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[0:00] Well, the first thing I want to do is make a correction because I misled you the last time we were together when I said words to the effect that it was really shortly after the resurrection of Lazarus that it would only be a few days until Jesus would then be going to Jerusalem for his last trip.

[0:30] And then it would end in his execution. And actually I got ahead of myself because that is not the case. And as we will see from the text that's borne out this morning, that after the healing of Lazarus, and you will recall we dealt a little bit with that, with the response of the Jewish establishment, which was the determination that Jesus has got to go, and they pretty much put out a contract on him.

[0:58] And I gave the implication that that was going to be realized within just a few days, and that is not correct. I've gone over my notes since, and I'm not sure how I arrived at that conclusion, but it was erroneous.

[1:13] So what is going to happen is right after the healing of Lazarus, the raising of Lazarus from the dead, it is true that the establishment did get together, and they did make that decision about Jesus needing to die, as opposed to the Romans coming in, etc., and everything that went with that.

[1:34] But what is going to happen is he's going to leave that area, largely because, well, first of all, because his time had not yet come, and secondly, because with the healing of Lazarus, the heat really was on.

[1:52] So he leaves that area and goes north. In fact, if you'll take your map, those of you who have a map, and look at the very last page, it is the places of Jesus' ministry then and now.

[2:08] And if you look down, excuse me, in the green area, right below Judea, right close to the top of the Dead Sea, you will see Bethany.

[2:22] Bethany is where Mary and Martha and Lazarus lived. That's where Jesus was when he brought Lazarus back from the dead. Then he went from there, not to Jerusalem, but he went up to, let's see if it's here on the map, Ephraim, you see Ephraim right above Judea.

[2:47] And that is in the area where he's going to spend some time, boy, in a morning frog. And then he's coming back down, and that will be several days later before he is actually entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, and we know what was going to transpire from that time on.

[3:08] So I stand corrected in that. And now we're going to look at our next miracle that we'll be undertaking this morning. And it is in Luke's Gospel, chapter 17, and beginning with verse 11.

[3:26] Luke 17 and verse 11. I don't know. My pipes are rusty this morning, I guess. These pipes have got a lot of miles on them, so I've got nothing to complain about.

[3:41] All right. This has to do with the ten lepers. It's not unusual at all for lepers to be in a colony where they all live because of the contagious nature of the disease.

[3:59] In fact, it wasn't until, well, I guess it's probably been within the last hundred years. No, it hasn't even been that long. It's probably been within, well, maybe the last hundred years or so. But leprosy was determined to be caused by a virus.

[4:15] And for a number of years, there was a leper colony in the United States. And it was located in Louisiana.

[4:27] And it was only with the elimination of the disease and the conquering of leprosy that it was done away with. It was in a town called Carville.

[4:38] Carville, Louisiana was the last leper colony. And, of course, it's been closed now for quite some time. But leprosy, as you well know, in the Bible, was one of the most dreaded diseases that anyone could possibly contract because there was no effective treatment for it.

[4:55] And it was, for all practical purposes, an end-of-life disease. It was terminal in most cases. And it was one of the most heinous things that you could imagine because people's fingers would just rot and fall off and their nose and so on.

[5:13] And Phil Yancey, one of my favorite authors, teamed up with Dr. Paul Brand, a surgeon and physician who had been ministering as a missionary for several years in India.

[5:26] And Dr. Brand's specialty in working with the lepers there in India was to amputate the big toe of a leper, assuming that it was sound, one of the sound parts left, and transplant it to the man's thumb.

[5:53] Now, the whole concept just blows my mind. In the first place, that it could even be done. And in the second place, that it would even be worthwhile. Who would think, in terms of your big toe, being able to take the place of your thumb?

[6:09] But that was an operation for which Dr. Paul Brand was famous. And people in India would come from miles around just to have that surgery performed, those who were lepers, and had a problem with their thumbs.

[6:21] So it was one of the most dreaded diseases that you can imagine. And when someone came down with leprosy, they were immediately isolated from everybody.

[6:31] They had to leave their family, leave friends, everyone. And they would go to a place, if there was a leper colony nearby, where there were other lepers, kind of like a leper sanatorium. And these people, whenever they did go out anywhere in the public, they were obligated to carry with them a clapper.

