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Have You Forgotten The Miracles? · Bible Tract Echoes Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey friends, welcome to Bible Trek Echoes.
• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Michael McCurry your host.
• 0:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so very much for joining me once again today.
• 0:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: We are in the Book of Mark chapter number 8.
• 0:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Mark chapter number 8.
• 0:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you'll find your place there, we'll begin with verse number 1 in just a moment.
• 0:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: But before we really jump into the meat of the broadcast, we're going to talk today about the track that started it all.
• 0:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: This track right here is called The New Birth.
• 0:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: And this gospel tract was really the first one that we know of Paul Levine writing.
• 0:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it was definitely the first to become very popular.
• 0:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Started with the article in a Christian periodical that Paul Levine was asked to write.
• 0:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: He wrote it as a gospel plea.
• 0:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it was just supposed to be an article.
• 0:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: But so many people started cutting that article out of that newspaper, that magazine, and sending it to lost failing members and friends.
• 0:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: And they began to contact.
• 0:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: Dr. Paul and said, could we have more of it?
• 0:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: Could we have that as a gospel tract?
• 1:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: We want to give them out and he, through a burden by the Lord, decided we're going to print this, but we're going to do it free as the Lord provides.
• 1:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: And now, 85 years later, it started with a small run of some 3000 gospel tracks.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: But today, we have tens of millions, hundreds of millions all over the world.
• 1:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it started.
• 1:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: with a little Gospel track, just like this.
• 1:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: We encourage you if you would to go to Bibletracksink.org and use this Gospel tract order, this Gospel tract.
• 1:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: I believe it would be a help to you if you would go there.
• 1:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Bibletracksink.org today.
• 1:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, we are in the book of Mark, chapter number eight.
• 1:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd love you to join me there, Mark chapter number eight.
• 1:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're going to read the first, let's see, first, eight or nine verses here.
• 1:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: a story that maybe a deja vu all over again.
• 1:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you've heard this story before, this biblical account.
• 2:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: I hesitate to call them stories because people begin to think of them as allegorical.
• 2:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think of them as some parable, some fable, some fairy tale.
• 2:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: But these are true accounts.
• 2:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is what happened and given to us by God so that we can learn more about our Lord and Savior.
• 2:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus Christ.
• 2:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: And that's what we're going to do today.
• 2:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: But while we do so, we're going to ask ourselves a question and maybe just maybe I'm going to relay a personal anecdote that I think will go along with this account.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Mark chapter number eight.
• 2:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you there?
• 2:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Mark chapter number eight and verse number one, the Bible says this in those days, the multitude being very great in having
• 2:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now been with me three days and have nothing to eat, and if I send them away fasting to their own houses, they will faint by the way, for a divers of them came from afar, and his disciples answered him, from once can a man
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: In the wilderness.
• 3:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: I want to come back to that question and he asked how many lobes have you and they said Seven and he commanded the people to sit down on the ground and he took the seven lobes and gave things and break and Gave to his disciples to set before them and they did set them before the people and they had a few small fishes and he blessed and Command to set them also before them
• 3:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: So they did eat and were filled, and they took up of the broken meat that was left.
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Seven baskets.
• 3:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, of course, you're familiar with very likely the feeding of the 5,000.
• 3:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: But we call this the feeding of the 4,000.
• 3:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: And we're gonna come back to this a little bit for in just a moment here.
• 3:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I want you to jump over to verse number 19 and 20.
• 4:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're gonna get there.
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think maybe tomorrow on the broadcast.
• 4:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: Pull that out for just a moment, verse number 19 and 20, when I break this is Jesus, when I break the five lobes among 5,000.
• 4:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: How many baskets full of fragments took yup?
• 4:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: They say in him 12.
• 4:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when the 7 among 4,000, how many baskets full of fragments took yup?
• 4:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: And they said 7.
• 4:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Just giving you that so that you understand that these are two different occasions.
• 4:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's a feeding of the 4,000 that we just read about.
• 4:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: And there were 7 baskets full left over.
