Latest / The Salt Company Denver / Meeting Jesus- Mark 1- Nate Feder
Transcript
- 0:01SPEAKER_00: Guys, I'm so stoked to be here.
- 0:03SPEAKER_00: My name's Nate.
- 0:04SPEAKER_00: If you haven't met me yet, I'm on staff here.
- 0:06SPEAKER_00: And we're continuing our series this week, Meeting Jesus.
- 0:10SPEAKER_00: Now, if it's your first time here, your 500th time here, I just want to say I am so thankful that you would trust us your Tuesday night, and there is nothing in the world that I could be more excited about than proclaiming the name of Jesus in this room.
- 0:24SPEAKER_00: So tonight what we're gonna be talking about is we're talking about what does Jesus do with our pain?
- 0:29SPEAKER_00: What does Jesus do with our pain if there is a God?
- 0:31SPEAKER_00: If Jesus really is real, then what does he do with our pain?
- 0:35SPEAKER_00: And so to help us start thinking about what he does, I have a question for you.
- 0:39SPEAKER_00: The question is, what's some of the worst pain you've ever been in?
- 0:43SPEAKER_00: Just like take a moment, dial in, and think about it.
- 0:45SPEAKER_00: Some of the worst pain you've ever been in.
- 0:48SPEAKER_00: Fortunately, most of the worst pain I've ever been in is my fault.
- 0:52SPEAKER_00: I am not the sharpest tool in the shed always.
- 0:55SPEAKER_00: Um, and this particular story I'm gonna tell you just is really gonna highlight to you um my mental acuteness, you know, like how good I am at avoiding causing myself pain.
- 1:06SPEAKER_00: So happened a couple years ago.
- 1:08SPEAKER_00: I'm working at this camp in northern Minnesota, I'm way up there near Canada, um, and I was a camp counselor, greatest place on earth.
- 1:18SPEAKER_00: And when you're a camp counselor, like the whole your whole job is to give these kids the greatest, the craziest, the best week of their life and survive.
- 1:26SPEAKER_00: You know, it's like I'm gonna be sleep deprived, I'm gonna be injured, I'm gonna have a concussion by the end of the week, but these kids are gonna have the craziest week of their entire summer.
- 1:34SPEAKER_00: So one of my favorite games uh that we would play at camp, it was called bucket ball.
- 1:38SPEAKER_00: Now, uh, bucket ball was the most dangerous, craziest game I've ever played, and here's the only rules.
- 1:44SPEAKER_00: So you get in the water, you're in the swimming area, so it's like six feet deep to three inches deep.
- 1:49SPEAKER_00: And the only rule you had to follow is you weren't allowed to fully drown a person on the other team.
- 1:54SPEAKER_00: So like lower your shoulder, head-to-head contact, drowning the person, like only a little bit, but not fully.
- 2:00SPEAKER_00: It's all allowed.
- 2:01SPEAKER_00: And the whole point is you're getting a ball on your side of the water to their side, and that's how you get points.
- 2:06SPEAKER_00: It's just war.
- 2:07SPEAKER_00: That's it.
- 2:07SPEAKER_00: War for as long as you can.
- 2:09SPEAKER_00: So we we'd play this game, we'd be like running on the rocks, you'd have cuts all up our legs, we'd have concussions, you know, like your nose is bleeding, and you're like, yes! Welcome to camp, everybody.
- 2:20SPEAKER_00: But we also had this rule at camp.
- 2:22SPEAKER_00: If you had enough caffeine and enough like um emergency packets, you couldn't get sick.
- 2:27SPEAKER_00: Like that was our whole mindset.
- 2:29SPEAKER_00: So, you know, we we play all these games.
- 2:31SPEAKER_00: I take my kids canoeing, we go camping, we're doing all the camp stuff.
- 2:34SPEAKER_00: We're in the woods, the high ropes course, and like I start getting body aches, and I'm starting to like hurt a little bit.
- 2:40SPEAKER_00: And so I'm like, caffeine, emergency, like I'll do a little double dose this morning and I'm feeling good.
- 2:47SPEAKER_00: So we keep doing that Wednesday, and then we get to Thursday, and I'm still feeling a little weird, but a little more caffeine, another emergency packet.
- 2:55SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm convinced I'm gonna be okay.
- 2:57SPEAKER_00: Friday wakes around or comes around.
- 3:00SPEAKER_00: I wake up and I'm like, oh man, like this doesn't this doesn't feel right.
- 3:04SPEAKER_00: And I get out of bed and I like have a little bit of a limp going, and I walk outside and I'm like, okay, the sun's brighter than usual, like I'm a little loozy, what's going on?
- 3:11SPEAKER_00: And I hear two words, two haunting words to this day.
- 3:14SPEAKER_00: One of my best friends, he walks out behind me.
- 3:17SPEAKER_00: I'm like, man, I'm looking good today.
- 3:18SPEAKER_00: It's Friday, you know, kids are gonna leave, we're gonna have a weekend.
- 3:21SPEAKER_00: And he says two words, he says, holy cankle.
- 3:26SPEAKER_00: And I look down at the place that I got this little cut earlier in the week, and my ankle has swelled to the size of my thigh.
- 3:35SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, oh, like that's probably not good.
- 3:37SPEAKER_00: And I have like a fever now, I'm kind of aware of, and so I don't know.
- 3:41SPEAKER_00: They make me lay down in the bed, then they make me drive myself to the hospital, which is kind of rude.
- 3:45SPEAKER_00: My whole like leg is starting to burn, and I'm like, I don't know if that's normal, but that's fine.
- 3:49SPEAKER_00: My whole body's starting to hurt, I'm sweating.
- 3:51SPEAKER_00: Long story short, I get to the hospital, they give me medicine, I'm allergic to the medicine, the lady's like, just pull the string if you have a seizure, you'll be okay.
- 3:58SPEAKER_00: Like, it's fine.
- 3:59SPEAKER_00: Um I was like, great, I'm like really glad I'm in the middle of northern Minnesota for this medical crisis.