[6:50] And these were like a couple of large, what we would think, maybe a couple of, like large ping pong paddles. And everywhere they'd go, when they would come into town, these people would clap these together, make a lot of noise, and they would cry out, Unclean! Unclean!

[7:11] And give everybody an opportunity to clear the way, and get out of the way, because the contagious nature of this disease. And of course, it being a virus, it could easily be carried through the air, just like a lot of other viruses can.

[7:27] So in this particular case, Jesus is encountering ten of these lepers, who obviously comprise a local colony, and they are together in this area.

[7:38] And we read, beginning in verse 11, of Luke's Gospel, chapter 17, and it came about, while he was on the way to Jerusalem, that he was passing between Samaria and Galilee.

[7:55] And this is after they, he's leaving Bethany, and going through Jerusalem, up north again. He's not going to stay in Jerusalem, because like I said, like the heat was on. And as he entered a certain village, there met him ten leprous men who stood at a distance.

[8:15] Of course they stood at a distance. These people always stood at a distance from everybody, because of their disease. And they raised their voices, saying, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.

[8:31] And when he saw them, he said to them, go and show yourselves to the priests. And it came about that as they were going, they were cleansed.

[8:49] Now that is, to put it mildly, one of the most remarkable things that you can imagine. Jesus did not personally confront them. He didn't touch them. He just told them to go and show themselves to the priest.

[9:03] And one might wonder, what's the point of that? And why did they do that? And we're not going to take time to turn to it, but I will give you the references, because this was something that Jesus was saying to them that was in keeping with the law of Moses.

[9:20] And in the law of Moses, in the references that I've got here, like I said, we won't turn to them, but you can make note of it if you would, is in Leviticus chapter 13, and verses 45 and 46.

[9:39] And leprosy was the kind of disease that would cause the breaking out of the skin, but there were similarities of other diseases that could be mistaken for leprosy that wasn't leprosy at all, because there were different kinds of skin diseases that could be contracted.

[10:03] And the priests were trained and had the responsibility, I guess you could say the priests were kind of like pseudo-physicians or pseudo-doctors in some cases. They were charged with the responsibility of examining the skin condition that someone was complaining about and being able to interpret whether it was really leprosy, which was to be feared and would require isolation, or whether it was another kind of skin disease that looked somewhat like it but wasn't leprosy, in which case the person could remain at home with other people.

[10:41] And it was the responsibility of the priest to make that determination. That is precisely why Jesus told these lepers, go and show yourselves to the priest.

[10:51] And you may wonder, well, what's that got to do with anything? Well, in light of what I just explained to you, it was their responsibility. And the text tells us that as soon as they were walking away, as they were going, before they even got to the priest, as they were going, they were cleansed.

[11:13] And I can imagine that the cleansing became very, very obvious to them because in most cases, when someone was coming down with leprosy, it was immediately obvious.

[11:26] It often showed up in the face, as well as other parts of the body. And even though they wore extensive clothing and a lot of garments back then, it was still something that was very difficult to hide.

[11:38] Many times, it would cause a person their ear or their ears, your ear would just literally, the flesh would just rot and drop off. And the nose could actually fall away from the face with a huge sore behind it.

[11:52] One of the most grotesque and ugly things you ever saw. So, as these men were going, these ten men, as they were on their way to the priest, just because Jesus told them that's what they were to do, as they were going, can you imagine the feeling, the elation that these men experienced as they looked at themselves and their hands and the faces of their friends?

[12:28] An indescribable situation. You just cannot, cannot imagine. nobody, nobody, ever cured anybody of leprosy.

[12:43] It was a terminal disease. Your flesh would just slowly rot away. You might live for years, you might live for months, but you were as good as dead.

[12:54] You were separated from family and friends and everybody. and for these men to have experienced this as they are walking. It just, it's indescribable to even think of it.

[13:12] Can you imagine the elation, the joy, the thanksgiving, the praise? It must have just been absolutely unimaginable.

[13:22] It came about that as they were going, they were cleansed. Now one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, one of them, that's the thing that we want to emphasize, one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice.

