When you come to church on Sunday do you come with the expectation that you will actually take something away? I believe real life change does not happen from simply hearing His word, but seeking to apply it into our lives….Today I wanted to share with you want two people took away from last week’s message called UNDENIABLE VS. UNEXPLAINABLE.

The challenge I want to set forth is… to live a life that is so undeniable…to live a life that is unexplainable apart from God’s active work in your life. Open up your God box to recieve all that he has for you -Michael Hahn

Hi Mark,

The worship was wonderful, thought the video was quite moving and the sermon was excellent. But saw something I would like to share with you..

You noted that the blind man was not allowed in the Temple when he was blind. But that, after Jesus healed him of his blindness, he was only in the Temple for a short time before he was expelled.

Jesus said, “For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind”, John 9:39.

And in the synagogue Jesus declared His mission, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord”, Luke 4:18-19.

The man healed of his blindness was kicked out of the Temple of GOD, where the Shechinah Glory of GOD no longer dwelt. But the the Temple came to him. And the man fell to his knees and worshiped Jesus, the Temple, in which dwelt the Shechinah Glory of GOD.

So while the bind man was delivered from his blindness and now could see and beheld his Saviour, those in authority were blind. Jesus saying, “If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth”, John 9:41.

I saw this same phenomenon some time ago, when I was in Kim’s life group, as we studied the passage in John chapter 5. You gave a sermon on this that was very meaningful to me about picking up your mat. But as we were studying this passage on the Wednesday we met, I saw that the man had lingered with his illness for 38 years and was unable to get to the pool to receive his healing when the angel troubled the water. But that, in the same way as He had come to the man who was born blind, Jesus, “the LORD, the fountain of living waters”(Jer.17:13), had come to him.

And Jesus commanded him saying, “Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked: and on the same day was the sabbath”, John 5:8-9.

And once again, the man did not know His name or who He was. And Jesus came to him, finding him in the Temple to tell him to stop sinning lest a worse thing come on him. And so the man went and told the authorities it was Jesus.

In both cases, the “Temple” had come to the afflicted and healed them. In both cases, the crime, the stumbling block, was that Jesus had healed them on the Sabbath Day. The religious establishment simply could not accept who He was, understand what His mission was and see, because their self-righteousness had made them blind, preventing them from accepting the obvious by faith.

Jesus healed the physical symptoms of blindness, but He had also come to heal us of our spiritual blindness. He had power in both realms: the physical and the spiritual. Those who will not accept Him, will remain not only in their spiritual darkness but in their sin. Which is a whole study in itself.

Blessings, Nancy Fortney

It is my prayer that each of you will take the time to simply ask God what He wants you to take away from your time in His presence on Sunday mornings.

–Pastor Mark