- 4:05SPEAKER_00: Um, ton of pain, my legs aching, my head hurts, I have a fever, I'm like, what is going on?
- 4:11SPEAKER_00: And then the doctor walks in the room and she says, One, you're an idiot.
- 4:13SPEAKER_00: Two, um, and I appreciated the candor from her.
- 4:16SPEAKER_00: She's like, You were an hour away from a blood infection.
- 4:20SPEAKER_00: She's like, What were you?
- 4:21SPEAKER_00: Like, why were you not going to the doctor?
- 4:24SPEAKER_00: It was obvious.
- 4:25SPEAKER_00: And see, what I had done was I had kind of just assumed that the cut would go away.
- 4:29SPEAKER_00: I had assumed that this like little cut on my leg wasn't a big deal.
- 4:32SPEAKER_00: I ignored my pain, I mistreated my pain, I uh misdiagnosed it, and so I ended up way worse than I ever would have been if I had just taken care of my pain earlier.
- 4:44SPEAKER_00: Soul Company, here's my fear.
- 4:48SPEAKER_00: My fear is that we all have pain in our lives.
- 4:52SPEAKER_00: We all have like wounds that are really important.
- 4:55SPEAKER_00: And we ignore it and we cover it up and we don't think about it, and we don't realize that that pain is left unchecked, ignored, or misdiagnosed, it's gonna get worse and worse until it's too late.
- 5:10SPEAKER_00: What we think is just a tiny little cut on our foot that's gonna go away is actually about to swell up and make you really, really sick.
- 5:19SPEAKER_00: So, here's what we're talking about today.
- 5:20SPEAKER_00: Whatever your technique is to dealing with pain, whatever that thing you do to ignore pain in your life is, I'm gonna tell you why you should bring your pain to Jesus instead.
- 5:30SPEAKER_00: Because today when we meet Jesus, we learn that the first thing Jesus does with our pain is he cares about it.
- 5:38SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna be in Mark chapter one, if you have your Bibles with you.
- 5:41SPEAKER_00: Mark chapter one, we're starting in verse 39.
- 5:44SPEAKER_00: And so as we walk through today, what we're talking about, what we're looking at, what we're realizing is that there is a better way to deal with our pain, and the better way is Jesus.
- 5:52SPEAKER_00: If you're a note taker in the room, the things we're gonna talk about today is that Jesus cares about our pain, Jesus heals our pain, and Jesus redeems our pain.
- 6:02SPEAKER_00: So, starting in Mark chapter 1, verse 39, let's start looking at how Jesus cares about our pain.
- 6:11SPEAKER_00: Jesus, he went into Galilee, preaching in their synagogues, driving out demons, and then a man with leprosy comes to him on his knees and he begs him, if you are willing, you can make me clean.
- 6:27SPEAKER_00: Okay, so our story begins with Jesus.
- 6:30SPEAKER_00: His ministry began with him proclaiming the good news that God's kingdom was coming.
- 6:34SPEAKER_00: He was freely traveling town to town, and he was healing people, and he was promising people that God was going to redeem and heal their pain.
- 6:42SPEAKER_00: So logically, anyone who was sick, anyone who was hurting, anyone who was struggling was coming to Jesus to be healed.
- 6:49SPEAKER_00: Verse 40.
- 6:50SPEAKER_00: Then a man with leprosy came to him, and on his knees he begs him, if you are willing, make me clean.
- 6:57SPEAKER_00: Okay, so the leper.
- 6:59SPEAKER_00: He's this man of pain.
- 7:01SPEAKER_00: Not just like ignore your leg infection kind of pain, but he's a man of physical, emotional, and spiritual pain.
- 7:08SPEAKER_00: Okay, one thing we notice about the guy is he's never given a name in the story.
- 7:11SPEAKER_00: He's just the leper, which like kind of hurts a little bit.
- 7:13SPEAKER_00: Like if I was called leg infection guy, like I would, I wouldn't appreciate that.
- 7:17SPEAKER_00: But he's never getting a name.
- 7:18SPEAKER_00: And the reason I think he doesn't get a name is because his pain identified him more than his name did.
- 7:24SPEAKER_00: His pain was a better marker of who he was than his own identity or name.
- 7:30SPEAKER_00: So leprosy was this brutal disease.
- 7:31SPEAKER_00: It it left cuts and boils all over your skin.
- 7:34SPEAKER_00: Everyone could see it.
- 7:35SPEAKER_00: And in this, in these like Bible times, it was a death sentence.
- 7:38SPEAKER_00: Basically, it forced you to live alone, rejected, and ejected, despised, unclean.
- 7:43SPEAKER_00: Everyone was afraid to get close to you.
- 7:45SPEAKER_00: It's like the cheese touch and die everyone would be kidding.
- 7:47SPEAKER_00: You got it like permanently.
- 7:48SPEAKER_00: Like no one wants to go near you, no one wants to touch you, you are infected, you are dangerous, right?
- 7:53SPEAKER_00: So this kind of pain, it was physical, it was visible.
- 7:57SPEAKER_00: People could see it and they avoided it.
- 7:58SPEAKER_00: But the biggest toll, I want us to see tonight, the biggest toll it has on this man is not just as a physical disease, but as a spiritual one, a social one.
- 8:08SPEAKER_00: Because the victims of leprosy, this leper was alone.
- 8:11SPEAKER_00: No one would go near him.
- 8:13SPEAKER_00: He was neglected, no one cared about him, he was abandoned, and he was unable to even go and worship God in the temple because unclean people weren't allowed.
- 8:20SPEAKER_00: See, the sickness was physical, but it wreaked havoc on him emotionally and spiritually.
- 8:26SPEAKER_00: So our question is what does Jesus do with his pain?
- 8:30SPEAKER_00: Verse 41.
- 8:33SPEAKER_00: Moved with compassion.
- 8:37SPEAKER_00: Jesus reached out his hand and he touched him.
- 8:41SPEAKER_00: The leper, I think, he runs to Jesus.
