FBCWest 643 | More than Expected

Recorded On: 01/26/2025
Bulletin
Hymn # 391 “Stand Up for Jesus”
SCRIPTURE READING – Ephesians 6:13 - 17
Giving of Selves and Our Offerings
OFFERTORY PRAYER
OFFERTORY MUSIC – Pru Hungate
Praise and Worship
“Battle Belongs”
“Resurrecting”
“At the Cross (Love Ran Red”
Proclamation of the Word
Message by Pastor Joe
“More than Expected”
PRAYER TIME / Time of Reflection
“Let It Begin”
Sermon Notes
Mark 2:1 & 2 Jesus is home in Capernaum and after several days people become aware of it and go fill the home so there is not even room near the door
Mark 2:3 & 4 4 men because they can’t fet into the house remove the roof and lower him into where Jesus is
Mark 2:5 Jesus seeing their faith forgives the man’s sins
Mark 2:6 & 7 The Scribes think Jesus is blaspheming because only God can forgive sins
Mark 2:8 Jesus knows what they are thinking
Mark 2:9 Jesus asks them a question, “Which is easier?”
Mark 2:10 & 11 So that they might know He can do both Jesus tells the man to get up, pick up your pallet and go home
Mark 2:12 The man gets up immediately, picked up his pallet and went home. As a result the people were amazed and “glorified God”
Scritpures
Transcript of Service
Oftentimes in life, we don't get what we're expecting. We're going to see where some people come bringing a friend, hoping and expecting Jesus to do something, and they're going to get more than what is expected. I encourage you so they take them up on the roof. Now, in those places, a lot of times people would be up on the roof. It was a little more, almost like a patio type of thing because during the summers, it would be hot. So you would get up and it would be a little more cool. Or he had actual, a little more room for the home. And so they go up there, but being on the roof, can't get them to Jesus.
So they just start to be frank, destroying the place.
They start digging a hole in the roof.
Now we don't know if this is Jesus' home or somebody else's home, but whoever's the homeowner, I'm pretty sure they're, they can't be too excited.
I don't even like it. If I have to pay for the roof being repaired, let alone doing it myself. But here they are and they dig a hole and it's not like a little hole.
Cause they got to lay, get a paralytic down so they can't do it this way. They got to do it this way. Cause if they do it this way, he's going to fall off.
So they got a big, a hole wide enough to get the pallet down to Jesus.
So I'm sure that night they're going to be able to see the stars.
So there's this hole in the roof because these four decided
they wanted this man healed.
And I'm sure they would not have gone through all this effort if they didn't expect, if they didn't hope that they didn't believe that Jesus could heal him.
But they did all of that with the expectation of Jesus healing this paralytic.
And Jesus seen their faith.
Notice seeing them, not seeing their activity, seeing their faith. Because their faith said, Jesus can heal him and we're not going to do anything that stops us from getting him to Jesus.
And said to the paralytic, son, your sins are forgiven.
They didn't come there expecting that. They came there expecting Jesus to heal their friends so that he could walk. But Jesus gives them something far more exceedingly beyond the ability to walk.
For gave his sins, which means that he would then have a right relationship with God, that he would be able to spend eternity with the Lord. Now, if he had just healed this man, that would have been wonderful and a miracle. But one day, either because of age, infirmity, disease, or death, the man won't walk.
But having his sins forgiven is eternal.
So they're getting more than they expect.
Because Jesus is able to do far more abundantly than we could ever hope or dream or ask for.
But some of the scribes were sitting there and reasoning in their hearts. Now, I find it interesting.
A lot of times when Jesus is teaching or preaching, we're seeing scribes and Pharisees. How is it that these sort of say idiots, how are these guys able to always get into where Jesus is, but people actually want to get there can't. And so, I think that's a good question. I think that's a good question. They're always giving Jesus a hard time. Oh, you can't do that. You can't, you know, you, you can't work on the Sabbath. You can't do this. You can't do that. And so they're going, they're, they're reasoning in their hearts.
And they say this.
Why this man speak that way? He is blaspheming. Who can forgive sins, but God alone? And so, they're going to say, why? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?
I want you to see some, they say what is the truth. Only God can forgive sins.
It is funny. People who think they know the scriptures will talk about the gospel of John and in essence say, well, the gospel of John needed to be written because it gives a high position of who Jesus is and it reaffirms and affirms and tells us that he is the son of God as if the other three gospels didn't. Matthew, for instance, keeps talking about Jesus being the son of man.
No one had to argue anything that Jesus appeared to be a man. The term son of man meant he was God.
Here in Mark on the second chapter, the scribes are saying, well, wait a minute.
Only God can forgive sins and Jesus just forgave sins.
What does that make Jesus?
God, don't tell me we got to wait till John to figure, oops, we left out a big part of the story. No, it's throughout all four gospels. It's not a surprise that the gospel is presented that Jesus is fully man and fully God
and that he can in fact forgive sins. And that is what he does.
Immediately, Jesus, aware in his spirit that they were reasoning that way within themselves, said to them, why are you reasoning about these things in your heart?
