The Healing Word

Pastor Jack Morris: Paul said, "I found out one thing, there's only one thing that's going to stand. Everything else is transitory and will not remain. That that will remain is Jesus." Hallelujah. And the beauty that he brings into my life, even Satan himself can't take it away. It'll stand forever.

Guest (Male): Today on "The Healing Word," Pastor Jack Morris joins us once again to conclude the series "Living by Faith: Freedom Found in Christ." With a powerful message titled "Ugliness Into Beauty," we'll see how Jesus himself took upon himself the curse of sin and transformed what was broken, shameful, and ugly into redemption, hope, and new life. Only God can turn a curse into a blessing, and he did it through the cross of Christ. Let's join Pastor Morris now.

Pastor Jack Morris: I was thinking of this time of the year, Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday, and how many times I've told this story that I'm going to tell you again today. I'm going to tell it perhaps differently, but basically, it's that same old, old story that we love to hear and it brings rejoicing to our hearts because it's so wonderfully changed our lives. But I thought after all of these years of preaching and telling this story, how I have told it, how I'm going to tell it again today, and I question myself and I question everyone else and all the other pastors here. Who can really tell the story?

I don't think any human can really tell this beautiful story. I've attempted with stammering lips throughout the years to tell the story. I've used rhetoric and logic, illustrations and stories, and theological exposition trying to tell in human language to human people a story that goes beyond anything that is human. It's a heavenly story. It's a story about God's love. But that love is too deep to plumb and too high to scale. The story about God's love come down, the love of heaven coming down, making contact with the sin of earth.

About that redeeming rescue that God made of each one of us who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and are believing on the Lord Jesus Christ today. A rescue from the regions of the damned to the celestial transcending glory of heaven. Now, who can talk about that region of the damned? Who knows anything about it? Who knows anything about that celestial transcending glory of heaven? Who knows anything about that? How can that be described, talked about, explained, expounded? Where can I get a story or an illustration to really bring it vividly to your mind?

Sometimes I feel like my work is so frustrated. I've tried and tried again. And then I find this commentary, the "Communicator's Commentary" by Dr. Dunham, and I read what he had to say. And he said, "Language defies us as we seek to understand Jesus' mighty act on our behalf. A mere surface reflection upon it leads us to exclaim it's too good to be true. But when we reflect more deeply, it causes us to be dumbstruck. We are without adequate speech to make our response."

Then I'll go on just a little bit more. God alone knows all that he did on the cross. The best intellects of 20 centuries have not been able to plumb its depth. Friend, you and I really do not know how much God loves us and all that he went through to save us and to bring us. I don't really know what else to say, but let's praise the Lord. Let's rejoice in Christ. Let's sing the Hosannas of the Lord. All hail King Jesus. I don't know what all you've done, but you've done it. And today we're saved in Christ. Our names are in heaven in the Book of Life.

In your outline on line A, write down the word "beauty." Beauty turned into ugliness. I want to talk about it, to chronicle that story. How that beautiful tree was made ugly. I'm told that in and around Jerusalem in the days of Christ, there were a lot of trees. But there was one tree, a beautiful tree, a magnificent specimen of God's creation. A tree that towered high above all other trees. Debased, degraded men took that tree in hand and cut it down.

And they denuded it of its leaves, they tore off its branches, they ripped off its bark, and then they cut its body in two and made a cross, a cruel, ugly cross. That beautiful, magnificent specimen of God's creation men made it ugly. They turned it into an instrument of execution. This is how the Romans executed people who were traitors of the government and enemies of the people. This is their way of capital punishment. And they took that beautiful tree and made it into the most ugly instrument of death. People would look at it and shudder in horror at what had been done to that tree. These debased, these degraded men did that to that beautiful tree.

But in Jerusalem at that time, there was a young man living. His name was Jesus Christ. And he was a beautiful person. He was holy, he was pure, he was good, he was compassionate. He took children and blessed them. He laid his hands on the sick and healed them. He brought the saving grace of God, the very presence of God. What more could a person do? The Bible said he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed of the devil. That beautiful man.

Well, debased, degraded men took that beautiful man in hand and they stripped him of his garments and then they gambled for his seamless robe. And when they were done having their fun, they took that pure body that was born of the virgin, they took that pure body, that stripped body, and they nailed that pure body, that stripped body, to that stripped tree. And then they lifted both of them up above the earth, that stripped body and that stripped tree. They dug a hole in the ground and they plunged one end of that tree down into that hole.

