20 20 Vision

The disciples had forgotten to bring bread except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. Be careful, Jesus warned them. Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.

They discussed this with one another and said, it is because we have no bread. Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them, why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail to see and ears but fail to hear? And don't you remember when I broke the five loaves for the 5,000, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up? Twelve, they replied. And when I broke the seven loaves for the 4,000, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up? They answered, seven.

And he said to them, do you still not understand? They came to Bethsaida and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spat on the man's eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, do you see anything? He looked up and said, I see people.

They look like trees walking around. Once more, Jesus put his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

Jesus sent him home, saying, don't go into the village. Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way, he asked them, who do people say I am? They replied, some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and still others, one of the prophets.

But what about you, he asked, who do you say I am? Peter answered, you are the Christ. Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him. I believe that one of the things that God wants for you and for me is good spiritual vision.

I speak with feeling because my natural vision is fairly bad. Yet at the spiritual level, we are told on several occasions in Scripture that the Lord Jesus purposes for you and for me to know good vision. There is reference to our eyes being opened.

The Apostle Paul speaks about this as he writes to the Ephesians. He says in the first chapter in the eighteenth verse, I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. He uses a different metaphor when he writes to the Corinthians and says to them, I don't want you to be as infants.

I don't just want to give you milk. I want to feed you with meat. And when he is writing further to the Ephesians, he presses them towards maturity.

In fact, in the authorized version of the Bible, you will discover in the letter, I think it is to the Hebrews, the author there saying, go on, go on to maturity. Now don't misunderstand me. I do believe that when our Lord came on earth, not only did he have a concern for the spiritual, but also for the physical.

And I want to nail my colors right to the mask, just in case there are any who are questioning my position. I do believe that God acts miraculously today. I have no problems in that area whatsoever.

But what I think is that sometimes when you come to Scripture and the accounts of our Lord's miracles, you have to interpret the miracle, yes literally as the relief of blindness or leprosy as the case may be. But underlying the miracle, because our Lord is a fantastic teacher who uses audio-visual to get his message across, underlying the miracle is some spiritual truth that he is also endeavoring to apply to his audience, be it the disciples or a larger company of people. Now you come across this unfortunate man with his defective vision in Bethsaida, and you get this little cameo of his problem and the way that the Lord ministered to him.

It's unique. I mean by that you don't find it in any of the other Gospels. And as you look into this particular scene in this village, actually it's a little larger than a village, you are impressed by the fact that some people have come to the Lord with this man and asked Jesus for his help.

You're impressed by the fact that Jesus takes a man outside the village, and they're in sort of semi-private. He's got the disciples with him, but they're removed from the crowd of villagers. There he ministers to the man, and he does so uniquely by spitting on his eyes and putting his hands on him and asking him, do you see anything? And he responds that he's got partial vision back, and then Jesus ministers to him again and he sees everything clearly.

You ask yourself the question, why? Why the two stage? After all, with the exception of this, every other miracle our Lord performed, it was instantaneous. He speaks and sight is restored. Limbs come back into use.

Ears are unstopped. Then why on this occasion does our Lord seem to be short on omnipotence? Well, I say to you the answer is to be discovered as often is the case when difficult questions arise in Scripture in the context of the passage. In other words, what I'm arguing is this.

You can't fully comprehend all our Lord is teaching spiritually in the twenty-second through to the twenty-sixth verse of Mark unless you study fairly closely what is contained in the fourteenth verse through to the twenty-first verse and the twenty-seventh verse through to the thirtieth verse of that chapter. In other words, it's a sandwich. I'm arguing that as you look at the whole of that narrative, so you get insight into why our Lord Jesus ministers to this blind man on a couple of occasions.

Here are two or three questions. I'll perhaps put up another one during the course of my address. What was one of our Lord's chief goals as far as His disciples were concerned? Well, my answer is this.

He wants them to have full comprehension as to why it is that He has come on earth. He selects these men. Verse thirteen of chapter three makes it quite clear.

He has twelve men who He's going to discipline. They're going to be in His entourage. They're going to be in His school.

The evangelical school in Ramallah is not the first Christian school in inception. It's a school that our Lord Jesus is head of and He selects these twelve men. And His main concern actually is not to speak to a mass congregation of people.

Rather His main concern is to teach these men what He has to say about Himself and about His Father's purposes. Chapter nine and verse thirty makes it quite clear. Jesus did not want anyone to know where they were because He was teaching His disciples.

It was more important that His disciples understood why He'd come on earth, what was the basis of His ministry, than anything else. Because when He's being taken from the world, His disciples are to continue to do what He inaugurated. So the main objective of our Lord's teaching ministry is not to the mass.

