Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / July 15, 2018 | Game Changing Moves - A Game Changing Touch

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July 15, 2018 | Game Changing Moves - A Game Changing Touch · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Hey, good morning.
0:02
SPEAKER_00: How are you doing today?
0:04
SPEAKER_00: Good?
0:05
SPEAKER_00: Three goods, that's all.
0:07
SPEAKER_00: A little anemic.
0:08
SPEAKER_00: Can we do that again?
0:09
SPEAKER_00: How are you doing?
0:10
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we just showed you the play on the screen that France is going to use to beat Croatia today in the World Cup final.
0:17
SPEAKER_00: We show you that, and you know.
0:19
SPEAKER_00: By the way, uh, if you're visiting this morning, or frankly, even if you're not visiting, we're in a series called Game Changing Moves this summer.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: Ten of them were in number five today.
0:28
SPEAKER_00: And in honor of a keyboardist over here at the Mulvaine Building, he'll be there in college building uh next week, who was a K-State football player.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: Uh, our game changing move this morning is uh something that happened, the game changing move that happened uh about 30 years ago uh in Manhattan, Kansas.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: Manhattan, Kansas, known as the only place where they really play football in the state, and uh which has uh which has a football field uh no longer named Wagner Field, named after uh Bill Snyder, family football field after the guy who sort of changed the game for Kansas when it came to football.
1:08
SPEAKER_00: And there's a statue of him.
1:09
SPEAKER_00: This is Bill Snyder at age 49.
1:11
SPEAKER_00: He was an assistant football coach up at Iowa for Hayden Fry and uh would have probably taken over as uh as head coach up there after several years.
1:21
SPEAKER_00: He was invited down to check out the job here in 1988 at Kansas State University.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: All of his friends said, haven't you read Sports Illustrated?
1:31
SPEAKER_00: They just ran an article entitled The Worst Football Program in America.
1:35
SPEAKER_00: It was all about Kansas State, which has lost 27 straight football games, only won three football games in the last four years.
1:41
SPEAKER_00: Why would you even go down to that black hole?
1:44
SPEAKER_00: Well, he came down and interviewed, and it was winter time.
1:48
SPEAKER_00: It was uh November in 1988, and he did a strange thing.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: When he was interviewing, he said, I'd like you to take me outside, and I just want to stand out in the cold for an hour.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: Just leave me out there.
2:00
SPEAKER_00: I've told you this story before, I think, and uh so he stood out there for an hour and he talked.
2:05
SPEAKER_00: He had students walked by, he stopped 40 or 50 students, and he didn't tell them why he was there, he didn't say anything about them.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: He just, uh, this 49-year-old guy just asked them some of them for directions.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: He just uh started random conversations and he came in an hour later.
2:20
SPEAKER_00: He says, Every one of the 40 or 50 students that I stopped stopped in the cold to talk to an absolute stranger, this is the place I want to come.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: That was a game-changing move.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: The random students at K-Stame through, and life for Kansas State University and the city of Manhattan has never been the same.
2:39
SPEAKER_00: So that's my game-changing move for the morning.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: And if you happen to be standing out in the cold this winter and somebody uh you're walking somewhere and you see somebody just standing there, make sure you talk to them.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: They could be the next uh who knows, uh football coach of Washburn.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: Whatever.
2:55
SPEAKER_00: So, um, game changing.
2:58
SPEAKER_00: Now I want to share uh with you a game changing move from the Bible.
3:01
SPEAKER_00: This is an obvious moment where a game changed for a woman.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: The title is Game Changing Touch.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: If you have a Bible or if you have a cell phone, you want to look up the text, it's in Mark chapter 5.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: The story is carried in all three of the synoptic gospels.
3:15
SPEAKER_00: Synoptic uh Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: Synoptic means they look at things the same way.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: John's a little different.
3:23
SPEAKER_00: So Mark has the most details of this story, Mark chapter 5, starting in verse 21.
3:29
SPEAKER_00: And it goes like this in one of the translations.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: A large crowd gathered around Jesus while he was by the sea.
3:36
SPEAKER_00: What sea would that be, folks?
3:37
SPEAKER_00: Would that be the Mediterranean?
3:39
SPEAKER_00: No, it would be Galilee, which is really just a lake, but they called it a sea, Sea of Galilee.
