back to index2015-03-29 Who Are You Fixing Your Eyes on?
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Well, we'll see how things go from here on out. 00:00:12.560 |
Again, this is the Lord's Day, and especially in kicking off Palm Sunday, Passion Week, 00:00:19.280 |
it would be appropriate for us to just look over the Palm Sunday account. 00:00:23.760 |
And so in Matthew chapter 21, verses 1 through 11, that's where we'll be. 00:00:29.200 |
And even as I come up here, I know you guys have been at this church for about almost 00:00:45.720 |
And the question that I come to is, how do I make something that I already know new? 00:00:53.840 |
Isn't that the struggle that we have when we read the Bible? 00:00:57.560 |
We read the same things over and over again in Paul's letters. 00:01:03.120 |
It's no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. 00:01:05.240 |
And you read it, and you're just kind of like, okay, I know that already. 00:01:10.980 |
And I remember one thing that Pastor Peter would always remind me, especially when it 00:01:14.920 |
comes to scripture, is it's the living Word of God. 00:01:19.840 |
It's designed to tell us something new each time we come to it. 00:01:24.100 |
And so with this Palm Sunday account, what I'm hoping to accomplish is to have you guys 00:01:29.720 |
look at the Palm Sunday account from a new perspective. 00:01:34.760 |
Not necessarily my perspective, but from the perspective of someone who has been transformed, 00:01:41.240 |
has been changed because he and his friend encountered Christ. 00:01:47.160 |
And so what makes Palm Sunday unique in my mind is not necessarily the account of what 00:01:52.720 |
took place, but what took place before Jesus entered Jerusalem, right? 00:01:57.120 |
So in Matthew chapter 20, verses 29 to 34, you have the account of the healing of two 00:02:10.400 |
They're at the mercies of their friends and of strangers. 00:02:17.180 |
But in Matthew chapter 20, verses 29 to 34, what we have here is this encounter that these 00:02:25.320 |
They're calling out to him, "Son of David, Son of David," trying to get his attention. 00:02:32.200 |
Despite the crowd trying to suppress them and say, "Hey, just be quiet. 00:02:37.200 |
They yelled out more, "Son of David, Son of David, have mercy on us." 00:02:44.120 |
And so Jesus called for them and he gathers the two blind men to him and he asked him, 00:02:52.160 |
And simply put, they ask him, "Give us back our sight." 00:02:56.760 |
And in verse 34, it says, "Jesus, in pity, touched their eyes and immediately they recovered 00:03:07.040 |
In Mark's account, we know that one of these blind men was named Bartimaeus. 00:03:12.440 |
And I'll reiterate his name throughout this message. 00:03:20.120 |
They've been blind for, I don't know, for how long, but for whatever period of time, 00:03:30.080 |
And then they encountered the Son of David, Jesus Christ. 00:03:37.520 |
And what is the first things that they see as they follow Jesus? 00:03:44.920 |
They're seeing, for the first time, Jesus going through Palm Sunday, going through the 00:03:50.720 |
cleaning of the temple on Monday, Silent Wednesday, and finally Good Friday. 00:03:57.080 |
And so what I want to do this morning is pick up three observations of Christ as he goes 00:04:02.640 |
through Palm Sunday from the perspective of Bartimaeus and his friends. 00:04:08.840 |
And so what we'll do this morning is instead of reading the whole account, we're just going 00:04:11.680 |
to read verses four and five in Matthew chapter 21, and then we'll pray and we'll get started. 00:04:20.720 |
This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying, "Say to the daughter 00:04:25.560 |
of Zion, 'Behold, your king is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, 00:04:36.600 |
Heavenly Father, we thank you again for this time to exalt Christ through your Word. 00:04:45.360 |
And especially, Lord God, in light of Passion Week, this is a time where all of your people, 00:04:52.360 |
believers who have confessed Christ as their Lord and Savior, this is a time for us to 00:04:56.400 |
