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Jan. 12, 2023 - Just Informed Talk - Craig James

16:47

Jesus Heals A Leper & Forgives A Paralytic - Luke 5:12-26 | God's Grace Is Greater

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	Hi and welcome back.
	We have our God's Grace is Greater segment that we're doing today.
	And today we're picking up where we left off in the Gospel of Luke.
	We left off yesterday at verse 11 in Luke chapter 5, where we talked about Jesus recruiting his first disciples.
	It was an amazing story of a miracle that Jesus was able to perform that not only taught us a valuable lesson about humility before God, but also was able to begin the discipleship of Peter, James, and John.
	Simon Peter, I should say.
	James and John with Jesus.
	And we're picking up right where that left off yesterday in verse 12, and we're going to be reading all the way up to verse 26, where we're going to see Jesus perform a miracle, but we're going to find an even more powerful truth in the miracle but we're going to find an even more powerful truth in the miracle he performed than the miracle itself, if This is Jesus healing not only the leper, but also healing the paralytic.
	And inside of that miracle, there is something that Jesus teaches us that I think is one of the most valuable lessons that we can learn as Christians from Jesus and his ministry and his gospel.
	So, Let's just go ahead and read it.
	We're starting in verse 12 of Luke chapter 5, doing all the Gospels.
	We started in Matthew, we did Mark, now we're in Luke.
	So let's go ahead and jump in at verse 12 and read it.
	Right here it says...
	While he was in one of the towns, a man was there who had a serious skin disease all over him.
	He saw Jesus, fell face down and begged him, Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.
	Reaching out his hand, he touched him, saying, I am willing, be made clean.
	And immediately the disease left him.
	Then he ordered him to tell no one, but go and show yourself to the priest and offer what Moses prescribed for your cleansing as a testimony to them.
	But the news about him spread even more, and large crowds would come together to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses.
	Yet he often withdrew to deserted places and prayed.
	On one of those days, while he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting there who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea, and also from Jerusalem.
	And the Lord's power to heal was in him.
	Just then some men came carrying on a mat a man who was paralyzed, They tried to bring him in and set him down before him.
	Since they could not find a way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered him on the mat through the roof tiles into the middle of the crowd before Jesus.
	Seeing their faith, he said, Friend, your sins are forgiven.
	Then the scribes and the Pharisees began to think, Who is this man speaking blasphemies?
	Who can forgive sins but God alone?
	But perceiving their thoughts, Jesus replied to them, Why are you thinking this in your hearts?
	Which is easier, to say your sins are forgiven you, or to say get up and walk?
	But, so you may know the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he told the paralyzed man, I tell you, get up, pick up your mat, and go home.
	Immediately he got up before them, picked up what he had been laying on, and went home glorifying God.
	Then everyone was astounded, and they were giving glory to God.
	And they were filled with awe and said, We have seen incredible things today.
	Wow.
	Now, this is a powerful set of miracles performed by Jesus, not because only the miracle, or because of only the miracle performed itself, but because the lesson that Jesus teaches us inside of the miracles performed.
	Now, two lessons we can learn from here, I believe, that I took away when I read through these pieces of scripture.
	The first one was the man who was cleansed of his leprosy.
	What happens here?
	What we see happen essentially is Jesus is going to these towns and he was there performing these miracles.
	But what causes the man to reach out to him?
	I don't believe that this man actually saw Jesus perform any miracles previously.
	If I had to take a guess, I would more likely assume here, but I could be wrong, that So that is like a lesson for all of us.
	When we hear about Jesus and the power of what he can do in our lives, sometimes the hardest thing for us to do is just to have that initial faith, right?
	Because a lot of times in what we read through these Gospels, Jesus is confronted by Pharisees and scribes who demand that he performs miracles to prove he's God.
	See, they want the proof before they believe.
	But that's not how it works, right?
	Jesus teaches us that that's just not how it works.
	And he gives us these examples, and Luke gives us these examples through his documentation, historical documentation of what happened.
	That's not how it worked at all.
	As a matter of fact, what happens?
	The man who had the serious skin condition says this, Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.
	So he does two things.
	First, he humbles himself before God and says, if you are willing, knowing that the answer could be no.
	He could say, no, you can't be healed.