[13:56] Ha! I guess it was a loud voice. Can you imagine this man experiencing something like that, whispering about it? He is ecstatic.

[14:07] He is crying out to the top of his lungs with a loud voice. Perhaps the others were as well, but it was this one, and this one alone who had the presence of mind and the supreme gratitude to stop and ask himself the question, how can this be?

[14:32] I'm healed. How can this be? And he knew the source of it. It had to be. It could be no one else but Jesus.

[14:45] Overwhelmed, overwhelmed with gratitude and presence of mind, he couldn't go any further. He couldn't even make it to the priest. He had to turn around. By the way, there's no mistaking this.

[15:00] He didn't look at his sores and his wounds and say, well, yeah, they do look a little better. He saw his flesh, his skin, as clear and as clean as it has ever been in his life.

[15:18] I wouldn't be surprised if the first thing he didn't do was to pinch himself and see if he was dreaming. He's going to wake up and find out that it wasn't even true, that it was just all a dream.

[15:30] But no, it was true. And all he could do was turn around, retrace his steps, and go back and find this wonderful man.

[15:42] My, oh my. And by the way, he was a Samaritan. Oh, oh, oh, a Samaritan.

[15:54] The Samaritans and the Jews have no dealings. Well, this time, there was a Jew by the name of Jesus that had dealings with a Samaritan.

[16:06] Isn't that something? My, oh my. Fell on his face at his feet, glorifying God with a loud voice, giving thanks, and he was a Samaritan.

[16:22] I'm sure Jesus thought and maybe even said, well, I appreciate your thanks. I appreciate your, but, uh, where are the others?

[16:39] You know, this, fellas, this is a perfect example of the deficiency of our humanity.

[16:52] We often don't exhibit a spirit of gratitude like we ought. quick to complain, quick to gripe, quick to bellyache.

[17:05] Sometimes we can be very slow to be thankful for what we have, to be grateful. This saying has been given, you've probably had it, heard it before, regardless of what your situation is physically or the kind of pain you're in, just remind yourself there's a whole host of people who would love to trade places with you.

[17:38] And it's just a natural part of our humanity, I guess, to sometimes be ungrateful and to think, oh, woe is me and have a pity party and nobody's got it as bad as I do and where is God when you need him and why am I suffering this and so on and so on.

[17:54] And we just, someone has said we just neglect to stop and smell the roses. And you know that's typical of our human frame and our fallenness.

[18:07] Our gripe-itude often outstrips our gratitude. And we just need to remember if you have, if you have received regeneration and forgiveness from Jesus Christ for your sins, man, it doesn't make any difference what else is going on in your life or in your body.

[18:33] You ought to be absolutely overwhelmed with gratitude. Thank you, God, thank you. Regardless of what's happening, regardless of the deprivation, regardless of the disappointments and everything else, if you've got Jesus Christ in your heart, nothing else matters really.

[18:52] That's, wow. Glorifying God with a loud voice. The Samaritan, Jesus said, were there not ten cleansed, but the nine?

[19:04] Where are they? Were none found who turned back to give glory to God except this foreigner? Well, that's about the way we are.

[19:15] Ten percent of humanity is grateful. What about the ninety percent? Well, we just kind of take that for granted, don't we? That's nine out of ten, just kind of take it for granted.

[19:29] But one out of ten is really, truly thankful and just has to say so. And he said to him, rise.

[19:40] This man was on his face, bowed down before Jesus, thanking him. And Jesus told him, rise, get up, go your way, your faith has made you well.

[19:56] What did he mean by that? He simply meant by that, that when these ten accosted Jesus, they did so on the basis of what they had already heard about this man and what he had done.

[20:15] And when they came to him, beseeching him that he would have mercy on him, they did so with a complete confidence that he would be able to do for them what he had done for others.

[20:32] That faith, that belief, that trust, that commitment was there and their thinking was if we can only find Jesus and get to Jesus, he can do for us what he had done for others.

[20:44] That's what Jesus meant when he said, your faith has made you whole. That is, your confidence in me has made you whole. It's a beautiful, beautiful account. And it's interesting that Dr. Luke is the one that gives us this account and he's able to speak about the situation from a medical profession.