recalibrate and refocus, Lord God, on what is most important, on who is most important 00:05:04.120 |
And so God, I pray, and I know the leaders are praying and people in this room are praying. 00:05:09.120 |
We pray, Lord God, that this Passion Week will not just simply be another week that 00:05:13.880 |
just goes by, but rather this would be a week in which our passion and our focus for you 00:05:19.320 |
could be reignited, that we would see with much more clarity how different we are to 00:05:27.920 |
And Lord God, as we study about Christ this morning, again, Lord, help us to be in awe 00:05:39.520 |
Alright, so if I was Bartimaeus and his friend who just recently received sight, I'm coming 00:05:45.160 |
up to Palm Sunday, and I'm looking at what's going on, and I see Jesus, and the first observation 00:05:51.720 |
that I would take note of if I was Bartimaeus is that he is a commander. 00:05:59.800 |
Now when they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethphage, the mountain of olives, then 00:06:04.960 |
Jesus sent two disciples saying to them, "Go into the village in front of you, and immediately 00:06:12.000 |
you will find a donkey tied and a colt with her. 00:06:17.400 |
If anyone says anything to you, you shall say, 'The Lord needs them,' and he will send 00:06:23.100 |
And so the first observation that Bartimaeus and his friend would notice is that Jesus 00:06:28.880 |
He gave a command to his disciples, and it's an imperative here in the Greek. 00:06:33.960 |
It says, "Go into the village, untie and bring them to me." 00:06:39.560 |
Again, the time was coming for Jesus to accomplish his purpose on earth. 00:06:45.360 |
From Luke, in Luke 9, 51, it states that Jesus set his face towards Jerusalem. 00:06:51.000 |
Now again, when you hear that phrase, "set his face," it brings about an image of just 00:06:57.880 |
There is a purpose, and Jesus will not fail to accomplish it. 00:07:01.560 |
He is setting his face towards Jerusalem to accomplish his ultimate purpose. 00:07:09.320 |
In Mark chapter 10, verses 32 to 34, it describes Jesus and his disciples walking towards Jerusalem 00:07:22.600 |
And for whatever the reason, in Mark chapter 10, verses 32 and 34, the disciples noticed 00:07:29.440 |
In fact, it was so different that they were amazed and afraid. 00:07:37.640 |
I mean, they've walked with Jesus for three years, so what's so special about this time? 00:07:48.400 |
I mean, what was different that would make the disciples amazed and afraid? 00:07:53.720 |
And I would argue that the reason why is because they understood, maybe partially, but they 00:07:59.960 |
understood that something great was about to happen. 00:08:07.000 |
Something life-altering was about to happen to the world. 00:08:12.760 |
And these are important details because we know Christ was purposeful. 00:08:18.040 |
That he wouldn't just simply send his disciples into this village, commanding them to take 00:08:31.320 |
And all throughout the Gospel accounts, and even throughout Scripture, we find Jesus was 00:08:38.840 |
He was not afraid to act upon his role as a commander. 00:08:45.360 |
In Matthew chapter 4, verse 17, he commands the masses to repent and to believe because 00:08:53.280 |
In Matthew chapter 4, verse 19, he commands his disciples to follow him wherever he goes. 00:09:01.600 |
In Matthew chapter 5, verse 27 to 30, he commands the kingdom people not to lust. 00:09:09.240 |
In Matthew chapter 28, verse 18, he commands his church to go and make disciples of all 00:09:17.480 |
So Jesus is not afraid of passing off commands. 00:09:23.600 |
And all the commands of Christ, found not only in the Gospel, but throughout the Scriptures, 00:09:28.000 |
they are designed to draw God's people nearer to him. 00:09:34.200 |
Again, whether they're drawing near to God through salvation, right, when they hear Jesus' 00:09:39.480 |
command to repent and to believe, or whether they're obeying some sort of command that 00:09:44.680 |
is designed to sanctify the individual, like love your neighbor as yourself. 00:09:51.200 |
