MEN LIKE TREES

SERMON OF THE WEEK #200804 – January 27, 2008

Mark tells us that one day, Jesus and the Apostles came unto Bethsaida, and they bring to Him a blind man, and beseeched Him to touch him. Now Jesus had been in Bethsaida many times, although no other visit to the city was mentioned until this one. We know He had been there many times, and done many miracles because in Matthew 11:20 Jesus said, “Woe unto thee, Bethsaida, for if the mighty works that were done in thee had been done in Tyre and Sidon they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. It shall be more tolerable for them in the Day of Judgment than for thee.”

With all their advantages of learning from Jesus, Bethsaida was the worst town in the world to go to Hell from, and the best town in the world to go to Heaven from.

America today stands in the same judgment as Bethsaida. We have been blessed by God with greater opportunities to evangelize the world than any nation in history, and what a heavy judgment will fall upon this land in the judgment as we see the efforts of a people gone mad in their efforts to remove every reminder of the grace of God. It shall be more tolerable in the Day of Judgment for some of the cities in the Middle East than for sports-crazed, idol-worshipping America.

So they brought this blind man to Jesus with the request, “Touch him, Lord.” They were confident that Jesus could restore his sight by a touch. They had no doubt heard how Jesus had gone into a house at nearby Capernaum, and healed Peter’s mother-in-law by touching her hand. And it was at Capernaum that He had healed a leper with the touch of His hand. And even more inspiring in the same area He had restored the sight of two blind men with the touch of His hand. So there was no question with these people that Jesus could heal this blind man with the touch of His hand. They had faith in the Lord to heal, but they had to do something about it. They had an active faith, and brought him to Jesus.

Many of us have faith the Lord can save from the uttermost members of our family, or other friends, but is it an active faith? We pray about it, but what have we done to bring it to pass?

So the Lord first took him by the hand, and led the blind man out of the city. At Bethsaida they had not responded and, rather than work one more miracle, and have them sneer, and say, “…any rabbi could have done as well,” He led him out of their city to heal him. When He led him out of the city, He was leading him away from unbelief in the virgin birth, and He was leading him away from those who denied the authority of His Word.

Jesus still leads us today, but He does not take us by the hand, as He did the blind man of Bethsaida. While we may rejoice, and enjoy the sentimental feeling about Jesus, as we sing “Precious Lord, take my hand, lead me on, help me stand, I am tired, I am weak, I am worn.”  But after we sing about it, let us come back to reality. The Lord is no longer here in a physical body taking us by the hand, and leading us. However, He still leads us just as much as He led the blind man of Bethsaida. While He was here on earth He could lead only one person at a time, but now through His divinely inspired Word, He can lead us all as we sing “Lead me on through the night, lead me on to the light: Precious Lord, take my hand, lead me on.”

So they came to Bethsaida; Bethsaida means, “The House of Fishers.” House of Fishers is an appropriate name for that village because it was the hometown of at least six of the Apostles. In John 1:43, John tells us that Philip was of Bethsaida of the city of Andrew and Peter, and it was there the Lord called Philip when he said, “Follow Me,” and Philip brought Nathanael to the Lord. And since Luke tells us James and John were partners with Simon, which would have been their hometown, it seems that six of the Apostles would become fishers of men in the great ocean of humanity, when they received the Great Commission.

It would also be appropriate if every congregation could be known as the House of Fishers, because of the great number of preachers sent out to be what Jesus called fishers of men. The crying need for the world today is for more preachers of the Word. Remember, it was Jesus Himself who said, “Pray the Lord of the harvest that He send forth laborers into His harvest.” The reason we have been on the radio for all these years is because we are fishers of men, and radio seems to be a real good fishing hole.

And so it seems a strange coincidence that in the city known as the House of Fishers, there were a great number of people who were spiritually blind, but it was here some compassionate people had brought a blind man to Jesus with the request that He touch him. Jesus took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town.

Then Jesus spit on his eyes, and put His hands upon his eyes, and said, “Seest thou ought?” He looked up and said that he saw men as trees walking. After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly.

Jesus spit on his eyes; this probably was to loosen his eyes stuck shut. This served as a salve to loosen his eyelids; a miracle was not needed for this part of the healing. Jesus does not perform useless miracles. When He changed the water into wine, He did not waste a miracle on filling jars with water. This was something they could do. When he raised Lazarus, He did not work a useless miracle by rolling away the stone; this was something they could do, and must do first, then came the miracle of resurrection.

He still does not do for us today what we can do for ourselves first. Many times in church meetings people are asked if there are any prayer requests. Some good folk will ask for prayer if someone has a rash, or ingrown toenail, and not a word about prayer for people who are being tortured, and put in prison for their faith.

This is the only miracle that the Lord worked in stages. He touched the man, and he looked up, and saw men as trees walking. Then He touched him and he saw clearly. Most of the time today the healing that is done by the Lord in answer to our prayers is done the same way. We may be sick unto death, and to everybody’s amazement the sick person recovers. Generally the recovery is by a gradual process.

Then think too, of how many ways the Lord works in our lives by stages. God did not give the completed copy of the Word of God in the Garden of Eden to Adam and Eve. It was not a leather-bound copy of the Bible that guided Adam.

