[0:00] Let me say, I am incredibly excited about this particular text and this story that we see in the first 20 verses of chapter 5. Although I am feeling pretty sick today.
[0:11] So I really, really want my presentation of this to look like this. I have a feeling it's going to look more like this. And I've got to tell you that my face is kind of numb, so that might have looked exactly the same. I'm not really sure right now.
[0:25] I took some day quill this morning. I feel like I took night quill. And I'm telling you that not so that you have pity on me. I think a lot of people probably aren't feeling too well this morning.
[0:36] But so that if I say something that makes zero sense to you, you may know why. And I'm in a bit of a fog this morning. And so in just a moment here, we'll pray together for clarity for my speech and God's sustaining work in our time together as we study the Gospel of Mark.
[0:54] Let me remind you where we've been. We've been off for a couple of weeks. We took a two-week break after we wrapped up Chapter 4. But remember that Mark's Gospel account, as is the case with other Gospel accounts as well, but is to convince his readers that Jesus is in fact the Son of God, that He is who He says He is, and to compel us to become disciples of Christ who make disciples of Christ.
[1:17] And I'm afraid that I have to make that clarification in the current environment in which we live. Please know that a disciple of Christ necessarily makes disciples of Christ, that that's a natural outflow of following Jesus because Jesus came to seek and to save the lost, and therefore we should do the same.
[1:37] But I feel that I need to make that clarification. So Mark's argument for us is to become disciple-making disciples of Jesus Christ. And he has, in a very comic strip kind of way, moved through a ton of action through the first four chapters to show us Jesus' power over all sorts of things.
[1:59] Over nature, over illness, over sin, over demons. We've seen this repetition throughout the beginning of the Gospel of Mark.
[2:10] We saw in chapter 1, verses 21-28, an exorcism. Verse 23-24 reads, And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
[2:23] Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God. In chapter 1, verses 32-34, we see the casting out of many demons, kind of a summary of an evening he spent healing and casting out demons.
[2:39] In chapter 3, verse 11, we see again an unclean spirit encounter him, and we see this broad sweep of whenever the unclean spirit saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, You are the Son of God, and he commands them to be silent.
[2:55] Then we study the controversy that arose as a result of Jesus' exorcisms. Chapter 3, verses 22-30, and this was that narrative, that liar, lunatic, or lord narrative that we discussed together.
[3:09] And that was a result of the exorcisms. People were accusing him of doing this by the power of Satan. But now we find, in chapter 5, the most spectacular account of Jesus' power to cast out demons.
[3:23] And here I really appreciate that Mark spends a bit more time on it than either of the other two synoptics, Matthew and Luke. He fleshes out more of the detail for us, to drive us to understand who it is that this Jesus is.
[3:40] So let's read it together, beginning in verse 1 of chapter 5. They came to the other side of the sea, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit.
[3:56] He lived among the tombs, and no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain, for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces.
[4:07] No one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains, he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones. And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him.
[4:19] And crying out with a loud voice, he said, What have you to do with me, Jesus, the Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me. For he was saying to him, Come out of the man, you unclean spirit.
[4:33] And Jesus asked him, What is your name? He replied, My name is Legion, for we are many. And he begged him earnestly not to send him out of the country. Now a great herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside, and they begged him, saying, Send us to the pigs, let us enter them.
[4:50] So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs, and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and were drowned in the sea.
[5:02] The herdsmen fled and told in the city and in the country, and people came to see what it was that had happened. And they came to Jesus, and they saw the demon-possessed man, the one who had had the legion, sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, and they were afraid.
[5:17] And those who had seen it described to them what had happened to the demon-possessed man and to the pigs. And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their region. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed with the demons begged him that he might be with him.
[5:30] And he did not permit him, but said to him, Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you. And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled.
[5:45] Join me in prayer. Father God, we do thank you for the gift of your word and for Mark's gospel account of the life of Jesus Christ. And I pray, Father, as we look at it together this morning, that you will strengthen me to speak with clarity for what you would have us learn from this text today.
[6:07] You are the creator and sustainer of all things, and you do this through the powerful word of Jesus Christ. And so we pray that he will work in me in a great way by the Spirit this day, and that you will help us all in our hearing to apply the truths contained in this text to our hearts, that we might become in increasing ways devoted to Christ.
