. It wasn't just one of these, oh gee, thanks guys for the coins.
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I'll ask you another question. I know you're supposed to do the application at the end. Oh, well, when you came to know
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Christ, when you came to know God, when you came to find out that there is a supreme being who reigns over you, and not only does he reign over you, but he has shed his love upon you.
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Do you remember those days of joy? Do you remember what it was like to not feel in bondage anymore?
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He's leaping, he's walking, he's running into the temple, he's praising
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God. And you know, I thought about what Brother Keith preached not too long ago.
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Matter of fact, last week, right? Yeah. That we ought to sing like a redeemed people.
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Well, I'm going to tag on to what he said. We ought to sing like a redeemed people.
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We ought to sing like a people who are full of joy. We ought to sing like people who have been restored from being lame and unable and totally dependent.
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We ought to sing because we praise God. And that's exactly what this man does.
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He leaps, he walks, he's praising God. And all the people saw him praising
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God in the name and the person of the work of the
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Son of God. So again, how thankful are you and I that God has come to us, that he's reached down and lifted us up?
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I'm going to tell you, I've been a Christian now close to 50 years. Now still, and I get choked up every time
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I think this thought that he saved me. That he gave me life because I was so lost.
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I was so bound. I was so wrong in so many things.
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The gospel that I had heard from others one day became real to me.
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And you know what I realized? That I was his and he was mine.
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I can't get over it. And I pray God I'd never get over it.
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And I'm not just talking about a trial or a situation, my friends. Although I'm not trying to deny that this man was overcome.
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Again, 40 years laying basically on the ground flat and now he's walking.
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And he's able to all of a sudden take care of himself in ways that he never could before.
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And he's overcome with praise and worship. Shouldn't we be like this?
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Lame man, friends, full of joy. Instead of complaining.
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Oh, I'm good at complaining. I don't know how good you are, but I'm good at it. I can complain with the best of them.
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Let me ask us, are we thankful or we thankless?
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Are we a living epistle of thankfulness for what
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God has done for us? Or are we pretty much just thankless?
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Because you know, that's one of the characteristics of the ungodly. Read it.
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Read it in Romans. What does it say? They're unthankful. You can pretty much tell when someone's thankful, by the way.
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Because it's written all over them. Now, I'm not saying we should just act in ridiculous ways.
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But there ought to be something that people see in us as they saw in this lame man that we are now praises of God.
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So are we thankful, friends, or are we thankless? Are we running towards God as he runs now towards the temple?
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Or we run wherever we want? Or we don't run at all. You know,
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I thought about David, right? And we had heard about this in the fire conference. As the brother preached on the returning of the ark.
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And you remember what it says about David? After the disobedience and doing it the wrong way.
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And now he's bringing the ark back. And every couple of steps, what does he do? Hey, just jumping up and down, praising
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God, dancing. So much that when he gets home, right? Wife's looking out the window.
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She said, man, you crazy. Remember what he said to her?
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I'm just going to paraphrase it. He says, you think that's bad? You wait and see what
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I will do. Listen, my friends, this lame man is such an example to us of someone who's come to know the living and true
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God. Took him by the right hand, lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength and he's leaping and stood and he entered the temple.
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And then it says it again, right? He's walking and leaping and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising
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God. Man, sometimes we look like the frozen chosen and we act like the frozen chosen.
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I'm not advocating that we go dancing on the top of the tables. But I don't know about you, but what
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I think about this lame man, it was more than just, hey, I'm really glad you guys came by.
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And all his praise is lifted up to who? To God. He's overcome.
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He's full of joy. What a day.
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You know what I thought about on the way in this morning as I was driving? I thought about wouldn't it be great to see someone get saved today?
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How many of us came here this morning and thought that God could take a dead sinner and give him life today?
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How many of us want to say, I did that? Or how many of us want to say,
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Lord, forgive me because I am so frail and thankless that I don't believe that you can actually save.
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You see, one of the realities of being a Christian is the realization.
