Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we're picking up the Gospel of Mark where we left off, and where we left off is at the beginning of chapter eight. So that's what we'll look at today. While you're finding your way there, if you want to read along, let me pray for the word. Our Father and our God, we come to you again in the name of Jesus. And this time before the preaching of your word, Lord, that we might remind ourselves that we're handling reverently here the very word of God. And Lord, I think there's no greater time of needful prayer for me than when I preach. So Lord, I know your word's powerful, mighty. Lord, help me as I try to unpack it and explain it. And Lord, I do pray that you would just open our ears that we might hear and open our hearts that they might receive your word. Open our minds that we can understand your word. And Lord, for that, we are grateful. In Jesus' name, amen. So where we are in Mark's gospel, and I'm hoping to take us through, and I think we have enough time to do so, through a few different sections of text. And the first one here is the feeding of the 4,000 is what we will look at here. This is going to be Mark 8 and verses 1 through 9. So the feeding of the 4,000. It says, in those days, the multitude being very great and having nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him and said to them, I have compassion on the multitude because they have now continued with me three days and have nothing to eat. And if I send them away hungry to their own houses, they will faint on the way, for some of them have come from afar. Then his disciples answered him, How can one satisfy these people with bread here in the wilderness? He asked them, how many loaves do you have? And they said, seven. So he commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground. And he took the seven loaves and gave thanks, broke them, and gave them to his disciples to set before them. And they set them before the multitude. They also had a few small fish. And having blessed them, he said, set them also before them. So they ate and were filled, and they took up seven large baskets of leftover fragments. Now those who had eaten were about four thousand, and he sent them away. So Mark and Matthew are the two of the synoptics. John doesn't record the 4,000, the feeding of the 4,000, but Mark and Matthew do. And as you're going through your Bible, if you're just kind of reading it on a faster pace than we're taking it as we're studying it together, it almost seems like a repeat. We just saw this a couple of chapters ago, and now we're seeing it again. What's the significance? And there's even some commentators, I think mistakenly, go down this trail. But they look at that and think, well, this is actually the same experience that's just recorded twice. And some of the nuances have changed, maybe a copyist error or something along those lines. I don't think that's what's going on here at all. I think these are two different events that happened probably several months apart from each other. Then there's differences between the two. And I want to point those out. So in Mark chapter 6, that we just read just a couple weeks ago, we saw that there was 5,000 men in the crowd. And remember we talked about that, that didn't include the women, didn't include the children, so there's a lot more than 5,000 individuals that were being fed. In Mark chapter 8, what we just read, there's what, 4,000 Presumably men, not including the women and children. That's how they would record crowds. They would count the men. In Mark chapter 6, the crowd arrives and eats and then is dispersed all in the same day. But here in Mark 8, if you look at verse 2, it says the crowd had followed Jesus for three days. In Mark 6, if you remember, it said that Jesus had compassion on the people, and it was a spiritual compassion. He looked at the crowd and said, they look like sheep, but without a shepherd. And he began to teach them, because they lacked good teaching, and then he fed them. In Mark chapter 8, if you noticed, he also has compassion, but he has compassion on them physically. And it says in verse 3 of chapter 8, and this time it's not the disciples asking Jesus to send the people away that they might eat. Jesus says in verse 3, and if I send them away hungry to their own houses, they're going to faint on the way, for some of them have come from very far away. So Jesus has compassion on them physically. In Mark chapter 6, they only have, what, five loaves and two fish, if you remember the story. And here in Mark chapter 8, they have only seven loaves and a few little fish. We don't know how many, but they had a few little fish. And in chapter 6 of Mark, the feeding of the 5,000, at the end of that meal, they took up 12 baskets of leftovers. Remember that. In the original language, it's a little basket. These are little baskets that somebody would use to carry meals if you were traveling. I have a little igloo cooler I keep in my car, just so I can keep a couple things in there for traveling. That's what these baskets were. They were smaller baskets, maybe could fit a meal or two in them. But they took up, in Mark 6, 12 of these of leftovers. But you'll notice in Mark 8, these are