Plainfield Christian Church
07-28-24 | Elijah: Humiliating Gospel
Welcome to the Plainfield Christian Church podcast. We hope that this message encourages you today. For additional resources to learn about what it looks like to be fully alive with Jesus, visit our website at plainfieldchristian.com. Enjoy the podcast. Morning church. My name is Luke. I get to serve as one of the ministers here and here is my sermon and a sentence for you today in case you fall asleep in a few minutes. Here you go, ready? When you've got a mess, you can't clean up, bring it to the one who can. When you've got a mess that you can't clean up, bring it to the one who can. So it begs the question then, what is your mess this morning? You know that thing in your life, that addiction, maybe it's a sin, maybe it's a habit, a problem, a relationship. What's that mess that if Jesus walked in the back door right now and we walked right up to you and he looked you in the eye and he said, really? You're still doing that thing. That mess. What is it? Well, what's that thing that brings you disappointment when you look in the mirror and you still don't like what you see? What is that pattern in your life? We've all got it, that behavior that you're trying to change, but it keeps on coming back over and over and over again. That weakness that leaves you wondering whether really if this is all there actually is and you better get used to it because you're not sure you're ever going to really be able to change. What's your mess? Because when you've got a mess that when you can't clean up, you bring it to the one who can. In the Proctor House, our washer and dryer are downstairs in the basement. So that means that when Rebecca or I and mostly Rebecca does a load of laundry, the boys are almost never down there to see it. We've got three boys due to Calvin Wesley, six, five and three and so I put myself in the mind of my youngest son Wesley, the three-year-old this week and I thought, you know what? What does he think about when he thinks about laundry? He probably has no idea how the laundry actually works. In his mind, he just goes upstairs to his room and the boys all share room and they've got this like basketball goal, laundry basket, hoop thing, right? And so what do the boys do when they've got a mess? Like when they've got mud on their shorts or when they've got blood on their shirt or they've got sweaty socks or heaven forbid if there's some other kind of bodily fluid involved. What do they do with that mess? In Wesley's mind, he knows what to do with that mess. He goes and he walks up and he shoots that mess in the hoop and it falls into the laundry basket and then lo and behold, something incredible and magical and wonderful happens. The very next day, those clothes show back up in the drawer completely clean. It's like sorcery. Who knows how it actually really works, right? All he knows is that when you've got a mess, you can't clean up. You bring it to the one who can. I don't know what season of life you're in right now. Maybe it's a fun season or maybe it's a hard season regardless. I want you to put on your steel-toed boots with me this morning. Can you do that? Because the Bible's going to step on our toes a little bit today. The first truth we're going to be confronted with in Scripture today is that you have an impossible sickness. That's the mess that you can't clean up. Let me give you some context. We've been spending this summer walking through the life of a guy named Elijah in the Old Testament that this was before Jesus was born. The hearts of God's people were wandering away from him. They were building all these altars to all these other gods called idols. They were running after other things for hope and meaning and significance and purpose and peace in their lives. And so God used one guy named Elijah to draw the hearts of his people back to him. And we've seen God do amazing things through Elijah. But what I've loved is that every week we've come back to James chapter 5 to remind us that Elijah was not a spiritual superhero. The dude didn't wear a cape. He didn't have some kind of red phone hotline to God. In fact, he had no spiritual power that you and I do not also have. James chapter 5 says Elijah was a man like us except he prayed. So if God can use Elijah, maybe just maybe God could use people like us too. But over the past couple weeks we've actually seen the mantle get past and Elijah has passed the baton to his successor Elisha. And God has continued to work through Elisha also and we're wrapping up our series today. This is the last week of this series and we're going to see one of the most famous stories in Elisha's ministry. Second Kings chapter 5. If you've got your Bibles, that's where we're going to be. Second Kings chapter 5. And I'm just going to put all my cards on the table from the jump. Ready? Today is baptism Sunday. And I believe that for some of you in the room today, you are going to make a decision this morning during the next hour that will change the course of your life. Second Kings chapter 5. We're about to dive into this story. A story of another man with an impossible sickness, kind of like you and me. He's a man named Naaman. Now what you got to know about Naaman before we dive into the Bible here is that Naaman was the commanding officer of the Aramean army. You might remember from last week, those are bad guys. They're enemies of Israel, depending on what version of the Bible you're reading, it might say the Syrian army. In other words, Naaman is the head honcho of the bad guys. That's what the Jews would be thinking as they read this text. Let's read it together. Second Kings chapter 5 says this, "Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded. Catch this, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The Lord had given him victory. Notice that God is sovereign in the events of history, so don't sweat it. It says he was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy." Now remember, if you're a Jew reading this, you're thinking, "Well good. Serves him right. He deserves it." The text goes on. Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive, a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman's wife. She said to her mistress, "If only my master would see the prophet who's in Samaria, he would cure him of his leprosy." Now let's pause right there because this is absolutely incredible. Think about what's happening here. That little girl has been kidnapped from her home. She has been stolen from her family, abducted and enslaved. That means she should feel about Naaman the way we felt about Osama bin Laden. She should be thinking, "Leprosy, good. I hope you rot for what you did to me and my people." But instead, this little girl displays the most radical thing about the people of God. Throughout history, one of the most radical realities of being God's people is that he asks us to love our enemies. Why in the world would God ask us to do that? Well, to remind us of when we were God's enemies and he loved us. If you fast forward to the New Testament, Jesus says it like this. This is the command to you and me. Jesus says, "Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you and pray for those who mistreat you." And so this little servant girl here in Second Kings chapter 5, she embodies the boundary-breaking love of God. And she says, "Nayaman, you hurt me, but I want to help heal you." And I want you to know that you can do that too. This little girl, she's not like a prophet calling down fire from heaven. She's a normal person doing her normal job on a normal day in a normal conversation, but she sees an opportunity for a simple act of love and to put in a good word about God. And you can do that too. God can use that. The Bible says, remember first Peter chapter 3, he commands us. He says, "Hey, always be prepared. Be prepared to give an answer for everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. God opened a door for that little girl and she was ready to give an answer. Are you watching for open doors in conversation? Are you watching for open doors with your neighbors and your co-workers and with your family to do just a little simple act of love and put in a good word for God? Because remember, the people around us are as impossibly sick as Neiman and you and I know where they can find healing. But the text continues. Look what happens. The little girl tells them, "Hey, there's a prophet in Israel." So Neiman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said. "By all means go," the King of Arem replied, "I'll send a letter to the King of Israel." So Neiman left, taking with him 10 talents of silver, 6,000 shackles of gold, and 10 sets of clothing. That is generational wealth. That's a King's ransom. It says the letter that he took to the King of Israel read, "With this letter I'm sending my servant name into you so that you may cure him of his leprosy." No, okay. As soon as the King of Israel read the letter, he tore his robes. He said, "Am I God? Can I kill and bring back to life? Why does this fellow send someone to me to be cured of his leprosy? See how he's trying to pick a quarrel with me?" But when Elisha, the man of God, heard that the King of Israel had torn his robes, he sent in this message, "Why have you torn your robes? Have the man come to me and he will know that there's a prophet in Israel." Mike dropped. What a great line. So here's the scene. Neiman has leprosy. He's got this incurable skin disease. The little Jewish servant girl said, "Hey, there's a man of God in Israel who can heal you." So the King of A. Ram sends a message to the King of Israel saying, "Hey, heal my general." And we can pity and understand the King's reaction a little bit. Can't we? The King of Israel says, "What? Like who can do that? I'm not a God. I'm just a man." And yet remember Elisha and Elisha, they were just normal people like us to accept they prayed. And so Elisha says, "Hey, bring it on." Even leprosy. Now here's why that's amazing. You and I, we live in a world where our existence is fairly sanitized on a day-to-day basis. We're kind of insulated from this kind of visible physical suffering most of the time. But you got to understand what leprosy would have been for this main name. And it was total humiliation. It was shame. It was public shame. You were isolated from your family. It was an eventual death sentence. If you've been on a mission trip before to a third world country, perhaps you've seen more visible kinds of suffering than we see here in Hendricks County, Indiana. I can remember my first time going overseas, 19 years old, spent the summer living in a village in Sub-Saharan Africa where every single day I'm walking by all these people who'd had botched polio vaccines as children. And so now they were crippled, missing limbs, body parts warped, forced to spend their lives begging, dragging themselves around on the desert floor, hopelessly incurable, facing and impossible sickness. Marred for life. And that might not be what your body is like. Like externally, your life might be fine. You probably don't have leprosy today, but actually the Bible says that you and I also have an incurable sickness that's even worse. And the Bible word for it is sin. It's pretty common in our day and age to throw around the idea that all people are basically good. But unfortunately, Scripture doesn't teach that. You were made good. Yes, absolutely. The baby in my wife's womb is good, thankfully. He's made in the image of God, but not long after that little boy enters the world, he's going to grow up a little bit