3:43
SPEAKER_00: And one of the synagogue leaders, that would be the synagogue there in Capernaum, which you can see today, can see the ruins of that town.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: In fact, you can even see the basalt uh ruins, just the foundation of the synagogue of Jesus' day.
3:59
SPEAKER_00: And one of the leaders there, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet and kept begging him, quote, My little daughter, she was twelve years old, is at death's door.
4:11
SPEAKER_00: Come and lay your hands on her so she can get well and live.
4:17
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus went with him, and a large crowd was following and pressing against him.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: And now you have an interruption to the story.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: This is one of those interesting stories within a story in the Gospels.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: A miracle within a miracle.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: A woman suffering from bleeding for twelve years had endured much under many doctors.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: She had spent everything she had and was not helped at all.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: We don't know what she had.
4:47
SPEAKER_00: Don't know precisely.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it could have been, you know, we think it has to do with the womb, uh, with the uterus.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: It could have been, you know, a lot of things.
4:57
SPEAKER_00: It could have been a problem clotting, it could have been a glandular problem, it could have been uh fibroids and so forth.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: But whatever it was, it was a continual bleeding issue.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: She'd spent everything she had and was not helped at all.
5:10
SPEAKER_00: On the contrary, she actually became worse.
5:14
SPEAKER_00: Having heard about Jesus, she came behind him in the crowd and touched his robe.
5:18
SPEAKER_00: Men that day wore, they had sandals on.
5:21
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, like all other men, would have had that tunic that he wore next to his skin.
5:25
SPEAKER_00: We know later on, we're told that that tunic was seamless, and it went down to the ankles.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: And then over it he wore a robe or a cloak.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: Those things were square, and uh as a result, they had corners at the bottom four corners, and by law, book of numbers, they had to have uh they had to have a little tassel, blue tassel, on the four corners to remind them to pray, to remind them to keep the 613 commandments of the Mosaic Law.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: They were called tzitzit, uh, T S I T T S I T, and they're still worn by the uh Orthodox over in Israel.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: See those little tassels.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: And so it's possible some people make a whole sermon out of the fact that she touched those tassels and what that has to do with the law.
6:09
SPEAKER_00: That clearly, however, is not the point.
6:11
SPEAKER_00: It's not even mentioned in Mark.
6:13
SPEAKER_00: But she touched the edge of his robe, says Matthew, for she said, If I can just touch his robes, I'll be made well.
6:21
SPEAKER_00: So she believed she was superstitious.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: She'd heard some magic.
6:24
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a lot of stories roaming around about this power guy that he walked around, he was the sort of the power alien or whatever, and all you had to do was touch him, and the superstition went, then whatever you wanted, Shazam, you would get it.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: And so she believed that superstition.
6:39
SPEAKER_00: She believed that magic, uh, but but in it was mixed some faith.
6:43
SPEAKER_00: And so she she uh goes at him, uh, goes through the crowd, and instantly, as she touched the edge of his garment, her flow of blood ceased, and she sensed in her body she was cured of her affliction.
6:56
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
6:57
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever had something like that happen?
6:59
SPEAKER_00: That's really something.
7:00
SPEAKER_00: At once, Jesus realized in himself the power had gone out of him, which is interesting since people have been bumping up against him, rubbing next to him all day, and this hadn't happened any other time, but he sensed the power had gone out, turned around to the crowd, and he said, Who touched my robes?
7:15
SPEAKER_00: And his disciples said to him, guy needs a hat, sun's getting to his head.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: That's a silly question.
7:22
SPEAKER_00: You see the crowd pressing against you, and you say, Who touched me?
7:25
SPEAKER_00: Come on, come on, Lord, that's embarrassing.
7:28
SPEAKER_00: So, um, so he was looking around to see who had done this.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: And then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came with fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth.
7:39
SPEAKER_00: Is that interesting?
7:40
SPEAKER_00: So it becomes clear the reason Jesus had stopped the crowd and asked about the woman so forth, is he knew being God, he knew that she was, she was gonna go away and she's gonna talk magic and she's gonna talk superstition, and she was gonna believe that somehow it was something she had done.
7:56
SPEAKER_00: And he wants her to know that it was not the grasp of her hand that had healed her, but the grasp of her faith.
8:03
SPEAKER_00: So, daughter, he said to her, your faith has made you well.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: Go in peace and be free from your affliction.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: This is an interesting and a famous and a very popular story.
