The Healing Word

Guest (Male): The Healing Word Ministry on One Place is brought to you by the generous donations of people like you. At any time during today's message, feel free to send a prayer request or make a donation using the links provided. Now, I pray you will be blessed as Pastor Jack Morris delivers a message from the Word of God that will encourage and strengthen your faith in Him.

Pastor Jack Morris: You can't love without doing something. You can't say, "Oh, I'm so sorry. Goodbye." You can't do that. Jesus was filled with compassion, and compassion on the inside now becomes visible on the outside. He reached out, and compassion is not complete until it connects.

Welcome to the Healing Word, a radio ministry of the Largo Community Church. Here's Pastor Jack Morris with today's message that will grow your faith in God and lead you to a closer walk with Jesus.

Israel prays for deliverance. We're going to look at Exodus chapter 2, verses 23 through 25. There it is on the screen, and I want you to look at it and read it with me in unison. "During that long period, the King of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God. God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and with Jacob. So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them."

Now they were in a harsh, cruel, bitter existence, the Israelites. And then something happened. It happened in their mind. They remembered, "Hey, I'm a Hebrew. I'm an Israelite. I'm a child of God. What am I doing in this mess?" They remembered that God made a covenant with Abraham. Abraham was their grandpa. It wasn't that far removed. It was Abraham, Abraham had a son Isaac, Isaac had a son Jacob, and it was Jacob who wrestled with God and God changed his name to Israel, which means a struggling with God.

And that's why Israel is called Israel today, the people. That's why the nation on the map is called Israel. It all started with Jacob, and it all started this release from slavery when the people remembered, "I am a child of God. God made a promise to Abraham, my grandfather, and it extends to me. It didn't stop with him, but it comes to me also." And they believed and they acted on that promise and God eventually liberated them. They remembered their heritage.

Now, verse 23 says, "Their cry for help went up to God." When we're in bad straits, difficult times, when we cry out to God, those prayers go up to God. They went up to God and verse 25 says, "God looked and was concerned about them." So while I'm looking up, God is looking down. When I'm praying up, God is sending his blessing down. But remember, it's all in remembering who you are. You have to remember God's saving. Do you remember when God saved you, forgave your sins, the place?

You remember when you were baptized, gave testimony, and the presence of God was there in a great way giving testimony through your baptism. Remember when you took your first holy communion? You said, "Hey, this is I'm starting my journey now in the Lord. I'm going to grow now in His grace." You have to remember, remember, remember. And in remembering, the prayer will come, the faith will be developed, God will bless, and the answer will come. And God looked on their situation. Their cry came before him.

The scripture says in Hebrews 4:15, "God is touched with the feelings of our infirmities." He sees our weaknesses and our problems and our difficulties and the straits that we're in, and he's touched by that. Now, the word touched and the word compassion can be used interchangeably. God is touched with the feeling of our infirmities.

Here's how compassion works. We read in Mark chapter 1 that Jesus was met by a leper. There was no cure for leprosy. This man was hopeless. He had lost everything: his family, his association. He was just an outcast, "Unclean, unclean," he would cry out. So his hopeless situation caused him to come to Jesus. And he remembered that Jesus was healing people, and he goes to Jesus and he said, "Now, if you're willing, you can heal me. You can do something for me, something that no one else can do for me. You can do it."

And the scripture says Jesus was filled with compassion. Filled. Let me turn over here and look at it with you. The scripture says, "If you are willing, you can make me clean." Verse 41: "Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man." Now, notice. Filled with compassion. Compassion does three things. First, there's compassion. That's inside. That's in my emotion. Jesus' emotion was filled with compassion. But compassion doesn't stop there. He then reaches out, and then he touched.

So there it is: one, two, three. You can't love without doing something. You can't say, "Oh, I'm so sorry. Goodbye." You can't do that. Jesus was filled with compassion, and compassion on the inside now becomes visible on the outside and he reached out. And compassion is not complete until it connects. He touched the man, and now the man is healed.