- 8:43SPEAKER_00: He's this guy, he's despised, he's hated, he's alone, he's dressed in rags, covered in boils, covered in sores.
- 8:50SPEAKER_00: And he's been hearing from like people when they're walking out of the city about this healer.
- 8:55SPEAKER_00: He's been hearing about this guy named Jesus who's healing the craziest sicknesses and casting out demons and doing these miracles.
- 9:01SPEAKER_00: And so I think he sees Jesus in the distance and he runs up.
- 9:04SPEAKER_00: He's like he's like cashing in all his chips.
- 9:06SPEAKER_00: He's like, these people, they're gonna hurt me, they're gonna cast me out of the city.
- 9:09SPEAKER_00: But if Jesus is here and I'm sick, I have to go to him for healing.
- 9:14SPEAKER_00: So he runs up.
- 9:15SPEAKER_00: You know, it's like his only chance to for freedom.
- 9:18SPEAKER_00: And he sees Jesus, he's like, oh my gosh, this is him, and he just falls on his face before Jesus.
- 9:24SPEAKER_00: People are probably like jumping out of the way, they're like covering their mouths, hiding their children.
- 9:28SPEAKER_00: And the leper's like, I don't care, I'm getting to be in front of Jesus, and he falls down on his face.
- 9:34SPEAKER_00: He begs him for help.
- 9:37SPEAKER_00: Jesus stops what he's doing.
- 9:39SPEAKER_00: He steps close to a man that others stepped away from, he steps into the pain that no one else could bear, and he shows compassion to a man that no one else cared about.
- 9:50SPEAKER_00: Jesus looks him in the eyes, eyes that no one had dared to meet in years.
- 9:55SPEAKER_00: And Jesus cares about his pain.
- 10:02SPEAKER_00: So why should you bring your pain to Jesus?
- 10:06SPEAKER_00: Now I know, or I hope, that no one in here has leprosy if you do.
- 10:10SPEAKER_00: Um I don't know how to help you.
- 10:12SPEAKER_00: Um but I do know, I do know that there are people in here with real pain, right?
- 10:17SPEAKER_00: There's people in here with physical pain.
- 10:19SPEAKER_00: Man, like your bodies are wounded.
- 10:20SPEAKER_00: Emotional pain, your heart is hurting, spiritual pain, you have been hurt.
- 10:26SPEAKER_00: Just like our leper.
- 10:28SPEAKER_00: Here's why you should bring your pain to Jesus.
- 10:30SPEAKER_00: For those of you in physical pain, I think some of you tonight are actually sick and injured.
- 10:35SPEAKER_00: Like you're sitting in these seats and you're like, my body is broken.
- 10:38SPEAKER_00: You have scars on your body to prove it.
- 10:41SPEAKER_00: Maybe because of your injuries, your illness, it just hurts to get out of bed.
- 10:45SPEAKER_00: It's so hard to go to work, to go to practice, to just make it through the day, that right now you're sitting here and you're in physical pain.
- 10:53SPEAKER_00: You carry around real physical gain and pain, and guess what?
- 10:57SPEAKER_00: Jesus cares about it.
- 11:01SPEAKER_00: He wants you to bring your every frustration and your pain and your hurt to him.
- 11:05SPEAKER_00: Because we don't serve a God who's ignorant of our hurt, but we serve a God who cares.
- 11:10SPEAKER_00: Why should you bring your pain to Jesus?
- 11:12SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus actually cares about your physical pain.
- 11:16SPEAKER_00: That's not all though.
- 11:17SPEAKER_00: Emotionally.
- 11:18SPEAKER_00: I don't know about you guys, but I I can be a perfectionist, and in my life, one failure or one mistake can make my entire week in myself feel like a failure.
- 11:28SPEAKER_00: I begin to carry around the weight of perfectionism, which is a weight that no man can carry.
- 11:33SPEAKER_00: It's like one more bad grade in a class, one more failed day at work, one more failed conversation with the person, and emotionally I become exhausted.
- 11:41SPEAKER_00: Weary, hurt, spiraling in pain, right?
- 11:44SPEAKER_00: Emotionally exhausted.
- 11:46SPEAKER_00: And so we mistreat our pain, we numb our brains, doom scrolling, we isolate ourselves from our friends.
- 11:51SPEAKER_00: But Saltko, listen to me, why should you bring that pain to Jesus?
- 11:55SPEAKER_00: Because he cares about your emotional pain.
- 11:58SPEAKER_00: He cares that you're weary and exhausted.
- 12:07SPEAKER_00: Spiritually.
- 12:08SPEAKER_00: Man, because of what you've been through in your past, you can't imagine that God would ever love you.
- 12:13SPEAKER_00: Or because of what you did last summer, last month, last week, or last night, it's hard to imagine a world where if there was a God, that he would ever, even for a moment, love you.
- 12:24SPEAKER_00: Salt company, like, look at me.
- 12:27SPEAKER_00: The story of the Bible.
- 12:28SPEAKER_00: What we're learning about Jesus in the leper right now is that Jesus sees your pain and he cares about your pain.
- 12:36SPEAKER_00: And he loves you.
- 12:38SPEAKER_00: When a man stood in front of Jesus in unimaginable pain, weary, worried, and broken, Jesus cared about his pain.
- 12:47SPEAKER_00: So Jesus sees your pain, and just like the man with leprosy cares about your pain.
- 12:51SPEAKER_00: So if you have pain tonight, hear me, right?
- 12:54SPEAKER_00: Jesus cares about you and your pain.
- 12:56SPEAKER_00: And if Jesus, the king of the universe, cares about your pain, then you should bring it to him.
- 13:01SPEAKER_00: Don't sugarcoat it.
- 13:03SPEAKER_00: Don't make it sound better than it really is.
- 13:05SPEAKER_00: Jesus wants to hear about your pain because he cares.
- 13:09SPEAKER_00: Spill your anger, your frustration, that pain, that anxiety you just can't kick and bring it to him because he cares.
- 13:19SPEAKER_00: Well, sometimes, Salt Company, I think, we're sitting in our seats and we're like, caring isn't enough, right?