[21:03] So, let's come over now if we may. Any questions about this, by the way, before we go on? I was wondering about the other nine. If they didn't come back, what happened to them? Well, I assume that the nine just went on to the priest and got checked out by the priest and you kind of wonder whether, you see, all of these areas, of course, are Jewish and they are practicing Judaism and there are synagogues all over the place and there are priests all over the place, all over Israel and we cannot help but wonder because, but the text doesn't tell us that the priest to whom these nine were going, did the priest know any of these men?

[21:46] Very likely that he may have because this was a local kind of thing and it may very well be that some of these nine or maybe all of them, I don't know, had gone to the priest earlier and the priest said, yep, it's leprosy you need to be isolated and perhaps priests had already reached that verdict and sent them into isolation and now they are coming back, I wonder if the priest saw any of these coming, said to himself, what are these guys coming for?

[22:20] They've already been examined, we know what they have, why are they coming? And they come to the priest, can you imagine? and I don't want to create a case that I don't have a chapter and verse for, but I'm trying to piece this together, if they did get to the priest, there's good reason to believe that the priest probably knew these men and what's he going to think?

[22:43] Especially if he might have been one who had already pronounced them leprous and now he looks at their skin and he's got to be, he's got to be incredulous, he's got to say, what happened?

[22:54] What, how did you, what, what's going on? And I'm sure that they told him, a man called Jesus. Yes, Bob? Would the Samaritan be a non-believer, a Jew, a non-Jew, non-believer?

[23:07] No, well, Samaritans were a mixed breed, literally, Samaritans were half Jewish and half Gentile because where the Samaritans came from was, remember when the, I don't want to get too far astray here, but remember when the, when the tribes separated, ten tribes to the north, two tribes to the south, they broke up, well, in the year 722, 722 BC, Assyrians came down from the north, invaded the ten tribes in the north, defeated the people, carried a lot of them into captivity, city, and they put an occupational force of Assyrian soldiers there in the land of north Israel, the northern ten tribes, and after they were there for a while, you got the situation, boy meets girl, we had occupational troops in

[24:08] Japan, after the war, some of them brought home what we call Japanese war brides, boy meets girl in Japan, they got married, come over, that happens all over the world, because that's the human dynamics, that's the way boys and girls work, it's that way all over the world, and they entered, they entered married with the Jews, and they produced offspring that were not fully Jewish, full-blooded Jewish, they were half-breeds, they were Samaritans, and they were called Samaritans because the capital of the northern ten tribes was Samaria, and they were Samaritans, and because they were considered half-breeds, the Jews, the two tribes in the south that remained in the Union where Jerusalem was, did not accept those in the north as full-blooded Jews because they were considered, they were considered trash, they were considered not really Jews, well, they were half-Jew, and half-Gentile, but anyway, that's the story.

[25:16] Yes, Dave? I know when you got somebody that's sick in your family or a relative or something, and you got all kinds of people praying for their healing, and it doesn't come, I've always felt that God sees the big picture, and he allows this person to die, and the people that, I know in some cases, some people lose their faith, or they blame God because they prayed and they said that they thought God would heal them, but they didn't.

[25:48] So, is it because their faith wasn't really true, or is it just because God saw the big picture and he thought this was the best thing for them to, you know?

[26:01] Yeah, what you've described is a very, very common problem, and what it boils down to is this, why won't God be reasonable and do it my way?

[26:12] And when he doesn't, we think that our faith is substandard, and there's some sin in my life that God didn't answer that prayer, or that God didn't hear, or that God doesn't care.

[26:26] And as a result, a number of people have walked away from God, they've got a grudge against God, because he wouldn't do it their way, and you've got all these people praying, and I remember hearing the testimony of a man who was sat next to a fellow in an airplane, and he was saying that his father was ill, and he was nine years old, and the pastor came and prayed, and people from the church came and prayed, and neighbors came around and prayed, and they circled around my dad's bed, and they prayed for him, that God would raise him up and heal him, and he died.

[27:03] Well, what's wrong with that scene? Wasn't God listening? Didn't God care what was going on? And the man came to the conclusion, if God doesn't care anymore for a nine-year-old boy who needs his father than that, I don't want anything to do with him.

