Christ's Work Among Men By Stephen Bignall
Luke 5:1-32 1 Cor 15:1-19 1 Cor 15:50-58 

and we want to look at it too for the sake of you who believe we have lost
someone this week not lost that person eternally not lost that person forever
but lost his presence among us and that is a great disturbance in our lives and
it causes us grief and we feel pain and the sense of that loss and again we find
ourselves turning to God for comfort and solace turning to God for hope crying
out to God because death has been evident and real to us once more and we
know that our time is coming and the time of those we love and who do not
know Christ is coming and we're discomforted and we're disturbed within
we see our children and we wonder where their hearts are not just our little
children but our children that have risen to adult life and they stand among
us as men and women and we wonder what their state is and we see their path and
we're discomforted we wonder if we will mourn them in the months of the weeks to
come but with a mourning inconsolable in this life because we know they were
not here consoled only in heaven when those remembrances are done away with
and those things are past so for you this morning I asked you to look at
Christ's work your master's work your work we want to look at firstly the
relevance of the work of Christ the relevance of the work of Christ what is
the work of Christ the Lord Jesus typifies himself as many things he says
that he's the light of the world he says that he's the great shepherd of the
sheep he says that he's the husband men the he says that he is the vine itself
but here he is the great physician he's a doctor he's a doctor and I want to
look at Christ's work amongst men in the aspect of his doctoring not in the bad
sense you know we talk about people doctoring the books doctoring this
doctoring that we use it in the wrong sense which it's something evil but
Christ's doctoring is not evil it's not improper it's it's not weak some
physicians in the 60s would have prescribed for you that if you were
feeling a bit stressed that you should take up smoking and the very few
physicians that would describe prescribe that for you today some physicians in
the 60s and 70s prescribed falidomide for pregnant women but no one would
prescribe falidomide today because of the dreadful harvest that has been
reaped in the disfigurement of the children there are physicians whose
healing is not healing at all but a worsening of the problem because of
ignorance because of inability they fail but Christ does not file the disease
that Christ grapples with he will defeat the person who is afflicted with it he
will say he will say those to whom he ministers are healed those to whom he
ministers are healed what relevance does this have for us what relevance does it
have for you this morning you're not a leper you're not paralyzed but I tell
you that you are a leper and you are paralyzed there is a disease wasting
away in your members in your body and in your heart and it's corrupting
influences are bringing you towards death which is its final end it's a
disease of the spirit it's already killed a part of you you're already dead
to God you cannot know God that ability with which man was created is no longer
there it's like an organ that has died your spirit cannot know God you cannot
know him in your being because sin has put to death that ability and severed
that relationship like the cutting of an optic nerve severs a man's sight or the
crushing of the ordinal nerves severs his hearing and that's what's happened
that's the first and terrible result of sin raining in your members but an even
well not an even more terrible but a more evident result is that you're
beginning to die and as you're dying you're becoming more and more corrupt
not only physically have you noticed as you get older it's a grooming becomes a
real problem doesn't it things we didn't worry about when we were children we
worry about now we groom our hair it's falling out we put oils into our skin
they're wrinkling we seek tonics and vitamins to sustain our strength we wake
up with aches and pains some of you young people won't know this yet but I'm
just beginning to adjust to the fact that I'm starting to wake up with aches
and pains and on it's nothing terrible it in the sense that I've got some
lingering disease other than sin is raining in my body and and leading me
to death and my body is becoming more and more corrupt more and more it's
suffering but that's not only happening in your body it's happening in your
heart it's happening in your heart the child
likeness that excused much of the disobedience that you knew as a child
it's faded away and you stand as an adult there's no good smiling anymore
when you do things wrong it's not good excusing your sin with childishness
because you're men and women many of you and you're absolutely accountable to God
absolutely you stand in the maturity of age and yet your hearts are becoming
more and more strange to God a strange from him more and more you want to be
separate from him but you're becoming closer and closer to standing before him
without Christ the Gulf as it were keeps widening between you and God the
judgment against you keeps increasing between you and God yet you are
