Standing Out in the Crowd

Welcome

Offering

Today is Missions Sunday. I want to begin to Highlight the Missionaries we support around the World. Today, I want to highlight the Jenni and Kelly Conrady Missionaries to Honduras. They are working through out the country of Honduras to raise up leaders and churches. Here are a few pictures from their recent work. Every month I encourage every family to give at least $25 on top of their regular tithes and offerings to help support our missionaries.

Announcements

With that all being said let’s jump into todays message.

If you are new to our church today, it would be helpful for you to know that we practice a form of preaching called “Expository Preaching”.

What that means, is we believe the Bible is best taught by taking books of the Bible and then breaking them down from beginning to end, chapter by chapter, verse by verse. Our goal, to better understand not only what God’s Word says, but what it means in our lives today.

That being said, if you’re new to our church, we are currently walking through the NT book of Matthew.

And so if you haven’t been with us, I would encourage you to go online to YouTube or any Podcast service where you can watch or listen to messages leading up to today.

Last week we began the discussion of Jesus drafting his Dream team. As we discussed there was way more to these guys being willing to leave everything behind to follow Jesus. They had heard his message then chose by Faith and the prompting of the Holy Spirit to become followers of Jesus. Disciples per say.

But not like Disciples as we use the word today.

In this time period a Disciple of a Rabbi was basically becoming an apprentice in hopes of someday becoming a Rabbi themselves.

This was an elite status in Fact one of the greatest Rabbi’s of this time was Gamaliel. To be a Disciple of Gamaliel would be like having a masters degree from Harvard or Yale.

Paul speaks of this in Acts 22:3

Acts 22:3 ESV

3 “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city, educated at the feet of Gamaliel according to the strict manner of the law of our fathers, being zealous for God as all of you are this day.

So here is the big deal with this idea. As Jesus is starting his ministry as a Rabbi, He does choose the brightest and most qualified, He chooses those who are unqualified and probably the least educated.

And this is who Jesus starts his Ministry with.

Moving forward from today Matthew will begin to show us the impact of Jesus’ impact in Galilee.

Keep in mind over the course of Chapters 1-3 Matthew has demonstrated how Jesus is both the Better Adam and God with Us.

From Chapter 4 on He is going to be demonstrating that He is the Better Moses as well set on

1. Delivering Isreal from Slavery

2. Giving New Teaching From God

3. Saving Us All From Our Sin

4. Initiating a New Covenant

Matthew is going to begin by showing the reader:

Jesus has the authority as a teacher and preacher of God’s Word.

Jesus has the power to heal the human condition.

Jesus has the power to defeat the enemy and his demons.

Jesus has the authority over the Sabbath, and all other Jewish Law and Tradition.

Jesus has the Power over Creation itself

We are about to embark on a Journey through the Sermon on the Mount but first we are going to look at how Jesus got the people there to listen.

Matthew 4:23–25 ESV

23 And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people. 24 So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics, and he healed them. 25 And great crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.

Jesus embarks on a journey around Galilee teaching in the various synagogues of the area.

This is about a 2,800 square mile area and home to somewhere around 3 million people.

He is teaching in only Jewish houses of worship. This is important because his mission in this time period is to show the Jews that He is the Messiah and if they accept Him and His Authority He will establish His Kingdom.

However along the way as He is journeying he is preforming miracles.

Matthew 4:23 ESV

23 And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.

So his fame is beginning to spread.

Matthew 4:24 ESV

24 So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics, and he healed them.

So as he is Journeying people are showing up from everywhere and Jesus is healing with out discrimination.

This demonstrated that Jesus has power over the human condition.

But it served another important purpose.

It drew people in.

Matthew felt it important to list the types of Healing Jesus preformed.

1. Physical Ailments and Chronic Pain

2. Demoniac

3. Epileptics and Paralytics

Jesus’ miracles were all done with compassion but there was two primary purposes to these healings.

1. To Demonstrate Jesus’ Divinity

To Bring Glory to God

This demonstration of God’s power was not to make people feel better or live longer....It was absolutely about bring attention to the Gospel.

We need to be careful that we are not placing our hope in long life and physical healing.....That our Hope is in the saving power of Jesus to usher us into eternity.

This why we have to be careful not to attribute someones healing to their faith or lack there of.

Nobody is getting out of this world without tasting death so to attribute healing to a lack of faith is to say a christian that does not live to 100 is lacking faith.

Jesus is more concerned about the condition of our spiritual soul than he is the condition of these mortal bodies.

Miracles demonstrated that He is Jehovah Rapha the God Who Heals.

Miracles also drew an audience to Jesus’ teaching.

I believe this is still his purpose in Healing today.

I believe that Jesus still heals for the purpose of drawing a crowd to hear the Gospel.

My Healing is a reminder to me that I am Called by Him and need to stay focused on His Call.

The healing of the man in Peru was to demonstrate to me that I didn’t get to determine how God heals and that he still has power over the Enemy.

Healing is always more about bringing Glory to the Healer than it is about pleasing the one being healed.

John 9:1–3 ESV

1 As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.

These healings served their purpose because people were showing up by the thousands. Which gave Jesus a crowd to share the message with.

The problem with crowds is that not everyone gets it and gets in on it.

We saw last week some of those in the crowd were followers He called directly

Andrew, Peter, John and Philip

Some of those in the crowd were followers who became disciples because they heard the message and wanted in on the Kingdom.

Some of those in the crowd were just there to receive something or just to be part of the show.

In all three of these groups were believers and nonbelievers.

Those that would make Jesus Lord and Savior and those who simply followed him around.

The same is true about the crowds that sit in our churches today.

Many walk through the doors but never walk through to Jesus.

The church is full of people who have hung around for years but still haven’t put their faith in Jesus.

Then you have those just showing up for the show or what they can get from the experience.

What we see in Jesus’ time is the same as it is now.

The ones who stand out in the crowd are those who choose to make Jesus Lord, Take Part in His Mission, and Contribute to the Kingdom.