[6:32] And we pray this in his precious and holy name. Amen. Now, this fantastic miracle has come right on the heels of another miracle. And you recall that Jesus was spending large parts of his time on the west coast of the Sea of Galilee, particularly in a town called Capernaum.
[6:49] You see him in Capernaum, back on the seashore, back in Capernaum. We saw in chapter 4, him actually cast out from the shore and teach from a boat. This is where we get the parable of the sower. He's teaching from a boat.
[7:00] And then he's crossed, and in the crossing, there was a great storm, a storm that potentially had waves that were ten feet high on this little lake called the Sea of Galilee. And he has performed a spectacular miracle by simply speaking to the creation, and it obeys him.
[7:18] And the disciples, in verse 41 of chapter 4, says, So I just want you to remember that's where the disciples are at in their faith.
[7:31] That's where they arrive on the shore, and then this happens. This very next thing happens. And there's a man there that is extremely demon-possessed.
[7:44] In fact, when Jesus asks, What is your name? He replies, My name is Legion, for we are many. Now, it would be conjecture to say that it was a particular number of demons.
[7:55] We don't know for sure, but we must understand that in this day, the day of Caesar Augustus, a legion was made up of 6,826 men. That's what a legion was.
[8:07] It would be 6,100 foot soldiers and 726 horsemen. So, potentially, 6,826 demons possessed this man. We don't know that to be sure, but it was certainly a great number.
[8:21] To the degree that this man was incredibly strong. He was a wild man. In Luke's account, it says that he was naked out in the tombs. Wild.
[8:31] They had tried to come out and to bind him because nobody could pass by on the road, and he had broken the chains and broken the shackles that he was bound with. This would have been a supernatural feat that would have been accomplished.
[8:45] And we see here, at the very end of verse 4, and I absolutely love this, it says, no one had the strength to subdue him. So, he had lived here in the tombs and the catacombs wreaking havoc.
[9:00] A wild man, crazy, crying out, cutting himself, extremely demon-possessed. And the record here is no one had the strength to subdue him.
[9:12] But when Jesus lands on shore, we learn something very exceptional about Jesus, and that is that Jesus did, in fact, have the strength to subdue him.
[9:23] And he does it with his words. No one could shackle him with chain. He would break the chains. Jesus speaks and subdues the evil spirits that are within this man.
[9:36] Notice in verse 6 that these demons do not try to run away and try to hide from the power of Jesus Christ. They recognize who he is. They know full well the power that he has over them.
[9:49] And so they run to him to beg mercy of him. Verse 7, crying out with a loud voice, The man has fallen down before Jesus. What have you to do with me?
[10:00] Jesus, Son of the Most High God, I adjure you or I plead with you, I solemnly implore you, right? By God, do not torment me.
[10:16] These demons, these enemies of God that in years past had revolted against him, right? that were now given permission to run the earth and to wreak havoc and quite a number of them, an army of them, have decided to wreak havoc in this particular man's life and in the society in which he lived.
[10:36] Fall down and beg for mercy at the feet of Jesus. And we should learn from this that we need to ask God to have mercy on us.
[10:49] Now, we are not categorically the same as demons, right? Hear that. We are not categorically the same as demons. However, apart from regenerative faith in Christ, apart from having our hearts made new, apart from believing that he is who he says he is and that he accomplished what he accomplished, we are enemies of God.
[11:13] We are set against him in every way and our end is destruction. We should fear God in the same way that these demons fear God because his wrath is coming on those celestial beings that revolted against him as well as on those who do not believe that Jesus is who he says that he is.
[11:38] We should fear God. Proverbs 9.10 says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight. Why is this the case? Because properly acknowledging that God is who he is, that he is the great I am, that he is the creator of all things, and that he has a standard that we fail miserably to meet is the starting place to finding our justification in the personal work of Jesus Christ.
[12:07] Fearing God, knowing that he has set a standard for us to live by and that we have failed, is the place in which we find our hearts humbled, knowing that we need a Savior.
[12:22] That our eternal state necessitates somebody interceding on our behalf. That there is no work that we could do to repay the debt that is owed for our sin.
[12:34] That the wrath of God is due those who are his enemies rightly, justly. It's proper for him to punish those who are his enemies. And it puts us in a place where we can recognize that Jesus bore that wrath on our behalf.
[12:53] Notice here, Jesus simply speaks. He gives permission. I love this at the beginning of verse 13. They plead with him. It seems that there's been a bit of an argument going on.