It's to these handful of men. Another question that I put to is, what is the Lord's chief goal for you as a Christian? And my answer is, is almost the same. He wants you to come to an understanding, a full understanding, of the nature of the gospel and His call upon your life.

He wants the eyes of your understanding. Most curious expression that Paul uses there in Ephesians isn't it? Fancy the eyes of the heart. You don't imagine your heart as having eyes.

The eyes of your understanding. He wants an open, so that you can perceive, so that your vision spiritually is far better than mine is physically. He wants you to have twenty-twenty vision.

What was the chief feature amongst the larger audience that our Lord Jesus ministered to? And my answer is, they were dull. Verse twelve of Mark four will tell you. He's narrated parables.

He's used audiovisual as it's available in those days. He's talked about agricultural and farming scenes that they can actually see. Maybe He points them out in the distance.

But these people that He speaks to, by and large, are very defective in understanding what He's saying. And so He comments that their attitude, it fulfills the scriptural prediction. They may be ever seeing but never perceiving, ever hearing but never understanding.

Otherwise they might turn and be forgiven. Look at the seventh chapter and the sixth verse and you get exactly the same. When He talked about the deficiency of worship and the wrong attitude that people generally had towards Him and God His Father.

These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain. Their teachings are but rules taught by men.

And I could give you many examples from Mark's gospel to show you that the large number of people who attended the ministry of our Lord Jesus, they were very dull. Their vision was virtually non-existent. Now Jesus doesn't want His disciples like that.

He doesn't want you like that. This is why you see it's so imperative in our gathering together in a morning to be extended as far as our understanding is concerned of scripture. Preaching is not in.

I have waged war for 20 years in an argument that has less and less credibility in our nation. That the Word of God should be explained fully and at some reasonable length to people. Because the Word of God itself is that which builds you up spiritually.

Gives you stamina, understanding and ability to cope with life. In our modern world we don't like that sort of thing. We don't like to listen and to concentrate.

But our Lord is very concerned to teach His disciples so that they are different from the ordinary person in the crowd. So we find them in the 14th verse, that little picture that we get before we move into Bethsaida with this blind man at a central stage. We find our Lord is with His disciples on the Sea of Galilee and the disciples once more are embarrassed.

Mark 8 chapter 14. They've forgotten to bring their sandwiches. At least sufficient for all of them.

They've only got one loaf. And Jesus, He remarks in the 15th verse as they're on this boat about something that they relate to their bad memories. Be careful He says, watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.

Now they puzzle verse 16 what He's talking about and they come to the wrong conclusion. He's criticizing them because they don't have enough food. What Jesus was actually saying was that the yeast of the Pharisees, the evil intent in the hearts of the Pharisees that you come across throughout this gospel and indeed of the the servants of Herod was going to become so accentuated that it would become a dangerous principle that would be combating the disciples all the time.

So Jesus says watch out for them. But these men, they're not 20-20 in their spiritual vision are they? It's because we have no bread. And Jesus says well how on earth can you come to that conclusion? What are you talking about? Verse 17, about having no bread.

Do you still not see or understand? Are your eyes still hardened? Don't you remember it was only yesterday that I was feeding 5,000? Don't you recall a similar incident when I fed 4,000? Do you think that I would therefore be worried when you have only just got one loaf of bread? Would that be a problem to me? The problem was this. You've got hearts but they're hardened. You've got eyes but they fail to see.

You've got ears but they fail to hear. You've got a memory but it doesn't have good recall. And so Jesus picks up his question once again and says in verse 21, do you still not understand? Partial vision.

It wasn't that they had no comprehension. They didn't have full comprehension. The eyes of their heart had been quickened to some degree but not completely.

Now we can't criticize them because we're in the same boat, almost literally. One can use that illustration. We grow in grace and in the knowledge of God.

And one of the reasons why you dear friends who've lived 60, 70 years ought to be praising the Lord is because your knowledge of him has increased as the years have gone by. If it's not, then you need to confess and ask him to give you a greater thirst for his word, a greater understanding of his purposes in your life. Don't you still understand? Do you still not understand, says our blessed Lord? Repeated questions, says one commentator, concerning understanding indicates that the teaching goal in Jesus' ministry to the disciples has not been achieved.

It points forward to a miracle of illumination which is going to come in a little while. Now it's convenient. It's more than convenient.

It's within the providential control of our Lord Jesus that the boat comes into harbor at Bethsaida, this fairly populous village. So much so that it was actually given the rank of an ornery town by the Romans who were controlling that area. Some people bring this blind man.