- 13:23SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't care if someone cares about my pain.
- 13:25SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be in pain anymore.
- 13:28SPEAKER_00: And so the second thing that Jesus does with our pain is that Jesus heals our pain.
- 13:34SPEAKER_00: Okay, so read with me, verses 41 and 42.
- 13:37SPEAKER_00: Jesus heals our pain.
- 13:41SPEAKER_00: Moved with compassion.
- 13:43SPEAKER_00: Jesus reached out his hand.
- 13:45SPEAKER_00: I am willing, he told him, be made clean.
- 13:50SPEAKER_00: And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean.
- 13:57SPEAKER_00: Well, Jesus heals pain.
- 13:58SPEAKER_00: So we've talked a lot about pain.
- 13:59SPEAKER_00: We've talked about physical pain, we've talked about emotional pain, we've talked about spiritual pain.
- 14:04SPEAKER_00: And the important thing we need to remember about the leper is the depth of his pain.
- 14:07SPEAKER_00: Like sometimes we look at someone like a leper and we're like, he's physically sick.
- 14:10SPEAKER_00: That's his only problem.
- 14:11SPEAKER_00: You can see it on his skin.
- 14:14SPEAKER_00: But the bigger problem that he had, the biggest problem the leper had was that he was unable to go be with God in the temple and to be with the people of God.
- 14:22SPEAKER_00: Because of his sickness, he was isolated from the people that are meant to worship God with him.
- 14:27SPEAKER_00: Because of his sickness, he couldn't come before the presence of God in worship.
- 14:30SPEAKER_00: He couldn't enter this room tonight because of his sickness.
- 14:34SPEAKER_00: So while his symptom might have been physical, his problem was really spiritual.
- 14:40SPEAKER_00: And his problem was really social.
- 14:42SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like he felt pain and anxiety and hurt.
- 14:45SPEAKER_00: But his problem was that he was spiritually separated from the God of the universe.
- 14:50SPEAKER_00: His problem was that he could not be with the people who were meant to lead him to know and love and follow God.
- 14:56SPEAKER_00: The leper was a man of spiritual and social pain, even before physical.
- 15:02SPEAKER_00: So in our story, the leper's on the ground, right?
- 15:05SPEAKER_00: The pains rocking his body, boils are obviously all over him, and everyone is appalled that he would dare approach Jesus.
- 15:12SPEAKER_00: This isn't a man with a simple physical sickness.
- 15:14SPEAKER_00: It's a man he's like suffered apart from God and God's people.
- 15:18SPEAKER_00: So he's physically exhausted, he's emotionally destitute, he's spiritually exiled from the presence of God.
- 15:23SPEAKER_00: He's a man of pain, and so he falls down before Jesus.
- 15:26SPEAKER_00: And he's begging Jesus to heal him.
- 15:28SPEAKER_00: It's his one shot to get his life back.
- 15:31SPEAKER_00: And he says to Jesus, if you're willing, you can make me clean.
- 15:38SPEAKER_00: He knows.
- 15:39SPEAKER_00: He's like seen maybe Jesus do miracles.
- 15:41SPEAKER_00: He's met other people that Jesus has healed.
- 15:43SPEAKER_00: And so he goes up to Jesus and he's like, I know you can heal me.
- 15:46SPEAKER_00: But the question he asks is, Are you willing?
- 15:50SPEAKER_00: I think that question breaks my heart.
- 15:51SPEAKER_00: I think it's a question some of us ask.
- 15:53SPEAKER_00: It's like, would anyone be willing to care about my pain?
- 15:57SPEAKER_00: Like he falls in front of Jesus, the eternal Son of God, and he looks up at him and he's like, I know you can do it, but do you do you care enough to heal me?
- 16:04SPEAKER_00: Like, are you actually willing to meet me in my pain and to heal me and to restore me?
- 16:10SPEAKER_00: Maybe he thought Jesus was like all the other people who looked at him in his pain, who looked at him in his hurt, who looked at him in his uncertainty and ignored him.
- 16:18SPEAKER_00: So then we look at Jesus.
- 16:20SPEAKER_00: Jesus, he looks at the man, he places a hand on his shoulder and he looks him in the eyes.
- 16:26SPEAKER_00: And he speaks to him.
- 16:28SPEAKER_00: He cares about the man, but Jesus doesn't just care about it and he does more than that.
- 16:33SPEAKER_00: Jesus isn't just a simple man sent from God who's really good at having empathy.
- 16:37SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the eternal Son of God, fully man and fully God, who holds the power over sin and death.
- 16:42SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus looks him in the eyes and he cares about his pain, but he doesn't just care about it.
- 16:47SPEAKER_00: He changes his entire world with six words.
- 16:51SPEAKER_00: I am willing to be made clean.
- 16:56SPEAKER_00: And in one moment, in one second, every inch of this man's disease-ridden body, every wound, every hurt is just gone.
- 17:07SPEAKER_00: Jesus, the eternal Son of God, spoke his healing into being.
- 17:10SPEAKER_00: He purified the man by the power of his word, freeing him from his physical, emotional, and spiritual hell.
- 17:16SPEAKER_00: Like I mean, the guy's standing there and he's like, What just happened?
- 17:20SPEAKER_00: But I think the coolest part of this story is what happens next with Jesus and the man.
- 17:25SPEAKER_00: So follow with me.
- 17:26SPEAKER_00: So look down to verse 45.
- 17:29SPEAKER_00: Okay, it says this second half 45.
- 17:32SPEAKER_00: Jesus could no longer enter a town openly, but he was out in deserted places.
- 17:37SPEAKER_00: Okay, so what happens is he heals the man, he tells the man to be silent.
- 17:40SPEAKER_00: We'll talk more about that.
- 17:41SPEAKER_00: And the man goes and he tells everybody that he was a leper and he's been healed.
- 17:45SPEAKER_00: And so the leper is now like the big shot in town.
- 17:48SPEAKER_00: Everyone wants to talk to him.
- 17:50SPEAKER_00: Everyone's inviting him in.