seven large baskets. It's a different word. These are very large baskets. As a matter of fact, in Acts chapter 9, these are like the baskets that the Gentiles would use when they try to hide away Saul, who became Paul. It says, the disciples took him by night, led him down through the wall in a large basket. That's the basket we're talking about in this story. So there's a lot of differences between these two stories. And I think one of the poignant reasons why Mark and Matthew include these, not only because they truly happened, but also because in Mark chapter 6, if you look at Luke's telling of that story, remember that the feeding of the 5,000 is recorded in all four Gospels. But in Luke 9.10, the location is Bethsaida. This is Jewish territory. These are Jews. This is a messianic meal to the Jews. A miracle meal to the Jews. But in Mark chapter 8, this is a messianic banquet to the Gentiles. Predominantly Gentile territory. Surely there were some Jewish people there, but predominantly this is Gentile territory. In Mark chapter 8, you get that little bit of a help with a time stamp of sorts where it says, in those days, and then he moves on to this multitude and what Jesus does. In what days? We have to go back to Mark 7 in verse 31 where it says, again, departing from the region of Tyre and Sidon, remember that's outside of Jerusalem, that's Gentile cities. He departed from ministering there in Tyre and Sidon and he came through the midst of the region of the Decapolis, which means the 10 cities. And he went to the Sea of Galilee. On that side of the sea, that's the Gentile side. So two different meals here, one to the Jews primarily, one to the Gentiles primarily. And that's significance. I think in my studying of this and my understanding of it, it's a little bit of a foretaste of the heavenly banquet that's going to be there for us as the marriage supper of the Lamb. We're both Jew and Gentile. We're one body in Christ. There's no longer separation, right? You probably don't need to make those kind of distinctions. Because if we're in Christ, we're one. We're one. It doesn't matter what your background is, what country you came from, whether you had a Jewish heritage or a Gentile heritage. It doesn't matter. We're one in Christ. And I wanted to read this to you Because it's such a great passage of Scripture. But this is Revelation 19, and we get a little glimpse of this meal. in this event, where it says, then a voice came from the throne saying, praise our God, all you his servants and those who fear him, both small and great. And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thunderings saying, hallelujah. For the Lord God omnipotent reigns. Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory. For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready. And to her It was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Then he said to me, Write, Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he said to me, These are the true sayings of God." And we know in the word of God, the bride of the Lamb is the church. It's the church. When I was reading that, I always get a little excited when I study and think of heaven. My granddaughter, Hayden, I was sitting on the deck the other day with her, just me and her, and she said, where do kids get this stuff? But she goes, granddad? She calls me Grandpa Larry. Grandpa Larry? I said, yeah. She goes, do you have any dreams? Or she didn't say the word aspirations, but that's what she meant. And I said, not really. And she kind of looked at me puzzled. I said, I want to go to heaven. I said, that's something that's held out there for me. I said, but I've done so many things. I really don't have some big aspiration. I just want to minister for Christ and love my wife. And yeah, the next big thing on my agenda, I don't know what God's got on the agenda for me, but the next big one for me is glory. And she didn't quite understand that. But I said, do you have any dreams or aspirations? And she said, yeah, I'd like to collect these little toys that she likes. She goes, I'm going to get a collection of these toys. And I said, OK. So that's good. When I think of the subject of heaven, though, I'm always reminded, and I was talking to Karen about this yesterday, we went to Sandy Cove Retreat. We used to go there every year, and Vicki remembers that. And the kids would go off with their teachers and do their thing, and we would go to the preaching. And I don't know if anybody's ever heard of this preacher before, but one of the weeks we went, there was a gentleman by the name of David Brees. And David Breece, he's with the Lord now, but he was one heck of a preacher. That guy memorized the Bible. He preached through Romans and I had my Bible open so I could listen along and I knew he was going to make a mistake and he would go up and come back two verses, go up 16 verses, go to the next chapter and I was like, how did he memorize the entire book of Romans? But he preached a sermon one time there on the subject of heaven. And it was the most marvelous sermon on heaven that I think I had ever heard. He was talking about trays of hors d'oeuvres going down the aisle being carried by peacocks. I was just like, wow. But he would preface that