All these things, all these commands that Christ lays out before us, these imperatives, 00:09:59.000 |
I know, when we hear the word command or commander, it conjures up a negative type of reaction, 00:10:09.160 |
Sometimes when we hear the word command, we get the idea of it being burdensome or unwanted, 00:10:15.560 |
You know, I moved back in with my mom, and I love my mom to death. 00:10:22.560 |
But even this morning, as I got up this morning to just, you know, kind of finalize this sermon, 00:10:26.480 |
she was giving me my commands, like, "Oh, you need to clean up before you go. 00:10:31.960 |
You know, and, "Oh, you do this, do that, do that." 00:10:46.160 |
At those times, when she's passing out those commands, it's burdensome. 00:10:53.240 |
But I think that it's not the commands itself that are burdensome. 00:11:01.360 |
I think oftentimes it's who the command is coming from that can make the commands burdensome 00:11:09.920 |
So for example, when I was in high school, I played a year of high school football. 00:11:15.600 |
And our freshman team, I mean, our freshman team was pretty good. 00:11:23.480 |
You know, I mean, whenever the coach told us to run a play, we ran the play. 00:11:27.360 |
When the coach told us to do something, we would go and do it. 00:11:32.000 |
We would do it with passion, with conviction, with focus, to execute the plan to be complete. 00:11:39.440 |
Now, I came a little bit late into the season. 00:11:43.120 |
And so obviously all the positions that I would want to play were already taken. 00:11:52.480 |
I was just simply sent there to be like an extra body, you know, just to be used. 00:11:57.760 |
Now that JV team was, it wasn't as awesome as our freshman team. 00:12:06.200 |
And you know, you could tell by the players on the JV team that when the coach was giving 00:12:11.920 |
them a play to accomplish or to execute, that they weren't as eager or they weren't as focused 00:12:20.120 |
or they weren't as precise in executing that play. 00:12:25.440 |
When the coach would tell them to do something, you could tell they were dragging their feet. 00:12:32.920 |
The coach has led them into this path where they were winless and they didn't have anything 00:12:40.100 |
So his commands became burdensome, became unwanted. 00:12:45.120 |
In the same way too, depending on who gives the commands affects our focus, affects our 00:12:51.160 |
passion, affects the way we want to execute these commands. 00:12:56.000 |
And we know with Christ as the great commander, that he will never lead us astray. 00:13:03.800 |
I don't think there's anyone in this room that will come up and say that Jesus led me 00:13:08.160 |
I followed Jesus and my life turned out being the worst for it. 00:13:12.080 |
I think all of us could safely say that Jesus is good. 00:13:18.160 |
And what he commands us to do is going to be good for me. 00:13:25.520 |
And so we need to understand that Jesus is a commander. 00:13:29.400 |
He will command us however he sees fit and it will be good. 00:13:35.200 |
So Bartimaeus and his buddy, they're looking at Jesus and saying, "Okay, he's a commander. 00:13:42.240 |
Now the second thing that I would assume Bartimaeus would observe is that Jesus is a fulfiller. 00:13:56.000 |
Unlike politicians and other world leaders that we may know of, or maybe even our bosses 00:14:00.840 |
at work, sometimes they may say one thing, but then they do something else, right? 00:14:06.720 |
Well with Jesus, we understand that he will keep his word. 00:14:13.640 |
Jesus is the word of God made manifest in the flesh. 00:14:18.460 |
And Jesus was very purposeful in selecting Zechariah 9.9 as the text to be fulfilled 00:14:26.420 |
Again, Matthew refers to Christ fulfilling some portion of Old Testament prophecies at 00:14:35.540 |
And so when you consider the timing of this entrance and you consider the word, the promises 00:14:41.500 |
found in Zechariah 9.9, again, it is another time in which Christ is declaring, "I am your 00:14:54.100 |
Now we read in verse 4 and 5, you know, that he did all these things to fulfill what is 00:15:00.340 |