8:17
SPEAKER_00: Now you understand a lot more about this woman, partly because this is the Gospel of Mark, it has a lot of details, but partly because the writer has deliberately made this a sandwich story and put this story as sort of a loser sandwich, she's the loser, in between uh the opposite of her.
8:37
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
8:37
SPEAKER_00: The story surrounding her shows how really uh uh at the bottom of the food chain she is.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay, here's a contrast chart.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: She is anonymous, she has no name.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Uh sometimes in in tradition she's called Berenice, other times Veronica.
8:53
SPEAKER_00: I don't like either of those names.
8:54
SPEAKER_00: I like to call her Marianne, I think that was her name.
8:56
SPEAKER_00: So anybody, she's anonymous, she's just known as the woman with an issue of blood, as versus the other guy, Jairus.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: He's a prominent man.
9:05
SPEAKER_00: She is impure.
9:07
SPEAKER_00: He is not only pure, he's a teacher of purity.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: She is broke, she has nothing left, bank account depleted, he is well to do.
9:16
SPEAKER_00: She is a community outcast, he, an enmired community leader.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: She's had a chronic illness for 12 years.
9:23
SPEAKER_00: Uh he has a daughter who has a sudden illness, a 12-year-old daughter.
9:28
SPEAKER_00: She approaches from behind for good reason.
9:31
SPEAKER_00: He gets to approach Jesus' face.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: She touches him.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: It's a passive miracle by Jesus, the only one like that.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus touches this 12-year-old girl pretty soon, an active miracle.
9:42
SPEAKER_00: She hides out fearfully, he approaches boldly.
9:45
SPEAKER_00: And notice, so so what we're getting here is we have a picture of a woman who really is a as a nobody, okay?
9:54
SPEAKER_00: And now what's worse is we find out her timing absolutely stunked.
9:59
SPEAKER_00: Because she delays him, what happens is while he's still speaking to her, people now come from the synagogue leader's house and they say, Your daughter is dead.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: Why bother him anymore?
10:11
SPEAKER_00: Great.
10:12
SPEAKER_00: Wow, how would you feel?
10:13
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you delayed the whole, you stopped the whole party.
10:16
SPEAKER_00: They're hustling out to go heal this beautiful little girl, daughter of a very famous person.
10:20
SPEAKER_00: You stop him.
10:21
SPEAKER_00: I mean, timing is everything in it.
10:22
SPEAKER_00: An older person here at the church came to see me one day and said, said, Would you do my, would you please do my funeral?
10:28
SPEAKER_00: So I, yes, sure.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: I said, I pulled out my calendar.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: I said, When would you like it?
10:32
SPEAKER_00: So, because timing is important.
10:36
SPEAKER_00: This last Friday, Melody and I found out how bad our timing was.
10:39
SPEAKER_00: We did our first road trip with the oldest grandkids, took them up for a couple days to the Omaha Zoo in Omaha.
10:45
SPEAKER_00: And and uh at the close of the day at 4:30 or so on Friday, you know, we run up the hill because there's the train.
10:51
SPEAKER_00: You see the train in the depot, kids want to take the train, so forth.
10:54
SPEAKER_00: We're first in line.
10:55
SPEAKER_00: Like the train hasn't less the depot, lots of empty seats.
10:58
SPEAKER_00: I wave at the conductor, I'm thinking we can get on, so forth.
11:00
SPEAKER_00: There we are, first line, all of a sudden, the train goes off, and as it leaves, we hear the conductor say, and this is the last train of the day.
11:09
SPEAKER_00: Great.
11:10
SPEAKER_00: Kids go, oh, Papa, Grammy.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: So, so, but, but we say, How about let's do the let's do the carousel?
11:17
SPEAKER_00: They like the carousel that morning or whatever.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: So we run on the get on the tram and get down there, and we get to the carousel, and there it is, and they're loading up the carousel, and there we are, and we're first in line, but you know, little doors shut, and the girl whom we talked with earlier that morning, and she's there, and and we're there, and door shut, and and then she pushes the button, she starts it, and then she looks at it and says, Oh, I'm so sorry, that was the last ride of the day.
11:39
SPEAKER_00: So we're going, man, our timing is bad, and the kids are going, and we're going, hey kids, this means we can get back to the hotel and swim and eat pizza quicker.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Ah, yeah.
11:49
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, you have to figure out ways of uh manipulating children to get them happy.
11:55
SPEAKER_00: My worst timing, I mean, I've had a lot of bad timing.
