Sermon Tone Analysis

*Date:*      3rd June 2007                                                                         (Sunday AM)                                                                       *Ref:* A0313

*Place:     Kambah P.S.*

*Title: No Balm in Gilead*

*Text:        *& Jeremiah 8:22

 

*Illust:     *It’s been called Australia’s allergy epidemic – a rapid and unexplained increase in the number of children suffering allergic reactions to a range of every day items such as pets, pollens and peanuts.

Ten years ago there was a handful of sufferers, today an estimated 40 per cent of children have an allergy of some sort, whether asthma, a food allergy or dermatitis.

!

I.                   Sickness

!! A.               Reality of Sickness

i.                 Sometimes when you go to a deteriorating country like a Fiji ~/ Zimbabwe ~/ Indonesia & you go to the Hospital or see the sick, you realise that their standard of health care is extremely poor compared to ours.

It also can seem like there are more desperately sick people

ii.

But this is only an illusion.

Precisely because our medical system is so good, our sick are quickly located away from the general population & into the hospitals or they are on medication that disguises the sickness.

~~ Truth is that many people are chronically ill.

iii.

Sickness is a reality of life, in fact according to some research approximately 33% of the population or 1 in 3 people are suffering from some form of chronic illness:[1]

      "…an illness that is permanent or lasts a long time.

It may get slowly worse over time.

It may lead to death, or it may finally go away.

It may cause permanent changes to the body.

It will certainly affect the person's quality of life."[2]

According to the Australian Institute of Health & Welfare: it would be expected that 1 in 3 men and 1 in 4 women will be diagnosed with a malignant cancer in the first 75 years of life.[3]

An AIHW report: /Australian hospital statistics 2005-06/, shows there were 7.3 million public and private hospital admissions in 2005-06, compared to approximately 7 million in 2004-05.

This included a 4.5% rise in public acute hospital admissions and a 3.3% rise in private hospital admissions.[4]

iv.

Even more amazing than the numbers of Australians with a chronic illness is the staggering number of people that are coming down with allergies in Western countries like Australia.

With all our sanitation, food standards, inoculations & medical care.

– Sickness

      The prevalence of asthma in Australia is among the highest in the world: between 14% and 16% of children and between 10% and 12% of adults have asthma.

Although it is not a major cause of death, asthma is one of the most common problems managed by doctors and is a frequent reason for the hospitalisation of children, especially boys.[5]

!! B.               Reason for Sickness

i.

The bible makes it very clear that the reason we are sick is as a result of human sin.

In the beginning God created a perfect world; there was no death & no sickness.

However when Adam & Eve sinned, sickness, disease & death entered creation.

~~ Sin:

         Genesis 2:16-17 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

(NKJV)

ii.

Curse of Sin, personal sin & sin in the human race.

Death is just sickness complete.

In our nation what we see is the curse of sin, evident in the sickness all around us.

         Deuteronomy 28:21-22 21 The Lord will make the plague cling to you until He has consumed you from the land which you are going to possess.

22 The Lord will strike you with consumption, with fever, with inflammation, with severe burning fever, with the sword, with scorching, and with mildew; they shall pursue you until you perish.

(NKJV)

         Deuteronomy 28:59-61 59 then the Lord will bring upon you and your descendants extraordinary plagues—great and prolonged plagues—and serious and prolonged sicknesses.

60 Moreover He will bring back on you all the diseases of Egypt, of which you were afraid, and they shall cling to you.

61 Also every sickness and every plague, which is not written in this Book of the Law, will the Lord bring upon you until you are destroyed.

(NKJV)

iii.

It is important we have the revelation that Satan is the author & energiser for sickness.

\\ *All* *sickness* even when there are bona fide medical reasons is spiritual.

Often when people quote the story of Job to demonstrate that it was not sin in Job’s life that caused his pain & sickness they miss the source of the disease.

Job 2:7 So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and struck Job with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.

(NKJV)

      And we see Jesus on numbers of occasions clearly links sickness ~/ infirmity to the devil

         Luke 13:16 So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound—think of it—for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath?” (NKJV)

!

II.

Balm of Gilead

!! A.               The Balm of Gilead

i.

As I have mentioned, in this nation we are incredibly fortunate.

We have an extremely high standard of medical care.

~~ Medicine & Medical solutions.

~~ Important element in healing.

–

      In the Bible the Balm of Gilead was a recognised healing balm with special properties to bring healing.

–.

Now we don’t know precisely what plant it is from nor what it was used as a cure for, but it was extremely highly valued & was a major export from the people of the region of Gilead.

Genesis 37:25 And they sat down to eat a meal.

Then they lifted their eyes and looked, and there was a company of Ishmaelites, coming from Gilead with their camels, bearing spices, balm, and myrrh, on their way to carry them down to Egypt.

(NKJV)

ii.

As the creator, God gave the world this Balm, so too God gives us medicine & medical science so that our health can be maintained and repaired when we are sick.

iii.

I don’t recommend that people not take medication or see a Dr, but what you need to remember is that as the problem is ultimately spiritual in nature there needs to be a spiritual solution.

!! B.               Is there No Balm

i.

In our text, the people are in a place where there is no medical answer & Text – No balm & no physician.

~~ A desperate place.

ii.

In developing and degenerating countries, we see amazing miracles, - The people are desperate they have no other avenue, they have no chance apart from a supernatural touch from God, there is no balm & no physician.

In fact if you do go into the hospital you are likely to not come out again.

Pr Newton taking me to the Hospital in Jakarta & one of the brothers talking me in past the guards – then we went looking for people to pray for.

– Bad scene, not like hospital here.

Crowded, dirty, primitive.

– I would not want to be admitted.

Tempted to say that we see miracles because the need is desperate, but God responds to faith not need.

iii.

Because even here with our advanced medical care many times the Dr’s are powerless to effect real change.

Sure they can make you comfortable, they can control, sometimes, a sickness but not entirely arrest it or remove it.

– Much of modern medicine is quite powerless to bring about a complete physical healing let alone deal with the spiritual elements

      Truth is that people are just as desperate here, the need is just as great.

!

III.

Blood of the Lamb

!! A.               Aggressive Faith

i.

What is needed, overseas & here in Australia is *Faith*, an */aggressive/* faith to */pursue/* healing.

Healing for ourselves & for others.

In the Bible we see that Jesus was never passive about sickness.

He treated it as the enemy & as a consequence He saw people healed.

Acts 10:38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.