[27:19] And maybe he doesn't even exist anyway. Maybe that's why the prayers weren't answered. He wasn't even there to hear them. So, and there's a little saying that has been real to me, and I think it would do good to keep it in mind, and that is, God does not do anything, and he does not permit anything without taking everything into consideration.

[27:49] And do you know what he wants us to do? He wants us to trust him. He wants us to be like Job who said, though he slay me, yet will I trust him.

[28:06] That's not easy to do, but it is so important. God's saints grow best in the shadows, not in the sunshine.

[28:19] But we all want the sunshine, we don't want the shadows. And Phil Yancey wrote a book called The Question That Won't Go Away.

[28:34] And the question is why? Why does God allow this? Why doesn't God do something? Six million Jews were wondering the same thing when they perished in the Holocaust.

[28:48] And because many of them could not process any possibility of an answer from that, they wrote God off. And you can understand from a human standpoint how people could do that.

[29:02] You pray and you ask God and he's supposed to be all powerful and all loving and all caring. And this is one of the great reasons of, one of the great rationales, if you will, of atheism.

[29:14] I don't think it's valid, but you can understand how they arrive at that. And it is referred to as the disparity between their being an all loving, all wise, all powerful God and the existence of evil.

[29:34] How do you account for that? How can this God who supposedly loves everybody and everything, why doesn't he step in and put an end to it?

[29:44] if I could, I would. I would stamp out evil and murder and rape and mayhem. I would stamp it out right now if I could.

[29:59] But I can't do that because I'm not God. But he is, and why doesn't he do that? And that is the question that plagues a lot of people today.

[30:12] So we've got a situation here. Yes? I think one of the best examples is Charles Darwin. He was a Christian minister whose daughter was like 9 or 10 and got ill and he prayed for her and when God took her away and didn't heal her, he turned 8th and wrote the theory of evolution.

[30:35] He was a Christian pastor which a lot of people don't realize at one time. That's a case in point. I appreciate you mentioning that. And it reminds me of Charles Templeton.

[30:48] Charles Templeton was a close personal friend of Billy Graham. And in Billy's early days before he was really discovered in Los Angeles with the crusade there, they would hold crusades locally and Charles Templeton would preach one night and Billy Graham would preach the next night.

[31:07] And it was the general consensus of most of the people that Charles Templeton was the better preacher. And one day Charles Templeton picked up a copy of Life magazine.

[31:20] I don't think it's even published anymore. And on the picture, on the cover of the Life magazine was a picture of a starving emaciated child about three years old in some remote country.

[31:36] country. And Charles Templeton was so moved by that reality that he walked away from his faith, gave up the ministry, adopted atheism, and moved to Canada.

[31:57] And what's his name? Lee Strobel. Lee Strobel went to Canada and interviewed him in his later years.

[32:14] And he at the time was in his 80s. His mind was failing. He was entering early stage Alzheimer's. And Lee Strobel was coming from a position of having been an atheist himself who came to faith and he was concerned about Charles Templeton and what was going on and the rationale.

[32:33] Some of you remember the video. We showed a video here a few years ago relating that scene. So this is real stuff. And we still question.

[32:46] We wonder why? Why? Why doesn't God do something? Why doesn't God heal? Why doesn't God intervene? Why Ukraine? And what's going on there and the atrocities and everything? Why doesn't God?

[32:56] Listen, fellas, we need to understand. We need to understand that when God gave volition to humans, it had all the potential in the world of becoming a very ugly package.

[33:15] That's what sin is. It is ugly through and through. And if God is going to step in every time somebody is ready to do something stupid and murderous like killing six million Jews, if God is going to step in every time and prevent that and just override people's volition, then what's the point of having it?

[33:47] What's the point of giving it? going to happen? And yet there are times when apparently that is what happened and what we call that is a miracle, but it doesn't happen very often.

[34:02] More often than not, when the doctor says, I'm afraid it's terminal, you've got maybe two to three months, sometimes they're wrong and they miss it, big time.