11:58
SPEAKER_00: Jim Congnan timing, bad, bad connection.
12:01
SPEAKER_00: I remember especially one embarrassing situation.
12:03
SPEAKER_00: I was single, I was leading the singles group here back uh when I was a little younger.
12:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and uh so I heard the Oz Guinness, uh Francis Schaefer's brother-in-law, was coming to speak in uh Lawrence, and so a bunch of us went over and we sat, I think that was a church or something we sat in.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: Oz Guinness was great, and you know, he talked and so forth.
12:24
SPEAKER_00: Question, QA time came up, and I had one burning question as a result of what he talked about, and you know, my hands going up there and everybody.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: And the QA time was over.
12:32
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't asked my question.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: And so he's leaving, and I became one of those people that that speakers hate, you know, one of these leeches, you know, that grabs them on their way out.
12:40
SPEAKER_00: So I'm watching what Dory goes out and I'm seeing, and so I zip out the back and I and I go up and out and I say, Hey Oz, my name's Jim, and I got a question for you.
12:49
SPEAKER_00: And Oz clearly was not the not eager, he wasn't going to stop, he wasn't even going to slow down.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: So he kept walking.
12:56
SPEAKER_00: I'm walking across the street with him, you know, and I'm trying to explain this question.
13:00
SPEAKER_00: You know, if my singles asked me this, what do I say, da-da-da, you know, and so forth.
13:03
SPEAKER_00: He just kept going, and then here was the car and the driver to take him to the airport, and he opens the door and and he goes, bye, and he shuts the door, and I go, bye.
13:11
SPEAKER_00: And and I thought, wow, my timing was really bad.
13:15
SPEAKER_00: Some cases, you know, your timing is embarrassing.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: In some cases, your timing leads you to frustration.
13:22
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine her timing and how she felt when she heard, great.
13:27
SPEAKER_00: Here I am, here I am.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: My life's bad enough, and now I just kill the little girl.
13:33
SPEAKER_00: So um, this woman has got everything going against her, uh, uh, but yet I think that there's something you and I can learn from her.
13:42
SPEAKER_00: And it all starts with her identity, because for 2,000 years she's not been known as Bernice or Veronica or Marianne or anything else.
13:49
SPEAKER_00: She's been known as the woman with the issue of blood.
13:53
SPEAKER_00: Because that's how it translates the passage in the King James, the New King James, and the older translations, a certain woman who had an issue of blood.
14:02
SPEAKER_00: So even today, the academic books and articles are entitled Woman with the Issue of Blood.
14:09
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
14:10
SPEAKER_00: So to other people around her, I'm guessing that her issue had gone on so long and had become so big that it dwarfed who she really was, and everybody just started referring to her, not by her name, but by the fact that she was the woman with the issue.
14:25
SPEAKER_00: And maybe even in her own mind.
14:27
SPEAKER_00: Do you know how it is sometimes when you have an issue that is just so big in your life?
14:31
SPEAKER_00: You wake up in the morning and it's the first thing you think about, your issue.
14:35
SPEAKER_00: And then for lunch, you have a sandwich and you lunch on your issue.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: And then in the afternoon, either you call your friend or your friend calls you, and unconsciously, without you even knowing how it started, within almost seconds you're talking to her once again about your issue.
14:49
SPEAKER_00: And then when you pray before you go to bed at night, your prayer is all about your issue, and your issue has gotten bigger than God, and your issue has gotten bigger than you are, and sometimes your issue just sort of swallows up who you are, and you lose your identity, not only in front of everybody else, but also to yourself.
15:08
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we've all got issues, right?
15:11
SPEAKER_00: I've got issues, but most of my issues last for a few days, you know, and then I fix the air conditioning and the car, you know, is comfortable again or something.
15:20
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you can sort of get through it after a while.
15:22
SPEAKER_00: If your issue lasts for a month, you've sort of ruined the month, but at least then you can move on.
15:26
SPEAKER_00: But some of us, sometimes your issue lasts for a whole year, and you feel like in some ways it's just polluted the year.
15:33
SPEAKER_00: But of course, all of us.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: I mean, y'all, you I the truth is I guess all of us have a different issue every year, don't we?
15:40
SPEAKER_00: I mean, four years ago it was your house, three years ago it was your spouse, two years ago it was your kid, now it's your health.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we have issues that last for a year, but can you imagine having an issue that lasted year after year after year and lasted for 12 years, it just kept going on and on?
