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Pastor Mike will be speaking on God’s light for your darkness part 2. He will be in John 9-1-12
Nowhere did he say if you’re hurt you get to quit. Nowhere did he say if things don’t go the way you want them that you get to quit. But what he does say, always abound in the work of the Lord. The best radio program that is out there, it’s Hope Worth Having.
And I hope today that you are ready to learn, grow in your faith. And to continue to find the opportunities to be deeper in your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. Today we’re going to continue our study in the Gospel of John chapter 9 verse 1 through 12.
And we’re learning about God’s light for our darkness. We’re learning about how God dispels darkness into our life. And the one great thing about light is that light reveals what is hidden. And sometimes there are things in our hearts that need to be addressed.
And maybe in our pride we didn’t see it, but God’s light reveals it. It reveals and exposes what we need to confess to God. And so today as you are learning about God’s light for your darkness, I hope you will be willing to just come to God and confess whatever you need to.
Let’s get into the Gospel this morning and learn more about God’s light for our darkness. I remind you that even Jesus Christ, while He hung on the cross suspended between heaven and earth, and all of the wrath of God for the punishment of mankind’s sin, was upon Him.
And as the moon, or as the sun turned dark and the earth began to quake, that He cried out to God Almighty. My God, my God, why? And so I give… it. But the problem with believers living in the world of why is that there is not always an answer.
And it’s like a dog chasing his tail. If we spend our life in suffering asking why we will not be able to move forward in our life. We will not be able to take the steps that God wants us to take so that we might do the work of God.
And so the disciples like us are distracted and they are saying why. Jesus quickly corrects that and He says immediately that it is so that the works of God should be manifest in Him. God has a plan in my suffering.
Wednesday night we’ve been learning about suffering. And we were learning how God has this great purpose in suffering, and we looked at Joseph and how Joseph, in the midst of betrayal, in the midst of being rejected and forgotten, in the midst of being falsely accused, that Joseph says to his brothers who are in fear of retaliation, he says to them, what you meant for evil, God meant for good.
And so, yes, there are people who mistreat us, and yes, we find ourselves in physical challenges, and yes, we can even be falsely accused or mischaracterized in our life, but the truth is, remember this, that God is at work in your heart, and God is at work in your life, and that he can turn everything around, a tragedy into a triumph, and he can take your suffering and use it to make a huge difference in the lives of others,
and not only in the lives of others, but to bring glory to God. The disciples wanted to speculate, but Jesus wanted to put the focus on moving forward, and I wanna say this to many of you this morning, and I say it out of the kindness of my heart, but I have to be straight with you.
Wallowing in pity will not make the suffering easier, and as hard as it is, emotionally, and mentally, and even spiritually, I need and God wants for you to write the last sentence of that chapter of your life, as you look backward, and start letting God write a new story.
a new chapter in your life. And I want you to look forward, not backwards. I want you to say, God, what are you doing in me? And what are you teaching me? And what are you calling me to? And God, what are you wanting me to do as I serve you in the days ahead?
That’s what Jesus is doing for the disciples. We are to do God’s work, and it doesn’t matter what circumstances we find ourselves in. We must all move forward, and we must all close the book to whatever pain, hurts, and struggles, and quit looking back and saying why, but embracing what God has before us, knowing that He has a great purpose, and He has a great plan, and that as I respond to Him, that God is going to bring glory,
even out of my suffering. And if you get time later, read 2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 6, the apostle talks about his affliction, and here’s what he says, that if I am afflicted for the encouragement of the saints and the salvation of others, then God be glorified.
And sometimes God allows us to suffer, that others may watch us, and they may be encouraged, and they may find that they have the strength through Christ to be able to endure, and to be faithful and obedient to God, and yet others who are unbelievers watch our lives, and they see that there’s something real about this faith in Christ.
There’s something authentic about it that stands out in the midst of a dark world that has seen so many fake people, and hearing so much, so many voices that are misleading them. So I want you to know that we are to do God’s work, no matter what challenges are before us.
Some of you have quit working for God because you’ve been hurt. Some of you have stepped back because you are hurt, and you’ve got to recognize, look, you’ve got to move forward. You’ve got to move forward because God has a purpose in our pain.
He has a purpose in our problems. He has a purpose even in what I call, and you’ve heard so many times, church, sandpaper people, people who rub us the wrong way. And just when you think you’ve gotten rid of one, another one shows up, amen?