- 17:51SPEAKER_00: They're like, tell us what happened.
- 17:52SPEAKER_00: What did Jesus do?
- 17:53SPEAKER_00: How did Jesus do it?
- 17:54SPEAKER_00: Like, what like what like are you clean?
- 17:56SPEAKER_00: Are you actually clean?
- 17:58SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, because of what happens, because everyone is making such a fuss over this man's healing, he can no longer enter in the town.
- 18:06SPEAKER_00: He trades places with the man.
- 18:08SPEAKER_00: The leper was an exile.
- 18:10SPEAKER_00: He couldn't go with the people of God and be in the presence of God, but Jesus was accepted.
- 18:14SPEAKER_00: He could go town to town, anywhere he wanted.
- 18:17SPEAKER_00: But because Jesus cared about him, because Jesus chose it was good to heal him, Jesus trades places with the man.
- 18:26SPEAKER_00: He trades his acceptance for exile so the leper could trade his exile for acceptance.
- 18:35SPEAKER_00: And isn't that what Jesus does for us?
- 18:39SPEAKER_00: Isn't Jesus willing to trade places with us for our pain, for our hurt, and for our wounds, so we can have life?
- 18:48SPEAKER_00: What Jesus does for the leper is exactly what he's promising you tonight and what he does for us tonight.
- 18:54SPEAKER_00: Okay, so just to understand this, right?
- 18:55SPEAKER_00: How does Jesus heal our pain?
- 18:57SPEAKER_00: We need to understand one thing first.
- 18:59SPEAKER_00: Everyone in this room, we're on even ground.
- 19:01SPEAKER_00: We're spiritual lepers.
- 19:04SPEAKER_00: Let me be clear.
- 19:05SPEAKER_00: We're spiritual lepers because there's sin in the world.
- 19:08SPEAKER_00: And sin separates God from his people.
- 19:11SPEAKER_00: And so, as people who are separated from God, who live in a sinful world and who we all sin, we're infected with a disease that cannot be cured by good works, good grades, or good doctors.
- 19:21SPEAKER_00: We are unclean in the presence of God.
- 19:24SPEAKER_00: Because we all sin and we all fall short of the glory of God.
- 19:27SPEAKER_00: And so when we're born into this world, we inherit a spiritual leprosy that can only be washed by the blood of Jesus our Savior.
- 19:35SPEAKER_00: So the first thing we need to realize is, man, I have something in common with this leper.
- 19:38SPEAKER_00: I'm sick.
- 19:39SPEAKER_00: I have an issue, and the issue is sin.
- 19:42SPEAKER_00: So just like the leper couldn't enter the temple because of his sickness, we can't be with God because of our sin.
- 19:48SPEAKER_00: We are just as sick as the leper, and we experience pain of all kinds, just like him, that distract us from our real issue.
- 19:56SPEAKER_00: Just like the lepers, we have a whole host of physical, emotional problems in our lives.
- 20:01SPEAKER_00: We have a whole host of pains and hurts, but our greatest issue, your greatest issue in this life is your spiritual and social brokenness caused by sin.
- 20:11SPEAKER_00: We're spiritually and socially unclean and in need of Jesus to declare that he is willing to make us clean.
- 20:19SPEAKER_00: We cannot be with God or be with God's people because of the biggest problem of sin.
- 20:24SPEAKER_00: So Jesus.
- 20:26SPEAKER_00: So Jesus, the eternal Son of God, He looks at us in our spiritual leprous state.
- 20:32SPEAKER_00: He looks at us and doesn't just care about our sin.
- 20:34SPEAKER_00: He looks at you and doesn't just care that you've committed sin or you've hurt other people, if you've hurt yourself.
- 20:40SPEAKER_00: But he looks at you and he says, You are worth it for me to come down and live the perfect life in your place, to die a death that you deserve on a cross, paying the penalty for your sin.
- 20:53SPEAKER_00: Jesus looks at your life and says, It's worth it to take all of your sin, past, present, and future, so you could be cleansed from your leprosy.
- 21:01SPEAKER_00: He lives the life we couldn't live, he dies the death we deserve, and he rises from the dead, defeating death, so anyone who believes in him, no matter their pain, no matter their sin, no matter their struggle, would receive full forgiveness of their sin.
- 21:16SPEAKER_00: To be cleansed before God and God's people, Jesus dies for us.
- 21:20SPEAKER_00: He trades places for us.
- 21:25SPEAKER_00: And Jesus trades places with us.
- 21:28SPEAKER_00: He takes our place on the cross where he dies so we can take his place with God and his people and live.
- 21:35SPEAKER_00: Man, have you accepted that?
- 21:37SPEAKER_00: Have you been made clean by Jesus, or are you still in your sickness trying any home remedy you can to find a cure?
- 21:47SPEAKER_00: There's more good news though.
- 21:48SPEAKER_00: I don't want to end it there.
- 21:49SPEAKER_00: I need to say this one thing or this added thing.
- 21:51SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say a lot of one thing tonight, so I'm so sorry for all of you.
- 21:54SPEAKER_00: Um The good news is that Jesus doesn't just say, I will cure you of your sin and leave you.
- 22:00SPEAKER_00: Be.
- 22:00SPEAKER_00: The good news is Jesus doesn't just look at us in our spiritual leprosy state and say, I'll get rid of the sin, but then you're on your own.
- 22:09SPEAKER_00: Jesus cures the root of our pain.
- 22:11SPEAKER_00: He dies on the cross, suffering for the weight of our sin.
- 22:15SPEAKER_00: But the thing that keeps us going when in this life we still suffer and we still hurt is we can look forward to the day that Jesus will return and restore everything that sin has broken.
- 22:26SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think tonight you you might be sitting in a chair and you might be saying, I get it that Jesus heals me from my sin, but I'm in pain.
- 22:33SPEAKER_00: Like I'm hurting and I don't want to deal with it anymore.
- 22:37SPEAKER_00: And my promise is this: one, your biggest problem isn't that pain, it's your sin.
- 22:41SPEAKER_00: I promise you.