and he's going to choose to do what he knows is wrong. He's going to choose to not do what he knows is right. And he will become a sinner with an incurable sickness just like you and me. We have an impossible sickness. I know this is hard, but go with me here for a moment. Don't tune out because you can't be healed unless you identify this sickness. There's an old preacher named John Wesley. He helped lead the greatest revival this continent has ever seen. And people would respond to his preaching in amazing ways. And so somebody asked John Wesley one time, "Hey, what's your philosophy of preaching? How do you do it?" Wesley said, "Ha, my philosophy of preaching is to crush them with law and then rescue them with grace." So if you've got your steel to boots on, let me crush you with the law for just a moment. God shows us how sick we are. He shows us our sin by giving us his laws. When you read through the Bible and you see commands like do not lie, do not steal, do not covet, honor your father and mother, love your enemy, love your neighbor as yourself, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Part of the reason those commands are there, Romans 5 verse 20, Paul says, "The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase." In other words, part of the reason God's given us his laws is to show us just how warped our hearts have become. Because if you're anything like me, when you read those laws, you immediately start thinking of how far short of that we have fallen, right? My goodness, when I read what Jesus says in Matthew 5 verse 48, when Jesus commands us, be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect. Immediately, I just think of all the times that I have been so far short of perfect. The law can't heal you, but it does help you identify the sickness. If I'm driving late at night and my car breaks down on the side of the road, I need two things to get that car back on the road. I need a tool to fix it and I need something to help me identify the problem. Grace is the wrench that helps fix the problem, but the law is the flashlight that's going to show you where the problem is in the first place. So when you read the law of God, you're going to realize that you have an incurable sickness. The Bible has different words for it, but Scripture says that you are broken, Scripture says you have wandered from the path, you have trespassed, you've missed the mark, you are fundamentally crooked in your nature, you are in debt, you're guilty, you're shackled by shame, you are trapped in futility, you have a lawless, fleshly nature. From the moment in the garden of Eden that Eve rebelled against God and ate the forbidden fruit, and Adam stood passively by and did nothing, each and every one of us have chosen that same path. You have an incurable sickness. If Regent's chapter 2 says, "As for you, you were dead," dead in your transgressions and sins. Now, if you're a follower of Jesus this morning, that's what you were. You were dead. If you are not a devoted disciple of Jesus Christ this morning, baptized into him, then that is what you still are. You are dead in your transgressions and sins. Paul says in which you used to live, when you followed the ways of this world and the ruler, the kingdom of the air, the spirit who's at work and those who are disobedient, all of us lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh, following its desires and thoughts like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. So when we're in Second Kings 5 today and you read about Naaman and his leprosy and his incurable sickness, I want you to see yourself in him. I want you to see your sin in his leprosy. You have an impossible sickness. That's the bad news, but here's the good news. There is a very simple cure. You've got a mess that you can't clean up, but you can bring it to the one who can. Naaman does. Here's what happens. Naaman goes to Elisha's house looking for healing. Pick it up in verse 9. It says, "So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and he stopped at the door of Elisha's house. Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, "Go wash yourself seven times in the Jordan and your flesh will be restored and you'll be cleansed." But Naaman went away angry and said, "I thought that he would surely come out to me and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot, cure me in my leprosy, are not a banner and far part of the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel. Couldn't I wash in them and be cleansed?" So he turns and went off in a rage. So here's the scene. Naaman, the big wig bad guy, shows up with his royal entourage and Elisha doesn't even get out of his lazy boy to open the door. Bro, this is not how to win friends and influence people. Let's work on your social skills a little bit, right? And to make it even worse, he sends his servant to go tell Naaman to dunk himself seven times in the Jordan River. Here's what you need to know about that. The Jordan River is gross. Like super duper gross, I've been there, I've stood in it, there's Luke with his jeans rolled up, standing in the Jordan River. Like it is a nasty muddy, slimy, little tiny stream. It is a nasty little place. And so imagine that you're Naaman. In fact, let's contextualize it a little bit. Let's say you have been having chronic migraines and they life-flight you to Methodist Hospital. I don't know why they life-flight you for chronic migraines, but go with me, okay? And you get to see the top doctor. And the top doctor, you're expecting, yes, she's going to have the cure for my problem, but she walks in, she looks at her chart and she says what you need is to cannonball repeatedly into the magical healing elixir waters of White Lake Creek. You would not walk out of that place thinking you got your money's