15:57
SPEAKER_00: Initially, you know, you had everything in your power, you could sort of do something about it.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: You had a bank account, you had money, and you had physicians that said that they could help you, and you had a social network, you had friends, maybe you had a husband, or maybe she had a husband, maybe she had a family, but you had some sort of you know connections and folks down at the church, you know.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: But then as the years moved on and as it began to drain you, you began to drain everyone else.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: Because it's all that you could think about, and it's all that they could think about when they saw you, and they began moving over to the other side of the street.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's when you know your deficient your issue has defined you.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: That your issue has become who you are.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: Kirk Douglas was once driving down in Southern California, he saw a sailor by the side of the road.
16:47
SPEAKER_00: He said, just on a whim, he pulled over to give the sailor a ride.
16:51
SPEAKER_00: Sailor was hitchhiking, and sailor got in.
16:54
SPEAKER_00: Kirk said, I started the car up, guy looked over at me, did a double take, and then he said, Hey, do you know who you are?
17:03
SPEAKER_00: And Kirk, in his speaking uh times later, would say, Yeah, that was a great, great question.
17:08
SPEAKER_00: It's a question we ought to all consider.
17:11
SPEAKER_00: Do you know who you are?
17:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, for this woman, this woman had sort of lost who she was.
17:18
SPEAKER_00: The rest of the world had, in a sense, faded into the background.
17:21
SPEAKER_00: She had become the woman with an issue of blood.
17:28
SPEAKER_00: So uh the question is, how in the world was she going to deal with this?
17:32
SPEAKER_00: Because physically it had left her well, anemic.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have blood transfusions then.
17:38
SPEAKER_00: She's constantly losing blood, right?
17:40
SPEAKER_00: And and and I am sure she was pale.
17:43
SPEAKER_00: In fact, when I have a picture of this woman going through the crowd, I feel like she probably hadn't left the house that much.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: She is so low on energy, she was always so exhausted, she was so pale, she makes it through the crowd, finally through this crowd, and then collapses with her last shred of strength.
17:59
SPEAKER_00: She flops out an arm just so she can barely touch the hem of Jesus' garment.
18:04
SPEAKER_00: I suspect that's what happened because she was anemic.
18:07
SPEAKER_00: She was physically utterly depleted.
18:12
SPEAKER_00: Financially, she was broke.
18:14
SPEAKER_00: Physicians had taken all of her money.
18:15
SPEAKER_00: They'd made promises.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: They'd said, listen, don't expect a quick cure.
18:18
SPEAKER_00: Take these, do these, do these drugs and so forth, and eventually it'll happen.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: And she moved on to another physician, and now she's she's absolutely broke.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: Religiously, and that's really the important thing here, spiritually speaking, this woman now was contaminated.
18:39
SPEAKER_00: According to Leviticus 15, she now couldn't go into the temple.
18:45
SPEAKER_00: Leviticus 15 says that what happens in life is sometimes you can't help it, but you get contaminated.
18:51
SPEAKER_00: You know, when you go to the hospital, sometimes there are certain rooms like at the ICU or CCU.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: You can't go into those rooms without washing your hands, maybe even wearing a mask.
18:59
SPEAKER_00: It's because you're contaminated.
19:01
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you are not going to be allowed in there.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: And that and that God was the same way.
19:06
SPEAKER_00: The temple is a holy place and so forth, it represents purity.
19:09
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, if you've touched a dead body, it's going to take you seven days of ritual purification to get cleansed, to get clean.
19:16
SPEAKER_00: Then you can join the temple again.
19:18
SPEAKER_00: You can come back in.
19:21
SPEAKER_00: But if during that time you touch anybody while you're unclean, that person becomes unclean.
19:25
SPEAKER_00: It's going to take them seven days.
19:29
SPEAKER_00: And this is a mess for women, for young women with menses and so forth.
19:33
SPEAKER_00: So this meant that, I mean, you know, you've got a week every month that you're doing the cleansing, but this woman, for twelve years, constant, perpetual bleeding, constant, perpetual impurity, so she can't go to the temple anymore.
19:52
SPEAKER_00: But not only that, anyone she touches or hugs becomes unclean.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine what this does to her sexually?
19:58
SPEAKER_00: As a woman, she can't have sex with a man and he won't have sex with her.
20:03
SPEAKER_00: Maternally, she can't have children.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: If she's single, no man will ever want her if she's married.