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Listen, friends. It's the realization that we have that God sees us.
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That God knows us. That God can never be deceived nor fooled.
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Now, granted, that's true for the ungodly. But we ought to be the ones to know that.
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And this man is just, like I said, he's lit up. And as we move into the final point,
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I just want to say this. This man basically is going to fall out of our view.
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After a little while, he's gone. He falls out of the picture. You know what's really cool?
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It's over 2000 years and we still talk about him. What will people say about us when we're gone?
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What are people going to say about you and me when we're gone? Are they going to say, you know what?
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I remember so -and -so. Boy, they really praise
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God. Well, they had trials in their life. They had situations, but I always knew that they were worshipers of God.
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And not just worshipers of God, but worshipers of the one who has saved this lame man, the
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Lord Jesus Christ. And so let me just for a moment lead us down to the thought of the testimony of the lame man.
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And I don't think he was concerned at this point with testimony, by the way. I think he's genuinely overcome by the mercy and power and grace of God.
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And the testimony comes because of the work of Jesus Christ in this man's life.
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Because as I said to you before, it's early on in the spreading of the gospel, isn't it? And the day of Pentecost has come and the gospel has to go out from Judea and Samaria to all the ends of the earth.
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And so if you will, this is a pivotal time. And that's why I say God never is early and God never is late.
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And God will bind who he wants to bind and God will loose who he wants to loose to fulfill
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God's purpose. Now that disturbs the unbelieving man. But it is early on.
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And so God bears witness with signs and wonders like he said he would. And look at verse nine, it says that, it says that the crowd has seen a good work, a great work and the people saw him.
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And they knew it was him, verse 10, that sat begging at the beautiful gate of the temple.
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And they were filled with wonder and amazement at all that had happened to him.
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This man has become a living epistle known and read of all men. And he could not have imagined all this friends.
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He could not have imagined what God was about to do with him and through him.
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You know, we all have unsaved relatives.
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Some of us have unsaved kids, grandkids, great grandkids, nieces and nephews.
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What kind of testimony wouldn't it be if they came to know the Savior? Wouldn't that be great?
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Wouldn't that be something to see them go from being lame to being found?
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How much, how often do we actually pray that God would save those that he's entrusted to us?
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Just a thought. But here's the testimony of the man as it's played out.
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And so in chapter four, what Peter does is he takes this healing, this great restoration.
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And I will say this, you might want to argue whether he was actually just healed of his infirmity or actually came to know
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God. I'm gonna take the position that both took place.
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That not only was he healed physically, but that he was healed spiritually. And so now
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Peter takes the opportunity to present the gospel as a means of explaining what had taken place.
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Just look at the first verse in chapter four. Now, as they spoke to the people, the priests and the captains of the temple and the
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Sadducees came upon them. And check this out in verse two. They were greatly disturbed.
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That they taught the people and preached in Jesus the resurrection of the dead. This man's leaping, praising, rejoicing.
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The people are in amazement. The people are wondering, praising God for what he had just done.
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And there is the religious people and they're greatly disturbed.
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Well, what we do for them? I wanna say it to you this way.
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Apart from the spirit of God, apart from the spirit of God, not even a miracle can move someone's heart.
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Testimonies are great. I think we should use our own testimony at times to speak to other people.
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But even the testimony, even the witness of this man who everyone knew, who was laid at the gate for all those years and all of a sudden he rises up and his legs are strengthened, his ankles are strengthened and he's jumping and leaping and praising
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God. And there are still those that are opposed to Jesus of Nazareth.
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Do you know that the best of testimonies, as great as they might be, will never lead someone solely based on that to Christ?
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That's right. I'll tell you one person that, your testimony, brother, your testimony is amazing.
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But your testimony will not save someone. And your testimony is amazing.
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And yours and all of our testimony is amazing. Well, it won't save anyone. God saves.
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And to some, it's a saver of life. And to others, it's a saver of death.
