Mark chapter 5. We'll read her text here in just a moment. I think often of the words of a Christian nurse. She was going to do missions work, and she was having a conversation with the doctor. The doctor said, Do you really believe that all men are lost who have not accepted the gospel? She said, Yes, I do. He replied with a look of seriousness, saying, if you really believe that, you can never live like the rest of us do. And that's true, isn't it? If you really believe the Bible, you can't live like the world lives. We want to look at one of our Lord's miracles. There are at least 18 miracles in Mark's Gospel. And we want to look at the raising of the daughter of Jairus. And there will be a part two to this message. I just want to give you two or three thoughts tonight. And then we'll finish the message another time. But in Mark, Jesus is a servant. Words like straightway and immediately keep appearing over and over again. If you read Matthew, Jesus is the King. In Luke, He is the Son of Man. In John, He is God. In Mark, He is the Servant of Jehovah. He's always on the move. Always ministering, working, teaching, going. In fact, this miracle that we're about to look at, Jesus performs a miracle on the way to do this miracle. He's just always occupied with the Father's business. So we'll begin our reading in Mark 5 at verse 35. While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue's house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead. Why troublest thou the master any further? As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, be not afraid, only believe. And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter and James and John, the brother of James. And he cometh to the house of the ruler of the synagogue and saith the tumult, and them that wept and wailed greatly. And when he was come in, he saith unto them, why make ye this ado? And we, the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth. That's the divine record. And we'll think on the subject, the damsel arose. And we want to see some very valuable lessons that apply to our lives as servants of the Lord, Jesus, is the perfect example in Mark's gospel of how to serve the Lord. And we want to see what he does, and we want to make sure that that's happening in our lives as well. So, first of all, this account is about death. It's about a little girl dying, 12 years young. This reminds us of the fact that we're living in a fallen, cursed world. Please don't kid yourself, this ain't heaven. Please don't think that everything is supposed to be like it is. Jesus had nothing to do with the sin and the death that's in this world, and he's gonna get rid of it, amen. The sin and death is our fault. But if we're gonna be faithful servants of the Lord, we've got to recognize the reality that death is on everybody's trail. And we've got to recognize that death is no respecter of age or station or condition, that death is the great enemy, the great separator, the companion of weeping and sorrow. I wish I could tell you otherwise, but we just need to be honest with ourselves and with other people and realize that we're all sinners and the wages of sin is death. And this world is broken. This world is suffering and sorrowful. I guarantee you, everywhere in the world, you've heard me say this before, but we went to the Outer Banks one time, and I said to our family, I said, this is a beautiful street right here, we're right along, we weren't far from Kitty Hawk and Nag's Head, and some of you have been there. I said, I guarantee you though, these people get sick, they got to have doctors too. These people here, they got it. There's a cemetery, I guarantee you. If we drive around long enough, we'll pass the hospital and the cemetery at one street over from the main street. Hospital, cemetery. It's that way everywhere in the whole world, by the way, because people are sinners everywhere and therefore they die. and it's not always the senior citizens that die. So here's a little girl who dies. We're introduced to her daddy. He's Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue. As such, he's a man of influence, a man of faith and prayer. Obviously, he goes to Jesus to get Jesus. His little girl is sick. She gets worse. He decides, I need to go get Jesus. He's heard of Jesus, obviously. Our Lord has done many mighty miracles at this point in his life. And so the word of God tells us, back up in 22, his name was Jairus. He comes to Jesus, falls at Jesus' feet and beseeches him greatly saying, my little daughter, life at the point of death, I pray thee, come and lay thy hands on her, that she may be healed and she shall live. And Jesus went with him, amen. And much people followed him, the Bible says. But no sooner has Jesus agreed to go, but a servant comes to Jairus and says, Just tell Jesus, it's too late now. Your daughter just died. It's too late. Don't trouble the master. I'm sure Jairus thought, well, I should have been here yesterday. Or as soon as she got, I shouldn't have waited till she got so very sick. And now she has died. My little girl, my little 12 year old. girl has passed away. I'm sure the tears flowed freely. He's a heartbroken daddy, a heartbroken daddy. I