[34:20] There are people now walking around who should have been dead five years ago, according to the medical profession, but usually they're not wrong, usually they're right, and usually they've seen it enough to know that disease takes its course and this is going to be the end game.

[34:41] So, bottom line is we don't know. There's so much that we don't know, that we don't understand, but we know this, God is worthy of our trust no matter what.

[34:55] Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. And that's the thing that we need to keep in mind. God is worthy of our trust, and the decisions that he makes on our behalf are always in our own best interest, even though they may hurt like everything at the time.

[35:15] God does know what he's doing, and he's in charge. Well, your faith has made you well. Now, if we could come over to, for a little bit of time, we've got left.

[35:29] Chapter 18, verse 35, and every time I read this story about blind Bartimaeus, I can hear in my mind George Beverly Shea singing, one sat alone beside the highway begging.

[35:48] His eyes were blind, the light he could not see. He clutched his rags and shivered in the shadows. Then Jesus came and bade his darkness flee.

[36:02] When Jesus comes, the tempter's power is broken. When Jesus comes, he turns the night into day. When Jesus comes, the tempter's power is broken.

[36:19] He turns the night into day. He turns the despair into joy for all is changed when Jesus comes to stay.

[36:30] My, oh, my. Approaching Jericho. You can see that on your map, too. I remember visiting Jericho. It was really unusual because when we pulled into the city in a little town of Jericho, and there are two Jerichos, really.

[36:46] There's an old Jericho, the archaeological Jericho. That's the one that Joshua attacked where the walls came tumbling down. That's the old ancient Jericho, and just a stone's throw from that Jericho is what is referred to as the modern Jericho.

[37:01] Jericho, and the thing that was so unusual about it when we got there was there were beautiful palm trees all over everywhere there because of the elevation, et cetera, and it was a wonderful place.

[37:15] Approaching Jericho, a certain blind man was sitting by the road begging, and some of the texts tell us that there were two men, but Dr.

[37:26] Luke apparently is just focusing on one. I don't know if it's because he was the spokesman, he did most of the talking or what, but at any rate, we are told that he was there begging, and that's about all blind people can do, was beg, and by the way, it was not looked upon as a dishonorable occupation, but it was considered to be an honorable occupation if that was all you could do while you begged, and this man's begging, just like the man at Temple Gate Beautiful in Acts chapter 3, and hearing a multitude going by, he had to hear him, he couldn't see, he began to inquire what this might be, what's all the noise, what's everybody talking, what are people yelling about, anyway, what's going on, and they told him, Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, and he called out saying, Jesus, son of

[38:27] David, have mercy on me, where did he get that, how did he know that Jesus was the son of David, do you realize how few people were the sons of David, you know the genealogy, that a thousand years before this time here, David, the king, was on the throne, and you could follow his descent line, of the royal line, of the tribe of Judah, and you'll find it in Matthew, and you'll find it in Luke 3, where the genealogy unmistakably goes all the way from David the king, who established the dynasty, through the bloodline, all the way down, and it stops with Jesus of Nazareth.

[39:18] the line of Judah concludes with Jesus, and surely the word must have gotten out, because that's what they're saying, and on Palm Sunday, when he comes into town, Hosanna, Hosanna, save now, that's what the word means, deliver now, son of David, direct descendant of David, because every king that sat on the throne, after David, beginning with David's son Solomon, and then Rehoboam, and on down, every one of them was a direct blood descendant of David the king, and the only one with the credentials to sit on the throne of Israel, to this day, is Yeshua

[40:20] Hamashiach, Jesus the Messiah, and one day, he will sit on that throne, and he told his twelve disciples, you who have followed me in the regeneration, shall also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes, when the son of man comes into his kingdom, my, oh, my, he called out saying, Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me, and those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet, but he kept crying out all the more, can you imagine these people saying, be quiet, hush, hush, can you imagine, and he's thinking, it's easy for you to say, you're not the one sitting here blind as a bat, you would tell me to be quiet, and again, this man had to have heard by way of the grapevine and people talking, about Jesus' miraculous healing ministries, and here is my chance, and you expect me to say nothing, to be quiet, the man screaming, yelling, crying out, son of