• 4:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then there was the feeding of the 5,000, and there was 12 baskets full left over.
• 4:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: But these are two separate things.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is not two different people telling the same story in different ways with different numbers.
• 4:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: The Bible does not have mistakes in it, and we can trust it.
• 4:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I want you to realize here, go back to a verse number four, and it is disciples, Mark 8, verse 4, and it is disciples answered him.
• 4:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: From whens can a man satisfy these men with bread?
• 4:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: here in the wilderness.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, you realize the premise of the question first of all.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, yes, truly, what man could satisfy all these people?
• 5:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: It may have been a situation again, where it was just 4,000 men plus probably 4,000 women and some children it could have easily been an excess of 10,000 people, but let's just say it's just 4,000 just to keep the,
• 5:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: someone like you could we on an hours notice, cater in a meal for 4,000 people?
• 5:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think so.
• 5:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: It wouldn't happen.
• 5:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think all the work that went into our open house, not that long ago, the tail end of September had a wonderful time and thank you to each every one of you that came.
• 5:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: But we had some great smoke chicken.
• 5:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: We had some sweet corn.
• 5:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: We had all that stuff.
• 5:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: We were only feeding, you know?
• 5:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: 100 plus people.
• 5:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't this a massive affair of thousands upon thousands.
• 5:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: I've been at a summer camps and things work.
• 6:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: We'll feed four five six seven hundred people multiple times a day, but there's preparation that goes into that.
• 6:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: the truck comes by the week before multiple times dropping off meat and dropping off eggs and dropping off all sorts of things that get put in freezers and get put in refrigerators and there's an army of ladies that come in and men that come in and make it all possible.
• 6:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: Can a man?
• 6:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: Feed 4,000 in the wilderness with no notice, a man cannot, but disciples, friends, you're not talking to a man.
• 6:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're talking to the man, the man of God, God's Son, may God become flesh to live amongst us.
• 6:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's who you're talking to, a man you will.
• 6:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: God with us.
• 6:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: So the premise of the question,
• 6:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: But the question that I want to ask today, and the little story of us, not even a story, personal account that I want to share today, I want to ask this question, have you forgotten the miracles?
• 7:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: Have you, have we forgotten the miracles?
• 7:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: I recall.
• 7:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was a younger man.
• 7:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: I had the privilege of serving as an associate pastor in Akron O'Hio.
• 7:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: My good dear friend, Pastor Joe Gromaldi.
• 7:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: He is a mentor of mine.
• 7:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's a dear friend.
• 7:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: And he was my pastor.
• 7:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: had to serve alongside him, and there in Akron had the privilege of being there for about five and a half years, but I knew I knew the Lord had something on the horizon for me.
• 7:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I shared that, I did not hide that from Pastor Ramallah, he knew that, and we talked about it much.
• 7:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: His heat wanted what's best for me still does, and I thought I'd aburden for planting a church, and God just wouldn't give liberty wouldn't give peace about that.
• 7:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: still have burred and foreign seeing churches planning and I try in my position here at Bible tracks to help with that we supply gospel tracks to many a church plant and we do that do that as much as we can but God wouldn't give peace about it.
• 8:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: And in talking to Pastor Gamaldia, he was at a loss as well as me, but the Lord brought a evangelism, not that I wasn't yielded to it, it just wasn't something I really thought about it.
• 8:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: I hadn't thought about it much, and I know a new, so many good, faithful evangelists.
• 8:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think I'm going to leave some names off, but Jeff Farnham and Oliver Raysen, Dan Martin, and though he's gone on to be with the Lord, one of my
• 8:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: personal favorites Teddy Houston and so many others Dennis Coral and all these men that have invested me the office of an evangelist and Guy just wouldn't let me get away from it now
• 8:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Alright, Lord, is this what you have for me, and a Sunday of June of July, 2019, I sat down and passed her's office after talking to her multiple times throughout that year and I said, Pastor Grimaldi, I know, I know now, I've got peace.
