Well, hello everyone, and welcome back. This is our daily devotional for Thursday, December 4th. Man, alive, 21 days till Christmas. But Thursday, December 4th, 2025, and I am delighted to be with you today. I hope that this finds your week progressing just so nicely and that you're enjoying the Advent season and all the things and that sort of stuff. If you're local to us, I don't know, I haven't heard from anybody. I wonder how it is in Gypsy Hill with the lights this year. I think we might try to do that Friday. But anyway, it's so good to be with y'all today, especially as we continue on with our time in the gospel according to Matthew. Do you remember where we were yesterday that we see Jesus bringing back a girl from the dead and also at the same time healing this woman with the bleeding issue? the the painting that I showed you that remarkable remarkable picture that's in a chapel at the Church that they have built in Magdala right Magdalene Mary Magdalene that I was at a few weeks ago Remember we saw the Cardo right the main street where Jesus most likely was walking When the woman reached out to touch the hem of his robe Really really remarkable stuff. I've got together with some folks yesterday and they asked me to I hadn't spoken with them since I got back from Israel, and they said, well, how was it? I told them that it was just a remarkable, remarkable experience, and that I've been preaching for 23 years, and I wish that I had gone there 24 years ago, because it's really changed the way I see a lot of things. All of that being said, that's where we were yesterday in Matthew chapter 9, and today we continue along with Jesus healing the blind, healing the mute, driving out demons, all sorts of amazing things, but we see a common thread running throughout every one of these things that Jesus does. What is it? Well, we saw it yesterday. And we're gonna see it again today and we will see it more as we go through the gospel according to Matthew But we're gonna pick up reading in verse 27, but before we read anything, let's go to our Lord in prayer Our God and our father we pray that you would be with us now guide us by your Holy Spirit so that we would See the truth of your words certainly but also that we would wonder if at the power of our Savior, that Father, really and truly, we are on the winning side, and not because we chose to be, because you chose us to be. You have blessed us in every way. Give us grateful hearts now and guide us that we would be captive to your word, and we pray it all in Christ's name, amen. All right, everybody, so we're picking up in Matthew 9, verse 27, where it says, as Jesus went on from there, Where does this mean he was? We don't really know. He's in this entire region of the Galilee. Where we were yesterday with him was Magdala. Maybe he's in the same exact city. We don't exactly know, but, excuse me, verse 47. As Jesus went on from there, two blind men followed him, calling out, have mercy on us, son of David. Interesting term. Pause right there for a second. Very interesting term that they ascribe to Jesus. Realize that when we hear this, there are lots of things that can come to mind when we hear the term son of David. Usually, when we hear that, we think, oh, well, he must be a descendant of David or Oh, well, it must be because he's out of the tribe of Judah, and he's in the line of David. Remember the whole Luke chapter 2 thing? We read that as a family very recently. But Luke chapter 2, where Joseph goes to the city of Bethlehem, he's the line of David. They think, oh, yeah, well, maybe it's the line of Judah. You know, when this terminology was used, especially by people then, most often it had a royal connotation to it. Why? Well, remember the promise that was made to David, that always he would have an heir that was seated on the throne. Always. It's eternal. It's everlasting. And we know, of course, that if that is not speaking of Jesus the Christ, then God has broken his promise. Because I don't know if you remember your history, but Let's say that this is A.D. 30 or so, where all of this is going on, A.D. 28, A.D. 30. It's not gonna be, but 40 years after this or so, that Israel's gonna be destroyed. And currently, while this is going on, they have a King Herod, but y'all, he's a king, but he's a king of a conquered country. And he's nothing compared to the empire, to the Roman empire and its emperor. So it's gotta be through Jesus that this promise is fulfilled. And so they say to him, they call him, have mercy on us, son of David. Again, royal connotation there. Verse 28, when he had gone indoors, he talking about Jesus, when Jesus had gone indoors, the blind men came to him and he asked them, do you believe that I am able to do this? Yes, Lord, they replied. The question is what? You know, it's fascinating there. We shouldn't overlook John chapter two, where it talks about how Jesus can look into a man's heart. They didn't even tell him what they really wanted. They just said, have mercy on us, son of David. You know, you can say, well, I'm sure he assumed that they wanted to see. Well, Jesus didn't assume anything. He knew. And so he cut right to the chase. He said, do you believe that I am able to do this? Not that I will do it, that I'm able to do it. Yes, Lord, they replied. Then he touched their eyes and said, according to your faith, will it be done to you? And their sight was restored. Now, pause right there for a second, because we're about to get into this messianic secret thing again. But y'all, the thread that I mentioned before praying is this thread right here that you see running through all of Jesus's miracles, and it is the miracle of faith. Certainly. All right. I'm not denying the miraculous side of whether it's raising someone from