20:11
SPEAKER_00: Certainly her husband has left her by this time, because after all, she can't cook for the kid, she can't clean for the kid, she can't hug the kid, she can't hug him, she can't clean the floor, she can't wash the dishes.
20:23
SPEAKER_00: Everything she touches becomes unclean.
20:27
SPEAKER_00: She might as well be deaf and dumb.
20:30
SPEAKER_00: She lives in a quarantined cocoon completely apart from society.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: That's how hopeless her condition is.
20:46
SPEAKER_00: And if this woman had decided to completely turn away from God and give up, you wouldn't blame her because after all, it was the law.
20:55
SPEAKER_00: It was God's Torah that said that she was perpetually contaminated.
21:02
SPEAKER_00: That kept her from ever pulling up a chair with the girls and saying, Yeah, let's chat.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: That caused her constantly to run into an old friend and have that friend say, sorry, I can't talk to you.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: I gotta take the kids to practice, and I really am so busy right now, I can't spend a week going through the ritual purification.
21:26
SPEAKER_00: I can't go on the sidelines.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: Sorry, I'll talk to you another time.
21:30
SPEAKER_00: When I've got a week free.
21:33
SPEAKER_00: You could understand if she'd given up on God.
21:37
SPEAKER_00: She's now down to her last prayer, I think, and we've come to the day in which she decides to pray it.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: What was her game-changing move here?
21:48
SPEAKER_00: I think is that she didn't give up.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: And instead of going away from God, she went to him.
21:54
SPEAKER_00: And she touched the hem of his garment and changed her identity forever from the woman with an issue.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: So the woman who touched Jesus.
22:05
SPEAKER_00: Two things happen in this miracle that never happen any other time in the Bible.
22:10
SPEAKER_00: Number one, Jesus heals somebody before without even knowing it.
22:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, every other time it's, you know, he looks you in the eye and he says, you're healed.
22:20
SPEAKER_00: In this case, God sort of, the father sort of bypasses the son, sees the woman collapsing, crawling, touching while Jesus is busy.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: The father sends the power out to heal the woman and also alerts Jesus, you don't want to let this woman get away thinking this is all magic and superstition.
22:44
SPEAKER_00: She's healed.
22:46
SPEAKER_00: Jesus heals someone without even knowing it.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: The other thing that happens for the one and only time in all of Scripture is Jesus calls somebody daughter.
22:55
SPEAKER_00: To this woman who hasn't heard an affectionate word for over ten years.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: A soft word, a loving word.
23:03
SPEAKER_00: Jesus turns to her and says, Daughter, your faith has saved you.
23:11
SPEAKER_00: And that changes her life.
23:13
SPEAKER_00: Her game-changing move changes her life.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: And in legend and in tradition, church tradition from hundreds of years later, she's given names.
23:23
SPEAKER_00: She's given the name Veronica because she's associated with a woman who in legend touched Jesus on this day and was healed, but then on the day of Jesus' death, when he's lugging a cross up to Calvary, tradition or legend says there was a woman who was beside him who saw that the sweat and the blood flowing down into his eyes stung his eyes and show she continually wiped his forehead.
23:49
SPEAKER_00: And the legend says that this woman who touched him and was healed now touches him out of gratitude.
23:56
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if the legend is true, but we know it could be.
24:01
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if something like what happened to her has ever happened to you, but it could.
24:09
SPEAKER_00: Maybe God won't choose to heal you if it's a disease issue of some kind, but He can change your life in a remarkable way.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at the four elements of her game-changing move, because those four elements can be in your life and can change your game.
24:27
SPEAKER_00: And the first is simple.
24:29
SPEAKER_00: The first is desperation that she'd run out of hope, that she was down to her last prayer, that she was out of money, that she had hit bottom.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: And you know it's true.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I think that people don't experience miracles in their life or game-changing moves or have wonderful things happen to them because they haven't hit bottom yet.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: You know people who haven't trusted Christ as their savior because they haven't hit bottom yet.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: When I hit bottom, then I'll look up, right?
24:57
SPEAKER_00: And and this woman had hit bottom.
24:59
SPEAKER_00: This woman lived in a world that was so dark that the light really attracted her.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes you are exactly where God wants you only when you get so desperate you have nothing left but Jesus.
25:14
SPEAKER_00: And when you have nothing left but Jesus, then you discover that Jesus is all you need.