[13:05] There's kind of a parenthetical in verse 8. He says, What have you to do with us, Jesus, the Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God. Do not torment me. For, Jesus was saying to him, Come out of the man, you unclean spirit.
[13:17] So he begins to debate with Jesus. Jesus has told them to come out. He begins to debate with him. And they have a bit of a conversation. And they beg to be sent to the pigs. Verse 13, So he gave them permission.
[13:31] He said, Okay. That's where you can go. And this draws my mind, and I hope it does yours, to the book of Job, where we see in chapter 1, verses 6-12, as well as chapter 2, verse 1-7, where God grants Satan permission to torment Job.
[13:50] He is the sovereign ruler of all things. He holds all things in the sway that it exists in by the power of His Word. This is our Jesus.
[14:03] It's an incredible, incredible picture. No one had the strength to subdue Him. But Jesus did by the power of His Word.
[14:16] So we need to ask God to have mercy on us. If you have not done that, if you have not come to a position in your life where you have recognized that there is a standard, that God is who He said He is, that He sent His Son, and that Jesus is God.
[14:32] There are many people in this world that deny that there is a God at all, which is a way for them to set themselves up as their own God. If you live in that kind of a state where you don't want to submit yourself to the rule and the reign of the person of Jesus Christ, you need to do that.
[14:48] Your end is destruction if you have not. We plead with you today. Ask God to have mercy on you. And the wonderful promise of the Gospel is that He will. The wonderful promise of the Gospel.
[15:01] Titus 3, verse 3. Please turn there with me. You should see this for yourself. If you are a student of your Bible, which I hope you are, you will see again and again and again Gospel presentations, summations of what God has done for us in Christ.
[15:26] Beginning of verse 3 of chapter 3. We ourselves were once foolish. See if you can pick up some of the characteristic of this man.
[15:39] Foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.
[15:51] Beginning of verse 4. But, and this is absolutely my favorite conjunction in the Scriptures. This word right here in Titus 3, verse 4.
[16:03] But, when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior.
[16:23] So that being justified by His grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. God would have been totally just to stop this process at the end of verse 3.
[16:35] We in every way had set ourselves up to be enemies of Him. And we deserve the punishment that was coming to us. So praise God for the conjunction at the beginning of verse 4.
[16:46] Because of His goodness, because of His loving kindness, not because of works that we can do on our own. He has made us new by the Spirit in Christ. Praise God.
[16:59] We need to learn from this that Jesus is Himself God and that He will save us from the wrath of God to eternal glory with Himself.
[17:12] What a blessing that is. We also need to learn from this text that we should tell our friends how much the Lord has done for us.
[17:24] That we should tell our friends how much the Lord has done for us. One of the things I love about this story is that it's evidence that Jesus understood God's global purpose for His glory.
[17:40] Jesus understood and gives us hint to the very fact and if you're again a student of your Bible this wouldn't come as a surprise to you but that God has intended to save peoples.
[17:52] Peoples from all over this world. That God has intended for people across this planet to praise His name forever. Jesus got this. Jesus crossed over the Sea of Galilee to an area that was primarily Gentile.
[18:09] Primarily Gentile. These people would have been descendants left over from Babylonian captivity when the Jews were carried off in Babylonian captivity and peoples moved into the area Gentile peoples which is just categorical not Jewish when you hear that term Gentile Greek not Jewish right?
[18:27] The country of the Gerasenes we see here and we see that the man later goes and proclaims in the Decapolis which was a set of ten cities and you'll see them they're all up and down the coast there of the Sea of Galilee and out beyond.
[18:44] We also see that there was a great herd of pigs and Jews didn't eat pork so this was a Gentile town that he was landing in to do this to come and to share the good news of the coming kingdom.