The vertical beam was pointing up to heaven. It was saying to all the world that this is the way to heaven. This is the gate of heaven. This is none other than the door of heaven. This is the way to God. And the outstretched beams of that cross, reaching out to the east and to the west as far as the east and the west can go to encompass the whole world, saying, "God so loved the world." God reaching out to embrace all people. It was an ugly scene, but the message was beautiful.

Look at point B in your outline and write down the word "ugliness." Ugliness turned into beauty. It's strange, it really is, but it certainly is no secret that men make things ugly. God started a beautiful garden and he called it Eden. It was a paradise, but men polluted it. Everywhere men go, they pollute the rivers and the streams. They dirty the streets and they throw out their garbage. We're always having to clean up after one another. We just make things dirty and make beautiful things ugly.

I see young couples get married and I'm always happy for them. I really am, most of the time. Occasionally I wonder, but most of the time. And they're so beautiful, and they're starting a new marriage, a new home, a new life, a new family. It's beautiful. They're beautiful. They're saying such beautiful things. They take such beautiful vows. They make such beautiful promises. And then what happens to 50 percent of all of those people who stand there and take those beautiful vows and go through that beautiful ceremony and all of that beautiful dressing and beautiful flowers and beautiful decorations?

And then somebody comes around and says, "Pastor, my marriage is hell on earth." But it started out so beautiful. What happened? And I see young people, their lives are so beautiful. I love them. They sing, they inspire me. They're so pure when they're born and they're so sweet and they're naive and so innocent. And then they start making choices as they begin to grow older. And they make some good choices, but some of them make some really bad choices, bad decisions.

And that that started out so beautiful, so naive and so innocent, sometimes turns out so ugly. What happens? People make things ugly. But I'm happy to say God makes things beautiful. And God can turn it all around again. Those lives made ugly, he can turn them around and make them beautiful. Those marriages made ugly, he can turn them around and make them beautiful. God will touch and beautify when we bring ourselves, our marriages, our situations within his reach so he can touch.

The touch of God will bring beauty. Ugliness turned into beauty. Yes, they, the debased men, those soldiers, made the tree that was beautiful ugly. They made that life, the most pure, beautiful life that ever lived and walked on this earth, God himself indwelt that body, Jesus of Nazareth. They made him so ugly. So ugly. They bruised him, they beat him with a Roman whip and tore his flesh. He was a ghastly sight. His visage, the Bible says, was marred more than any man.

I mean, he was so bloody, so beaten, so torn, torn that people looked upon him and wondered, "Am I looking at a human?" They didn't even recognize him. He was that beaten. But let me tell you something about God, what God can do. What God can do, he can turn ugliness into beauty. And if there's ugliness in your home, in your life today, the good news is that God can turn that ugliness into beauty. You need to bring that ugliness to him, put it in his hands, and let him do the miraculous, the supernatural.

That dead man and that dead tree, are you listening to me? That dead man and that dead tree is alive. They live again. Men can kill and make ugly and destroy, but God can resurrect and can heal and make whole. God can do it when we give the ugliness, the death, the conflict, the destruction, when we give it to him. That dead man lives again. After the agony was over, some men came and separated his dead body from that dead wood. They separated and they took him down.

But let me tell you something, inseparable in mind, in history, in thought, is that man and that tree. For 2,000 years, we can't get that man or that tree out of our mind or out of the history books. We're still singing about that man. We're still singing about that tree. That man lives again. That tree is alive. This is what God can do. And God continues to do that. The agony was over, thank God. Men had done their best, or better put, men had done their worst.

But now it's God's turn. Watch what God does. Look at his hand of mercy and watch what he does. The good news was he's alive. The angel said, "Go tell the disciples he's alive." Did you hear the good news? That man you saw on the cross, bleeding, writhing, his body would writhe in pain until he died. That man who was taken down and separated from the wood, that man who was put in the tomb, he's alive. Tell his disciples he is alive.

He is alive. I want you right now, turn to your neighbor and people in front of you and back of you, take a few minutes, tell one another, remind one another he's alive. Come on, he's alive. Yes, he's alive. Tell everybody he is alive. Do you know that news spread from heart to heart until all Jerusalem heard the good news that he's alive? He's alive. Who's alive? That man out there on that cross, Jesus of Nazareth, who blessed our children, who healed our sick, who brought the presence of God to us.

Men killed him, but he's alive. He's alive. And it began to spread. It spilled over into Judea, into Samaria. It ran like liquid fire along the Roman roads until everybody in the Mediterranean region knew that he's alive. He's alive. He's alive. That man made ugly by sin is alive. That's the good news. And God beautified that that was ugly. God resurrected that that was dead. God purified that and sanctified that that men made impure and ugly.