worth from that medical establishment, would you? You'd be thinking, what in the world is this? You have an impossible sickness, but there is a very simple cure. And Naaman's thinking, are you kidding me? No way. Like, give me something legitimate to do. Like, tell me to bring to you the heads of 500 of Yahweh's enemies or to like, pay my weight in gold. Give me something weighty to do. That's more like, and I'm not dunking myself with that nasty water. Do I really have to do that? And my guess is, that's probably why some of you have not yet been baptized. Today's baptism Sunday. My guess is maybe you've got questions about the role that baptism plays in salvation or, you know, I was baptized as a baby. Does it really need to be by immersion? You're Naaman and you're standing there saying, do I have to? And the question is, God says yes, so will you obey? Will you follow God or will you wait around asking God to follow you? It's a very simple cure. And yes, sure, the water ain't magic. It's just tap water in a tub. It comes from the faucet. It's a muddy creek in Israel. But look what God can do with it, verse 13. Naaman's servants went to him and said, my father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more than when he tells you, wash and be cleansed? So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy. Amazing. So put yourself in Naaman's sandals here for just a moment. You're hiking up your robe, you're walking down and your toes are feeling the mud and you're stepping into that slimy water and you plug your nose and you get ready to dip under. One. Still got leprosy. Two. Same old source. Three. This is ridiculous. Four. I look like a fool. This is some kind of frank. Five. Only two more to go. Six. What was I thinking? Seven. Can you imagine like, oh my goodness, oh my goodness, I'm healed, I'm healed, it's gone, I'm clean, look. And look what he does. After he gets miraculously healed, look what he does, verse 15. Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. This time, Elisha actually answers the door. He stood before him and said, now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel, so please accept a gift from your servant. The prophet answered, as surely as the Lord lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing. And even though Naaman urged him, he refused. So notice the dipping in the water didn't just clean and heal Naaman's outside, it actually transformed him on the inside too. He swears allegiance to the God of Israel, he's got a generous heart, all of a sudden, and that's the thing about us. Like Christianity is not just about washing the outside. Following Jesus is not about becoming a nicer person, it's about becoming a new person. That's what happened in these waters. If you're a follower of Jesus, that's what happened to you when you got baptized. If you've not been baptized, that's what can happen to you. Paul says in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come, the old is gone, and the new is here. Your impossible sickness has a supernatural but incredibly simple cure, becoming fully alive in Jesus. When you've got a mess, you can't clean up, bring it to the one who can. Now, whether you're a follower of Jesus this morning or not yet, we've crushed you with law, I think, sufficiently. I want to spend the last few moments here together rescuing you with grace, if that's all right. If you have not sworn allegiance to Jesus yet as your king, I want you to know this is what he makes available to you, and if you have, if you've been following Jesus, then I want to give you three truths about this very simple cure that Jesus has given you, just to remind you of what you've received. Number one is there's no one he can't save. There is no one he can't save. Here's how I know that. In Luke chapter 4, if you fast forward to the ministry of Jesus, Jesus preaches his very first sermon in Luke chapter 4. The context is Jesus has just gotten baptized. He spent 40 days wandering around in the wilderness triumphing over Satan, and then Jesus goes back to his hometown. The local boy, the golden boy, the little boy who grew up a carpenter, did you hear? He's become a rabbi now. I heard he's over at the synagogue. He's over going to make his home church proud, going to preach his first sermon. They can't wait to hear what he has to say. What's the new little rabbi going to preach the first time he steps up into the pulpit? But instead of a fluffy, feel-good pep talk, Jesus drops a theological depth charge using the story of Neiman. Luke chapter 4 verse 27, these are Jesus' last words in his first sermon. He says, "There were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elijah the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed, only Neiman, the Syrian." In other words, "Hey Israel, you missed it. God doesn't just care about you religious people who've got your lives together and you come from the right bloodline. The radical love of God is for everybody, even your enemies, the people that you hate the most, God's wild about him, and that's why I'm here." As you can imagine, it went over like a lead balloon. Jesus's home church tried to kill him because they were scandalized by the kind of people Jesus came to save. There is no one he can't save. I don't know how messy your life is today, but I know how messy mine is. And maybe you're thinking, "God really do this for somebody like me. Could I really get cleaned up? Could I really change? Could I, a person like me, could I really become fully alive in Jesus? Could God actually care about somebody like me in all of my inconsistency and in all of my mess and all of my secret sin and my habitual addiction and I snap at my kids and I'm horrible with money and I'm been keeping secrets in my faith this week and I've got serious doubts