	But then he gives an affirmative statement saying, you can make me clean.
	That is an affirmative statement of his belief in Jesus.
	He is saying, Lord, if you're willing, which you don't have to, you can make me clean.
	You have the authority and power to do this in my life.
	And he does all of this out of faith, knowing, again, that the answer could be no.
	So what can we learn from that?
	Well, we learn in Jesus' response, Jesus touched him saying, I am willing, be made clean.
	And he was immediately healed.
	And in those days, leprosy was a serious thing.
	There were serious laws and rules about staying away from people who had these skin diseases.
	And it was a very dangerous thing as seen by most people to even get near somebody who had this kind of affliction.
	Yet Jesus not only came near him, but he touched him and made him clean.
	Because the man had faith.
	Now he told him not to tell anyone.
	I'm sure knowing that the word would get out one way or the other.
	But he tells him to do two things.
	To go to the priest and offer what Moses prescribed for cleansing as a testimony to them.
	Basically saying, go and give thanks according to the law as it is written.
	So, why did he do that?
	Well, I don't know exactly the answers to every question here, but I do know that what we learn in that first example is that the faith that that man had in God was tempered by his humility and understanding that God may not do what he wants.
	And that probably for that reason, I don't know what the exact reason is, because God works in His own way, not according to anything that we can truly ever know until we are with God, and He allows us to have that insight and discernment and wisdom.
	But in the way that He presented Himself, He came with humility.
	He humbled Himself before God.
	And then he believed and knew that God could do it.
	And that's how me and you have to be in our lives.
	We have to humble ourselves before God, right, and trust that he can do it.
	Have faith that God can do great things in our life to deliver us from whatever we're facing, whatever affliction we're facing, whatever problems that are surrounding us, whatever hurdles and obstacles that we continue to hit every time in life.
	So if you're out there wondering how can you overcome it, there's only two things really.
	Just have the same faith that the leper had and have the humility to know that sometimes God might not answer your prayer.
	And that's okay.
	But it doesn't mean that God isn't listening.
	It doesn't mean He's not there.
	And it doesn't mean that He's not standing right next to you right now through the fire, through the pain, through the struggle, through whatever you're facing.
	But then we have this next exchange, which is even better, right?
	We have Jesus going and teaching where there were Pharisees and teachers all sitting around.
	These are all the noble men coming in from Judea.
	They were coming from Galilee.
	They were coming from Jerusalem, all to see this new preacher, Jesus, that everybody's talking about, that's doing these miracles and performing these great teaching sermons.
	So what happens in this story is pretty interesting.
	Jesus is surrounded by a large crowd, as he always is, right?
	And he always...
	And let's just back up here.
	In the last part of the previous section where it tells us that Jesus often withdrew to deserted places and prayed...
	Remember, Jesus was the Son of God.
	He was God incarnate in this flesh.
	He was God in flesh, right?
	In human form.
	And even he had to withdraw and go and pray to God quietly by himself.
	He teaches us this later in other parables that we'll read about later.
	If God in flesh has to do that, if Jesus had to do that, imagine what we need to do.
	We need to be praying all the time.
	We need to be finding places where we can quietly meditate on our connection to God and allow God to speak to us clearly and show us the way.
	But then we get into this next section where the historical documentation shows us that Jesus was surrounded by a large crowd that contained the Pharisees and the teachers and those who were considered wise among men.
	Now, there was a man who was paralyzed, being carried by his friends, and they couldn't get to Jesus, so what do they do?
	They climb on the roof, they pull all the roof tiles off, and they literally lower this guy and drop him in front of Jesus' feet.
	At least that's what the story tells us.
	And what does Jesus say?
	Well, the full expectation...
	You know, overall, is that Jesus is going to make this guy walk.
	He's a paralytic, so he's healing people.
	He's praying miracles.
	They're going to make him walk.
	But Jesus doesn't do that.
	What does Jesus do?
	He says, friend, your sins are forgiven.
	Now, What he's done for that man is better than anything he could have ever done otherwise.
	He took a man who was sinful, just like he would eventually do for us all through his sacrifice on the cross, and he removed the sin that was going to cast him into a fiery lake to burn for eternity because of his grace.
	His grace and then that man and his friends and their belief.
	Right?
	Right?
	So Jesus looks and he sees the Pharisees and he sees what's in their heart.