remember years ago having a funeral. This young man had gone to the beach. I guess he had graduated. I remember he was hit by a car. He was killed. I was asked to sing in the funeral. And I remember his dear distraught mother saying, but he was only 17. She said, that is too young to die. That's young, but that ain't too young to die. You're never so old, but that you could live another day. And you're never so young, but that you could die today. You could die today. So how cruel death is. Death has come to this little family. This little 12-year-old girl has passed away. But I want you to notice the hero of this account. Amen. But Jesus, amen, says, Jairus, let's go. It's going to be all right. You just believe. Amen. He doesn't promise him anything. He just says, be not afraid, only believe. Amen. Don't give up, Jairus. Your daughter may be dead, but that's no problem to me. Amen. Your daughter may be dead, but I'll get more glory raising her from the dead than if she's just sick." You see, when Jesus is laid, He's still on time. Amen. And He knows what to do to get the most glory. He would have got glory by healing her of her sickness, but He certainly got more glory raising her from the dead. Because there's only two other accounts of Him raising people from the dead. He didn't do that often. But he did do it. Amen. The second thing I noticed here is the ridicule that Jesus faced when he got to their home. It's amazing, isn't it? They laughed at him. They laughed at Jesus. Some people say that's just the paid mourners. I don't know. I just know the Bible says he came to the house there. A lot of people around, you know, standing around talking and saying, oh, this is so shocking and sad and what are they gonna do? And Jesus so much as says, she's dead, but she's not permanently dead. She's dead right now, but things are getting ready to change. And they laughed at him. They left him to scorn, verse 40 says. But it goes into where she is with mom and dad and Peter, James and John. This reminds us that as servants of the Lord, not only number one, are we living in a broken world, a world of tears and disease and demons and death. Number two, you need to realize not everybody's gonna believe what you say. You remember the shock of it when you got saved? You thought everybody would want to get saved. You thought everybody would shout when you said, hey, I got saved Sunday. But no, some of them said, it won't last. And some of them said, saved, what do you mean? We're all saved. Or somebody said, mind your own business. And so our Lord Jesus Himself who had already done enough miracles that everybody should have known who he was and what he could do. Our Lord himself met opposition and unbelief everywhere he went. I mean, they said terrible things about him, didn't they? Accused him of everything you could imagine. We're no better than our master. And I'm just here to tell you that God's people will love you and the world will hate you. And if the world thinks you're a pretty good guy, I reckon you must have been quite invisible around them or silent. Because they're going one way and you're going the other, and you're no better, but you are different. So you just tell me what your enemies say about you. Years ago in the swap shop, 25 years ago, 30 years ago, somebody called in and said to Pete Ray, hey, I've got some nasty magazines I wanna sell. Pete Ray said, whoever you are, you better hope Alan Fox didn't hear that or you'll be in trouble. Yeah, I mean, I'm glad the first name that he thought of, that's way back yonder, he thought of me. He said, there's one person that's against all that, and that's Alan. They tried to get liquor by the drink in this county, as you know, for generations. Years ago, 20, 30 years ago, the main guy in Maiden said, we'd have it in there if it wasn't for Alan. I'm glad the devil knows me. Y'all know you too, amen? You stand up for what's right. Everybody's not going to pat you on the back. The Sadducees, Pharisees, the Herodians, they couldn't get along with Jesus and He couldn't get along with them. So that's just part of it. Choose your crowd, friend, because you can't fit in with everybody. Even Jesus couldn't fit in with everybody. Choose your crowd. Some of you haven't chosen your crowd yet. Chameleon, you kind of depends on who you're around. Come on, don't die on me now. That's right. A lot of folks just depends on who they're around. Well, they laughed at Jesus. They didn't want to believe. But this girl was not permanently dead. And now life has arrived, and God is present, and death is going to have to flee. And you know the miracle, and we'll look at that another time. I'm emphasizing the ridicule and the scorn that our Lord endured. I like what D.L. Moody said as a young preacher. He had to preach a funeral. And he said, I don't know how to preach a funeral. I never preached a funeral. He said, I think I'll read the Bible and see how Jesus handled funerals. And he said, Jesus never preached a funeral. Jesus broke up funerals. Amen. Just like he's about to do here. So we ought to tell people, you know what these, you go home, turn on your television, you know what those lying tele-evangelists will tell you? They'll