- 22:42SPEAKER_00: It's the fact that there's a loving God in this universe who is beckoning you to come close to him, and all you have to do is say yes.
- 22:50SPEAKER_00: But then the reality is that when God draws you near, when Jesus pays the price of your sin, he brings you before the throne room of God in which you'll always be accepted, and he makes you part of the people of God who will walk with you and encourage you and lead you to follow Jesus for the rest of your life.
- 23:08SPEAKER_00: Jesus frees us from sin and death when we believe in him so that we can spend the rest of our lives experiencing his healing power in the presence of God and God's people.
- 23:18SPEAKER_00: Yes, you'll still struggle.
- 23:20SPEAKER_00: Yes, you'll still experience the power of sin in this world, but we can keep going when we know we're not alone, when we know we're not condemned, when we know that Jesus is going to return to free us and wipe away our tears once and for all.
- 23:34SPEAKER_00: Man, so when I was a kid, uh I had gotten this like small little wart on my knee.
- 23:38SPEAKER_00: Uh my mom, who's the greatest mom of all time, I want to affirm, I'm telling the story, Mom, I love you.
- 23:43SPEAKER_00: Um she struggled with me, okay?
- 23:46SPEAKER_00: I was a hard child.
- 23:47SPEAKER_00: And there was this like special home remedy, okay?
- 23:50SPEAKER_00: And the home remedy was this.
- 23:52SPEAKER_00: The home remedy was you took like a little dab of garlic and you're supposed to put it on it, and it was gonna heal it and make it go away.
- 23:58SPEAKER_00: Um, but you know, I'm being like I'm breaking stuff in the house and I'm running around, and so here's what happens.
- 24:03SPEAKER_00: My mom misreads the instructions.
- 24:04SPEAKER_00: She gets one of those like two inch by two inch square band-aids.
- 24:07SPEAKER_00: She covers the whole thing with this stuff and she slaps it on my knee, and I'm like, all right, praise God, I'm healed.
- 24:12SPEAKER_00: Like one minute goes by, it starts to tingle.
- 24:14SPEAKER_00: I'm like, oh man, like this is good.
- 24:16SPEAKER_00: Five minutes goes by, it starts to burn.
- 24:18SPEAKER_00: I'm like, this does not feel good.
- 24:19SPEAKER_00: 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 30 minutes.
- 24:21SPEAKER_00: I start complaining and complaining.
- 24:22SPEAKER_00: My mom thinks I'm being a baby.
- 24:24SPEAKER_00: She's like, shut up, Nate.
- 24:25SPEAKER_00: Like, just like go, go outside.
- 24:26SPEAKER_00: I don't know, go do something.
- 24:28SPEAKER_00: One hour in.
- 24:29SPEAKER_00: I like I'm a coward for this.
- 24:30SPEAKER_00: I'm like underneath our kitchen table.
- 24:32SPEAKER_00: I'm 10, by the way.
- 24:33SPEAKER_00: Okay, so first off, like, judgmental people out there, check yourself.
- 24:37SPEAKER_00: I'm like under the table in agony, and I'm like, I think my leg fell off.
- 24:40SPEAKER_00: Like, this is horrible.
- 24:42SPEAKER_00: Here's what happened, right?
- 24:43SPEAKER_00: Here's what happened.
- 24:46SPEAKER_00: The root of my pain was this tiny little wart, but the instructions were misread.
- 24:50SPEAKER_00: So the thing that was meant to bring my healing only increased my pain and it made the promise worse or the problem worse.
- 24:57SPEAKER_00: And so I'm afraid, I'm afraid that we all do the same thing.
- 25:00SPEAKER_00: You have pain in your life.
- 25:02SPEAKER_00: You have real pain in your life.
- 25:06SPEAKER_00: But instead of bringing it to Jesus and experiencing pain, you try home remedy after home remedy after home remedy and you're in so much pain that you just try to numb it with anything you can find.
- 25:19SPEAKER_00: And what I promise you, what I promise you, is that you will never find healing for that pain.
- 25:25SPEAKER_00: But when you come to Jesus is when we find healing from our pain.
- 25:29SPEAKER_00: So when we're talking about the second thing that Jesus does with our pain, Jesus heals our pain.
- 25:35SPEAKER_00: We take comfort knowing that he heals the root of our pain, he heals our sin.
- 25:39SPEAKER_00: He draws us back to God, he brings us into God's people, and it's in those places that we truly experience freedom and life from the rest of our sins.
- 25:49SPEAKER_00: So, Jesus does not just care about your pain.
- 25:53SPEAKER_00: He doesn't just heal your pain, he does one other thing.
- 25:55SPEAKER_00: He redeems your pain.
- 25:58SPEAKER_00: Okay, look with me at Mark chapter 1, verse 30 or 43 and 45.
- 26:05SPEAKER_00: Then, Jesus, he sternly warned him and sent him away at once, telling him, See that you say nothing to anyone, but go and show yourself to the priest.
- 26:14SPEAKER_00: Offer what Moses commanded for your cleansing is a testimony.
- 26:18SPEAKER_00: Yet he went out and he began, he began to proclaim it widely to spread the news with the result that Jesus could no longer enter a town openly, but he was out in deserted places, and they came to him from everywhere.
- 26:28SPEAKER_00: Okay, I don't know about you guys, purposeless pain sucks, right?
- 26:33SPEAKER_00: Like if you've ever been to the DMV, it's like two hours of unimaginable, horrible, the worst pain of all time.
- 26:40SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's switch back to the leper.
- 26:42SPEAKER_00: I think the leper had so many sleepless nights where he was like, I'm in unimaginable, purposeless pain.
- 26:48SPEAKER_00: Like, why am I sick?
- 26:50SPEAKER_00: Why do I have leprosy?
- 26:52SPEAKER_00: If there was a God, how could a God like who loves let me experience this pain that I'm feeling right now?
- 26:59SPEAKER_00: Maybe after the leper was healed, he had a night relayed in bed, and he was like, Why did I have to endure 10 years of being a leper?