by saying, you know, our mind doesn't know. The Bible says that. We have no idea. We can't even conceive of what God has in store for us. But that's the glories of heaven. And I think here, in the story of the feeding of the 4,000, and previously the story of the feeding of the 5,000, it's just a little bit of a foretaste of that glorious supper that we'll enjoy as God's people. So we have all these differences, but I also want to point out the similarities between the two of these feedings. In both, multitudes are involved. This isn't just a few people. These are crowds of people, multitudes. In both of the feedings, Jesus has the disciples. to confess their lack. And both times, he wants to know, well, how much do we have on hand here? Just five and two, just seven and a few. So they had to understand and be able to record later in the Gospels that, no, we looked around. It wasn't like somebody had food hidden somewhere. There was nothing there. It was scanty supply. In both, the disciples also confessed their inability. There's no way we can do this. This can't be done, right? God loves it when we say that, doesn't he? This can't be done. And then God just goes, oh yeah, watch this. In both of the feedings, it's an overabundant feeding. In both of the feedings, both of the miracles, there's leftovers, right? Different amounts, but there's leftovers. And remember that. The next time you're putting leftovers away in your refrigerator, Think about that. And we pray before our meal. We probably ought to pray when we put our leftovers away too. And say, Lord, you didn't only just provide a meal for us, we've got leftovers. And that reminds me of a story when you fed the 5,000 or the 4,000. And in both of these feedings, both of these stories, the disciples showed a lack of faith, a lack of faith. And the feeding of the 5,000, and I'll look at John's gospel on that. In that story, Philip answered to Jesus and said, 200 denarii worth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them might just have a little. He did the calculations. This isn't going to work. We can't do this. John 6, 9, they say, well, there's a lad here. He has five barley loaves, two small fish. But what are they among so many? No faith here. And then when you get to the feeding of the 4,000 in verse 4, his disciples answered him and said, what? How can one satisfy these people with bread here in the wilderness? There's no faith here. But Jesus is going to do the miracle anyway. In both of these feedings, the disciples don't understand. They don't understand. In Mark 6, 52, after this miracle occurs, and they witness it, and they pick up all the leftovers, it says in verse 52 of 6, and it says, for they had not understood about the loaves, because their heart was hardened. And then we'll look in a bit, but I'll jump ahead. After the feeding of the 4,000, Jesus is gonna say to them, how is it you do not understand? They didn't get it, they didn't learn, they're not there yet. So the record of Matthew and Mark, there's these two events, the mass feeding miraculously, these feasts. But I think there's one point we want to come away with in the telling of these stories. the way that Mark puts this together. If you go back and just start in Mark chapter 1 verse 1 and just read it all the way through to where we're going to end today, I think you'll see this point come up, is that at this stage in Jesus's ministry, at this stage in Jesus's discipleship to his disciples, they are still very dull and they have little faith. They're still very dull and they have little faith. And when I say that, It's obviously not to look down my nose at these disciples who became God's apostles and turned the world upside down, or you might want to say right side up. I look at that and I think we're the exact same way. And you read the epistles, and I'll read you a couple sections of the epistles. But when you read the epistles, you'll see that the early church was in the same boat. We're so dull, and it takes so long for God to work on us that we begin to understand spiritual things. These are texts that I know you know, but just to fit it in right here with what I had to say, like in Hebrews 5, The writer of Hebrews says in verse 12, and this is a little bit of a rebuke to the church that he's writing to, but he says, for though by this time you ought to be teachers And that's kind of a rebuke right there. By this time, you ought to be the teachers. He says, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God. And you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil." It's not as if there's milk doctrines and meat doctrines, but we can have a babyish understanding of the true doctrines of God, or we can really fully wrap our mind around and plumb the depths of the doctrine of something like the atonement. And that's what he's talking about. Another one for you, 1 Corinthians 3, beginning in verse 1, where Paul writes, And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. I fed you with milk and not with solid food, for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able. It's a little bit of a rebuke to the church in Corinth that they needed to really wrap their minds around, do some studying. And here's a couple places