the dead or healing a paralytic, or in this case, restoring men's vision. That's miraculous. But do you realize that it's always a double miracle at least? Why do I say that? Well, I say that because, y'all, faith in itself, trusting in Jesus Christ, is all unto its own miraculous. People say all the time, well, why don't we see miracles anymore like we used to? Well, if you're not, I would encourage you to look a lot closer because the Lord is still working. I can tell you countless things about how people with terminal medical conditions were healed. You see that sort of thing. But if you want a primary example of miracles taking place today, it's anybody coming to a saving faith in Jesus Christ. Now, why do I say that? I'd say, well, why is it a miracle to believe? If I go to Walmart, I don't know, and I'm looking on the shelf, And I see that I can buy Hunt's tomatoes or San Marzano tomatoes. And you say, well, I believe San Marzano tomatoes are going to be the best ones. Y'all, that's not faith. That's belief. What Jesus is saying here, do you believe? And then he says, so it will be done to you according to your faith. We need to remember something about faith. And I don't know if you know this or not. You should, if you've been listening to me for a while, because I've talked about it several times. But the reality is this, when it comes to faith, we have no claim to our faith. Our faith does not come from us. It's not that we weigh the options and say, aha, henceforth, I shall proceed as fill in the blank, or I shall ascribe to this ideal, et cetera, et cetera. Y'all, faith is entirely different. Why do I say that? Well, Ephesians chapter two, verse eight says, for it's by grace you've been saved through faith, and listen close, and this not from yourselves. It is the gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast. What the apostles just said in Ephesians two, eight, and nine is that you're saved by grace through faith alone. but that faith doesn't come from you and me. It's not something we work up within ourselves. Why? Well, take your pick of scriptural metaphors that are used to describe us apart from Jesus. What do we find that the Bible says we are apart from Christ? We find that we're deaf, blind, we're lame, crippled. Ultimately, as for you, you were dead in your sin and your transgressions. How many decisions are dead people making? I had this discussion recently with somebody, a fellow pastor that is not of the same persuasion as I am. And he said, so you mean to tell me that fill in the blank. And he went on this attack against the idea of God being sovereign over salvation as well. He believed that God chooses you because God knew that you would choose him, to which I said, that's not election. That's ratification. That makes you in charge of your salvation, not God in charge of your salvation. But all of that being said, the principle that faith doesn't come from us, that it is the gift of God, therein we find the miraculous. Therein we find the miracle of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that we're dead. In this discussion I had, he said that the way salvation works is that everybody is given the same amount of grace. which the Bible never says anywhere, by the way. The Bible also never says that everybody is given faith. But he says, all we have to do is choose. And I said, all right, so let's take the scriptural metaphor, dead in your sins and transgressions. Let's say that I come up to you, I don't have a syringe, but I come up to you and I say, I've got this life-giving shot, this serum. And I say to you, all you have to do is say yes, or all you have to do is choose to believe that this serum is gonna give you life. What are you gonna do? So I'm gonna choose. And I said, no, you're not, you're dead, man. You're dead, dead people. Dead people don't choose to take life-giving serums. They don't choose squat. They're dead. We are dead in our sins and our transgressions apart from Jesus. If you are a believer, don't you dare say you don't believe in miracles. Because if you have a saving faith in Jesus Christ, number one, and you don't believe in miracles, you won't examine what you think is saving faith. But number two, if you do have genuine faith, you're trusting in Jesus alone for your salvation, he's Lord of your life, then you have personally experienced at least one miracle. And I happen to think that, well, lamentations, right? It's because of the Lord's great love and mercy that we're not consumed, that the earth doesn't open up and swallow us in our wickedness. The miracle is God's mercy, his grace. But y'all, this thread that is running throughout all of these miraculous healings that Jesus does is always faith. That's why I said it's a double miracle at a minimum each time, because there's certainly the miraculous thing, but what precedes it is faith. in the power and the deity and the work of Jesus Christ. Hence, he says, according to your faith, verse 29, according to your faith, will it be done to you. Verse 30, it says, and their sight was restored. And this is where we get to that messianic secret thing. Jesus warned them sternly, see that no one knows about this. Y'all, what's up with that? We've talked about this briefly before. This certainly, excuse me, I've got a frog in my throat. This certainly is not unique to Matthew. We see the messianic secret pop up in Mark and Luke. Mark, most notably, when we dealt with the whole business of the two demoniacs and the garrisons, Mark only focuses on one of them. But as soon as the deacon is driven, he says, hey, don't tell anybody about this, shut up about it. And then he goes and he does it anyway. Why, number one, is Jesus saying, be quiet about this? And number two, why don't they listen? Well, number