But God is revealing in you what you need to work on. God is using those sandpaper people to smooth out the rough edges of your life and the Lord knows that our edges are rough. Amen. The second thing I want you to learn this morning is that the work of God, I want you to learn about the work of God that we are to do.
I really narrow it down to two things but certainly out of it explodes many variances and styles of ministry. But I want you to write these things down the work of God that we are to do. What is it? Number one, it is bringing sight to blind, to the blind.
Number two, it is bringing light to the darkness. These are the two things that we are to do. Let’s go back and let’s talk about the sight to the blind. We look in verse 1. Jesus passed by. He sees a blind man.
This man has been blind from the beginning. Jesus stops and begins to minister to him. We all understand that this is speaking to us spiritually this morning, that every one of us is born into this world spiritually blind, and that blindness has brought us to the point where we literally are begging.
We see in verse eight, the Bible says, the neighbors therefore, they which before had seen him, that he was blind said it’s not this, he, that, sat and begged. You wonder why people run on tangents in life.
They are begging for purpose. They are begging for meaning. They are begging for significance. They are begging for forgiveness. They are begging for fulfillment in life. They are begging for these things.
And the thing is this, they don’t even realize that they’re begging. They jump in different relationships. They turn to things and to this world, hoping that somehow it will satisfy them and bring some kind of fulfillment to their hearts that the emptiness will go away and the hurt will fade away in their lives, only to find that when they wake up the next morning, it’s still there.
Only to find that the world will abuse you, take advantage of you and leave you on the side of the road. Once they’ve taken all that they can out of you, they will leave you there. And there you are again, begging, begging.
We understand that every one of us, that we are born blind spiritually, we are beggars. The Bible says for all of sin to come short of the glory of God, there isn’t a one of us that isn’t spiritually blind, but we must understand that there is hope for our blindness and that blindness comes through that.
that sight overcoming our blindness comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. That he is the one that brings light. He is the one that brings sight to our hearts. So as we examine the life of Christ and we see him minister to this blind man, how do we do that?
How do we bring sight to the blind? Here’s, write this down. I just jot down to a few thoughts here. Number one, help people see their blindness. A lot of people don’t see their blindness. Have you noticed that?
They’re addicted to drugs and alcohol. They’re running from one relationship to another. They’re trying to experience all that life has to have. They’re pursuing careers and money. And all along the way, they’re blind to the truth of Jesus Christ.
This story I told you about Debbie, she didn’t know that she was spiritually blind. But thank God for Alice, who God sovereignly brought into Debbie’s life and Alice shared Christ and she helped her see that she was spiritually blind and she needed a Savior and she received Christ as Lord and Savior.
Isn’t that wonderful? That’s your job, church. Go out of here and help people learn that they are blind. We’re not hateful and rude, but we’re honest and we want to help people understand that until they come to grips with their spiritual sickness, they can’t get any help.
You know that person in your family that will never go to the doctor, right? They won’t admit they got issues. You know that person that you’re trying to help in the community or maybe even at the workplace or even in your own family that has an addiction problem that until they recognize they have this problem, there is no real help and solution for them.
This generation can be characterized by the words of Jesus in Revelation 3 17 that says, because you say I am rich and have become wealthy and have need of nothing and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind and naked.
So many are there. The blind needs sight. The Apostle Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians 4 verse 3 and 4 that even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing whose minds the God of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel, the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
How? How do I do How do I bring sight to the blind? Not only help people see their blindness, but number two, I want to encourage you to relieve them of their suffering. Help bring relief to their suffering.
Listen to me, church. I can’t hear you until you help me. I can’t believe you until I trust you. You can’t just tell me that I need to be saved. You’ve got to come and show me. And that’s why I’m saying that Jesus came to this blind man and he got very tangible with him.
He didn’t just come in and say, listen, you’re a dirty rotten beggar. You’re a dirty rotten blind man. And you need to open your eyes spiritually. But Jesus did something physical in his life. Are you with me, church?
Many times, Jesus ministered to people in a very physical, tangible way by relieving suffering in their life. This is what the church does. This is why we feed the homeless. This is why we provide shelter to those who have no place.
This is why we come to people and we say, look, we have a ministry that we want to help you out because we are winning an audience and we are building trust with them so that we can show them that they need Christ.