approaching God himself your time is growing short it's growing so terribly
short I do not know how short your time has become but God is aware because he
he is appointed a time when you'll meet with him and this gospel this church
this Bible the people that have called you to come here the people who have
invited you the people who who have befriended you know that your time is
growing short know that you're in a dreadful condition but they know
something else they know that they can tell you where to find cleansing where
to find healing where to find forgiveness from God where you can come
to have that faculty renewed and brought to life again that part of you that is
dead made alive and so they've asked you to come they haven't asked you to come
to me they haven't asked you to come to them they haven't asked you to come to
the church haven't asked you to come to Don McMurray they've asked you to come
to Christ that's why they've brought you here that you would meet with Christ now
you may not see him here he's not sitting in that chair but Christ is here
his testimony is here his words are here and he is present invisible
indiscernible to our physical eyes but he is here and his power is here and his
knowledge of you is here and he looks into your heart this morning and you
cannot shield yourself from him and what remains is what will you do what
will you do will you pretend that you have no need of this position will you
pretend that your life is so ordered and so perfect and your behavior so beyond
reproach that you could not possibly be wasting away with this disease of sin
will you think that your relationship with God is so intimate and complete
that you cannot possibly be dead to him or will you believe the testimony of the
gospel of Christ those who were saved those who are rescued those who are
healed by the Christ of God know as Paul testified in that reading that
Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures according to the
scriptures and what did Paul say he said this is the gospel that I preached to
you this is the reason this church exists when I was reduced during this
week to the bare realities of life and death the only thing that remained to me
was this gospel the only hope that remained to me was in Christ everything
else seems so substandard and immaterial and inappropriate everything else seems
so wasted but this gospel I was trying to find something to say and all I had
was this gospel and I thank God that it's all I had I thank him for that
because this gospel is the reason why Christ came into the world he came to
deliver it it's the medic and it's the ointment it's the medicine that alone
can heal humanity it's the only thing that is of any benefit to you as a human
being in this life and in the life to come so it's very relevant and you only
have to look about you you only have to see the thrashings about of humanity to
know that you are in the midst of sinful people and a sin yourself every
invention every invention of man that that is going to do such a great good
it's just twisted and does such terrible harm and you do I don't have to lay it
all out before you read your newspapers read your newspapers look at the
television look around you see where the race is going know why the race is the
way it is it's because of the disease that reigns and brings them into
subjection its symptoms race throughout the human beings that inhabit this earth
it's called sin it ends in death and it's offensive to God now let's look at
Christ's work among men now that we know the relevance of the gospel let's look
at the results of his work open with me if you will to this fifth chapter if you
haven't got a Bible try and find someone who has look on look on if you do
nothing this morning look on this morning
there are some fishermen there are some doctors and lawyers legal men but
religious men also there are crowds pressing about as a man collecting
people's taxes and lining his pockets with it there are others who are
carrying their friend through the streets of the city heading towards the
one in whom they have hope alone this is the same there are men there are women
there are children some are critics come to judge Christ to dismiss Christ to
condemn Christ some are curious come to see what manner of man this is some are
needy and have to be carried by their friends but they've come to see this
Christ we want to start from verse 12 it happened when he was in a certain city
that behold a man who was full of leprosy saw Jesus he knew his disease he
saw the physician and he implored him implored him he fell on his face and he
begged him Lord if you were willing you can make me play what happened then he
put out his hand and touched him saying I am willing be cleansed and that was
the end of the matter that was the beginning of something different for
that man leprosy was ended freedom from leprosy cleansing had begun it says and
immediately the leprosy left him the disease was dealt with immediately then
the crowds increased because the report in verse 15 went around concerning him
all the more and great multitudes came together to hear you see they didn't
come together just to be healed they came to hear and this is very important