and I keep trying to get better, but it seems like it's one step forward and two steps back and I've got some real skeletons in the closet and if that's you this morning, welcome to church. Join the club. There's no one he can't say. Go read your Bible. God loves calling and using people that we would never hire here at Plainfield Christian Church. If King David applied for a job at PCC, HR would flag that application immediately. Dude's a lying adulterer. Don't let him in. If Moses applied for a job at Plainfield Christian Church, we're taking one look at that resume and that dude is not getting an interview. Kill the guy with your own bare hands, spent the next 40 years wandering around with some sheep. No thanks. We could go on and on and on. If you're stuck believing that you think heaven is going to be really boring someday, being with nice sanitized church people who had perfect lives and love singing in the angel choir, think again because you're going to be in heaven with some crazy wacko weird people who've got stories that will make you blush because there's nobody that God can't save. He wants you. Here's the second thing. There's no one he can't save and there's nothing you can pay. Nothing you can pay. If you keep reading in 2 Kings chapter 5 this afternoon, the story goes on and kind of the summary of what happens is Elisha's servant is a little miffed that Elisha has turned down this opportunity to be like once in a lifetime wealthy and say yes to Naaman's gifts. And so the servant sneaks out and he runs after Naaman and he says hey actually we changed our minds. Can we have some of that treasure? And word to the wise, if your boss is a prophet, don't try to pull one over on him, right? And Elisha he sniffs it out immediately and here's why what the servant did was wrong. Yes because it was lying but also because it was a distortion of the gospel. Because the gospel, the good news of how Jesus saves you in me is all about grace. It's all free. And the servant was essentially saying to Naaman yes God will heal you but you've got to pay up. And listen, in the world you walk into every week you can pay up for a lot of things. You can buy a lot of things. Go Google it. You can purchase your citizenship. You can buy your way under the New York Times bestseller list no matter how bad your book is. You can pay for social media followers for the low price of $30,000. You can purchase your own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame but you can't buy divine healing. The gospel is free. Have you heard the one about the rich man who went up to his minister and said preacher if I give the church a million bucks will it get me into heaven? And preacher said well it's worth a shot. So if you want to try today I won't tell you no but I do think it's my pastoral duty to remind you that all of the gold in the world cannot purchase an ounce of goodwill from God. Remember gold is pavement in heaven. It's the asphalt of the divine economy. And so Peter reminds the church saying for you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors. It was with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. And sometimes like the longer you walk with Jesus if you're a church person here today and yeah hopefully you're growing but sometimes the better you are the harder it is for you to remember that you've still got a mess you can't clean up and that the only thing you have ever earned is God's wrath. And that all the good things in your life aren't because you deserve them they're just because God's gracious. But if you're here this morning and you're looking around at your life and you're thinking yeah that ain't me and sometimes that's good because sometimes the more messed up you are the closer you are to throwing yourself on the free mercy of God because you know that's your only shot. For the record it's the only shot for any of us. Paul says in Ephesians chapter 2 it's by grace you've been saved through faith and this is not from yourselves it is the gift of God not by works so that no one can boast. There's no one he can't save. There's nothing you can pay and here's the last thing. God humbles us before he heals us. God humbles us before he heals us. Yeah when you've got a mess you can't clean up bring it to the one who can. There's no one you can't say there's nothing you can pay but there is an entrance requirement for salvation and the entrance requirement is humility. God humbles us before he heals us. I don't know exactly what it's going to be like when we get to heaven but my guess is none of us are going to strut through the pearly gates. I doubt any of us are going to whip out our resume and brag to God about all our spiritual accomplishments. When the royal entourage shows up outside Elisha's house the dude doesn't even answer the door because he knows that if Neament is going to be healed first he has to be humbled. Elisha knows what you and I need to know that your morality, your net worth, your appearance, your resume, how successful and put together your family is, your church attendance, your Bible reading plan. Those are all good things that can become dangerous and deadly idols on the altar of your heart when they lead to a kind of disgusting spiritual pride that is poisonous in the eyes of God. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5 verse 2. Blessed are the poor in spirit. There is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you today if you're desperate. Blessed are you if you're on your last shot. Blessed are you if you know you are impossibly sick and hopelessly lost. If you're here thinking today you know what I'm not perfect but I'm pretty good. I'm at least like middle class in spirit. Then you will miss out on God's best for your life. Dwight O. Moody said God sends no one away empty except those who are full of themselves. The great reformer Martin Luther one time was asked what did you contribute to your salvation? What did you bring to God? He said sin and resistance. God humbles us before he heals us. You remember the rich young ruler? Do you remember that story? Matthew chapter 19 is a rich young man who comes up to Jesus during Jesus' ministry and he kind of struts up shoulders back chest out. He says hey I've kept all the commands what else do I need to do to inherit eternal life? It says that Jesus saw he was rich and he said oh oh sell it all. Give it to the poor then you can come and follow me. He could see that wealth was that man's idol and that as long as he was holding on to money he'd never be able to hold on to Jesus. He'd never be fully alive and the man couldn't do it. He couldn't let go and so he walked away. And this is just my imagination but I wonder if someday the rich young ruler became the rich old ruler laying on his deathbed and I wonder if the rich old ruler looked around at all his piles of gold because if I did don't you think he would have given it all up in that moment for just one more shot at life with Jesus and go back to Elisha. Elisha knows that from his own experience because Elisha was rich remember he was the CEO of a successful agribusiness 24 oxen but Elisha did not discover the life that God had in store for him until he let it all go and he burned it. God humbles us before he heals us so let me just ask you is your pride today standing in the way of you being obedient to God. I don't know who needs to hear this today but I think somebody in this room does Peter said to the church 1 Peter chapter 5 God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble I need to hear that humble yourselves therefore under God's mighty hand that he may lift you up in due time cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. I did a funeral once for a man the only song he requested was Frank Sinatra. I did it my way. I thought what a sad assessment at the end of a life because if Naaman would have done it his way he would have died from leprosy and if I would have done it my way I would be dead in my sin but he did it God's way he humbled himself he dipped seven times in a nasty muddy gross stream. What could be more humbling than that? Well actually maybe something's more humbling than that. Maybe a little more humbling than that is the idea that you are called to lay down your life and to surrender your will to the reign of a local carpenter who claimed to be God and was executed by the Roman Empire 20 centuries ago and risen from the dead and the promises that by turning from your pride and swearing allegiance to him being baptized into his name you can receive forgiveness from all of your sins healing from your impossible sickness the presence of the Almighty living God dwelling within you and eternal life forever in the kingdom of heaven. This is the gospel that the healing you seek for your impossible sickness the Bible says by his stripes we are healed and that's a crazy message to go out saying into the world. Think about that to the intelligent that's dumb and to the moral that is humiliating and to the mockers that is preposterous to the world that is outdated embarrassing stupid simple reductionistic and narrow but to us Paul says to us we preach Christ crucified a stumbling block to Jews then foolishness to Gentiles but to those whom God has called to us both Jew and Greeks Christ is the power of God and Christ is the wisdom of God for the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength yes you have an impossible sickness but there's a very simple cure he has a name his name is Jesus God humbles us before he heals us there's nothing you can pay and there's no one that he can't say we're going to get to see some baptisms here in a man it's going to be fun and if you have not received the healing that you need you can today just takes a little bit of humility the prayer team is going to gather around the edges of the room here in a moment they'll have their glowing lanyards on a man if you want to be obedient you can find healing in the water like name and did but if you have already received healing if you're remembering back to the day that you were baptized if you're already a follower of Jesus you remember that story in the gospels where Jesus miraculously healed ten lepers and nine of them ran off but just one came back one came back to say thank you so my prayer today is that we would be the ones to say thank you and that you would respond yeah if you need prayer for the prayer team if you want to just respond by singing by receiving communion here in a few moments by giving generously to what God is doing here i'm just going to trust that the Holy Spirit is going to lead you to the response he wants you to take and we'll listen to him and say thank you would you pray with me man king jesus you're an awesome god and we we've messed up our lives pretty royally you know that even better than we do but we praise you almighty holy awesome god that through your death and your resurrection we can have eternal supernatural healing that all the mess in our lives we don't know what to do about it but we bring it to you because we think you can fix it and so thank you it's in jesus name that all god's people said thank you for listening to the podcast today it is our deepest desire here at playing field christian church that you would experience the joy of being fully alive in jesus if you have any questions about our church or would like a plan to visit with us go to playingfieldchristian.com if you'd like to receive our podcast every week we encourage you to subscribe to the playing field christian church podcast on whatever podcasting platform you prefer have a great week