Again, it shows more of who Jesus is. He knows their inner thoughts and he knows their conversations, even though he's not a part of it. And again, the scribes are very much like other people. Jesus will say something and they'll argue amongst themselves what Jesus said.
The obvious thing to do is if you don't understand what somebody says, ask them.
That would be like, I make some comment in this message and you go home and you say, I wonder what Pastor Joe meant by that. Ask me. I'm the one who said it. I either said it right or I said it wrong, but you can, you know, although there are times when there's the classic, you go to lunch and have roast preacher and I get that. And that's that's okay.
But again, it seems that constantly when somebody, when Jesus does something or says something that they argue amongst themselves rather than just, and they're there, they heard Jesus say, your sons are sins are forgiven. If they heard it, then they could probably ask Jesus, what'd you mean? Only God can do that.
Jesus says, which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sons are sins are forgiven or to say, get up and pick up your pallet and walk.
When I hear this expression, it reminds me of, of the book of revelation. You go, how could that remind you of the book of revelation? How could that remind you of the book of revelation? Because the angel, the messenger will conduct a tour of heaven. And for instance, there are a time when there's multitude upon multitude upon multitude of people who are dressed in white robes. And the angel says, who's that? Who are these people?
And John's response is Lord, you know, which means I don't have a clue. You're asking me a question. Do you already know the answer to?
When I look at this, I would say, well, both are easy to say.
It's easy to say your sins are forgiven. It's also easy to say, get up and pick up your pallet and walk.
But by saying it means doing it.
Then to say your sins are forgiven is much harder because you've got to be God to do that.
And since I'm not God, I can't do that. But I find it interesting. A lot of people will have something happen in their lives and somebody will do something against somebody else. And the person who wasn't the victim of the incident forgives the people who did it. Well, you weren't sinned against number one and number two, you're not God.
You can give mercy. You can give mercy.
But forgiving sins is an exclusive authority of God.
So Jesus is saying.
Which is actually by saying it, you can accomplish it.
You know, I could say 50 years from now, X is going to happen.
I'm never going to be held responsible because in all probability, I ain't going to be here in 50 years.
And you probably won't remember it anyway.
If I were to say, well, come Monday, X is going to happen. And assuming God grants me another 24 hours, then if it happens, it happens. And if not, it doesn't.
So Jesus is going to say, I'm going to show you that I can forgive sin. Who's going to say that? Who's going to say that?
But so that you may know that the son of man has authority under to forgive sins.
You know what I'm about to do is going to confirm both things that I have forgiven this person's sins because I have the authority to do it because I am the son of God.
He says this. He said to the paralytic.
I say to you, get up, pick up your palate and go home. And I would add and fix the roof. But he did. He just said, go home.
So he gives him instructions. First, you got to get up, which means you got to believe that Jesus can forgive you because otherwise kind of kind of look stupid trying to get up and you don't.
Then after you get up, you need to pick up what got you here and go back where you came from.
And he got up and immediately picked up the pallet and went out in the sight of everyone.
He did what Jesus instructed him to do, which confirmed that Jesus was able to forgive his sin.
His friends and him came expecting Jesus and hoping that Jesus would heal him.
And Jesus did.
But then Jesus did so much more than that. He forgave their sin.
Now, it's interesting. These five individuals are not unlike most of us today.
We are driven to Jesus because of some crisis in our life.
Something happens, you know, the Foxhole conversion, you're in the middle of a physical battle in war and you're afraid you're going to die and you cry out to God to save you. Or you have some financial burden or maybe somebody in your family is sick or you're sick or been diagnosed with cancer or whatever it might be. And we cry out to Jesus to save us.
Only to find out that he can do so much more than what we're asking.
That he can forgive our sin.
That he can make us children of the living God. That he can cause for us to be dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
That death is simply a shadow that I fear no evil because he is with me.
Jesus healed, but he saved.
So that all the they were all amazed and we're glorifying God saying we have never seen anything like.
Now I know because I'm human.
And all too often we think we are the center of the universe. I know you think you're the center of the universe and you're wrong because I am.
But we tend to think that everything revolves around us and that God would be displeased if anything bad happened to us.
Because God just can't wait to just bless us so real good and blessing us real good means that we're rich and we're famous and we're all these things.
But maybe just maybe the difficulty that you're experiencing that's causing you to reach out to God.
Is there to do two things.
One to bring you closer to him and two to have the rest of the world amazed and glorify God.
We all handle things differently. Because we're all different people.
We wouldn't not be something.
When whatever difficulty or problem or illness or crisis happens.
That people say.
I'm amazed.
At your reaction.
That you trust God. And because you trust God.
And because you trust God.
I'm going to trust God and I'm going to give him glory.
Maybe just maybe.
Our crisis.
To give a God the opportunity to receive glory.
They came expecting a healing. And got not only a healing but a true healing of the soul.
May God use the problems and difficulties in our lives.
To bring us closer to him.
To as we call out for healing.
Whether he gives it to us or not.
That we glorify him.
And so I want us to acknowledge. That there are times that when we may face difficulties in Christ.
That may be for an opportunity.
To not just be healed.
But to glorify God.
And all of God's people said.
Stand with me as we pray and as the band comes. To lead us in the reflection.
Father.