Our focus is now upon this fellow to whom I directed your attention earlier. And Jesus takes him outside the city, outside the town, outside the village. Why? Well he wants the disciples on his own and also incidentally he's dealing with a man who's somewhat passive.

If you're blind you're always passive, aren't you? I mean by that that you depend upon other people. You find this with Bartimaeus. He's brought by the, he cries as Jesus goes by, as he's sitting by his beggars pitch.

He can't actively be involved in society. It must be awful to be blind, don't you think so? I only hope to God that we people who are Christian have great concerns for blind people and deaf people and don't pass them by. Their world is much smaller than yours and mine.

The best thing you can do to a blind person is to give him a hug or her provided you know them. Because the voice that you have, that's all that otherwise they can hear. They can't see you, can they? Touch is a remarkable thing, not just for blind people incidentally.

Most of us want in affectionate fashions to be touched. So our Lord takes this blind man with the disciples and he engages him in a relationship because that's how Jesus deals with people. Never on us, always individually.

And he spits on this man's eyes. I don't know why he spat. Some commentators suggest that here's our Lord sort of doffing his cap to the medical authorities.

Saliva is supposed to have some healing properties. Certainly if I cut my finger the first thing I do is put it in my mouth. So I guess there's some sort of reaction that's natural, whether it's healthy or not.

I don't know but I do it. He spits on the man's eyes. Maybe our Lord has in mind, and here the commentators may be running out on their imagination, I don't know, but maybe he has in mind that one day spittle is going to be directed at him in a contemptuous, hostile way.

You spit at a man in the East, you insult him. And Jesus is going to be insulted. They'll spit on him.

And after they spat on him a few hours he elapsed and they nail him to a cross and that's the biggest insult of all. Cursed is every man who dies on a cross. And maybe Jesus in some way is saying, perhaps not to this blind man who can't understand at this stage, but to his disciples, he's getting them ready for the time when he will be accursed of men.

Well you can accept that or not but it's interesting speculation. He spits on the man's eyes and he puts his hands on him and he says, do you see anything? And he says, yes. What do you see? I see men as trees walking.

And you know from that if you use a little bit of logic, a little bit of detective work, that the man wasn't born blind or else he wouldn't have been able to use the metaphor of the trees, wouldn't have known what a tree looked like. So he wasn't born blind from birth but he's obviously been blind for a long time. The optic nerve has gone, his recall is deficient but it's sufficient for him to say, I'm not focusing and it looks as though there are trees moving around.

I've got defective vision. So the blessed Jesus puts his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened.

His sight was restored. Here's the punchline. He saw everything clearly.

Not straightaway, though obviously our Lord could have healed him just like that. So the question comes up again, why didn't Jesus heal him just instantaneously? And the suggestions that I offer to those folk to whom I dedicate this address is maybe our Lord is ministering into an even greater need that he perceives. That of the small audience who is watching him minister, I refer to the disciples.

Do you still not understand? No, they didn't. They had problems about that loaf. They have problems with the Lord Jesus.

They are constantly having problems with the Lord Jesus. A blessed Savior is a man who stimulates intellectual problems when you come to read about his story. He wants them to begin to appreciate who he is.

You don't always take that in straightaway. In fact I don't know anyone who can. We're always growing, always getting a little bit more information.

But most of us here have hit the bottom line that at least we know this. He is more than just son of man. He is son of God.

So these disciples at this particular point in their spiritual appreciation of Jesus, they're like the man from Bethsaida. They see men as trees walking. It's imperfect you see.

They need further help. They need further stimulus. And our Lord is going to, as he continues with them, he's going to ensure that that stimulus comes as his Father God plays upon the minds especially of one of these twelve men.

Here's the fourth question that I want to put to you. You remember I said I put three and I might have time to put another one. Well I do.

That's a miracle in itself. Why in native Galilee is our Lord Jesus ministering in such a remarkable fashion? You see he's just healed this blind man hasn't he? A little earlier we saw when we were looking at the exorcism of the Gadarean, we saw our Lord Jesus exercising remarkable supernatural powers there. When you look at his ministry at the end of the seventh chapter you see that he takes a man who is both deaf and dumb and he cures him of this double ailment.

Why is our Lord Jesus engaging in this run of miraculous activity in Galilee? Well my answer is this. In Isaiah chapter thirty-five and verse five, and there are many other references I could give you, of a prediction of what will be the activity of Messiah when he comes on earth. Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped.