It says, "Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Behold, your king is coming to you, humble and mounted 00:15:04.900 |
on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.'" 00:15:08.620 |
And so I think it would be good for us to unpack what Zechariah 9.9 is trying to get 00:15:14.340 |
And then we'll come back to Matthew chapter 21. 00:15:16.540 |
So again, flip your Bibles over to Zechariah chapter 9. 00:15:21.060 |
Again, it's just two books before the book of Matthew. 00:15:28.380 |
Again, to give us a little context here, Zechariah was a book written to the nation of Israel 00:15:40.980 |
And so now being part of the, under the regime of the Persians, they allow, King Cyrus allowed 00:15:46.580 |
them to come back to the land and to kind of like rebuild it, to restore it. 00:15:51.660 |
And so Zechariah was a book written during this time. 00:15:54.580 |
And Zechariah, the book itself, is filled with a lot of hope and a lot of positive prophecies 00:16:01.620 |
as a means to motivate the Israelites to continue to rebuild the temple, to rebuild their lives 00:16:13.220 |
Zechariah 9 starts off with this judgment upon, not Israel, okay? 00:16:18.820 |
I know we read a lot of the Old Testament prophets and we just simply assume all judgment 00:16:22.660 |
is on Israel because they're just a bad, bad people, you know? 00:16:26.340 |
But this time, no, it's judgment upon Israel's enemies. 00:16:30.380 |
Again, this prophecy is designed to be hopeful for the nation of Israel at this time. 00:16:35.120 |
And so here we have God basically prophesying, "Your enemies will be judged. 00:16:40.660 |
They will be, um, um, they will no longer exist." 00:16:47.580 |
And then after all that in verses, chapter 9, verses 1 through 8, we go to verse 9. 00:16:54.340 |
In verse 9, here we have a positive prophecy. 00:16:58.060 |
It says, "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. 00:17:09.060 |
Full and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey." 00:17:13.860 |
Remember, during Zechariah's time, they did not have a king. 00:17:22.100 |
In Israel's, in context of Israel's mindset, having a king, having a Davidic king on a 00:17:33.780 |
They look at the throne and there's no one sitting there. 00:17:39.740 |
And so, put yourself in the shoes of these Israelites. 00:17:46.340 |
They don't know how their, how their government's going to be, what their government's going 00:17:51.900 |
And here's a prophecy that a king is coming to them. 00:17:57.420 |
And he's going to be identified as one riding on a young colt. 00:18:01.020 |
Again, that image of riding on this colt or this young animal indicates a peaceful transition, 00:18:08.740 |
It's supposed to indicate that there's peace coming. 00:18:14.420 |
And so, you know, putting ourselves in Barnabas' shoes, we're seeing that Jesus is a commander. 00:18:20.520 |
He commands His disciples to do stuff and they follow and obey. 00:18:31.940 |
Maybe with our newfound eyes, we could actually go back to Zechariah 9.9 and let's read a 00:18:36.620 |
Oh, look, there is a king that is coming, right? 00:18:41.500 |
If I was Barnabas and his friend, newly given sight, I would take notice that there is a 00:18:51.220 |
And there are three characteristics that are listed off for here, listed off to us in Zechariah 00:18:56.300 |
9.9 that I want us to pay close attention to. 00:19:02.180 |
The first characteristic of this king is he is righteous. 00:19:08.220 |
The Hebrew word is "zaddik," which means to conform to a moral or ethical standard. 00:19:14.480 |
And as believers of the Word of God, we know that all human beings, mankind, has been created 00:19:22.820 |
And so, the standard, the moral and ethical standard that all mankind is under is not 00:19:33.020 |
We all affirm that the standard, the moral and ethical standard that we live by is set 00:19:41.060 |
And so, that is the standard in which this king that is coming in Zechariah 9.9 is living 00:19:48.980 |
He lives up to the standard of God's righteousness. 00:19:53.860 |