• 9:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: God wants me in full time of angelism to launch out by faith.
• 9:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: We sat there, we talked about it from an hour and a half to two hours, and we agreed it would be a good idea.
• 9:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: My wife had some health troubles at the time we won't go into that.
• 9:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's another miracle we could talk about, maybe we'll talk about that tomorrow.
• 9:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: He recommended we moved to Dwight, Illinois, right here about where I live now, about 10 minutes away in my office here in O'Dell and recommend I move here when I launch out to evangelism if I need to be on the road and my wife is able to travel with me due to health, a she can be close to family now she is able to travel with me.
• 9:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're actually flying out for Colorado here in the near future.
• 9:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: Two days later, I've got a call from a friend said, are you thinking about a transition in ministry?
• 9:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: I said who told you he said, well, yeah, I had a sense and I felt like the Lord wanted to give you a call and He said, are you thinking about moving back to Illinois?
• 10:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: I said, yeah, who told you?
• 10:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was standing outside the chapel at a summer camp, common ground Baptist camp in Butler, Pennsylvania, have gone there every year since.
• 10:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: And two days after that conversation, he said, there's this ministry Bible tracks incorporated.
• 10:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're looking for an office manager.
• 10:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think I should put you two together and tell them about you and maybe you look into that.
• 10:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And as it's sure, I was thinking my first year in a vange Elizabeth's gonna be a bread and water diet at the time 27 years old.
• 10:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: I still asked a question why someone would book me to come in and speak to their people.
• 10:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: But then I was thinking, yeah, first year in a vange doesn't why would anyone have me in?
• 10:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: For sure, if I have to be bivocational and kind of pick up a job to support my family, I'd love for to be in ministry of some kind.
• 10:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, talking to the man, many of you know enough, Mark Smith.
• 10:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: Two hours into a two and a half hour interview.
• 10:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, by the Mark, you can hear him saying this.
• 11:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: He said, for the Micah is may not be a good illustration, but I don't hold my cards close to my vest very well.
• 11:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: He said, Micah, I think you should be the next director here.
• 11:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, for the mark, that wasn't what I was here to interview for, but if you feel that of God that way, I'd be more than happy to pray about it, pray about it I did.
• 11:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: In 24 hours, God gave me peace about that and talked to the dear folks, the leadership of the ministry and all man, Lord put it all together.
• 11:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: I could see his hand and all of it, but as I look towards the future, as I think about what God has down the road,
• 11:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Why would I forget the miracles of the past?
• 11:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: And assume he can't do miracles in the future?
• 11:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: He realized the feeding of the 4,000, that's 1,000 less than 5,000.
• 11:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: They had seen the miracle of the 5,000, and here they are doubting the miracle of the 4.
• 12:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: Have we forgotten miracles?
• 12:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: I am curriger.
• 12:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe just maybe you need to go to Bibletracks, ink and Bibletracks, ink.org, and you need to order some gospeltracks because you've forgotten what it was like to hand one out.
• 12:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you've forgotten that people can still get saved because of gospeltracks.
• 12:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you've ever used them before in your life.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: For me, tell you.
• 12:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's three hundred people just this year that I let the stove have gotten same as a gospel tracks.
• 12:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: Don't forget that those miracles when you look towards the future.
• 12:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you're going through a tough time.
• 12:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean courage, I don't forget the miracles.
• 12:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Join us tomorrow, wherever a count of that there is no need to doubt you now on the broadcast tomorrow.
• 12:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Have a great day for his glory.
• 12:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: We'll talk to you soon.
• 12:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: God bless.
• 13:14
  [UNKNOWN]: Thank you.
• 13:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tuning in to Bible Tract Echoes, the radio ministry of Bible Tracts Incorporated.
• 13:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Want to see our gospel tracks and other resources?
• 13:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Visit us online at BibleTracksInk.org that's BibleTracksInk.org or follow us on social media to learn how you can partner with this ministry.
• 13:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks again for listening.
• 13:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: May the Lord richly bless you as you live for Him.