[18:59] Jesus understood his scriptures Jesus had a very clear vision of who God was to the world which enabled him empowered him to be able to do this as he was being led across the Sea of Galilee knowing full well I'm sure as he was God incarnate that he was going to encounter this man and encounter these Gentile peoples on that coast I'm sure he thought of things like Psalm 67 verses 1-3 may God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us that your way may be known on earth your saving power among all nations let the peoples praise you oh God let all the peoples praise you the significance of that would have been huge in his mind as he went to take the gospel to a Gentile people turn with you will to Isaiah chapter 42 let me further make this case to you the universal significance and calling of Israel is nowhere expressed more clearly than in
[20:07] Isaiah chapters 40 through 55 I encourage you to read those chapters on your own time there are two particular texts that speak of Israel's purpose to make God known amongst the nations particular ones very poignant to this fact we find the first in Isaiah chapter 42 verse 1 through 7 I better get myself there Isaiah 42 1 through 7 behold my servant whom I uphold my chosen in whom my soul delights I have put my spirit upon him he will bring forth justice to the nations he will not cry aloud or lift up his voice or make it heard in the street a bruised reed he will not break and a faintly burning wick he will not quench he will faithfully bring forth justice he will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth and the coastlands wait for his law thus says
[21:08] God the Lord who created the heavens and stretched them out who spread out the earth and what comes from it who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it I am the Lord I have called you in righteousness I will take you by the hand and keep you I will give you as a covenant for the people a light for the nations to open the eyes that are blind to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon from the prison those who sit in darkness you see that an expressed purpose of why God had a particular people these people Israel the Jews was to be a light to show the nations the goodness of God that they might repent and believe Isaiah 49 is the next one if you'll turn there again verses 1 through 7 listen to me
[22:09] O coastlands and give attention you peoples from afar the Lord called me from the womb from the body of my mother he named my name he made my mouth like a sharp sword in the shadow of his hand he hid me he made me a polished arrow in his quiver he hid me away and he said to me you are my servant Israel in whom I will be glorified but I said I have labored in vain I have spent my strength for nothing in vanity yet surely my right is with the Lord and my recompense with my God and now the Lord says he who formed me from the womb to be a servant to bring Jacob back to him and that Israel might be gathered to him for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord and my God has become my strength he says it is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel I will make you as a light for the nations that my salvation may reach to the end of So the very purpose of
[23:22] Isaiah drawing the people of God back to God was so that God might be proclaimed amongst the nations in these two marvelous texts Israel is called to reveal God's justice to the nations Isaiah 42 1 and to serve as a light to the Gentiles 42 6 and 49 6 so that this salvation offered to Israel might reach to the ends of the earth Isaiah 49 6 your mind might go to the story of Jonah Jonah is told by God to take the message of God's mercy to Israel's most cruel of enemies the Assyrians cruel enemies and he has to go God tells him to go to the capital city of Nineveh and there's a great outpouring there's a great response to the mercy of God as he goes there and preaches John chapter 20 verse 21 Jesus appears after his death to the disciples he says peace be with you as the father has sent me even so
[24:29] I am sending you and we know from Luke chapter 19 verse 10 he said for the son of man came to seek and to save the lost and that includes those outside of Israel that includes Gentiles praise God that includes us I don't know if any of you are of Jewish descent in this room I would guess not right if you're not praise God for these promises because this is how the gospel has come to us we've been given a promise by Jesus in Matthew chapter 24 verse!
[25:02] 14 he says and this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations and then the end will come and we get a glimpse of that in Revelation chapter 5 verse 9 and 10 John records for us and they sang a new song saying worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals for you were slain and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation you have made them a kingdom and a priest to our God that they shall reign on the earth and much debate goes on about what it means by every tribe and language and people nation the particulars of that the semantics of these words one thing we can be sure of the end has not come yet therefore the task is yet to be completed and this is what God has called us into in Christ and that is to propagate the truth if you like to go back and read Mark chapter 4 and see all the agrarian symbols there that is to propagate the truth of his kingdom amongst peoples everywhere the vision statement of our church changed recently many of you probably don't know that but we made a small alteration to it just to bring a little more clarity to it and we added some words to the end in the vision statement of our church is
[26:25] Christ family church exists to glorify God by its experiencing proclaiming and displaying the supremacy of Jesus Christ in all things and then we added to all peoples to be sure that everyone understood that we recognize as a church that is the task put before us to share the gospel everywhere with everyone thinking about God's global purposes you must also know that this includes North Georgia it includes the southeast it includes America it includes your dorm hall and your workplace and your home it includes all of this God wants to be praised and as his people we should want him to be praised far and wide we should want people to see what he has done for us to tell our friends about how much the Lord has done for us and how he has had mercy on us turn to
[27:29] Romans chapter 10 our high calling in Christ is to be disciple making disciples to be to be finding ourselves coming into conformity with Christ and to bring others along in that journey beginning in verse 11 of Romans chapter 10 for the scripture says this is Isaiah 49-23 everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame verse 12 for there is no distinction between Jew and Greek for the same Lord is Lord of all bestowing his riches on all who call on him for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved Joel 2-32 how then will they call on him and whom they have not believed and how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard and how are they to hear without someone preaching and how are they to preach unless they are sent as it is written how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news