In other words, the king that is described here in Zechariah 9.9 is someone who knows 00:20:00.020 |
how to respond rightly in all and every situations. 00:20:08.740 |
If the situation calls for mercy, the king will show mercy. 00:20:12.020 |
If the situation calls for correction, the king will correct. 00:20:17.220 |
And this is something that should really stand out to us as sinners, right? 00:20:21.820 |
Because all of us are in different situations, in different areas of our lives. 00:20:25.940 |
And sometimes we respond correctly, but I would say most of the time we don't respond 00:20:33.780 |
And so, this is an amazing characteristic that this king has. 00:20:43.940 |
If we contrast this to Israel's kings, right, then we know that Israel's kings, even though 00:20:50.740 |
they strive after righteousness, they were never righteous completely, right? 00:20:56.740 |
Saul, the first king of Israel, not righteous at all, right? 00:21:01.820 |
Even though he was the first king of Israel, he led Israel astray. 00:21:08.180 |
He had his moments of righteousness, but ultimately we understand that his life was not characterized 00:21:19.780 |
We have so many stories in the Old Testament where his wisdom allowed him to respond rightly 00:21:27.940 |
And yet, when you look at his marriage, and you look at where his heart was given over 00:21:37.380 |
And every king afterwards that came after Solomon, you know, first kings 1422, first 00:21:43.660 |
kings 1526, so on and so forth, there was a phrase that described these kings. 00:21:49.740 |
And the phrase is, "They did what was evil in the sight of the Lord." 00:21:56.340 |
They did not live up to the moral and ethical standards of God. 00:21:59.940 |
If you want to put another phrase, another spin to it, they didn't live up to God's holiness. 00:22:07.020 |
Again, as these blind men regained their sight, they noticed that he is righteous. 00:22:18.020 |
Christ's righteousness is consistent and it never wavers. 00:22:22.860 |
Unlike Israel's kings, Christ's righteousness is consistent and never wavers. 00:22:29.740 |
He responds correctly to the masses with needs. 00:22:32.240 |
He responds to the religious leaders by with correction. 00:22:36.540 |
He responds to his disciples with compassion and sometimes correction as well. 00:22:42.380 |
All in all, that's how his righteousness is manifested, the way he responds. 00:22:56.660 |
Zechariah 9.9 says, "Behold, your king is coming to you. 00:23:05.940 |
The word salvation here, saving, right, in the Hebrew depicts an image of making something 00:23:17.360 |
It pictures an individual surrounded by enemies, dangers, being oppressed. 00:23:23.340 |
And finally, someone from the outside comes in, making wide a path of salvation to save 00:23:39.740 |
It's not, we're not, I don't want to jump ahead to the theological truth, but literally 00:23:46.340 |
Deuteronomy chapter 20 verse 4 in the NASB, it says, "For the Lord your God is with, is 00:23:51.300 |
the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to save you." 00:23:57.020 |
Again, that word there, save, it refers to making wide. 00:24:04.220 |
And we see in Joshua, right, in the book of Joshua, the whole entire book is about this 00:24:08.660 |
conquest that Israel partakes in with God's help. 00:24:15.060 |
These cities were occupied with other people. 00:24:17.980 |
Israel was utterly afraid that these other cities are going to destroy them. 00:24:22.180 |
And God promises them, "I will save you by making wide the path of victory." 00:24:38.220 |
The image of making wide is also a good picture to illustrate the spiritual truth of our salvation. 00:24:44.260 |
I mean, when we think about our lives before we met Christ, we were surrounded by sin. 00:24:50.260 |
Not just outwardly, but inwardly, entangled in it. 00:24:54.820 |
And on top of that, we knew that we were depraved. 00:25:04.420 |
This world tells us to suppress it, to ignore it, move on, focus on happier things. 00:25:15.560 |
If you want to be saved from your sins, I'm going to make wide this road of salvation." 00:25:22.620 |