- 27:06SPEAKER_00: Like, what's the point?
- 27:09SPEAKER_00: Well, once Jesus heals the leper, he gives him purpose.
- 27:11SPEAKER_00: So here's the purpose Jesus gives the leper.
- 27:13SPEAKER_00: In all honesty, when I first read this story, I was so confused.
- 27:16SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus basically is like, shut up.
- 27:17SPEAKER_00: Like, don't tell anyone, like, go do your thing.
- 27:19SPEAKER_00: And I was like, that doesn't make sense.
- 27:21SPEAKER_00: He tells him, he says, Don't say anything to anybody, but go and show yourself to the priest and offer what Moses commanded.
- 27:27SPEAKER_00: Okay, here's why.
- 27:28SPEAKER_00: It's actually like pretty, pretty profound, pretty normal.
- 27:32SPEAKER_00: In the culture, in the time that Jesus was in, Jesus did heal him physically, emotionally, spiritually.
- 27:38SPEAKER_00: He he brought him back to be healed and that he could go to the temple of God.
- 27:42SPEAKER_00: But in that culture, until a priest looked at you and declared that you were clean, you couldn't enjoy the benefits of what Jesus had done.
- 27:49SPEAKER_00: So this leper, although Jesus has healed him and he's perfectly clean, he still needs a priest to look at him and say, Yes, you're good to go.
- 27:56SPEAKER_00: You can re-enter the people of God and re-enter re-enter the temple of God.
- 28:01SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus, because he cares about the man, I think simply is like, go do that.
- 28:06SPEAKER_00: Like, go do the thing, go to the people in the temple.
- 28:09SPEAKER_00: Like, pretty simple.
- 28:11SPEAKER_00: Here's the second thing.
- 28:13SPEAKER_00: Jesus was not in the business of temporary healing.
- 28:16SPEAKER_00: He didn't just come to die so he could heal a leper, for him, like 10 years later to be run over by a donkey and die.
- 28:21SPEAKER_00: Like that's not, that's not the point of what Jesus did.
- 28:24SPEAKER_00: Jesus came and he lived and he died to defeat death itself.
- 28:28SPEAKER_00: Jesus told the man to be quiet so Jesus could continue to proclaim the better healing, the spiritual and social healing that everyone needed, not just the physically sick needed.
- 28:40SPEAKER_00: So what purpose does that give your pain?
- 28:42SPEAKER_00: We know Jesus He cares about our pain.
- 28:45SPEAKER_00: We know that Jesus, He heals our pain, and that in the presence of God, with the people of God, we're gonna experience real, profound healing.
- 28:52SPEAKER_00: But what purpose does Jesus give your pain?
- 28:55SPEAKER_00: As I was looking at Mark, I think I saw it really clearly in chapter 5.
- 28:59SPEAKER_00: You don't have to turn there.
- 29:00SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read it to you.
- 29:01SPEAKER_00: In Mark 5, Jesus meets another man in pain.
- 29:04SPEAKER_00: He's a demon-possessed man.
- 29:06SPEAKER_00: He's broken.
- 29:07SPEAKER_00: He dresses in rags, no one can go near him.
- 29:10SPEAKER_00: He's out in the wilderness.
- 29:12SPEAKER_00: He's utterly broken.
- 29:14SPEAKER_00: He has nothing and nobody.
- 29:15SPEAKER_00: He's another broken person.
- 29:17SPEAKER_00: And Jesus meets him.
- 29:19SPEAKER_00: And Jesus heals him.
- 29:21SPEAKER_00: And the man's like, All right, I'm going with you, Jesus.
- 29:24SPEAKER_00: Let's do it.
- 29:25SPEAKER_00: And here's the purpose that Jesus gives him that I think profoundly should shape the way that we should view our pain, and we should view the way that God redeems our pain.
- 29:34SPEAKER_00: Jesus says this in verse 19 of Mark 5.
- 29:37SPEAKER_00: Go home to your own people and report to them how much the Lord has done for you, how he's had mercy on you.
- 29:45SPEAKER_00: So the man he goes out, he begins to proclaim the decapitalists how much Jesus has done for him, and they were all amazed.
- 29:52SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing to a man experiencing agony and pain and suffering, Jesus doesn't just tell him to relax or just hang out with it or to take a load off after he's been healed, but he tells them to go and tell other people in profound pain about a God who cares, a God who heals, and a God who gives purpose to pain.
- 30:12SPEAKER_00: The purpose the man gets, the way that God redeems this man's profound pain was sending him out to other sick and hurting people so he could tell them there is a God who cares and a God who heals.
- 30:25SPEAKER_00: Here's what that means for us.
- 30:27SPEAKER_00: Maybe, just maybe, the pain you're in tonight isn't purposeless.
- 30:34SPEAKER_00: Maybe the pain that you feel so deeply right now, that feels so impossible to escape, is not because God doesn't love you.
- 30:45SPEAKER_00: Maybe the pain you're in today is there so tomorrow you can proclaim healing to another person hurting just like you.
- 30:52SPEAKER_00: Man, how could we know freedom unless unless we understood that we were in bondage?
- 30:57SPEAKER_00: How could I know healing unless I knew the pain that I was really in?
- 31:02SPEAKER_00: Jesus right now is offering you not only healing from your pain and care for your pain, but Jesus is right now offering to redeem your pain so you would go out into the world of other hurting and sick people and proclaim there is a God who cares and who heals and who redeems.
- 31:19SPEAKER_00: Like, like what is that but what I'm doing tonight?
- 31:22SPEAKER_00: I'm just a broken man, sick with sin and hurt, who's been healed by my King Jesus Christ, proclaiming to a room full of people and myself who need to know there is a God who cares, a God who heals, and a God who redeems.
- 31:37SPEAKER_00: Man, tonight, if you've not accepted the healing of Jesus and been set free, tonight's the night to get freedom from your sin, from a God who cares.
- 31:47SPEAKER_00: Like it's time to stop the home remedies and to ask Jesus to forgive you of your sin and to set you free.