you mustn't just look at the physical healings that you see here because
greater than those is something spiritual that is happening and they've
come to hear they've come to hear Christ at the beginning of the chapter they
press about him to hear the Word of God at verse 15 they come together to hear
and to be healed and to be healed of their infirmities their diseases and he
often withdrew himself from them and went to his father in heaven and prayed
and communed with him and then went back and did his will so you see Christ
Christ is an example for you believer here he is dispensing the medicine and
he's going aside he's going alone he's praying in the wilderness he's coming
back and he's dispensing the medicine again and if our Lord and Master needed
to go aside and to pray to God in heaven to commune with his father he who
thought it not robbery to be equal with God who was God yet communed aside we
need to commune we need to pray but he's teaching again on a certain day you see
he was teaching teaching teaching and then the power of God is present to heal
those whom he was teaching and another man is brought different this time not a
leper not a leper a paralyzed man man who couldn't come and see by his own
power and volition couldn't bring himself physically into Jesus's presence
and his friends carried him his friends carried him and it seems that his
friends knew Christ they had faith in Christ they believed Christ because in
verse 20 it says so when he saw their faith he said to him the one who was
carried he spoke to the one who was carried into his presence when he saw
when he saw the faith of those that brought him have your Christian friends
invited you this morning have they over the weeks and months asked you to come
time and time again and you'll hear they've carried you in as it were
they've carried you in and the Lord looks at that and the Lord discerns
their faith and now the Lord looks to you and what will he say what is on your
mind God is here with you now what is on your mind God looks into your heart now
what is on your mind what was on this man's mind you want well you want
success you want love you want acceptance you want healing of some
physical infirmity well that's not what this man wanted that's not what this man
wanted because Christ looked into his heart Christ discerned what this man's
great need was Christ spoke to him very familiarly and very tenderly he said man
your sins are forgiven your sins are forgiven man is on a bed man is
paralyzed you've been lowered down through the roof by his friends so that
he can be near Jesus and Christ looks into his heart who says your sins are
forgiven you is there any protests recorded here from his friends is there
any protests recorded upon the man's lips hang on a minute that's not what I
want no protest is recorded here except the protest of the ever-present critics
the ones who always weigh the Son of God in the balance and find him wanting the
ones who cannot will not relent will not accept will always find reasons and
grounds to criticize who he is and what he does and they will always be where
Christ is preached because they hate what Christ is they hate what Christ
does because to believe what Christ is who he is and what he does is to condemn
themselves and in their own eyes they're above condemnation in their own eyes
their actions are acceptable and appropriate and they won't have him to
reign over them won't have this man to claim to have ruling power over me
righteous power over me to condemn my sin won't claim that I need his healing
because I will not recognize that I am needy and poor and wretched and naked
and miserable and blind and so they say who is this who is this is blaspheming
speaking against God is making a mockery of God God's not like this Christ makes
him out to be this Christ is saying he's God God's not like him God is like him
God is like Christ God is Christ Christ came in this world to show what God was
like and who God is that's why he came no good arguing that he's not what you'd
expect from God he doesn't do what you think God should do he is the very image
of God I'm not going to argue with you about that that is a fact it's a fact
this morning who can forgive sins but God alone who can indeed no one can
it's unforgivable you cannot you cannot even when someone offends you you can
forgive them but you can't wipe out the offense that they've committed because
it's been recorded in heaven whoever's been unjust to you or whoever you've
been unjust to whoever's failed you or you failed them you can reconcile
yourself to them but you cannot reconcile them to God or yourself to God
there's still a record to be dealt with you can be at ease and reconcile to
every person you know and still be irreconciled to God and separated and
condemned because of the actions that you've committed you see who could
forgive sins but God alone this Christ is God he claims to forgive sins if you
reject that you are unforgiven if you accept and embrace this Christ then like
this man he says your sins are forgiven you but that's not all he says you
notice what happens this man's infirmity of paralysis is removed he's no longer
incapable he's no longer helpless and I tell you this is another result of
