Will Your Faith Lead You to Salvation?

The people who are gathered in front of Jesus did not understand that this bread was provided by God, they thought Moses had fed the people. The bread was sent from heaven to supply for the physical needs of the people. The people do not understand that Jesus can fill them in a way that no bread is able to. It is evident that this crowd does not yet understand what it means to be a true disciple of Jesus.

In the book of Mark, Jesus goes on to warn us that “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear. Consider carefully what you

Pastor David took an interesting approach to preaching this particular passage in which Jesus' feet are washed by the sinful woman who cleans his feet and anoints them with perfume to the ire of Simon the Pharisee. Jesus uses this as an opportunity to use a parable to teach about grace and its availability to everyone. After reading the passage he began to break down the different perspectives of the characters in the story as if analyzing a play. He examined the perspective of the woman, Simon, Jesus and the others at the dinner.

They used Jesus miracles to help all the people to understand his messages of compassion and love for all and to follow in his footsteps. The miracle of the two blind man shows us that we should recognise our need to show compassion. This miracle is an example of literary and symbolic

Situation: Langston, a young boy goes to his Auntie Reed’s church for the revival. The little church was hot, and crowded. They people were “preaching, singing, praying, and shouting some very hard sinners”. At the end of the revival, they held a special meeting for the children, “to bring the young lambs to the fold. Langston was among the few lambs that are preparing to be saved by jesus. As Langston was waiting for Jesus to come the preacher said "Won't you come? Won't you come to Jesus? Young lambs, won't you come?” The boy waited a long time to see Jesus, Westley another boy having the same problem seeing Jesus lied about seeing him, and all the other kids dancing, and shouting that they “saw” Jesus. Therefor he lied about seeing Jesus because everyone else was done, and was waiting for him. Langston did not see the light, and never saw jesus, and cried because of it.

Introduction The passage John 9:1-12 tells the story of Jesus and the blind man. This passage highlights one of the many miracles Jesus performed throughout the Bible. Jesus uses the blind man to show his disciples that just because someone is suffering doesn't mean it was caused by their sin.

What does this story say about Jesus? Jesus is patient, caring, and wise. Though knowing the shallowness of his follower’s belief and the narrowness of his disciple’s perceptions, he still tested and asked his disciples to search out a solution for themselves. He was therefore better able to teach them and demonstrate his power and care for the people there. Though Jesus calls his followers to abandon everything to follow him, he is not cruel, but caring and wise in completely providing for them. He is the giver of life, fulfilling not only our earthly need but our spiritual cravings as

In accordance to the previous passage, Paul argues his case on being saved by faith by giving a few examples from Israel’s history. His first example is Abraham, forefather of the Jews, who “believed in God, and it was counted to Him for righteousness” (Genesis 15:6). That one verse alone says it all. Abraham was several years old before he was called, and he had failed a few times in his obedience, and even in his faith. And yet, he was justified long before the call, before his circumcision, before his story in the Bible even began. Why? It wasn’t because of any righteous deeds. It wasn’t because he was without sin. He just believed in God, and this was long before any Biblical Law was established. There was no rite necessary for

They told him not to give glory to Jesus because Jesus was a sinner. I love the blind man’s response: “I don’t know whether he is a sinner or not but one thing I do know….I was blind, and now I can see!” The blind man was not a Pharisee. The blind man was not a theologian. The blind man had never been to seminary. All he did was share his personal encounter with the Savior of the world that completely changed his life forever! He didn’t even have to use any big church words! When we share the personal story of what Jesus has done in our lives with others, we are sharing the Good news of the gospel. We are sharing hope with them and we are creating an appetite and hunger for Jesus Christ. I want you to think for a moment about how Jesus has impacted your life and ponder how you can take those encounters with Christ and share them with others. I hope you are able to remember all of the great things that Christ has done in your life. I’ll admit as I get older that my mind may allow me to forget things from time to time but for some reason I remember lots of things that have no eternal significance. Does that ever happen to you? Why do we forget some of the most important things in our life but we remember with great accuracy some of those things that are not as important in the great scheme of

Sometimes, God’s voice isn’t subtle at all. There are times when something is important enough, or we are hardheaded enough, that He speaks to us in the only way that gets our attention. He grabs us by the shirt collar and demands our undivided focus.