that we can find some help. Because none of us come into the kingdom knowing very much, knowing very little. I came into the kingdom, I came to Jesus Christ just knowing what a wicked sinner I was. I knew that already. And then to find out that there was this glorious gospel that even somebody wicked as I am could embrace Jesus Christ because he went and died for my sins. and he was buried, and he rose again for my justification. When that hit me, I was floored, and in a period of time, I resisted it for a long time. But when I finally yielded my life to Jesus Christ, with tears streaming down my cheeks, I understood this much. I thought I understood so much, and I barely understood anything. And then you enter into the school of the Holy Spirit, and God begins to teach you as you study and you grow. So where do we go to get help if we find ourselves weak in the faith? Maybe we think, you know, I feel like I'm a babe, you know, as far as doctrine and knowing the things of God go. One is to remain under solid teaching. To remain under solid teaching. There's a lot of teachers out there that don't even really teach the things of Christ. But solid biblical teachers, somebody that's going to open up the Bible and explain the scriptures. Ephesians 4, and again, I know you know this text, but it says, "...and he himself," that means Christ Jesus our Lord, "...he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers." Why? It doesn't say why, that's me asking why. It says, "...for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be..." And here it is, the babes. "...we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. But, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the Head, Christ." That's it. So we want to remain under solid teaching. God gifts the church with these men in these offices to do this work, to begin to train up and to build up, and not to make people like the pastor, but that they might be brought up to the fullness of the stature of Christ. And then secondly, I would say, not only remain under solid teaching, but pray. I always thought, you know, the way Jesus taught us about prayer, you know, and James says, you know, we don't have a prayer's answer because we pray for the wrong things. But, you know, when you pray, and earnestly from the heart, that you want God to grow you up spiritually, you think God's not going to answer that? As you say, Lord, I'm going to be in your Word today. I want to grow spiritually. I want you to teach me something from your Word. I think that's the kind of prayer God would love to answer if we would take the time to pray and to be in the Word. In another passage, you know, but James 1, if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, not doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. So in faith and confidence, we go to the Lord and say, Lord, I know this prayer is in your will. I know that, that you would grow me spiritually, that I might be more like Christ, my Savior. He'll answer a prayer like that. But we have to come to those, what the Reformers at times would call the fountains of grace, where God does that work, which is us being in the Word, coming to church, hearing good, solid teaching, that kind of a thing. And even Jesus said, I say to you, ask, it'll be given you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it'll be opened to you. And even there, we have work to do, don't we? We have to ask. We have to seek. We have to knock. We plead with the Lord to teach us. And he says, it'll be given to you. Have you asked? Have you knocked? That's what Jesus is talking about. So moving on to the faithlessness of the Pharisees in verse, we're back in Mark 8, 10 to 12. So it says, immediately, one of Mark's favorite words, remember? Immediately got into the boat with his disciples and came to the region of Dalmanutha. Anybody ever heard of Dalmanutha? Probably not unless you're reading through the text. It's actually a different word in Matthew. I'll talk about that in a minute. But they came to the region of Damanutha. Then the Pharisees came out and began to dispute with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven, testing him. And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, Why does this generation seek a sign? Assuredly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation." Well, where's Damanutha? Nobody knows. There's some people that think that maybe they have an idea where it might be, but I searched high and low through the commentaries, through my Bible dictionaries, through the maps, and we really aren't sure where this is. But we can be very sure that he's back in Jewish land, because the Pharisees would not have gone into Gentile territory where they would have been ceremonially unclean for having gone there. So he's back in Jewish territory, wherever he might be, and he's approached by the Pharisees. And if you look at Matthew's gospel, I believe it is, you'll find out that now the Pharisees have buddied up with the scribes. So they're coming together as well. But they come here, it says in my translation, to test him, to test Jesus. That same word is translated elsewhere in the Bible as tempt. Almost like they're in league with Satan, Satan who would tempt Jesus in