[28:36] Isaiah 52-7 Paul states to us very clearly here that our religion is a religion of words our hearts are changed by our knowledge of the gospel of Jesus Christ and it must be told to us which means as God's church longing I hope you can join me with this longing for the coming of Christ wanting to hasten that coming that we're the tools to get that done to preach the gospel far and wide and that means you have a place to go this afternoon to preach the gospel and that means that in your life young people oh I hope this is a church that sends people to unreached people groups that takes the gospel to places where the gospel has never been named where there is no scripture in their language that builds foundations for churches to grow and flourish in that it would be said of us how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news there is still a massive task ahead of us preach the gospel far and wide and you can allow that to burden you to be pressed down by it how can I one little person make any change at all or you can glory in the fact that God has made a promise to redeem people from every tribe from every nation from every tongue take comfort in the fact that he is the sovereign over all peoples and that if you just make yourself available to be used by him that he will use you it is his desire to bring about conformity to his kingdom he will use you here he will use you there how do we carry the gospel to some places there is a people group that I discovered in the bathroom reader if you hang out with me long you will quickly discover that any intelligence
[30:37] I have I learn from the bathroom reader there is a group of people on an island they are called the North Sentinelese it is North Sentinel Island it is protected by India no one has ever landed on this island and not been killed on the shore of it some people a grandmother and two children came off the island for a while and were tried to be assimilated into some kind of western culture and sent back to the island and they carried disease with them and wiped out a bunch of people on the island if you get on google maps you can't see that anybody lives on the island at all it is heavily forested the nation of India patrols it so you can't get anywhere near the island they are trying to protect these people from the diseases that would wipe them out as they have been so isolated how does God intend to save North Sentinelese I don't know but I firmly believe that as we stand around the throne we are going to meet people from that island so how do we get the gospel to those people how are we making ourselves available and being obedient to God's purpose and his plan for the North Sentinelese
[31:44] Jesus understood what God intended to do with the good news of the coming kingdom and so he went to a place that was outside of the normal realm in the Jews mind of God's blessing he went to a people that they thought were apostate in every way and could not receive the blessing of God and he shared the good news and he had mercy on a man who was extremely demon possessed now you know that this man that they marvel they're afraid 2,000 pigs I can't imagine what a herd of 2,000 pigs looks like much less rushing down a steep bank into the sea and drowning there there's some certainly some livelihood destroyed but it seems that the people are marveling because of the great power that this man had and that Jesus' power trumped it with words he was able to cast out demons and this man we find him now clothed and in his right mind and the end of verse 15 the record is and they were afraid so they asked him verse 17 to depart from their region they were afraid of the power that he had and the man that he had delivered the demons from begged him that he might be with him and note this
[33:09] Jesus said no Jesus had a better place for him to be he could have taken him on the boat he could have made him a disciple he could have taken him but he had a more particular purpose for him he tasked the man appropriately and he told him to go to his friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you now the great thing is if you'll flip a couple of pages over we get to see we get a record here that the man did this and everyone marveled at the end of verse 20 right he traveled amongst these ten cities telling what Jesus had done for him and we get some evidence of that if you'll turn over a couple of pages to Mark chapter 7 and look at verse 31 then he being Jesus returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the sea of Galilee in the region of the Decapolis this is the area that he was at he went back over there and he stays there
[34:11] I would presume I'm fairly confident of this chapter 8 verse 1 it says in those days and then we see him in chapter 8 verse 13 pass back across the sea so he's in this region when he performs the second feeding of 4,000 so he's now back in the region and a crowd of 4,000 people are now coming to him no longer afraid but marveling and wanting to hear what it is he has to say so this one man we don't know that he brought about regenerative faith in 4,000 people the presumption would be that he didn't we know that Jesus had very few followers after his death however he was certainly preaching the good news of the kingdom far and wide he was engaging people's minds they wanted to learn more about who this Jesus was I'm sure some with bad motivation they knew about this crazy thing that this Jesus had done and they wanted to see if he would do anything else that nuts they had come for the magic show but many
[35:14] I'm sure came genuinely wanting to know and understand who this person is so the man was willing to be put where he was not to go off to do something radical to go on his mission journey but to be where he was and to share the good news of the kingdom what the Lord had done for him with his friends Acts chapter 20 verse 24 Paul said but I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God let me shorten that sentence for you I do not count my life of any value nor as precious to myself except to testify to the gospel of the grace of God Paul saw that as his great purpose right my life is only precious in so much that it exists to make
[36:17] Jesus to us in Acts chapter 20 verse 24 so not only should we ask mercy of God but we should share we should tell our friends we should go far and wide telling people about the good news of Jesus Christ and you have to ask yourself if this is not a great motivation in your life if you don't desire to see people praise your Lord does he reign in your life are the truths of the gospel precious to you do you understand what he has accomplished on your behalf here we have a man demon possessed naked living in the tombs cutting himself he was a mess he was a mess God had done a great thing for him in showing him mercy boy was I a mess before God showed me mercy!