So here is God looking down on these Hebrews in the terrible, terrible condition that they were in, and there was no one to help them. They didn't have an army, a police force. They weren't allowed to develop their own nation, no government, nothing. Absolutely nothing. When you don't have nothing, look up. Look up. There's a God that cares for you, who saved you, who put your name in the book of life, who promises to be with you in all of life.

His promises are real. His promises are true. God does great and mighty things for those who look up and trust him and pray to him. God will do great and mighty things. And so the Israelites remembered and they prayed. Point B in your outline says God prepares now a deliverer. You see, God just didn't look on the Hebrews, feel sorry for them, but now God's going to do something for them. Compassion always reaches out. Compassion always touches. Compassion is God's love reaching out and touching us where we are in greatest need.

Now, no one in Israel knew that God was doing something. But God was. It was invisible. To look at Jesus when that leper was there, nobody knew his heart was filled with compassion. Nobody can see in a person's heart. You can't see until it starts coming out. And Jesus began to reach out. Something's happening. Something's going on inside that man named Jesus. Look at his arm. It's starting to move. But here Israel had no idea that God saw them in their terrible state. They had no idea that God was already doing something.

Listen, friend, listen to me today. God is already working in your behalf provided you've remembered who you are and you've prayed. If you've prayed, God's at work. He's doing something. Hallelujah. Don't wait and moan and complain and say God forgot me and begin to feel like a martyr. Not at all. God is working when we don't know that he's working, when we don't see him working. God was preparing a deliverer, and they didn't know that.

Now, 70 people went down into Egypt many years before. Joseph was already down there. Jacob, whose name was Israel, was living in the land of what we now call Israel. And there was a great famine, seven years of famine. They were nearly out of everything. They were going to literally starve to death, and all their flocks. So they loaded up their wagons, and 70 of them went down into Egypt where there was food. And they took their flocks and Pharaoh gave them favor and gave them the land of Goshen because these were shepherds. And so 70 went down, but nearly three million went up out.

Now, here one woman becomes pregnant. Who would have thought that God would have started a great deliverance, a great redemption by getting a woman pregnant? But he did, didn't he? Now, there had to be a lot of women to get pregnant to go from 70 to 3 million. And that wasn't an unusual thing for a woman to get pregnant, but in this situation her name was Jochebed and the little boy, the son in her womb, was named Moses.

God was doing a great thing. But it was out of sight. It was invisible. Nobody knew what was going on. But God knew. "These are my people. I'm going to liberate them, and I'm doing it in such a way that they'll know that it's God. It's the power of God. It's not by their power. It's not by might nor by power, not by man's might, not by man's ingenuity—that's what that might nor by power—not by man's ingenuity, not by man's power, but by my Spirit! By my Spirit! By my Spirit!" That's how God moves. And God is moving in your life. Have you prayed about it? Have you prayed about it? I don't know what's going on, but have you prayed about it? If you have, God's at work and God's doing something.

I'm Pastor Jack Morris. I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your prayers and your donations, in that order—prayers and donations. I need both from you, and if this ministry is to continue, and I believe it's God's will for it to continue, I'm going to need your partnership more so than ever before. I thank God for you. I trust that the Healing Word is a blessing. Pray that God's Word will go forth in mighty power to the saving of souls and the healing of lives, emotions, and bodies. God bless you, dear one. In Jesus' name, Amen.

God's timing is always on time. You know, there were several women in the Bible that God used their pregnancy to bring about a great victory for his people. Jochebed was certainly one. There was even before her, going back to Abraham and Sarah in their old age. Who would have known that God was going to prepare and start preparing from way back there all the way to Jesus? That's where it all started, with Abraham. He became the first believer. He was an idol worshiper. He was a heathen before he was a Hebrew. He was a heathen worshiper, a cultured, intelligent, educated, wealthy man.

But he was still a heathen. And then he turned to the Lord. God saw something in that man's heart that would respond to faith. And so God spoke to him, and sure enough his heart responded to faith. He believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness. It connected him with God. It made him one with God. And God said, "I'm going to make you a great nation." He said, "A great nation? It's just my wife and me, and we're old. We don't even have one kid. We don't have one child. And you talk about a great nation? We've got to have some babies, at least one to get started."