Christ's gospel when he heals sin when he restores life to that part of you
that's dead to God and gives you that relationship with God that was lost to
humanity then you're no longer helpless you're no longer hopeless Matthew Henry
I think it was said the bed carried the man in but the man carried the bed out
you see his prison the place where he had to lie in his helplessness he
carried it out under his arm there's a trophy was a trophy to all around and
they were moved they were amazed they glorified God it says here in verse 26
they were filled with fear they were in awe of God they're in awe of God they
saw Christ they saw what he did for this man and they stood in awe of God do you
stand in awe of God if your hearts ever been moved by God you've heard you
prayed you've sung you've loved you've befriended perhaps even folk here you've
prayed with them you've bowed your head in the service you've sung the hymns but
have your hearts ever been moved by God himself can you say that you know him
can you testify that you have believed has there been a time when your sins have
seemed so high and you so low and unforgiven and terribly needy and then
Christ has appeared on your horizon as the altogether lovely the altogether
merciful the altogether desirable the only remedy and your heart has been
nicked to him you've reached out to him you've cried out to him then you know
you know that his answer was man woman your seed I've forgiven you and that is
an irrevocable remedy it's an irrevocable remedy that cannot be
undone and will not be undone you will not be revisited you will not
relapse into a condition where you are separated from God and consumed by the
deadly disease of sin that will not happen but I tell you what will happen
what must happen and that's what happened to Levi here Levi while all this
has been going on it's been collecting the money another part of the city or in
another place it's been lying in his pockets been working for the enemy the
Romans working for the government and everybody hates the government I mean we
vote for a government every year and the year after we curse the government say
if the government did this and if the government did that there are people who
get fat off the government today and this man was getting fat off the
government and Christ comes to him and he says follow me same thing he said to
James and John and Peter in the boat do not be afraid from now on you'll catch
men what was he saying you say come with me come with me don't be afraid to come
with me I know you feel your sense of unworthiness I know you've said to me
depart from me for I'm a sinful man but I'm not going to depart from you I've
come for sinful me I've come for them I've come to heal them I've come to
forgive them I've come to make them my followers and that's another result of
the gospel as freedom there's cleansing there's forgiveness and now there's a
following after there's a walking after Christ and it says here in verse 11 when
they brought their boats to land they forsook all and followed him and it says
again of Levi when the Lord said follow me he left all he left the money there
didn't fill up a bag and just tie it round his waist hang on a second I'll
just get a few coins in we might need some expense money he left all and he
followed Christ he left all that was most precious to him he left all in
which he hoped he'd hoped in that money he'd hoped in that occupation to gain
something but he left it and he followed after Christ so there's a discipling
that's another result it's a following after it's a seeking after but thanks
be to God it's the same power that grants forgiveness that takes away the
disease it's the same power that draws us to follow after him have no fear if
you know Christ that you will be able to follow him have you been fearful of that
have you felt your your infirmities you know Christ you've heard the words of
forgiveness you've exalted in it and now you find you're stumbling now you find
you're unable to follow him sometimes he seemed so far and so ahead and so
distant cry out to him cry out to him Peter cried out the Lord said don't be
afraid I'd be afraid what I've called you to you will become you will catch
me you'll catch men Christian believe that you will catch me you'll bring them
in why because he's called you to it and this gospel that Paul preached it's
powerful apostle this apostle whose theology was given from God and his
teachings we believe and hold so dear he had this gospel to preach he had
confidence in it and he wanted the Corinthians to have confidence in it so
that they could follow after Christ as he had followed after Christ so they
could catch men as he had caught men so they could dispense the ointment the
medicant the healing the forgiveness of Christ as he dispenses it because
without Christ without the reality of forgiveness without the reality of that
rising from the dead which finds its ultimate expression in that physical
rising from the dead and ascendancy into the heavenly realm of Jesus Christ and
that rising from the dead that will come on the last day when the soul and body
shall be reunited and to send the Christ in heaven it all depends it all