say this, just come to Jesus and your problems will be over and life will be a picnic from then on. That's a lie. That ain't what happened to me. I mean, you got saved, you picked a fight with the devil. You were his right arm. Now you left him and you've been a threat to his government ever since. No wonder he's trying to tear you down because you're putting him out of business. Absolutely. Tell people the truth. Get saved and you'll have to fight sin and the devil and false religion every day. Tell people the truth. Don't tell them it's going to be rosy. That's not the truth. In fact, if you come to Jesus under those pretenses, I don't even think you can get saved. They come to Jesus, so you'll be happy. You show me that in the Bible, friend. No, you come to Jesus because you're a hell-deserving sinner. That's why you come to Jesus and you repent. Amen. You've broken God's law. You don't just come popping bubblegum and saying, I want to be happy. Sorry. Well, last of all, I want you to see how Jesus handled this. He went in and He laid His hand on this little girl's dead hand. He touched her. He laid his hand on her lifeless little hand. I'm calling that the personal touch. As servants of the Lord, number one, let's realize we're in a world that's broken. Don't you expect everything to be, can I say this in a country way, hunky-dory? That just means everything's going swell, wonderful. Hey, this world's full of death. This world's full of death. Number two, make sure you realize that there's going to be a crowd that don't appreciate you one bit. I used to write editorials in the paper against alcohol. And you know who would write the rebuttal against it? Grandmas. Shock me. I mean, if anybody's gonna stand against alcohol, it ought to be Mamaw. Shame on any Mamaw that defends alcohol. Come on, Mamaw, you got better things to do than that. And then thirdly, if we're gonna be like Jesus and be the servant we need to be, there's gotta be a personal touch. I'm talking about a need of compassion and the power of a personal touch. Jesus didn't just stay 50 miles away and said, I raise her from the dead. He said, no, I'm going to the house. I'm going in the room and I'm gonna lay my hand on her hand. We can learn from that. Did you know you can't serve God like a monk and live out in the desert somewhere like a hermit? If you're going to do any good for people, you got to go where they are. You got to lay your hand. Are you following me? You got to lay your hand on their hand. You got to come in contact with people. You got to get the salt out of the shaker. The salt ain't doing a bit of good still in the shaker. You say, I thought we were supposed to be separated. You are not isolated. Big difference. Yeah. That's right. How many times I've gone to the jail and talked to people in the jail and they're on the one side that used to be where they'd put you if you just spent one night. How many times I've gone in there in that jail cell and shut the door behind me and just said, Lord, let me imagine for a little while what it's like. Hey, You can't imagine till you're there, but you ought to try to every now and then imagine what it's like to be in somebody else's shoes. You might not criticize somebody so quickly if you had to walk a mile in their shoes. And don't you be criticizing anybody for that matter, because you don't know what you'd have done in the same situation. You might have done worse. You might have done worse. And you know what they did, but you don't know how many times they told the devil no before they finally said yes. Which means, and since you don't know the whole story, since you ain't God, I'm sorry, you disqualified yourself completely from ever criticizing anybody. There you go, now you got time to witness a little bit and pray. Amen? That's right. Well, Jesus used the personal touch. There ain't no substitute for a personal touch. How many testimonies I've read and heard of a personal interest and a personal touch? The preacher laid his hand on this young man's shoulder and said, are you a Christian? He said, no, sir. He said, I've been here for seven years, preacher, heard every message you preached for the last seven years. He said, but I'm not a Christian. And the preacher witnessed to him one-on-one. Guess who got saved that day? Personal prayer. His name was C.I. Schofield. Another story. He was a lawyer. Somebody said to him one day, Are you a Christian? He said, No. He said, I want to be. I need to be. I've got a good job, but I'm almost a drunk already. He said, Nobody ever told me how to be saved. C.I. Schofield got saved through that one-on-one. One-on-one. personal conversation, C.I. Schofield, editor of the Schofield Reference Bible. Yeah, a personal touch. A personal touch. Do you know how effective it is when you're talking to one person? Do you know why a lot of people don't get saved at church? Because the preacher ain't talking to them. Yeah, that's what they think. The devil says to every one of us, that's good preaching, throw it on back. Yeah. Amen. Throw it on back. But when you're talking to somebody one-on-one, they know you're talking to them. Amen. A Sunday school teacher had a burden for a young man in