	Because this is what he does time and time again.
	Because he is God in flesh, he can see into the mind and heart of these people standing there.
	They don't even have to say anything.
	He can see what is in your heart.
	And that's another thing we can take away is that Jesus can see what's in our hearts.
	So he knows with what intentions we do things in our lives.
	He knows that secret dialogue that you have going inside yourself always.
	So be careful and remember that, always.
	But, he sees in their heart that they think it's blasphemy for him to forgive sins, and that God is the only one who can do it.
	So they don't believe that he is God.
	And he perceives their thoughts, and he says out loud, why are you thinking this in your heart?
	He goes, well, what's easier?
	Is it easier for me to say your sins are forgiven, or to say get up and walk?
	Now, I think that question is obviously meant to show them that what he's doing, the path he's chosen to take to save humanity, to sacrifice himself, is going to be harder than the path of just going and healing everybody and saying, oh, everything's going to be fine.
	But, he says, so you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he says, To the paralyzed man, get up, pick up your mat, and go home.
	And what does he do?
	He gets up, picks up his mat, and goes home, giving thanks to and glorifying God.
	Everyone was astounded.
	They all gave glory to God.
	And they all said, we have seen incredible things here today.
	So that is the message that I wanted to share with you, that Incredible things can happen.
	If you put these two stories together, what do they teach us?
	A, that God can do great things in our lives.
	But B, in order for us to be worthy of that, well, we don't have to really do anything because God's grace has already taken care of that.
	But what are we taught to do?
	What is the example given?
	We have to humble ourselves and have faith.
	Now, obviously the scribes and the Pharisees didn't have faith, and they didn't humble themselves.
	They thought they were better than everyone.
	They thought they were the supreme givers of law.
	They thought their traditions were better than God's traditions, which is why Jesus came in the first place, to show them and all of us for all time that only God, Is what matters.
	Only His Son, our Lord Jesus, is what matters.
	And the Holy Spirit in our hearts.
	Not what laws are created by men on this earth.
	Those will all come and go.
	They will come and pass.
	But one thing that will never pass is the eternal salvation that has been given to us.
	The life everlasting through Jesus.
	So, how do we get it?
	Humble ourselves before God.
	And have faith that God can do these great things.
	And humbling ourselves does include...
	Having enough trust in God to know that if it doesn't go the way we want it to, the first time, the second time, the third time, the hundredth time, the thousandth time, the ten thousandth time, the millionth time, that eventually God's plan will be done.
	And if we have that faith, God will work for our betterment, for our good.
	Because, as written in Jeremiah 29, 11, God knows the plans He has for us, the plans for our future and our hope.
	Remember, there is hope in God.
	Jesus heals, he saves.
	And I know that this is what we're meant to learn, I believe, in these verses.
	So, I hope that helped you.
	We're going to say a prayer and then we'll wrap it up.
	Lord and Heavenly Father, we give thanks for this amazing scripture you've given us to share here.
	These lessons that we can learn through the miracles performed by Christ that we pray Lord will teach us.
	To have humility before you, to humble ourselves before you and to have faith and trust in you, Lord.
	Because we know that in our lives, you're going to be able to do great things, but we can't expect to know what those things are.
	We just have to trust you, Lord, that if we give you everything we have, that that will in turn allow us to have all of the things that we need, Lord.
	And at the end of the day, Most importantly, find the eternal salvation through the sacrifice of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
	I pray you'll show that to all those out there listening and watching and help them share that with others as well.
	We thank you most of all for that gift.
	In Jesus' name, Amen.
	Alright, well, I hope you guys enjoyed that show.
	We're going to wrap it up there, but if you want to like, share, subscribe, there's links below.
	If you're watching this on YouTube, in the description there's a link for you to come find my new show that I do right before this segment.
	So I hope you guys come on over and find me there.
	I know I got banned off YouTube, right?
	But I'm back, you know?
	But I can't say what I would say in the new show on YouTube or I'll still ban me again.
	So if you want to see the show, use the link in the description to find me on Rumble and BitChute.
	That's where I'm posting the main news show.
	But thanks for joining me here on this episode of God's Grace is Greater.
	I hope you guys enjoy and tune in tomorrow.
	But until then, my name is Craig.

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