[41:41] David, have mercy on me, and Jesus stopped, Jesus stopped, that, and commanded that he be brought to him, he hears this man crying out, Jesus stops in his tracks, and he turns to one of the apostles and says, go get that guy, and bring him here, we don't know how great the crowd was, but there were a significant number of people there, you can be sure, and a lot of confusion, and a lot of believers, and some unbelievers, and a mixed multitude, and Jesus says, go fetch that man, bring him here, when he had come near, he questioned him, what do you want me to do for you, and he said,

[42:48] Lord, I want to receive my sight, and Jesus said to him, receive your sight, your faith has made you well, well, yes and no, actually it was Jesus that made him well, but why did Jesus do that?

[43:08] It was because this man, obviously, had faith, confidence, trust, reliance in Jesus, that he could do that, and that's why I cried out to him, and Jesus honored the man's faith by healing him.

[43:28] Immediately, he received his sight, and began following him, glorifying God, and when all the people saw it, they gave praise to God.

[43:47] They knew there was no other possible explanation for what had happened. There was no denying it. Seeing is believing, and this man's seeing is believing, and by the way, these are almost all local situations, and don't you think the locals were very familiar with this man?

[44:09] Don't you think they were accustomed to seeing him? After all, how far does a blind man stray from his own digs? He was a local boy, they all knew him, and that just added to the confidence of it all, because there was no denying as to what happened.

[44:28] And the only question is, how did he do that? How could he do that? How could such power be given to a person who looks like one of us, dresses like one of us, eats food like one of us, and he's doing, who is this really?

[45:00] We know who he appears to be, but who is he really? I'll tell you who he is. He is God in the flesh, and it was no more problem for him to heal this blind man than it was for him to say, let there be light, and there was light, let the earth bring full and abundance, and it did, and he created man out of the dust of the ground.

[45:24] This is the same one. Questions or comments, anybody? Okay, well thank you for your kind attention, and I don't want to, I thought the food would be here by now, so I timed this to quit about this time, but we can, if you got questions, we'll be glad to take them, if you don't, why, thank you for your kind attention.

[45:56] Yeah, Roger? Well, you know, I asked them when they put this new heart in me, he said, what do you have to do? Do you have to shock that thing or flick it or something?

[46:06] They said, no, when we turn the blood on and it fills that blood, it starts pumping. And I thought, wow. Isn't that amazing? You know, it's almost like the heart has a mind of its own.

[46:20] I remember talking to Dr. Naravetla, and mine's coming up now, let's see, what is it, uh, uh, uh, coming up on 12 years since I had my four bypasses, and I was talking to Dr.

[46:35] Naravetla, and I said, uh, I understand that you, uh, you do some heart procedures without the heart-lung machine, that you don't have to go on the heart-lung machine.

[46:48] And he said, yes, I do. And I said, uh, can you do that with me? And he said, oh, no. He said, no, can't do that with you. He said, you've got too much work that needs to be done. I said, oh, well.

[47:00] Because if you don't have to go on that machine, then they don't have to stop the heart and everything. And there are certain procedures that he can do when he opens you that he doesn't stop the heart. And how in the world you can work on a beating heart, I don't know.

[47:12] And he says, no, we'll have to put you out. And I said, well, when it comes time to start back up again, what happens? And he said, well, we administer a slight shock to the heart and it starts beating again.

[47:27] And I said, what if it doesn't start? And he said, well, we shock it again. And I didn't want to ask you.

[47:41] But, you know, it's just, I still can't believe to this day and I know Roger has to feel the same way, only his was more extensive than mine because he didn't have his heart worked on.

[47:52] He had his heart taken out and another heart put in. And it's just, it is mind boggling.

[48:02] I have difficulty believing that they opened my chest and stopped my heart and had my blood circulating through a machine and me breathing through a machine while he made connections with four different bypasses from veins that he'd taken from my leg so it wouldn't be foreign tissue.

[48:34] And you know something? To this day, I do not recall chest pain before or after the surgery.

[48:46] And of course, I know I was on meds and that deadened it somewhat, but I never did have pain from that. So that's just absolutely incredible. Well, the food is here, and thank you ladies for the excellent service you provide.

[49:02] Thank you.