his class. He went to where he worked. He worked selling shoes in Chicago. His name was DL. Mr. Kimball said, DL, I appreciate you coming to Sunday school. I know you've never made a profession of faith. Is there any questions you have? Can I help you? Well, my heart's broken. I want to see you get saved. And DL, Tell you, I'm ready to get saved. I just didn't feel like it was the right place and time, but I'm ready right now. I'm ready right now." D.L. Moody bowed his head and got saved and went out and led a million people to Jesus. A personal touch. Jesus showed us a person. You say, I'm too good to do. Wait a minute, you ain't no better than anybody. Don't you think that way? But for the grace of God, you'd be in hell or on your way." Personal touch. You see, sinners ain't never been saved, so they can't identify with you, but you can identify with them. I'm almost done. Do you know who's qualified to witness? People who've been sinners before. Amen. That way we can say, hey, I know what you're talking about. I've been there. I know what it means. The guilt, the confusion, the darkness, the dominion of sin, the fear of hell, I know where you're living. Titus 3 said, we've all been there. Amen. So we're not speaking as holier than thou. You know what you need to do before you say to somebody, you're a lost sinner going to hell, say, I was a lost sinner going to hell, but Jesus saved me and what he did for me, he'll do for you. Amen. Not, hey, you dirty, rotten, hell-deserving sinner. No, you make sure you include yourself first. Amen. That's right, isn't it? That's right. So you can identify with them. I want to make one last point. And that is this crowd that was laughing at Jesus, They stopped laughing when the miracle was done. When they saw her get up and run around the house, they said, we were wrong about him. I want to tell you something about the laughter of the world. They're laughing tonight. They are having the biggest time, having the most fun mocking Jesus. burning the Bible, making fun of the Last Supper. Some of you know what I'm talking about. They're laughing. I mean, it's open season on Christians. I could give you the name of 500 movies that intentionally target born again Christians. They're laughing. I want to say something. That's gonna end. They're gonna be put to shame. And God's people are gonna be the ones rejoicing. God Almighty said that He would laugh at them. Psalm 2. God's gonna get the last laugh. God's gonna get the last laugh. If you were to go to Geneva, Tomorrow, I don't know if it's still operating, but for a long time, there was a house there where they printed Bibles. What makes that amazing is that a man lived there who was the most famous atheist in the world in his time, Voltaire. They made him leave Paris. He was so blasphemous, so atheistic, so anti-government. And he said terrible things about Jesus. And he said, within a hundred years, there'll be no more Bibles in the whole wide world. And he laughed. Guess who got the last laugh? Guess who turned his house into a Bible printing ministry? And the same printing presses that were used to print his venomous atheism were printing the Word of God. God got the last laugh. And He always will. He always will. One atheist, I have a friend, his name's Freddy Helms, he visited this grave in Ohio where the atheist said, if there's a God, let snakes infest my grave. Well, he got his wish. God can make an object lesson out of you. I'm just trying to say, you don't laugh at God. You don't dare God. You don't tempt God. There's more to this we'll look at at another time. I want to be an acceptable servant like Jesus. Don't you? It's a broken world. Let's be part of the solution. Twelve years old. That's awful young to die. Twelve-year-old girl died in Chicago years ago. R.A. Torrey was the pastor then. at Moody Memorial Church. He was talking to the family. He said, folks, we never expected this little girl to die. She's only 12 years old. And every one of them, the Sunday school teacher, and the mama and the daddy, and even Brother Torrey. Can you know none of us, none of us, ever really one-on-one talked to her about her soul. Please don't let that happen to some 12-year-old you know. One-on-one. You say, I'm a chicken. I ask God to help you with that. Yeah, maybe it'll turn you into a lion, amen, or a bulldog, amen. Somebody will thank you one day. They will. I'm trying to quit. Remember when there was a Hardee's? I was sitting in Hardee's one day, and there was this boy and his grandpa. I had led him to the Lord, not long before that. And I was sitting there trying to eat a fish sandwich, and that young fella kept saying to his grandpa, he said, Grandpa, that's him, that's the guy. I mean, he just kept saying, that's him. Amen. Amen. Ain't that a whole lot better than somebody pointing to you and saying, hey, that's the guy that got me in trouble. That's the guy that lied to me. That's the guy that helped me go to hell. No, how about, that's the lady that prayed for me. Amen. That's the man, Brother Danny, that prayed for me, that loved me, that told me about Jesus, that stood between me and hell and said, stop! Don't go! Amen. That's why we're here. Make a difference.