the wilderness, and now they've come to test him and to question him. Robertson, who is a Greek scholar, I'm not, but Robertson says that they began to question with him And then he has the Greek there that I can't read. But they began to question with him, dispute, not mere inquiry. They began at once and they kept it up. It's in the present infinitive. So they just wouldn't relent. They just kept it up, kept it up, trying to test him. And it says in the Bible, and this is kind of interesting, it says that Jesus sighed deeply in verse 12. One commentator said, the sigh seemed to come, as we say, from the bottom of his heart. The Lord's human spirit was stirred to its depths. I was reading R.C. Sproul's commentary on that, and he said in his commentary, the English language fails to provide a full understanding of how Jesus reacted. The Greek indicates he did more than sigh, even more than give a heavy sigh. It tells us he came to his absolute limit, humanly speaking, of exasperation. He was sick and tired of this kind of response. So they just egg them on and egg them on, and they ask for this sign. Matthew Henry wrote this about asking for a sign. He says, why does this generation seek after a sign? This generation is so unworthy to have the gospel brought to it and to have any sign accompanying it. This generation has so greedily swallowed up the traditions of elders without the confirmation of any sign at all. This generation into which, by the calculating of the times prefixed in the Old Testament, they might easily perceive that the coming of the Messiah must fall? This generation that has had such plenty and sensible and merciful signs given them in the cure of their sick? What an absurdity is it for them to desire a sign. All that Jesus has done. And they think that there's a human explanation for the miracles. If there's a miracle or a casting out of a demon that they can't explain, they say, well, of course he did something miraculous through the power of the devil. That's what they said. And then they asked for a sign from the heavens, something spectacular, something in the skies, rain down manna from heaven. You see in John 6. And Jesus says, no sign will be given you. In Matthew, that's expounded a bit, where Jesus answers them and says, when it's evening, you say, it will be fair weather because the sky is red. And in the morning, you say, it will be foul weather today for the sky is red and threatening. hypocrites, you know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times. A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign shall be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah." And it says, and he left them and departed. Now earlier, Jesus has said in Matthew 12, for as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Jesus is saying, the only sign you're going to get is, I'm going to go to a cross and die. You're going to bury me and think you got rid of me, but I'm going to emerge three days later in my resurrection. That's the sign you're going to get. And the sad statement, both in Mark and especially Matthew, so bluntly, is that he left them and departed. He left them and departed. He left them, it says in Mark's gospel, getting into the boat, departed to the other side. the clear signs that Jesus had already done. John, especially, calls them signs. The clear signs were buried. They were ignored. Further signs would be denied. And there comes a time when further talk is useless. It's useless. But Proverbs 23.9 says, do not speak in the hearing of a fool, for he will despise the wisdom of your words. You want to listen to a thing you have to say? I went to my day job. I was on a call the other day. And there was somebody that was trying to help a customer. And I knew that they thought more of themselves than what they really were. And anytime I talk to anybody, it has to go on and on about their pedigree and all the little things they put after their name. I'm always like, OK, let's see where this is going. Because if you're really that smart, you don't have to tell me all that. I'll just know when I talk to you. And this guy got on a call. And he goes, well, there was like seven people on the call. I was on this call. And he goes, first thing, he's very full of himself. He goes, does anybody on the call mind if I have this recorded? I'd like to record this call. I said, I don't care if you record it. And then me, and there was only two people from my company around the call, we didn't say a word. He went on and on and on. It took no time at all to find this guy didn't know a thing he was talking about. Finally, somebody else that was another party on the call finally stepped in and said, what are you even talking about? And we ended the call. And that was the end of the call. But we didn't speak a word, because it would have done no. And I knew that. It's biblical wisdom. It's right in Proverbs. If I had said anything, it would have done nothing to the conversation. But you had to pick and choose where to do that. That was fresh in my mind from this week. Speaking of these signs, these indicators, J.D. Jones, in his commentary, said, when Eleanor, the wife of King Edward, died at Harby, they brought her body to Westminster for burial. And