Friend, that tree lives again. Yeah, it's alive, that tree. We still sing about it. We still preach about it. We love that tree. We call it the old rugged cross, that instrument of execution. You see, if he had been hung on a gallows, I would have had a noose up here this morning. There would have been a noose. Or if he had gone to the electric chair, there would have been an electric chair up here. I'd have had an electric chair mounted up there.

It was just capital punishment. If it were a gas chamber, I'd have a gas chamber up here. But you see what has happened, that that was ugly, look how beautiful. You see how proud and boastful we are. Yes, decorate the churches on every pew, on every aisle, there's a cross. There's a cross on the steeples of churches, there's a cross. Women wear the necklace of a cross. Men pin it on their lapel. On the steeples of churches, whole cathedrals have been built by architects in the shape of a cross.

Beautiful gems, silver and gold has been cast and fashioned. Yes, that that was ugly, that that caused us to shudder, today we rejoice. We glory because it's the gateway to heaven. We would not know God without it. There would be only one place for us without the cross, and that would be the place of damnation forever and ever. But because of the cross, made ugly by man but made beautiful by God, you and I can come to church and sing those hymns and worship God and praise him forever and ever.

That that was a symbol of ugliness now has become a symbol of beauty, a symbol of resurrection. And I look at it, some of us make the form of the cross over us. We rejoice, we're proud, we boast in the cross. In a city called Macau, that is part of a colony that was established by the Portuguese, now with the oversight of Red China. There on a high, high hill is the facade of an old cathedral called St. Paul's Cathedral. There are steps, magnificent steps, high, long steps from the heart of the city that lead steeply all the way up to that hill.

And to that facade of the old church, and there stands a cross, a huge cross overlooking that city. Years ago, there was a great earthquake followed by fire, followed by storm. And the beautiful cathedral came down, but the cross remains. And to this day, that cross is still there. It still stands. And a number of years ago back in the 1800s, a man by the name of John Bowring went to Macau and he looked upon that cross on that high hill, and he was so impressed that he wrote that beautiful hymn.

What is the name of it? "In the Cross of Christ I Glory." He was so impressed by what he saw. Friend, it's not what we see here this morning, these crosses, but it's what you see when you close your eyes and you see the cross imprinted upon your heart. And you know that you're part of God's victory. That you are part of that plan of victory and you are now sharing in that victory because that cross has brought you to Jesus, into the presence of God. And you're a Christian today with a hope of eternity in your heart.

There's going to be storms, just like in the city of Macau. There's going to be storms spiritually speaking in your life and in mine, in your marriage, in your home, in your family. There's going to be storms. There's going to be things that are going to shake you and shake your family like an earthquake. This is life, and this is how life is. But regardless of what happened at Macau, everything else came down, but that that remained was the eternal promise of God through Jesus Christ.

Friend, I don't know what might come your way or what has already come your way into your life, into your family, and what has shaken you. But if you have the cross within you, the promise of God within you, the experience of redemption within you, all hell can't shake you down. You're going to stand and you're going to live and you're going to rejoice and you will abide when all else is gone away. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but the word of God will stand forever. Are you in the word? Is the word in you? Then you're part of that which is eternal.

You've been redeemed. The Apostle Paul said, and I'm going to read from Galatians chapter 6 verse 14. He said, "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world." I'm not going to boast in anything. I'm not going to brag about anything because the things I boast in and the things I brag about and the things that make me so happy and I start telling everybody about, I only end up getting disappointed, Paul is saying.

I brag about my children, they disappoint me. I brag about my marriage and it fails. I brag about my job and I lose it. I brag about whatever. Paul said, "I found out one thing, there's only one thing that's going to stand. Everything else is transitory and will not remain. That that will remain is Jesus." Hallelujah. And the beauty that he brings into my life, even Satan himself can't take it away. It'll stand forever. Friend, do you know him today? Bring your heart to him. Bring your home to him. Bring your marriage to him. Bring your children to him. Bring anything that is ugly in your life, bring it to him and he'll transform it and make it beautiful. That's his promise.

Guest (Male): What a powerful conclusion to this series. Jesus took the curse we deserved and replaced it with blessing, freedom, and new life. What once represented shame has become the greatest symbol of God's love and redemption. Thank you for joining us for "Living by Faith: Freedom Found in Christ." May you continue to walk in the freedom Jesus has already secured for you.

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