That yes, this is a problem in your life, whatever that physical problem might be, but there is a greater problem and it is spiritual. And sometimes to get to the spiritual, I have to find a tangible, physical way to open that door.
And so I want to encourage you to, as a Christian, as a believer, to look upon people with compassion and understand that we are called to help relieve the suffering in this world. It’s not that I can solve every problem.
It’s not that I have all the answers to the world’s problems in relation to the physical problems, but I’m gonna do everything I can as a church body of Christ, as a family of Christ, to relieve the suffering.
The third thing I would encourage you to do is I look at the life of Christ and I look at his model here, is I would learn to touch lives. Here’s what I’m saying to you. I know you say I’m touching lives by doing this or that, and I get it and I’m thankful for that, but as a believer, don’t be afraid to literally touch.
And I know we’re all on high alert about touching and certainly Jesus never touched in a wrong way, but sometimes holding a hand, putting your hand on a shoulder, having prayer, laying hands on a shoulder.
God’s people or individuals, let me pray with you, is a powerful ministering touch that can be transformative. Look at verse 6, when He had this spoken, He spit on the ground, He made clay the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay.
Jesus could have spoken it, right? He didn’t need to touch. When Jesus blessed the children that were brought to Him, the Bible says He took them on His lap and He held them. He touched them. Sometimes He touched me through your touch.
Sometimes people come up to me and they say, God called me to pray for you. Let me pray with you right now. And they just put their hand on my shoulder and pray. And that touch is meaningful and powerful.
All I’m trying to say to you is that as you minister, remember that God is using you to reach out to that person and make sure that you touch lives. Now, there’s many more things that we could elaborate, but I hope I’ve stimulated enough thought in your mind that you’ll begin to figure out ways to you can bring sight to the blind.
We also talk about light to the darkness. I have to move quickly here. Jesus said in verse 4, excuse me, verse 5, As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. Jesus told us in John 8, 12, I am the light of the world.
Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of light. How do we bring light to the darkness? Number one, correct wrong thinking. There are believers and unbelievers. Who think wrong.
Did you remember that story about how Debbie said she read verse 3 of chapter 9 and she said, look, it’s not your fault. God’s not judging you. How that was a moment. A breakthrough. So many people have the wrong theology.
You know what I like to tell people don’t believe everything you think. If you keep believing all the things that you think, remember the hardest deceitful who can know it. And if I believed everything I think, I think I would quit and give up and just give up and be do nothing.
But I keep going back to God’s word and believing what he says. And what we need is people to correct the wrong teaching, not in a confrontational way, not in an attacking way, but sometimes we have to teach truth, don’t we?
Which brings me to my second point. How do you bring light to darkness? Teach the truth. are opened by Jesus, hear me, must learn to see. Eyes that are opened by Jesus must learn to see. We must adjust to the light.
And here’s my example. Now, if you take time later to read, because chapter nine is about this blind man, and this story goes on, okay? But here’s how he started out. The blind man started believing, they said, who is this Jesus?
He said, he’s a man. You continue to read, and he says, he’s a prophet. And you continue to read, and this man says, he’s a man sent from God. And then when you get to the end, he says, he is Lord. This is how God works.
This is how you are to work, my friends. That’s why I said to you, eyes that are opened by Jesus must learn to see, teach the truth to them. Now look, we can’t all understand everything at the beginning, but we start with basic truths and we start helping people understand the foundation, foundational truths of God, and then it expands, it grows, and they begin to see who really is Christ.
And they come to the full revelation and they go from ignorance to faith, from misunderstanding to truth. And we know that Jesus said the truth will do what? That you’re free. Yep. I want you to bring light to darkness by encouraging troubled hearts.
There are many troubled hearts, church. There are people wrestling today with depression, discouragement, they’re wrestling with doubt, they’re wondering if anybody cares, they’re begging. Do not be like the disciples and pass beggars by.
These beggars may not be on the streets, they may be in your family. They may be sitting at the kitchen table. They may be in your church. Would you pray that God would give you a heart like Jesus and encourage the troubled to bring light to darkness when the loss to Jesus be equipped this morning to take the gospel of the light of Christ and show people how they can have eternal life.
In this great work that we are doing for Christ, the work that we are to do must be characterized by the spirit that Jesus had. And I think there are three things that stand out to me about Jesus’ spirit.