in every town at which her body rested for the night, they built a cross. And you can trace the route of that funeral procession by the crosses that still remain. So you could trace Christ's progress from Palestine by the healed men and women to be found in every place. Monuments to His compassion and love. He went to Jerusalem and He left His monument there in the person of the impotent man whom He restored to health and strength. He went to Cana and He left His monument there in the person of the nobleman's son rescued from the very jaws of death. He went to Decapolis and he left his monument there in him who had the legion but was clothed and found in his right mind. He went into the borders of Phoenicia. He left his monument there in the person of the daughter of the Canaanite woman whom he delivered from the tyranny of the unclean spirit. He went to Jericho, and he left his monument there, and the person of blind Bartimaeus restored to sight. He went to Bethany, and he left his monument there, and the person of dead Lazarus called back again to life. And as for Capernaum, from which place these carping Pharisees had come, he had done so many signs in Capernaum that, quote, if he had done the like in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes." No sign would be given them. And then as they depart, Jesus tells His disciples to take heed. Verse 13 to 21. says, and he left them, and getting into the boat again, departed to the other side. And now the disciples had forgotten to take bread, and they did not have more than one loaf with them in the boat. Then he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have no bread. But Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, Why do you reason, because you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive nor understand? Is your heart still hardened? Having eyes, do you not see? Having ears, do you not hear? And do you not remember when I broke the five loaves and the five thousand? How many baskets full of fragments did you take up? And they said, 12. Also when I broke the seven for the 4,000, how many large baskets full of fragments did you take up? And they said, seven. And he said to them, how is it you do not understand? The principle of leaven, yeast, just a small amount getting into the lump of the dough, working its way throughout the dough on its own, infecting the entire lump. That's the illustration Jesus is using here. A leaven so often is a picture of sin. And here he's probably talking about false teaching, dullness of understanding, turning to the traditions of men rather than the word of God. All these things that Jesus had been accusing the Pharisees of. And he wants to teach them that. Watch out for this. Just a little bit gets in. And it can destroy the whole lump. It can affect the entire body. And that's true of the church. Just a little false teaching creeps in, and pretty soon it infects the entirety of the church. And you see the battles for the Word of God throughout the centuries. Go back and read some of the great challenges that the church has had to deal with throughout Christendom. Because false teachings would want to creep into the church, and then people would have to rise up and say, no, no, no, we turn to the Word of God. We turn to the Word of God. That's what Jesus is teaching. But what do we learn here? We learn about the dullness of the disciples. And you hear me pray quite a bit that God will rescue us from this within our own selves, that we wouldn't have hard hearts, or ears that can't hear, or eyes that can't see, minds that don't understand. That's what they were guilty of here. 1 Corinthians 2 verse 14 says, But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him. Nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. And Jesus rebukes them here. And I want to move into this last section because I think the reason why I want to go through so much text is because I think we'll see why it is that Jesus will heal this man the way he does with progressive sight. Mark chapter 8 beginning in verse 22 says, Then he came to Bethsaida, and they brought a blind man to him. and they begged him to touch him. So he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town. And when he had spit on his eyes and put his hands on him, he asked him if he saw anything. He looked up and said, I see men like trees walking. Then he put his hands on his eyes again and made him look up. and he was restored and saw everyone clearly. Then he sent him away to his house saying, neither go into the town nor tell anyone in the town. Jesus could have healed this man instantly. Jesus healed people from a distance. The woman that had the demon-possessed woman we just studied. From that very hour, she was healed. The servant of the centurion. The centurion says, you don't have to come to my house. You just say, he's healed, he's healed. And he was healed from that moment. Jesus could have healed this guy instantly, but he did not. First he sees, Jesus is doing a work on him, Jesus has touched him, Jesus has laid hands on him. And at first he sees, but he doesn't see clearly. The man needs additional help from Jesus, right? He's not there yet. And Jesus continuing to work on him brings him to full