- 31:55SPEAKER_00: Man, if you've taken that step, then it's time to join God's people in following and drawing near to Jesus, enjoying the healing and the reminding of each other that he is coming back again to wipe away every tear.
- 32:08SPEAKER_00: And if you've already done that, then it's time to start living your life with purpose that Jesus wants you to live it with.
- 32:14SPEAKER_00: Telling others about the healing of Jesus that you've enjoyed.
- 32:17SPEAKER_00: Jesus trading places with us, dying so we can live.
- 32:21SPEAKER_00: Okay, I know some people in here, you're like, just tell me like one really simple thing to do, and I'm gonna do it, and I'm gonna do it quickly.
- 32:26SPEAKER_00: Go to fall retreat.
- 32:28SPEAKER_00: Come on.
- 32:29SPEAKER_00: Man, how do you enjoy the presence of God with the people of God?
- 32:32SPEAKER_00: You go into a place where you can draw near to Him for a weekend with people encouraging you, with people who have been through the same pain that you've been through, who will help you walk through it and help you give it to the king who cares.
- 32:43unknown: Come on, Red.
- 32:44SPEAKER_00: So, man, how do you practically do one thing tonight?
- 32:47SPEAKER_00: How do you give Jesus your pain?
- 32:48SPEAKER_00: Well, go to fall retreat.
- 32:50SPEAKER_00: There you go.
- 32:51SPEAKER_00: So, today we talked about meeting Jesus, meeting Jesus as our healer, and as people who have or you will experience pain.
- 33:00SPEAKER_00: You should ask the question why should I bring my pain to Jesus?
- 33:06SPEAKER_00: And we learn tonight from the leper that Jesus cares, that Jesus cares about his pain.
- 33:12SPEAKER_00: We also learn from the leper that Jesus heals the root of our pain, he restores us, he redeems us spiritually and socially.
- 33:19SPEAKER_00: But we also learned that we serve such an amazing and perfect and beautiful God that he calls you to something bigger than yourself and he repurposes and he redeems your pain all for his glory so other hurting people can know him and be loved.
- 33:35SPEAKER_00: So, man, before the night ends, what are you gonna do with your pain?
- 33:40SPEAKER_00: I remember my second year of college, I remember just breaking down in the room.
- 33:45SPEAKER_00: I was exhausted and I was discouraged and I was broken and I was in so much pain.
- 33:50SPEAKER_00: I couldn't imagine hope or light or freedom.
- 33:53SPEAKER_00: I was so just done.
- 33:55SPEAKER_00: Like felt like there was a filter over my eyes.
- 33:57SPEAKER_00: Everything was dark, everything was dreary.
- 34:01SPEAKER_00: And it was only through Jesus I found healing from my pain.
- 34:06SPEAKER_00: It was only through Jesus that I've been redeemed and healed of that pain.
- 34:11SPEAKER_00: So tonight I can tell you with a promise that Jesus redeems and restores and repurposes the pain that you can't imagine getting rid of tonight.
- 34:20SPEAKER_00: So as I end tonight, I was just wondering, I was like, if I was back in that moment in my room, broken and weary and worried and wounded, what would Jesus say directly to me?
- 34:32SPEAKER_00: And then I thought, what would Jesus say directly to those of you in pain tonight?
- 34:36SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is, the anxiety, the brokenness, the hurry, the work, the whatever it is.
- 34:42SPEAKER_00: What would Jesus say directly to you tonight?
- 34:44SPEAKER_00: And I think it's this to the weary, to the worried, and to the broken.
- 34:51SPEAKER_00: Come to me and I will give you rest.
- 34:54SPEAKER_00: Your soul is heavy and burdened by sin, but I came not to call the perfect or the healthy or the righteous, but I came to save sinners and the sick and the broken.
- 35:05SPEAKER_00: I care about your pain, your hurt, and your wounds.
- 35:08SPEAKER_00: Come to me and find rest for your soul.
- 35:11SPEAKER_00: To the weary, to the worried and the broken, money, friends, or fame, they won't heal you.
- 35:16SPEAKER_00: Serve me instead.
- 35:18SPEAKER_00: Let me heal you from the weight of sin and death and sustain you as you follow me.
- 35:24SPEAKER_00: I will sustain you, I will help you, I will never leave you.
- 35:29SPEAKER_00: To the weary, to the worried and the broken, come to me and I will give you rest, for I am the way, the truth, and the life.
- 35:37SPEAKER_00: If you believe in me, you will have eternal life, and one day I will wipe away all the tears from your eyes.
- 35:44SPEAKER_00: To the weary, to the worried and the broken, come to me.
- 35:49SPEAKER_00: I have not called you to follow me alone, but I have called you to follow me with my people and to use your pain and your healing to show others my care, my healing, and my redemption that I've showed you.
- 36:03SPEAKER_00: I'm the great healer of pain who cares about it, who heals it, and who gives it purpose.
- 36:09SPEAKER_00: To the weary, the worried, and the broken, come to me.
- 36:12SPEAKER_00: It's all coming, let's pray.
- 36:14SPEAKER_00: Jesus, apart from you, we can do nothing.
- 36:17SPEAKER_00: Apart from your healing, we are so utterly alone and broken.
- 36:21SPEAKER_00: Apart from your love, we are just leprous.
- 36:24SPEAKER_00: So, Jesus, I just pray over this room tonight that we would fall down on our face like the leper fell down before you, and we'd confess the pain that we have, whatever it is, and we'd experience your care.
- 36:36SPEAKER_00: And God, I pray that we would enjoy the healing, knowing that there is no condemnation for those in Christ, and that you separate our sin as far as the East from the West, and that there is a God who loves us and who forgives us.
- 36:47SPEAKER_00: And I pray in this room that there would be redemption from sin, and that we'd spend the rest of our lives finding the sick, finding the wounded, finding the hurt, and proclaiming to them the healing that you offer tonight, Jesus.
- 37:01SPEAKER_00: But no one walk out of this room without giving you your pain.
- 37:04SPEAKER_00: Amen.