Number one, he was obedient to the will of the Father. Father. Did you see that? Did you see that? I must work the works of him that sent me. Jesus would later say to his disciples, we know that he would say, he that sent me, I am now sending you.
And the point is that I was sent by the Father, Jesus is saying, and he’s saying, now I’m sending you. And so we must be obedient to the Father’s will. I think the second spirit that Jesus had is that he was a servant of servants.
The disciples didn’t have time to stop. Maybe they thought they were too good to stop. Maybe their agenda was too busy. But Jesus was a servant of servants. He did not feel ashamed to minister to the poor, to the blind, to the beggars.
He did not feel like he was above and better than anybody, but rather he chose to be a servant of servants. He had compassion. His spirit was a spirit that he was unable to bypass a legitimate need. When Paul and Barnabas set out, the church apostles said to them, take the gospel to the Gentiles, but their last words to them was remember the poor.
And I hope that all of us will not be so wrapped up in what we have to do that we’re not cognizant or sensitive and aware of the needs that are all around us as we go through our day. The third and final thing that I want you to note, and there’s much more that I could say, but time is way too long, is the urgency of God’s work.
We are to do God’s work. The work that we’re to do is to bring sight to the blind and light to the dark, but I want you to see the urgency of it. Jesus says, I must work the works, or we must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day, the night comes when no man can work.
You say, buddy, Mike, I am tired. I know I am too, but night’s coming spiritually. And there’s coming a time that we will not be able to work and do the work of evangelism and discipleship and encouragement.
And so now is the time, church. We must recognize it is an urgent work. It must be done while there is time. We must work now. Involvement in the work of God. of God is not an option. We must engage in his work.
We must find our place in the church. We must find our ministry that God has gifted us and equipped us with. We must all rise up and say, I refuse to be a sinner. I refuse to just be a soaker. I want to be a servant of God.
Hand me a tool, Mike. Give me something to do. There’s nothing that is below me or beneath me that I cannot do for Jesus. If the church calls on you to work, you must be willing to do it. But you say, well, I’m not gifted to work in the nursery.
I yet defined a spiritual gift to change diapers, amen? I know I don’t have it, amen. I tried that when I was young with three kids. Honey, I’m not gifted to change diapers. And it went over like a lead balloon.
I want you to understand that sometimes it’s not a matter of a spiritual gaffe, it is just a need in the church, amen. We just gotta do it, somebody’s gotta step up and take care of this task or that task.
I appreciate Brother Dave Aquilone who comes in early, comes in late, gets everything ready, he handles our sound, he makes me sound so good. The work is urgent and Dave is there and I appreciate so many of you that are, but I am appealing to many of you that are not.
I’m appealing to you. You want a big, grand position in the church, I ran out of them. I can call you the chief, take out the trash person if you need to. I’ll come up with a wonderful title if it’ll make you feel good, but the bottom line is there’s a lot of little things around here that just need to be done.
They just need to be done. I need God’s people to rally to the cause and recognize that whether it’s on this campus or it’s throughout this community or around the world that we must be fully surrendered and we must embrace the admonition of the Apostle Paul who said in 1 Corinthians 15, verse 58, therefore my beloved brethren, be you steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord for as much as you know that your labor is not in what vain in the Lord.
Nowhere did he say, if you’re hurt, you get to quit. Nowhere did he say, if things don’t go the way you want them, that you get to quit. What he does say, always abound in the work of the Lord. Hey, did you know that light cleanses?
You and I have been dealing with the COVID -19 viruses, but one of the unique thing is they’re saying that these ultraviolet lights actually kill the viruses. That’s what light does. It cleanses, and the light of Jesus Christ into my life cleanses me from all my sins.
The Bible says if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all of our unrighteousness. I hope today that you’re allowing the light of God to cleanse your heart and to help you to live faithfully before the Lord.
Hey, did you hear about our website, HopeWorthHaving .com? At the website are a lot of neat things. You can actually download sermons, you can download some music, you can read our newsletter, you can check out different things that are going on, and you can send in your prayer requests.
There are so many wonderful things that you can be a part of on the website, and I hope that you will take advantage of that and check it out, HopeWorthHaving .com. Go there today and learn more of what God has for you.
Remember this, that in Christ there is hope worth having.