depends on that you see Christ isn't risen if the cure isn't real if the power
isn't real then we're all wasting our time this morning my friends we're of
men most to be pitied and most miserable and some hearts are saying that's right
some people here believe that we're wasting our time they've come because
they've been invited they haven't come because they believe I ask you to
consider to consider what then can you do if that is true what hope can you
have if this only way that has ever been given this only place that you can ever
come this only person who has the power to heal you didn't rise from the dead
what misery to go through the rest of your life like that but Christ is risen
from the dead Christ is in heaven the power that he displayed on earth is now
deployed throughout the earth by who by the followers by the followers by people
like me by people like the the folk around you here who believe they've
taken the book and they're heralding its message and they have a person present
with them invisible powerful unable to open the hearts of men and place that
message right there in the center of their thoughts and feelings right in the
center of their being his name is Christ he is real is the great physician what
will be the result what will now be the response and that's the third point I
want to bring to you there was relevance in Christ there is relevance in Christ
there were results when Christ spoke there are results when Christ speaks and
there are responses one is acceptable to God one is unacceptable to God and the
first response is to believe to believe finally finally to believe to lay aside
the sham to lay aside the pretense that everything's all right with you it's not
all right with you can never be all right with you you're going to die can
you deny that you have no prospect of eternal life you know that diseases have
already made you feel your mortality you know that so the response the only
appropriate response is to believe it's the only appropriate response but
there's an inappropriate response and that is to refuse to believe that
everything really is all right despite the evidence of your eyes despite the
testimony of your conscience despite the evidence within your own body that
you're aging and dying despite the evidence within your own memory that
you failed and sinned time and time again it's to refuse it's to pretend
it's to assert yourself again and say rubbish it's not true it's not true and
that's what these men the Pharisees did they questioned it again and again why
do you do this why are you eating with these sorts of people these wretched
people who were so obviously inferior these tax collectors and others that's
down in verse 30 they rejected what he was doing they found something wrong
with what he was doing every time Christ was presented to these people
they found a reason to reject him will you do that this morning again don't do
it again and again and again how many times have different people pleaded with
you this might be the first time you have heard the gospel but not if you've
been here week after week it's not the first time but if you're here for the
first time don't reject Christ if you're here for the umpteenth time and you've
lost count of how familiar and how many times you've been with these people who
call themselves Ella more veil Baptist Church don't reject him again you don't
know what a day will bring forth you cannot know when your end is near but
you will know that it is inalterable and total when it occurs that there's no
going back but the time has come the appointment bell is rung and there's no
fleeing there's no putting him aside anymore he's there and if you stand
before him diseased and dead then you'll pass into eternity in that state and
know his displeasure forevermore
Christ had a message and his message was this that he's not come to those who
think that they are righteous he's come to the sick he's come to sinners he's
come to call them to a change of heart that's what repentance means so I've not
come to call the righteous I've come to call the diseased I've come to call the
sinner to a change of heart may God call you to a change of heart this
morning what other comfort are you going to have what other hope and believer
remember remember that there is a resurrection remember that he rose for
your justification to make you right with God and accepted and that he will
bring you one day into an eternal relationship with him where your sins are
something that are totally past that one day you'll pass through the portals of
death as we've watched over the years our friends pass through and have this
hope that as they believe so you believe and that belief is not futile it's not
in vain but there will come a time when there will be no sorrow neither crying
there will come a time when there'll be no more weakness no more failure there
will come a time when there'll be light and love and an eternity to enjoy the
two of them with your lovely Savior Jesus Christ that is the only hope that
I have to offer you my friends the gospel of Christ it's it's all I have
because it's all that I can hope may God bless it to you this morning may you be
able to preach it if you know him may you who do not know him believe it and
not be lost