Paul says in Hebrews chapter one that God spoke unto the fathers in divers portions and in divers manners. It was a gradual revelation until Jesus came and made His sacrifice and ascended to the right hand of the Father. Then and only then the revelation of God was complete, and it be said, in 2nd Timothy 3:15, “All scripture is inspired of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely unto every good work.”

So when Jesus healed the blind man, he looked up and said he saw men as trees walking. Evidently he had not been born blind because he knew what a tree looked like. He saw men as trees walking. In other words at first he had a distorted vision. There are millions of people today whose vision is distorted, and they are never able to see things as they really are.

The application of salve to his eyes reminds us of what the Lord said to the church at Laodicea in Revelation the third chapter. He said they were blind, and needed to buy of Him eye salve that they might see. Jesus does have eye salve, and it is for sale. It is somewhat expensive, and it will cost you some of your time. The eye salve is the Word of God, and the more you apply it to your eyes the better your vision will be. Let Jesus touch your eyes again, and you will look up, and like the blind man of Bethsaida, you will see all things clearly.

The man said he could see men as trees walking. This is the way the Devil wants us to see ourselves, not as trees walking, but as gods walking. This is what the Devil told Eve in the Garden of Eden at that debacle at the foot of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Eve began to have a distorted view of God. She thought she was god. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. Again Paul addressed the same subject when he told the Romans in chapter one, “Professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image of corruptible man. Humanism began in the Garden of Eden and has surfaced again in these last days when men think that they can make up their own rules. Our spiritual guide today is, “What do the polls say?”

Take a look at God’s view of man as found in Romans the third chapter. Listen to God’s description of the human rascal, “There is none that understand; there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongue they have used deceit. The poison of asp is under their lips. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways; and the ways of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.” This is the way God describes the human rascal. The icing on God’s damnation cake is when He says a few verses later, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Many have a distorted view of the human race; the humanistic view sees the human as god walking, but God sees him as a lost and damned-to-hell sinner to be held responsible for his actions.

And now another distorted view that some may have is the distorted view of the Lord Jesus Christ. Some people look up and see Jesus walking as a good man; they see Him walking as a perfect man; they see Him walking as a philosopher, but they don’t even see any tree. The tree Peter talked about when he said to the elders and the high priest in Acts 5:30, “The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew, hanging him on a tree.”

To look at Jesus without the cross is a fatal view. This was the distorted view of the Apostles when they first heard about the cross. Then Peter took Him, and began to rebuke Him, saying, “Be it far from thee, Lord, this shall not be unto thee.” The Devil did not want Jesus to go to the cross, and he knew the Lord would not listen to him, so he said, “Peter, you tell Him.” This would not be the last time the Devil would speak to people through the lips of a preacher. The greatest lies that are told today on this planet are the ones that are told by preachers.

The thought of Jesus carrying a tree was unthinkable to Peter; this could have no part in the program of Jesus coming into the world. The other Apostles felt the same way, when Jesus said, “And they shall kill Him, and the third day He shall be raised again.” They were exceedingly sorry.

Later on, Peter saw all things clearly. In his first epistle he tells us, “Ye were redeemed, not with corruptible things, with silver or gold, from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers; but with precious blood, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ.” Hear him again as he declares, “Whom His own self bore our sins in His own body on the tree that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.” At first, Peter could not see Jesus on the tree, and now he cannot see Him anywhere, but on the tree.

The preaching of the first gospel sermon on the day of Pentecost was a message on the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Peter’s vision had cleared up since that day at Caesarea Philippi when he said, “Be it far from thee Lord this shall never be unto thee.”

Saul of Tarsus who led in the slaying of Stephen and many other Christians did not see Jesus on the tree. After his conversion his vision cleared up, and he said, “He knew nothing, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified; God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of my Lord Jesus Christ.”

I read the footnotes in one of those popular study Bibles; and the footnote on Acts 2:38 informs us that it should be written like this, And Peter said unto them, “Repent for the remission of sins and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” It is sufficient rebuttal to say; if Peter had meant it that way, he would have said it that way. It is also an interesting thing to note that all of the major translations, both Protestant and Catholic, translate Acts 2:38 the same way repentance and baptism for the remission of sins or unto the remission of sin. Hundreds of world-class scholars, from all denominations laid aside their personal beliefs, and translated it the same way. Read it again in your version, and hopefully your vision will improve, and you will get a better view of the Man on the Tree.

And now one more concluding thought on the man with the distorted vision.

Many today are not touched with the suffering of Jesus who gave His life for them on the cross, and there is a reason for it. John tells us about it in his first epistle when he says, “He that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and the evil one toucheth him not.” So who is touching you now, the Lord or the Devil?

In Matthew 9 those two other blind men cried out to Jesus, “Lord, thou son of David, have mercy on us.” Jesus touched their eyes, and like the blind man of Bethsaida they received their sight. Today may the eye salve of the Word of God applied to your eyes through the preaching of the Word of God, cause some of you to look up, and begin to see as through a glass darkly; the Lord Jesus Christ, not walking as a tree, but hanging on the tree.