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Salvation is of the Lord. Right? Salvation is of the
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Lord. Should you and I live before our acquaintances and relatives and kids and grandkids and all that stuff?
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Should we not live before them as witnesses of Christ? Absolutely. Will that alone save them?
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Absolutely not. It's only by the power and the grace and the mercy and the compassion of the
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Lord Jesus Christ by the power of the
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Spirit. And as I said, the man is about to disappear.
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But you know what remains, friends? The gospel. Isn't that great? That the gospel is the same gospel today as it was in the day when he was lifted up from his lameness.
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I'll just close quickly with a thought or two about an application for us.
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Although I've somewhat said what I wanted to say. Listen, if we are the children of God, to say we ought not to fret at all over the situations of life would be untrue.
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Right? We are creatures. We have emotions. We have feelings. We have goals and aspirations.
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We have a whole lot in our package. And I'm not saying that we ought not to, at times, be sidetracked or fret or feel as if time has worked against us.
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Or if you want to say God has worked against us. But I will say this.
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We are always to seek to move forward, not backwards. We are always to be desirous to run the race.
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We ought to always be willing to endure hardship as a soldier in Christ's army.
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We ought to always be willing to run the cost that is set before us.
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Now listen, and I have to say this to myself. You're just in my way right now. God created me unique.
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I have unique situations in my life. You have unique situations in your life.
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God is able to meet every single unique situation. And we ought not to get bogged down with being overly concerned with someone else's situation.
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And not overly fretting because of what we see in others that we might not see in our life.
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Because that, my friends, will deter us from moving forward and running the race.
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And so be careful about comparing our situations. There are many hard things in this life, friend.
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And we're going to have to endure them. But just think of what lies ahead.
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When we read something like the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall follow us hereafter.
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And we ought to believe that. We ought to trust it. We ought to allow it to carry us through some of the worst situations.
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And this lame man, he had a bad situation. But he's not the worst off. I'm sure we could describe somebody who would be worse off than the lame man.
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But I want you to think about it. What is it going to be like when we see him, friends?
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And listen, we're not going to just see him who we think he is. We're going to see him as he is.
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There's nothing in this world that can give us so much light. Like the light that we will have by the very presence of Jesus Christ.
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When we behold His majesty carried for all eternity.
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Amen. Amen. And then finally, just a word to you.
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If you're here this morning and you don't believe. That no matter what you saw.
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That if you saw, and I've used this in the past. If you saw in tomorrow's morning as the sky came up, that God painted this thousand foot cross in the middle of the sky.
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You know what? That would not move you to Christ apart from the grace of God.
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And so I say to you that if you only have hope in this life.
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You are of all men, the most miserable. There's no other way around it.
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There's no other hope. There's no other way to be healed from the bondage and the tyranny and the judgment of sin.
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What will it profit you if you gain the whole world and lose your own soul?
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What will you give in exchange for your soul, my friend? And so I will say this to you, young people.
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You listen to me, young people. You have no real idea how much time you have in this world.
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Well, Brother Randy, are you trying to scare the kids? Well, no, I'm just trying to speak the truth.
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And I pray you live a long life. And I pray you grow up and you have many things that you enjoy in God's world.
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But I'm going to say to you, don't just think because you're a little child or a medium child or an old child like Jack and Paul, that your time is always going to be there because it's not.
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And to you old people, I'm not going to include you this time, Jack. But to you older people, as you see the days drawing closer and closer and you know in the depth of your heart, you really don't believe today is the day of salvation.
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Time is short, shorter than you think. I'm going to just close it with this verse.
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The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise and the elements will melt with fervent heat.
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Both the earth and the works that are in it will be destroyed, will be burnt up. Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness looking for and hastening the coming day of God because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire and the elements will melt with fervent heat.
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Let's just pray. Brother, again, thank you for the time we have.
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Thank you for your mercy. Thank you for your kindness. Thank you for your love and your compassion. Thank you for your holy rule in our lives.