Well, if you're a visitor this morning, we are working through the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Mark, and we come to the end of chapter 7, the end of chapter 7, Mark chapter 7, beginning at verse 31, where Jesus heals a deaf man. That is found on page 1072 in your pew Bible. This is the word of the Lord. Mark chapter 7 beginning at verse 31. We'll read to the end of the chapter. This is the word of the Lord. Then he returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee in the region of the Decapolis. And they brought to him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment. And they begged him to lay his hand on him. And taking him aside from the crowd privately, he put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting, touched his tongue. And looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, Epaphrah, that is, be opened. And his ears were opened. His tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. And Jesus charged them to tell no one. But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. And they were astonished beyond measure saying he has done all things well he even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak may the lord bless the hearing of his word they say that the last recorded words of martin luther as before he died were we are beggars this is true which i have captured there in your sermon title it's a hard concept really for us to grasp beggars are we really beggars especially as i said everyone today loves to wear last time i said everyone loves to wear the life is good t-shirt it's really hard when life is really good to think and to act and to know that before god you really are a beggar like the guy standing out on the street it's a hard concept for to grasp and what we're finding here in mark's gospel is this same struggle has gone on in the life of the disciples they just have not been able to understand jesus he is perplexing they have not been able to fully grasp him they really have not been able yet to really see him even though he had walked to them on the sea and revealed himself they're still struggling with that they had not really yet been able to hear him as they should and i thought a lot about that this week that problem that's been unfolding in the life of the disciples before us in mark's gospel why didn't jesus just deal quickly with it we had the power to do it clearly all these people were being brought to him and he was instantaneously providing them what they needed he had the power to just think a thought and so and so over here would be healed that happened last week with the Syrophoenician's woman's daughter that where Jesus was he immediately said your daughter's been healed why for the disciples has the whole thing been so slow going then I realized that had he done it you know real quick fast it really would not have had the impact on their lives as those who would go out and be some of the greatest preachers the world had ever known to take his message to the ends of the earth what kind of impact would it have been if he just went we always have said that the most effective preachers are those who first preached to themselves that way you're getting to the heart it's not just an academic exercise pouring out just knowledge it's a knowledge that's taken root in the seat of the heart the most effective preachers are those who know what they are no entitlement don't deserve any of this family doesn't get me in all this blessing does not mean i'm automatically into the kingdom None of that. In other words, the most effective preachers are those who are going to have the same kind of mentality as this woman came to Jesus last week who could openly say, yeah, I'm a dog and I'm not arguing with that. I get that. I know what I am. I know what I've done. I don't have to fight that. We've always believed that for those to really care about helping others, they have to first experience and receive care in their own life they got to be on the ground they have to have their knees bowed don't they or else it's just kind of prideful service out doing all this work for the lord but you've never really bowed yourself and i mean really getting on your knees and that i think should give us some help in understanding what is going on here in this particular account this morning of what we're dealing with with a death man who is brought to jesus what jesus is essentially doing in these sections of mark that we're studying is training his disciples major portions of the gospel are given to this the gospels to teach us jesus's intricate and careful training of his disciples who would then take it out to the ends of the earth and we would be where we are today from that little room in jerusalem where these guys went out and preached so that whatever he did in the gospels would have to have a lasting effect on them they'd be able to look back and say oh wow do you remember now we see the holy spirit's come do you remember what jesus did there remember what jesus was teaching us there this would drive their ministry back in mark chapter 5 he had explained to them that his ministry was going to have a dual effect which we've not done real well with and understanding his ministry has a dual effect it was a ministry of grace and a ministry of judgment we've been really unbalanced and have not been able to talk about the judgment aspect in our time a ministry of grace and a ministry of judgment and that judgment was exercised for clear rejection of him that he would say back in chapter 5 remember that seeing some may see and not perceive and hearing some may hear and not understand and then he goes on that the words of the prophet isaiah might be fulfilled but then the grace of god would be that