And when you take on that road of salvation, you're not walking on it alone. 00:25:28.620 |
Christ will be there with you, walking every step of the way. 00:25:40.900 |
And we know that the only way in which that path was made wide for us is because of what 00:25:51.240 |
Think about when this phrase of making wide, I mean, the sensation that comes with it. 00:26:00.220 |
There's space to breathe, to move around, to do stuff. 00:26:10.560 |
And I think the greatest feeling in the world is when the bus comes packed with people to 00:26:14.940 |
your bus stop, and when it stops at your bus stop, all those people leave the bus, and 00:26:26.080 |
You know, I get, like, singing this song about amazing grace, you know, like, I've sang this 00:26:33.020 |
song so many times, but for today, it was just a different, it was just a different 00:26:40.780 |
Being understanding that we have been, you know, our chains have been set free. 00:26:58.160 |
Behold, your King is coming to you, righteous, and having salvation. 00:27:06.360 |
The last characteristic of this King, Zechariah 9, is humble. 00:27:16.160 |
Definition of humility in Hebrew, I'm just going to read it, but it says, "This adjective 00:27:21.680 |
stresses the moral and spiritual condition of the godly as the goal of affliction, implying 00:27:28.000 |
that the state is joined with a suffering life rather than with one of worldly happiness 00:27:34.180 |
In other words, humility is choosing the hard path of suffering because it is the path that 00:27:41.520 |
will enhance and draw the believer closer to God. 00:27:49.600 |
Humility does not mean we are limp, like a wet noodle. 00:27:54.460 |
Humility means we make a purposeful decision to no longer live for ourselves, but to live 00:28:00.840 |
Because we know that path will draw us closer to God. 00:28:08.240 |
There is no other motive in choosing this harder path of suffering other than to have 00:28:17.740 |
I mean, when you look at Zechariah 9, 9, and you can go back to Matthew chapter 21 for 00:28:24.340 |
the rest of this sermon, but in Matthew chapter 21, notice that Matthew does not really put 00:28:39.820 |
the full content of Zechariah 9, 9 in here, right? 00:28:44.720 |
Verse 5 says, "Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Behold, your king is coming to you.'" 00:28:52.620 |
Zechariah talks about righteousness and bringing salvation. 00:29:02.900 |
Did Matthew, was he trying to like, you know, did he just have a bad copy of the Old Testament? 00:29:12.740 |
Matthew wanted us to focus on the fact that though he is being triumphantly received by 00:29:21.280 |
the people of Israel, that this path, this entry was a humbling entry. 00:29:32.220 |
Though the crowds are cheering, he is about to suffer. 00:29:49.140 |
He suffered by forfeiting perfect fellowship with the triune God to come to this earth. 00:29:55.340 |
Christ suffered by having human limitations like sleep and hunger and pain. 00:30:04.140 |
Christ suffered by having enemies that threatened his life. 00:30:08.900 |
Christ suffered being used as a tool by the masses. 00:30:15.020 |
You remember, he fed the 5,000 and what did they want? 00:30:25.340 |
Remember those 10 lepers, but only one came back? 00:30:29.100 |
Jesus was being used as a tool and he suffered. 00:30:33.940 |
So we can understand Jesus when he states in Isaiah chapter 49 verse 4, and that's one 00:30:40.780 |
of the servant songs, and we know that Jesus is the suffering servant in those songs. 00:30:45.860 |
It says, "But I said, I have labored in vain. 00:30:47.900 |
I have spent my strength for nothing in vanity. 00:30:51.620 |
Yet surely my right is with the Lord and my recompense with my God." 00:30:55.260 |
And again, we know, if you've been, if you're reading the Bible, you know that the ultimate 00:31:03.100 |
expression of humiliation, the ultimate expression of humility that Christ received at the hands 00:31:09.020 |
of mankind was the physical torture, the mockings, the beatings, and ultimately the crucifixion 00:31:20.740 |