sight. Do you see what he's teaching the disciples here? Do you see? They don't see. Do you not understand? Do you have eyes that can't see? Well, they see some. They see dimly. They see men walking like trees. They get a little bit of what Jesus is doing, but they don't fully understand who He is yet. We're being led to Mark, where that great declaration of Peter, that thou art the Christ. Right? I think it's Matthew's Gospel, maybe Luke. The Son of the Living God. to recognize who Jesus truly is. But they're not there yet. This is an object lesson to the disciples and to us. They're not completely blind. They're not. Jesus has worked on them. They see some things. They understand some things. They don't see clearly yet. Jesus must continue to work on them to get them across the finish line, so to speak, that they would understand who he is. And then even then, Even then, I think it's John's Gospel where he goes, finally, you understand, you get who I am. Even then, Jesus, after his resurrection, says, now don't you guys go out and do anything. Don't do a thing. In your flesh, you ain't going to get nothing accomplished. You wait till you're empowered from on high. You wait till the Holy Spirit is poured out on you. Then you go. That's what he says. So it's an object lesson for them, but it's also an object lesson for us as well. I think it's John Newton that's attributed to this quote. where he says, I'm not what I ought to be. I'm not what I want to be. I'm not what I hope to be in another world. But I still am not what I once used to be. And by the grace of God, I am what I am. It's a great quote. I can understand that. I'm not there yet, guys. I'm not. I pray that I will be made such, because the Word promises me that when I get the glory, that God will do that work. I'll see Him as He is, the Bible says. We'll be made like Him. But right now, we're on a path. We see part way. Sometimes I see scriptural things, spiritual truths, like men look like trees walking. I kind of get it, but Lord, I kind of don't get it. J.D. Jones had the same experience, and I'll end with his quote, because I really enjoyed what he said here. J.D. Jones, the commentator, says, I suppose my own experience is but a sample of that of thousands of others. It was but a poor and imperfect vision of the cross of Christ I had when I started my Christian life. But it has become clearer and clearer to me as the years have rolled by. my study of God's Word, my experience of life, my better acquaintance with the sins and wants of my own heart, all these things have helped me to fuller understanding of the great mystery of Christ's death and passion. I do not say that I see clearly, even yet, but I see heights and depths, glories and mercies in the cross of Christ today that were hidden from me 20 years ago. And this is only one example. The same truth could be illustrated in the matter of prayer and providence and the person of Christ. We do not see all or know all at once. The knowledge is progressive. And vision grows in clearness as we receive grace for grace, unceasingly renewed and enter into the secret of the Lord, which is with them that fear him. But notice that a man may have been really touched by Christ, right? A man could be really touched by Christ, even though his vision may be vague and dim. I see men, said the sufferer, for I behold them as trees walking. And yet, he had really experienced the touch of Christ. And so there are men and women whose notions of truth may be very crude and ignorant, who yet have come into that direct and immediate contact with Christ, which really constitutes the salvation of the soul. And I believe we're all on that spectrum somewhere. I agree with JD Jones. There's some things that I understand and I rejoice in that I didn't understand at all 20 years ago. And by God's grace, I pray that he continues to teach me and you, and that years from now, a week from now, we'll rejoice in something that we didn't really understand at this juncture of our walk. But I think as Norm Jean used to say, the old truckers used to say, you got to keep on keeping on, you know, in the faith, right? Stay in the word, persist, pray, ask for wisdom. God will bring us from faith to faith, right? From grace to grace as we continue to seek him. Let's close with prayer. Our Father and our God, we thank you for your word. And Lord, every one of us in this room, we're not there yet, Lord. We're not there yet. I pray that everybody in this room might know you savingly, and that's all the work of your grace. But Lord, we have a long way to go. And Lord, we know that you'll patiently take us there. And Lord, we do long for the day when we see you face to face. And Lord, we do wait for that day in glory with you, Lord, that wonderful supper, that marriage supper of the Lamb, Lord. Until that comes, until that day, we pray you continue to teach us and train us. And Lord, we are grateful for that. In Jesus' name, amen. Before I close with a benediction, happy Father's Day to any fathers in the room. I forgot about that. But receive the blessing of the Lord. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Go in the peace of Christ Jesus to a world that desperately needs to hear the gospel. In Jesus' name, amen.