Also we must know that there are the hands of God that are unseen – even though we say that we know, we do not know – and we say we can see but we cannot see – there are these hands of God that we cannot see – if we ask for help then there are these hands that help us.

Many people saw the poor man who was, "stripped of his clothes ", beaten, and left, "half dead ", but they all just, "passed by on the other side.”(Luke 10:30-31) The author uses imagery to show the state of which the poor man was in after being attacked. Many people walked past this tattered man including a Levite and ironically, even a priest, but nobody stopped even momentarily to lend a helping hand. Walking along the same trail, the Samaritans saw the man,

As a consequence of failing to cast out a demon from a boy in Matthew 17:20, the apostles came to Jesus in private to ask why; thus, Jesus explanation to the apostles centered on the failure to have faith, and misplaced authority conferred to the apostles by Christ in a previous command (Pentecost, 1981). Hence, the apostles were unable to cast out the demon as a result of a dependence on previous experiences, rather than the personhood of Christ (Pentecost, 1981, p. 261). Thus, Jesus’ lesson to the apostles, through this miracle, focused on the dependence of God to perform the miracle through faith; furthermore, Jesus teaching also revealed that faith, not position, would allow the apostles to carry on Jesus’ ministry in the days ahead (Pentecost, 1981). While Jesus demonstrated great power over the realms of nature and demons, Jesus also revealed authority over physical ailments such as blindness; however, in the case of the blind man in John 9:1-12, Jesus not only healed the blind man but also revealed to the apostles, and to the nation of Israel, the spiritual blindness that Jesus had come to remove (Pentecost,

After Pentecost, all the believers met every day at the Temple for worship and fellowship. The Church Age had begun, but they had not abandoned their Jewish customs (Wall, R. W., 2002). They looked upon themselves not as former Jews, but as the only Jews true to their heritage, for they alone had accepted Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. On a certain day Peter and John went up to the Temple at the ninth hour (about three o 'clock in the afternoon). Their purpose was to pray, but they were also looking for opportunities to spread the fame of Jesus according to Gen, R. M. (1989). They noticed there was a beggar resting on their way in. He was sitting near one of the gates, called Beautiful, and asking people to give him alms (which is money). Passers-by took pity on him because they could see he was lame and unable to support himself (Wall, R. W., 2002). In those days, someone with a severe disability such as this could not get help from the government, because there were no such things as welfare programs back then (Wall, R. W., 2002). Nor could he count on the financial support of his own relatives, because most families were very poor. They expected every adult member to bring in money, even if the only way was by begging. If a man had to beg because he was disabled, his family might leave him every day in a good place for attracting sympathy according to Hemer, C. J. (1989). The entrance to the Temple was especially good because people going to worship God were more likely to

However, in light of this narrative, Jesus spiritual meaning for this phrase shines forth. Jesus is the light of the world. As long as Jesus is in the world, he shines forth. Even when Jesus left the world, his light still shone through his followers. Jesus’ sole purpose in life was to restore mankind—to allow people to spiritually see. However, Jesus uses a physical example to show his spiritual message. After Jesus healed the man, the man was questioned for a great while by the Pharisees, and at the end of the questioning, the man was kicked out of the temple. Jesus again found him, but this time, opened the eyes to his heart. Jesus is the light of the world to show people the way—to become spiritually unblind. When Jesus said this phrase to the woman, he was showing her that he has come to make her spiritually free. Although the Festival (with its lights) was over, Jesus still shone to all. When Jesus said this phrase to the disciples in regards of the blind man, we has showing that he alone had to power to open a man’s eyes and allow them to see the truth of the Gospel message.