25:21
SPEAKER_00: And this woman had come to that place in utter desperation.
25:27
SPEAKER_00: Seminary professor, I really admired, he's passed on now.
25:31
SPEAKER_00: In the blackest period of his life, he described it this way: he said, I'd never known such lonely pain, never such fear, never such helplessness, never such despair.
25:43
SPEAKER_00: I was lost, utterly lost.
25:46
SPEAKER_00: I screamed for help and none could come.
25:49
SPEAKER_00: I was making my bed in hell.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: I lay down in my spiritual waste, but I did not sink.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: When I flopped into nothingness, I fell into God.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
26:07
SPEAKER_00: Maybe your issue isn't a health issue, maybe it's a marriage issue, maybe it's an alcohol issue, or a lust issue, or a drug issue, or a depression issue, or a money issue, or a psychological issue.
26:20
SPEAKER_00: Could be a lot of things, but it's beginning perhaps to separate you from everything and everyone that you've held dear.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: And as it drains you, it drains everyone else.
26:29
SPEAKER_00: And you begin to find yourself isolated and alone.
26:36
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're close to desperation.
26:38
SPEAKER_00: If so, then you are exactly where God wants you.
26:42
SPEAKER_00: Second thing that you find in her game-changing move was humility.
26:46
SPEAKER_00: And by this I mean, well, yes, the humility of being down on the ground and touching the hem of his garment, but I mean especially the fact that she came as she was.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: You remember that the autobiography of Billy Graham is called Just As I Am, because he used to finish his crusades, you know, by having just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me, and that thou bidst me come to thee, O Lamb of God.
27:12
SPEAKER_00: I come.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: I come.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: And Billy would always be talking about how you need to come just as you are.
27:16
SPEAKER_00: Don't try to reform yourself, don't try to get better.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: But you know, some people I think don't come all the way to Jesus because they're like the woman.
27:24
SPEAKER_00: They get up to the edge of the crowd, they take a couple steps closer to Jesus, then they look at the crowd, they look at the folks sitting there in church.
27:30
SPEAKER_00: And those people are so much cleaner than I am.
27:32
SPEAKER_00: Those people are shiny.
27:33
SPEAKER_00: I need to go back home first.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: I need to clean up a little bit.
27:36
SPEAKER_00: I need to make myself a little bit better.
27:38
SPEAKER_00: I need to put a band-aid on the blood.
27:40
SPEAKER_00: I need to do something, you know, so that then I can approach and I'll be a little more worthy.
27:45
SPEAKER_00: Listen, there was only one person who got a commendation from the Lord Jesus that day, and it wasn't any of the shiny people around him.
27:52
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't any of the Pharisees or the religious people or the disciples, it was the woman who remained contaminated and came to him just as she was.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: That takes humility to come to him just as you are.
28:08
SPEAKER_00: But that's what she did.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: She understood that was her place down there.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: A guy named Simpson, James Simpson, Sir James Simpson invented chlorophyll.
28:18
SPEAKER_00: He was a scientist over in England some years ago, was dying, and his best friend, knowing what a great Christian he was, said, Dr.
28:26
SPEAKER_00: Simpson, I know that by the end of this day, I believe you, like John the beloved disciple, will be leaning against Jesus' breast.
28:35
SPEAKER_00: Simpson croaked out, no, I won't.
28:39
SPEAKER_00: But I have laid hold of the hem of his garment.
28:44
SPEAKER_00: And that's all I want, too.
28:46
SPEAKER_00: I don't need a I don't need a place really up there, but wouldn't you be happy just touching the hem of his garment?
28:56
SPEAKER_00: Desperation, humility.
28:58
SPEAKER_00: The third element that you see, let's be honest, was determination.
29:02
SPEAKER_00: In a world where so many people who are in pain turn away from God, she who had every excuse to turn away from God turned toward God, came toward Jesus.
29:15
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I think people don't get their miracle or don't have anything great happen to them because they become fine with a status quo.
29:25
SPEAKER_00: You know, life is bad, but that's just the way it is.
29:28
SPEAKER_00: Remember when Jesus said to the 38-year-old paralytic, would you like to get well?
29:34
SPEAKER_00: I mean, sometimes it's a valid question.
29:39
SPEAKER_00: Or like her, would you refuse to stay content with a pass with the status quo and determine you're gonna do whatever it takes to change your situation with God's help?
29:52
SPEAKER_00: For you, it may be making a phone call.