many would see and that many would understand that many would hear jesus would say that but blessed are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear that that was his his gospel message to them i'm going to do that for you i'm going to give you a lot of grace so that your ears would hear and that your eyes would see now what we've been seeing with regard to the disciples something has been been reoccurring with them some kind of problem that we've seen and the problem that we've been studying in mark's gospel is that they have not understood we are now almost into chapter eight and these guys still don't get it maybe that's a strange encouragement by the way i think it should be i'm a lot like these guys you're a lot like these guys here we are chapter eight almost they're still not getting it and jesus keeps hinting at it jesus keeps saying it do you still not understand do you still not perceive chapter 7 verse 18 are you still without understanding remember peter challenged us to add to our faith understanding knowledge do you still not perceive now isn't that remarkable isn't it just remarkable that for judgment he had come that some seeing they may not see and hearing they may not here he's not bringing judgment on his disciples this is a ministry of compassion to them but look at this struggle look at the struggle to bring them on board with his project we all should feel that they needed to understand they needed to experience deliverance themselves you can appreciate the shock when the disciples sit there and listened to Jesus teach Nicodemus and he said to them to Nicodemus you need to be born again Nicodemus whoa raised in the Jewish faith circumcised on the eighth day did the whole thing it's like saying to us today you need to be born again baptized Christian school run the gamut you've done everything right you need to be born again to enter the kingdom the disciples needed to be born again the disciples needed to bow the knee the disciples needed to understand the disciples needed to be able to see the disciples needed to be able to hear and that pushes the question on us this morning what's keeping us from seeing and what's keeping us from hearing you can see this goal this morning in mark i hope your scriptures are open I want to show you this you can see this goal in Mark by his structure of what he's doing you have two events here one is the feeding of the 5,000 and then you notice in chapter 8 we begin with the feeding of the 4,000 so you got two massive feeding events each of those feeding events are two separate sections of Mark the end of each section is very important we're at the end of the first feeding section this morning, the feeding of the 5,000. And in the first feeding section, he concludes that section of feeding by healing a deaf man. Now, the second section is concluded in the feeding of the 4,000 by healing a blind man. Just real quick, look over at the end of um in chapter 8 i want you to notice this um that you have the beginning of chapter 8 the feeding of the 4 000 the end of that section comes in verse 22 tell me how similar this sounds to what i just read a moment ago you'll see it and they came to bethseda and some people brought to him this could be word for word with ours except this is now a blind man and not a deaf man brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him and he took the blind man by the hand and let him out of the village and when he had spit on his eyes see this all reoccurring again he laid his hands on him and said do you see anything and he looked up and said I see men but they look like trees walking I'll get there by the way then Jesus laid his hand on his eyes again and he opened his eyes his sight was restored and he saw everything clearly well that's the conclusion to the 4,000 today's the conclusion to the 5,000 event it's the same thing now this deaf man's gonna hear well today we come to this first deaf man that's healed concluding this section you have both two issues being dealt with in these two sections ears and eyes Stay with me, you'll see this by the end. The climax of these two events put together is Peter finally with his tongue confessing that Jesus is the Christ. That's the big moment in the Gospels for the disciples and that all the disciples do it. That's the moment where Jesus says, blessed are you. You're seeing and you're hearing. Transfiguration happens. This is my beloved son, hear him. To get there, Jesus had to open their eyes and unstop their ears. Now hopefully that sets the stage a little bit for what happens now. All that background, I believe it's going to open up this passage for you, which I'm sure you read, and the boys and girls when it said that Jesus spit and touched a tongue said, ew. That's what my kids did at the dinner table, ew. and I'm going to show you something I believe very powerful and beautiful about this. Jesus had been on a long tour with them through Gentile regions. It's been a big hiking trip, many miles of alone time with his disciples. Much needed, much needed. He really has stepped up his training now. We're moving toward the cross. He's got to get these guys where he wants them before he goes to the cross and dies. As the Jews had rejected him, he moved into Gentile territory, which would be, you know, the whole design of the ministry of Acts. It started in Jerusalem and Judea to the ends of the earth. As the Jews rejected, it went out to Gentiles. He moves into Gentile territory into Tyre and Sidon. You say, where is that in modern day? Today we're going to find him in modern day Lebanon. Lebanon. We considered last time that the coming of the Syrophoenician woman, what a training moment that was for the disciples. Jesus had healed this little