one, the answer is very simple. And that is that Jesus is still going about the countryside. He's still working these acts. And it points to really what these are all about. He is still establishing himself as the Messiah, as God the Son, as the prophet, the priest, and the king. That's what he's doing throughout the countryside, and he is letting his reputation go ahead of him. If it gets out too early, all of these things, and he's starting to promote it, he can't finish his task. It's as simple as that. And I know that he's sovereign and all that kind of stuff, but the Lord's timing is perfect. That's why when Mary came to him at the wedding at Cana in Galilee and said, hey, they run out of wine, do something about this. He says to her, woman, my time has not yet come. And that in itself is miraculous that a man said to his woman, I'm sorry, woman, my time isn't here and it's his mother. Anyway, a little bit of a joke there, but that's the whole purpose behind this. Jesus is building his ministry, but also Jesus is, aside from his ministry, he's investing in his disciples. God's timing is always perfect. And it wasn't time for everything to blow up around Jesus yet. And so he says, warn them sternly, see to it that no one knows about this. Verse 31, but they went out and spread the news about him all over that region. Y'all, why do they do this? Because that's what joy does. Whether it's the shepherds that saw the newborn child, it doesn't matter. Joy produces this desire to tell others, just does. Is it sinful for them to do it? I'm not even going to go there. I'm not even going to go there. But they were so joyous over the miracle they had experienced, they had to tell others about it. Devotional thought, do you tell others about the miracle you've experienced? Do you see the miracle of your salvation? If not, you might not be saved. I love you enough to tell you the truth. So keep those things in mind. But we're not done here in this section. Verse 32, while they were going out, a man who was demon-possessed and could not talk was brought to Jesus. And the demon was driven out, the man who had been mute spoke. Now pause for just a second there. We see another hallmark here. Wherever there's demonic possession, there's also a physical affliction. And that's important. I realize we live in this time, we're like, oh no, it was probably epilepsy, it was probably this, it was probably that. The Bible doesn't exaggerate, it's demon possession. But this demon rendered this man speechless. Continuing on verse 33, the crowd was amazed and said, nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel, and that's true. Prophets did all sorts of things, but they didn't do stuff like that. Verse 34, but the Pharisees said it's by the prince of demons that he drives out demons. Y'all, it just goes to show, For those who want to see Jesus as the devil, they're going to see Jesus as the devil. Even though, as we'll see, it makes no sense for demons to drive out demons. As Jesus said, that famous phrase, a house divided against itself will not stand, he would use that in response to the Pharisees, who accused him himself of being Beelzebub, the prince of demons, et cetera, et cetera. But the point is this, all of these things, yet again, are building who Jesus is. It's not that his identity is being built, his identity is set, but I'm talking about in terms of the presence of his ministry. And we have all of these things chronicled. As word about Jesus spread, I'm sure there were misgivings, I'm sure there were rumors, I'm sure there were people that believed all sorts of wacky things, but we have the testimony of God's word in its fullness. And what we see is Jesus, our Savior, who has dominion. Jesus, our Savior, who is in charge and who is always working. Is that what you see? When you see Jesus, the one who's in charge of your life, the one who it doesn't matter what you're facing, you know that he's in control and that he's going to work based on your good and his glory. And at that intersection, we find exactly where our lives need to be. Do you believe that? If so, does your life reflect that? And if you don't know, well, how would it reflect it? Joy, trust, enduring peace instead of worry, and being frantic instead of hurry? Do you have a genuine faith in Jesus? For it's your faith ultimately that heals you. Let's pray. Our God and our Father, we thank you for yet another example from our Lord of his power, of his divinity, of his dominion. Please let us evaluate ourselves and whether or not we're trusting in him alone. And I pray it in Jesus' name, amen. Well, I'd like to thank you all for being a part of this time. Lord Willem will be back tomorrow morning at 6 a.m., and y'all, it's Thursday, so go ahead and start planning. Oh, plan for next week, too. If you missed last night, oh, you missed a treat, but next week is gonna be amazing Wednesday night, and we're gonna have a guest speaking for part of the time. I'm really, really excited about this. I'm gonna go ahead and announce it now. Dr. Steve Adamson, who is the president of Erskine Theological Seminary and Erskine College, our denominational school down in South Carolina, is gonna be visiting with us. He's gonna be here with us on Wednesday night, he and his wife, Vaughn. Super duper impressive guy. Remember I told you that the ARP is distinct in that we were liberal and came back to conservative? Y'all, how often do you hear about colleges and institutes of higher education being liberal and coming back to conservative? Erskine is one of the very, very few. So very excited about that happening. Go ahead and mark your calendars and you're not going to want to miss that meal. Promise you. All right, y'all. Lord willing, we'll see you soon. Take care.