[37:10] in Christ do you remember! a!! And if you don't do you really understand sin its weight its consequence do you understand the great offense that it is to a most holy God we should want to make Christ known because of what he has done for us should be the great motivation in our sharing our faith we should want people to come to faith in him certainly to sing his praises to continue to tell people about his motivation ought to be that we just want to talk about it you talk most about the things you love most what do you talk most about I hope you're finding in your life as you grow in faith that you talk most about Jesus now it is good and healthy for us to have some strategy to this end that we think about how it is that we can share the gospel most effectively and there are countless trainings out there there's all sorts of stuff you can get your hands on that teach you how to best share your faith let me give you a simple one and I think this is all you need number one make friends so that you can share with them how much the
[38:32] Lord has done with you make friends so that you can share with them how much the Lord has Christians are so very monastic and that we only run in Christian circles put yourself in positions to be friends with people who do not know our Lord spend lots of time with people who do that's why we come together in church to encourage each other to this great end but spend time with people who do not know that Jesus is Lord that he is the Son of God so that you can share with them make friends with them become invested in their lives don't simply track and run but make friends with people that you might invest in them secondly pray for them pray for them salvation of souls is a spiritual work we cannot convince people by our words to come to faith in Christ it is a work that has to happen inside of them!
[39:33] Do it repeatedly Do you have people in your life that you're praying for? Do you have friends that do not know Christ that you consistently and fervently pray for?
[39:48] Pray for them. Number three teach them the Bible We're a religion of words preach the gospel to them by teaching them the Bible We are gifted in various ways and that is a good thing we all bear different gifts God has made us unique to use us in unique ways and you may be totally intimidated to sit down and share the truths of scripture with somebody you yourself may not feel like you really even know what the Bible has to say do not let that intimidate you this is the tool in our hands by which we share!
[40:23] the good news of the coming of Christ the kingdom that has arrived and is coming to pass a bunch of weeks ago I put out on the table in the hall a one-to-one Bible reading plan for Mark I don't know if any of you have it this is mine still stuck in my back in my concordance in mine this is a simple and easy way not the only way but a simple and easy way there's eight readings someone ready to ask come up with some answers to these questions ask the questions pray for them that God would work in their heart as they read the scriptures as they behold Jesus in Mark's gospel account teach in the Bible and fourthly serve their needs show people that you genuinely love them by spending time serving their needs show up at their place late at night help them move help them study do things for them that other people may not do for them show them that you genuinely love and care for them beloved
[41:32] I said to you that the great call of the gospel of Mark the great calling on all of our lives is to be disciple making disciples and that the one necessitates the other so you have to ask yourself if I am not sharing the truth of Christ what does that mean!
[41:53] a Christian at all that possibility exists I know most of you and I know that most of you are right so what does that say about your belief in the scriptures what does that say about what you believe that Jesus is and what he can accomplish it says very little right very little you think very little of him and his purpose and what he can do I hope in some way of his word casting out an army of demons right and then leaving a man behind to share about his goodness to him will awaken in you a desire to share the goodness of Christ on your behalf are we so cold are we so cold there are countless Christians around this world dying for their faith considering it a blessing to suffer the way Christ suffered and being martyred for the sharing of their faith and we are lulled to sleep by our comfort it has been a long prayer of many of the men of our church that there might be revival in this region let it start in your heart get that you cannot be a faithful disciple of
[43:13] Christ if you're not bringing others to faith in Christ propagate the truth far and wide let's pray together a