woman's demon-possessed daughter with just a word, and the effect that must have had for the disciples already were being taught to learn what Peter would learn in Acts 10. We are not to call unclean what God has cleansed. Gentiles are entering the kingdom. Salvation would be for Gentiles too. As we come to our text this morning, we read in verse 31 that he departed again from the region of Tyre and Sidon. He came to the midst of the region of the Decapolis to the Sea of Galilee. Now that should be somewhat important for us because Jesus has already sent a great preacher there. This would be my Bible test and I'd say who passes it? Who's the preacher that Jesus has sent there? The demon-possessed man who had a legion of demons in chapter 5 who wanted to stay with Jesus. And Jesus says, no, you go and you proclaim and tell everyone all the things that the Lord has done for you. Immediately says he went to Decapolis. He proclaimed it everywhere. Here we are. Somebody's been a forerunner. Somebody's been preaching. It was that man. Jesus' knowledge has filled the area. People want to know about Jesus, people want to see Jesus, they want to hear Jesus. We read that this beggar is brought to him as he walks into Decapolis, then they brought to him one who was deaf and had an impediment in his speech, and they begged him to put his hand on him. This man had at some point lost his hearing, And we know what happens when people lose their hearing. It affects the tongue. You are unable to speak properly. It has an adverse effect on vocal use. So you begin to lose the ability to communicate as you become deaf. Or communication gradually becomes unintelligible. It really is an awful infirmity, if you think about it. No ability, I mean, we take all this so for granted. No ability to hear and no ability to speak. Imagine. Gives us a lot of compassion on those who have these things, right? Should. But for the Jews, that kind of unintelligible speech, they couldn't tell if they were demon-possessed, and so they viewed these people as no better than the demon-possessed. I want you to notice what happens. In verse 33, Jesus takes him away from the multitudes. It's a very intimate moment in the Gospels. He doesn't want a public show. They want the public show. He doesn't want that. He takes this man. No doubt the disciples are there. It's an intimate training moment. Keep in mind, this is not recorded anywhere else in any other gospel. You only get it in Mark. That's probably why for many of you this is very unfamiliar. In this intimate setting, we read that Jesus takes his fingers and goes, and then he goes, after that, all of you are thinking this is really weird. I know you are. What in the world is going on? We're a little bit disconnected from this culture. I don't think we need to get into cultural things. I know healers of the day did all kinds of strange things. Think of the scene. The man can hear nothing. As a result, he can't speak. This man had no ability to listen to a voice and therefore, he couldn't talk with anyone. So Jesus puts his fingers in his ears. He then spits on his tongue, touches his tongue, and then Mark says he goes like this. Now, the disciples are standing there. They've just seen him grab ears. They've just seen him touch a tongue. They've just seen him look up to heaven and give the deepest sigh. Can you see it? It's okay. It's a visual for you. It's a great sermon visual. you don't need a screen to do it see it eyes lifted up to heaven i don't know what that side must have been like all i know is the deaf man can't hear it all he can do is see it what gets me in that is that in both cases of the healing of the deaf man in the blind man at the end of the second section here, it seems to me that Jesus is communicating he's having a real struggle to do this. That makes me a little nervous. What do you mean he's having a struggle? This is one of the few times you can get a real word picture of the emotions of Jesus in the Gospels. We can get an emotional response. He wants us to take in the emotional response. What is the emotional response? You get it a few times. You get it with Lazarus. When Lazarus dies that he weeps. He is overtaken in grief. That's an emotional response. Jesus, it's good to know this, isn't it? You get it in the garden of Gethsemane when he's sweating drops of blood and he says, my soul is so vexed, I'm overtaken with grief. And you get it here. Fascinating. A visual of what? You got some choices. Frustration? Concern? Compassion? I think it's all wound up in one. Why is he communicating it this way? I mean, last time he didn't need to go to the little girl. He just said, she's healed. He could have done that. Why communicate a struggle? Why didn't he just say, boom, you're healed? Because he wanted everyone here today to sense the struggle of this. To know the struggle of this. In both cases, the healing didn't just happen without some real effort and time given by the Savior. Now we're training, keep in mind. So the total scene of silence, there's no noise, hands and ears, touches the tongue, looks up to heaven, sighs with a deep emotion, and then gives us a word that in Aramaic is so difficult that the man's probably reading. This is what deaf people do. They learn real well to read epaphras it's hard to pronounce i tried that is be open and finally after all this this grand dramatic display we read that his ears were open and the impediment of his tongue was loose so that he spoke plainly. For the first time, he's hearing and he's speaking. Why is he doing all of this? The key to it's found in the next chapter. Look in chapter 8. The Pharisees come and ask him for a sign. You'll notice that in verse 11. Look at verse 12. And he sighed deeply in his