And so God gave them a child, and it all started. Even Sarah thought, "This is ridiculous." But you know, God does things that sometimes will amaze us, but it's so simple. It's the simplicity that sometimes will cause the amazement to come. How about Elizabeth and Zechariah? God was going to send a Messiah, but he needed a John the Baptist to be a forerunner for the Messiah. And so here comes the forerunner, John the Baptist. Elizabeth has become pregnant. How about Mary becoming pregnant with Jesus to build the nation called the Church of Jesus Christ?

Well, here is Jochebed now pregnant with Moses. God getting ready to bring a great liberation. Three million people he's going to set free through a baby, an infant, a fetus in a woman's womb. Well, it took time. God is not in a hurry. His time is always right. But when his time comes, victory comes in such a way that is undeniable and it lasts forever. Friend, when your victory comes—and your victory is coming—just be patient. And your victory will last forever. It won't be a short-lived thing at all.

Moses, he tried his best on his own, but it didn't work. You see, he had to go to Pharaoh's house to live. Pharaoh's daughter found him down at the Nile in that little wicker basket. He was trained in all of the education of Egypt: military, mathematics. These were some of the key curriculum of education for the Egyptians. They were a highly civilized nation at that time. And here he had all of that training. And then when he became a man, he thought, "Well, I'll deliver Israel now."

He knew that God had called him to do a special thing, and he acted on his own. He kills an Egyptian. And then God put him on the backside of the desert. Sometimes we want God to fix it now, fix it right now. I feel that way too. I want him to fix my problems today. I don't want to wait anymore. But God knows when to fix it. But after about 80 some years on the backside of the desert, God finally speaks to this man and he says, "Now you're ready. You're ready to trust me. You're ready to stop trusting yourself. You're ready to put your faith and confidence in me." And he called to Moses.

It was a long way from that wicker basket on the Nile to the burning bush in the desert. A lot of time had gone by. Friend, don't give up. Don't give up. You hear me? Everybody say, "Don't give up." Don't give up. God is moving. You may not see it, but God is almighty. He sits upon the throne of heaven. You're his child. Please remember who you are, who you're connected with. It is not you; it's him. And he's going to do the great and the mighty thing. And so God gives a deliverer.

Now I want you to read Exodus chapter 6, verse 1. Do we have that? There it is on the screen. Now read it together in unison. "Then the Lord said to Moses, 'Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh. Because of my mighty hand, he will let them go. Because of my mighty hand, he will drive them out of his country.'"

Now look at it. "Then the Lord said." Not right away, but after all of this preparation, after all of this time. Then it was God's time. Then the Lord said. You see, Pharaoh did all the evil that he could do and God says, "Now it's my time. Now it's my time." Then the Lord said to Moses, "Now you will see. You haven't seen before. Everything has been in preparation. Everything has been invisible. Everything has been out of sight. But I have been working. Now you will see it. You have to believe it, now you're going to see what I will do to Pharaoh because of my mighty hand he will let them go."

Now notice, two times: "because of my mighty hand," "because of my mighty hand." Say those words: "because of my mighty hand," "because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country." God is doing these things, not Pharaoh, not Moses, but God. And it's in God's time. Now's the time.

Now I want you to read Exodus 6:6. "Therefore say to the Israelites, 'I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment.'"

Now this is what God is going to do. Let me read the whole scripture here. Exodus 6:6. "Therefore say to the Israelites, 'I am the Lord.'" That's the first thing. They've got to know who's behind this thing. "Therefore say to the Israelites, 'I am the Lord.'" Notice, L-O-R-D all in caps, meaning I am Yahweh, I am Jehovah, there is no one beside me. There is no problem, no pain, no situation, no Pharaoh in your life or anybody's life. "I am the Lord. I'm in command here. I'm going to take charge."

Oh, I love this, I get so excited. "I am the Lord. I will bring you out." I'm going to do this from under the yoke of the Egyptians. "I will free you." Notice how many times in that verse: "I will free you from being slaves to them, I will redeem you." And I'll do it with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. Verse 7 says, "I will take you as my own people and I will be your God."