That is what Zechariah 9, 9 is pointing us to. 00:31:23.700 |
That is what Matthew is trying to point us to in Matthew chapter 21 verse 5. 00:31:28.260 |
That when Christ came on Palm Sunday, he came not to be exalted, but he came to be humbled, 00:31:34.020 |
to suffer, to die for the sole purpose of redeeming his people of their sins. 00:31:47.940 |
And so I want to conclude with this question, and again, I titled this sermon, "Who are 00:31:59.460 |
They had just regained sight by encountering Jesus. 00:32:03.660 |
And so you can imagine the excitement, the joy that they have in knowing that this man 00:32:14.020 |
They're fixing their eyes upon him on Palm Sunday, and they're seeing him being exalted 00:32:26.260 |
And Bartimaeus and his friend are like, "Yeah, man, that's the guy that I want to follow. 00:32:37.700 |
Monday comes around, and blind man Bartimaeus and his friend observe Jesus clearing out 00:32:42.860 |
the temples and rebuking the Pharisees and the religious leaders of their time. 00:32:49.300 |
And so maybe Bartimaeus and his friend are starting to think, "Oh, what's Jesus doing 00:32:56.980 |
He's upsetting a couple of folk, some people here, some religious leaders here. 00:33:05.180 |
Let's just keep following him and see what happens." 00:33:07.420 |
Again, I'm reading into the lines here, but maybe Bartimaeus and his friends were able 00:33:16.300 |
to hear some of Jesus' teachings to his disciples. 00:33:22.220 |
And perhaps in hearing the teachings, they're beginning to hear Jesus is leaving them? 00:33:31.300 |
He's talking about this helper that he's going to send back to them, but we don't want the 00:33:43.300 |
And finally, Good Friday comes along, and they see Jesus just five days before being 00:33:50.660 |
exalted and celebrated, but now being mocked, being beaten, being tortured, being spat upon, 00:34:04.260 |
So now blind man Bartimaeus and his friend have to ask, "Are we going to keep our eyes 00:34:16.540 |
I mean, Bartimaeus was named in Mark chapter 10, and so perhaps he was a prominent member 00:34:27.880 |
But the question that we have to ask ourselves this morning, are we fixing our eyes upon 00:34:36.180 |
Not the Jesus that is all cuddly and is there at our side, but are we looking at the Jesus 00:34:43.940 |
who is a commander, who is a fulfiller, who is the righteous king, the king that brings 00:35:03.180 |
I pray that our church will not become a church characterized by people who fixed their eyes 00:35:13.260 |
I pray that our church will not go in that direction. 00:35:16.660 |
But as we fix our gaze upon Jesus, as our gaze upon Jesus becomes clearer because of 00:35:21.940 |
our sanctification, because of the sanctification that God brings into our lives, that we would 00:35:26.340 |
say in our hearts and in our eyes, "I want to follow this man." 00:35:40.320 |
When I was in college, that was the principle I wanted to live by. 00:35:44.060 |
And at that time, it just sounded cool and godly, right? 00:35:48.260 |
But as I continued to grow and practice this principle, it became more and more real to 00:35:54.020 |
me that this is a principle that I need to live by. 00:35:57.340 |
It is not just a cool saying that I can post up on my Facebook wall, but rather it needs 00:36:05.860 |
To be known as a man, to be known as a family that fixes our eyes upon our Lord and Savior 00:36:11.680 |
Jesus Christ, going wherever He goes, doing whatever He does. 00:36:19.480 |
And as a church, are you ready to answer that question? 00:36:28.040 |
So go ahead and bow your heads and pray as the praise team comes up. 00:36:36.340 |
Passion week is a great opportunity for us to ask this question on a daily basis. 00:36:49.900 |
And as we go through the passion passages, I pray that it will not simply be old news, 00:36:56.440 |
but rather you will understand that everything that takes place in the next seven days is 00:37:02.120 |
designed to draw us closer to God, is designed to sanctify us so we can see Christ more clearly 00:37:10.380 |
So go ahead and pray as the praise team leads us in our response.