spirit then he says to his disciples in verse 17 who are asking him where are we going to get bread and food again are you kidding you're still asking that question he says to the disciples having eyes do you not see and having ears do you not hear the disciples had been listening to his preaching now for a long time they still have not seen they still have not heard the disciples had the ability to speak but they're not speaking they had not heard even though they had heard the unbelief is a marvel training time think about this these are pastors going out they have to understand them these are his disciples and he's giving them an intimate moment to display for them, to their weakness, their need that they're not getting. What a message here. What a message here. He needs to lay hold of their eyes. Wasn't it the Apostle Paul, when he had been converted, that said scales fell from his eyes? he needs to lay hold of their eyes he needs to embrace their ears and unstop them and he needs to loose their tongues to proclaim him and he's the only one that can do it he's the only one for he came from heaven and with sighs and groans and in prayer he says be open and that struggle is pictured here with this man was a visual of their struggle he was having them to think about hearing and seeing and confessing the grace that he must give to needy beggars he has got to give grace to needy beggars or there's no way anyone's ever gonna see or hear or speak even though you hear see or speak today but they haven't recognized that need they've got the life is good t-shirt they had just watched jesus um heal a syrophoenician woman to make a sermon illustration of faith but now of a beggar who comes for mercy right and they needed to go through this the disciples needed to get on their knees that they're going to be effective in carrying this anywhere they needed to become beggars you understand this i've been saying this in our series with mark it's it's challenged me greatly and i'm a pastor it's challenge me greatly just as much as it challenges you and i say these things to me have i've been saying this you can hear sermons and i can say you can preach sermons and never truly hear sermons and never truly preach sermons to you do you understand yet that's what jesus kept asking are you still without understanding that's the punch of this let me ask you have you come to Jesus as a beggar? Have you? Have you said, Lord, I'm blind. My ears are stopped. I have no life. I really don't even want to be listening to your word in church. I have no interest in this. Just going through the motions. Would you touch them? Would you? You say, how do I know if he's touched them? your tongue is going to loosen it. When the ears are hearing, your tongue loosens. And that's what Jesus has to do for you and that's what He has to do for me. He must take His hands of healing and He must touch your ears and He must perform a miracle in your life for you to be able to hear and to see. Every one of you. You understand the beauty of what Anna just did? It was a visual of Jesus who had already touched her ears and touched her eyes so that today she says, I do. Why we take making vows in the church very seriously. It's part of using your tongue to say, I believe. It's a response of those whose ears are unstopped and tongues loosed. It's a much bigger moment in the Gospels than you realize for the disciples. It's fascinating. It's amazing right now who is proclaiming, isn't it? It's just remarkable. The sense you get is once Jesus does this, everyone is blown out of their minds and they're all proclaiming now. The man and the friends who brought him. Where are we? We're in dog realm, by the way. We're among the dogs. We're in Gentile. We're in Lebanon. You know how, Mark, what he says about this deaf man, you're going to love this. This is one of my great, exciting things I get to do and be a pastor, is to see something and then get to tell you. The word that he chose for deaf, do you know it's the only time it's ever used in the New Testament for this man? I won't quote it. It's the only time in the Greek it's used in the New Testament. Now, whenever a writer's doing that, he's doing something big. You say, well, where did he get it? Where did he get this word? It's not the general word. There's other words. Why did he use this word? There's only one other time it's found in the entire Bible. In the Septuagint, which is the Greek reading of the Old Testament translation, which is what the New Testament writers were often interacting with, when they read the Old Testament? It's found in one other place. Here it is. Isaiah 35. I'll just read it. The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad. The desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus. It shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it. The majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God. Strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, be strong, fear not. Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He'll come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears, and here's the word, of the deaf unstopped. Then they shall the lame man leap like a deer and the tongue of the mute shall sing for joy and the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing. Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain gladness and joy and sorrow and sighing shall flee away forever. Listen, Mark is saying, I'm choosing this word to tell you Isaiah 35 has happened in this event. It's inaugurated it. this is just awesome what he just said when the time of fulfillment would come the lord god would come and what's he going to do he's going to unstop ears and he's going to let the blind see two things and then the lame are going to leap and guess what the mute are going to sing boy this place should be just bursting out when the songs go what we just studied today is the description of Isaiah 35. And here's my question. Shouldn't the disciples have been doing this by now? Shouldn't they have been leaping for joy? Shouldn't they have been seeing and hearing? Shouldn't they have been the ones proclaiming it everywhere? It's going to take us to the most glorious moment when after the blind man is healed in the second section, Jesus looks at the disciples and says now who do you say that i am and they all say you're the christ tongues are just loose to which i say are your eyes seen and are your ears open has your tongue been loose why do i say that well how beautiful they had been blind but they could finally now see they had been deaf their ears have been unstopped they could finally now hear and that's captured in their confession. That's captured in what Anna did today. That's captured in yours. They can't keep silent. This is not a one-time stand-up, Anna. You can't keep silent now. This is who you are because you see and because you hear. But think of Peter who would say, there are certain qualities that if you're not practicing, you're going to be blind. You're going to have a blinding effect in your life. You need this constantly to see and to hear and to have the tongues loose. That's what worship does for you. That's why we're here today. That's why you need to be here. But you'll never understand or appreciate Christianity. You'll never know what we're really about until this happens. The disciples just learned what their mission would be. To the ends of the earth, they would now go and with their message, they would bring a world. Think about the imagery here. these friends bring this deaf man to jesus they would go they just saw their ministry they would go out and carry the deaf and the blind to jesus spiritually this is what ministry is i'm i'm bringing the deaf and the blind to jesus today and you're saying open them and he says i'll do it that's what my day is that's what i love to do that's what i've come to do so you have the whole ministry of isaiah 35 pictured here of what theirs would be but for them to ever be effective first they had to know they needed this and i say that to you today and i say it to me it's a sad thing that israel should have been proclaiming their messiah they should have been hearing they should have been crying out at the reception of jesus are you or do you still have that sour attitude like a pharisee who sits here and wants to mumble about everything it would be a tragedy to sit and listen to sermons for years have jesus proclaimed and never have your ears unstopped and your eyes to see so that you can truly sing from the heart which has been the whole issue here the lord will have tongues loose who can forget when he comes into the temple and the scribes were furious because they heard the children crying out in the temple remember that hosanna to the son of david they were indignant you hear what they're saying these little children about you have you never read out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants you've perfected praise i'll have my singers listen if we won't hear and tongues are mute he'll raise up an entirely new generation and it'll shock this generation of children to sing his praise but i think so much of this church i think so much of what the life's seen it in you and i'm so thankful for what the lord has done here with real fire and joy in the heart we're speaking and singing that gives me the greatest hope because he's willing he's willing it's not that he's saying this may not he's willing to do it but we are beggars all martin luther on his deathbed this is true have you asked jesus for help it's been the theme here it really won't matter after your ears are open by the way and your tongues are loosed and your eyes are saying it won't matter what happens after that in your life. It really won't. Did you hear what they said about Jesus? He does everything well. I heard the story of James Boyce when he was diagnosed with cancer and shockingly given six months to live. Everyone was in a panic. You know what he said to everyone? He looked at this verse. Be at peace. God does everything well. That's when you know in the face of the worst circumstances that your ears are unstopped, that your eyes see, and you want to tell everyone the wonderful things the Lord has done for you. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, these passages are overwhelming in power, which is what Mark's gospel is, a gospel of power of the Son of God. And it makes us bow the head today asking something from You sincerely from the heart that as Peter understood, we need to be born again by the Spirit. Would You unstop our ears? Would You give sight to our eyes so that our tongues would be loosed? That we would give glory to You for so great a salvation? And then once having been born again, we know that if we don't practice the qualities that Peter told us to practice, it can have a blinding effect on our spiritual life and thus we still need this same gospel whether we've been here from an infant to Anna's age or all the way into the hundreds we still need your help it never goes away to unstop our ears to touch our eyes so that our mouths would be open thank you Father for your faithfulness and thank you that you're willing and that you've shown your love to this church and these people. We are the most blessed people on the face of the earth. For blessed are our eyes for they see and our ears for they hear. And now let us, our tongues be loose to sing your praise in our life. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.