29:54
SPEAKER_00: It may be asking someone's forgiveness.
29:57
SPEAKER_00: It may be falling on your knees in prayer.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: It may be calling a counselor or going to a doctor.
30:06
SPEAKER_00: It means doing something.
30:08
SPEAKER_00: What she did was minuscule in comparison with what Jesus did for her, but she had to do something.
30:17
SPEAKER_00: You've done something by being here this morning.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: You could do something else by saying, I'm not content any longer with my status quo.
30:28
SPEAKER_00: God, I want a game change.
30:31
SPEAKER_00: I'm moving toward you.
30:34
SPEAKER_00: And finally, of course, as Jesus said, it was faith.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: What kind of faith did this woman have?
30:40
SPEAKER_00: Well, it was tinged with a little superstition, but for me, her faith was a faith to believe that Jesus could do anything and her hope that he would do it in her case.
30:51
SPEAKER_00: And her faith was also an understanding that the law did not apply when it came to him.
30:56
SPEAKER_00: Because you know what?
30:58
SPEAKER_00: Here's the deal.
31:00
SPEAKER_00: If you'd said to, if she'd said to you, I think, I think I'm gonna touch him so he'll heal me, you'd have said, crazy woman, silly woman, stupid woman, don't you understand how this works?
31:10
SPEAKER_00: The law makes it clear.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: You touch him, he becomes unclean.
31:14
SPEAKER_00: You don't change.
31:15
SPEAKER_00: Unclean people touch clean people, clean people become unclean.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: You think somehow by touching him, he's gonna stay clean and powerful, and he's gonna change you?
31:25
SPEAKER_00: And she's saying, I believe that.
31:27
SPEAKER_00: I believe that if I touch him, if I touch even his robe, then I'll become clean.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: And that was faith.
31:36
SPEAKER_00: And God says it wasn't the grasp of your hand, it was the grasp of your faith that saved you.
31:45
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that's what you need.
31:47
SPEAKER_00: Do you believe that God can do what he promises he can do?
31:51
SPEAKER_00: Is it any wonder that this woman is one of the favorite women over the last 2,000 years among Jesus' followers?
31:59
SPEAKER_00: One of the first pictures that we have, colored on the walls of the Roman catacombs, is this woman, the woman with the issue of blood, touching Jesus' garment.
32:12
SPEAKER_00: And in that moment, he didn't say to her, It may take some time to get better.
32:17
SPEAKER_00: No, immediately, immediately she became whole.
32:23
SPEAKER_00: Because she was so desperate, so desperate that she went after Jesus.
32:28
SPEAKER_00: She was so humble that she went just as she was without trying to get better.
32:34
SPEAKER_00: But she was so determined that, can you imagine her going to that crowd, knowing she's doing something so illegal, she's brushing against people, making all of those people ritually unclean.
32:45
SPEAKER_00: She is not crying out as she was supposed to do, unclean, unclean.
32:49
SPEAKER_00: She's just sneaking through them, sneaking up behind Jesus, terrified that if he sees her, he'll run away from her.
32:57
SPEAKER_00: If anybody recognizes her, they'll go, I know her, she's unclean, and immediately no cure, total embarrassment.
33:05
SPEAKER_00: But she's so determined she's gonna get there.
33:08
SPEAKER_00: She's gone through everything.
33:10
SPEAKER_00: She doesn't care what happens to her now.
33:12
SPEAKER_00: She's determined, determined to see her game change.
33:17
SPEAKER_00: And by faith, she believes that she'll become clean.
33:22
SPEAKER_00: She won't make Jesus unclean.
33:25
SPEAKER_00: So I ask you a question.
33:27
SPEAKER_00: Isn't it time for your game-changing move?
33:30
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what your issue is.
33:31
SPEAKER_00: It could be a lot of things.
33:32
SPEAKER_00: There's anger issues, psychological issues, money issues, sexual issues.
33:36
SPEAKER_00: But whatever your game-changing move needs to be, don't give up.
33:40
SPEAKER_00: Instead of going away from God, go to Him, touch the hem of His garment and change your identity from that person with an issue to the person who touched Jesus.
33:58
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
34:03
SPEAKER_00: In this moment, Father, we are all that woman.
34:11
SPEAKER_00: Asking ourselves if we are that desperate, that humble, that determined, that believing, would you look down as you did so many years before and send forth your power to change lives.
34:33
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
34:38
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for coming.