Then will the lame leap like a deer, and the mute tongue shout for joy. Let me give you one other example. Psalm 146, Psalm 146 that also speaks to us about the ministry of Messiah when he is here on this earth.

In the eighth verse we read this, the Lord gives sight to the blind. The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down. The Lord loves the righteous and so on.

Throughout the whole of Mark's gospel up to this point and beyond there is a debate that is obviously going on. Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus? You remember the opposition party, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, they've already tried to shut Jesus up by accusing him of being a blasphemer. Later on they increase their allegations and they say in the twenty-second verse of the third chapter, he's possessed by Beelzebub, by the prince of demons, he's driving out demons.

The ordinary people who are in the congregation of our Lord Jesus, they just simply can't make him out at all. They can't understand what he's doing, they've got no categories in which to insert him, they're just utterly amazed. As far as the demon possessed are concerned, well they strike terror into the hearts of the people who are around when the Lord Jesus is ministering to them, but they themselves cannot educate folk as to who the Lord Jesus is.

Verse twenty-four of the first chapter illustrates this. What do you want with us Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God. And Jesus rebukes them, rebukes the demon possessed very sternly.

Time and time again you see from the Pharisees, from the ordinary people, and from the demoniacs the question is, who is this man? Now that question not only applies to these individuals or to these groups of people. The disciples wonder who the Lord is, do they not? Look at the fourth chapter and verse forty-one. Our Lord has calmed the storm on the sea.

Remarkable event, not only does he multiply bread, not only does he speak to diseased limbs, but he can control the very climate. He says to his disciples, verse forty, why are you still so afraid? Do you have no faith? They were terrified, verse forty-one, mark four, they were terrified and asked each other, who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him. Look at the fifty-first verse when he shows his supernatural activity of chapter six, verse fifty-one, chapter six.

He walks on water, the disciples are utterly afraid. He says in the fiftieth verse, take courage it is I, don't be afraid, verse fifty-one, mark six, then he climbed into the boat with them and the wind died down. They were completely amazed, for they had not understood about the lows, their hearts were hardened.

You see the point? Every category of person, the ministry of our Lord as they come across his ministry, they're asking questions. Who is he? He's a demon-possessed man. We know who you are, say the demons.

The Pharisees say he's a blasphemer and the ordinary people just can't work him out at all. The disciples, for them it's an utter puzzle. So Jesus takes them, still in his native Galilee, to Caesarea Philippi.

Our Lord has gone around to this point and he's doing good. People are already singing his praises. Look at the thirty-seventh verse of chapter seven.

People were overwhelmed with amazement. He has done everything well. That's the song of Jesus.

He's done everything well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak. All right, when Messiah comes into the world, the prophetic scripture says he will bring speech to the dumb, he will bring sight to the blind, he will unstop the deaf ears.

Who am I? Caesarea Philippi is the most remarkable geographical spot north of Galilee. There was the Greek temple to Pan. There they used to believe the pipes of Pan could be heard at night.

Philip had built a temple to Caesar as God. The Old Testament history of that place, you go back to the worship of the Baals. So the whole place, forgive the word, is sodden with paganism from the Greeks, from the Romans, from the so-called natural native religion of Palestine.

Caesarea Philippi is reckoned to be the source of the Jordan as it flows from the, as it comes halfway down Mount Hebron. And the Jordan speaks to spiritual Jews of God's rescue program in the Old Testament. Now isn't it amazing that Jesus gets his disciples to that spot, these men with dull spiritual vision, and he says, who am I? And they repeat what you'll see being said in Herod's court if you check an earlier chapter.

Some say you're Elijah. Some say you're one of the prophets. All right, says Jesus, in some principle that may be correct, but it's limited vision.

Tell me, fellas, who do you say I am? And Peter says, you are the Christ. Twenty-twenty vision. I'm not reading more into it than the text will allow me, or the context.

Peter's ideas of messiahship are not the same as the Lord Jesus's, but at least he's got the Lord in the right category. He's beginning to get the full understanding that he requires for the position that's ultimately to be his as the leading apostle. And don't you see, my dear friends, that the whole of that narrative at Bethsaida, and the events that preceded, and the events that follow dovetail to underline this point that Jesus's concern for the likes of you and me is spiritual understanding clarity.

Preaching will never be popular, because the gospel isn't popular. And the Lord has instructed through the proclamation of Scripture that men shall be saved. Of course there's a war on preaching.

Of course it's unpopular. But it's through the explanation of the Word of God that people are given spiritual vision. And the thing that you and I need more and more is for the eyes of our understanding to be improved, so the deficiencies are removed.

So we get a fuller grasp of who he is and why he came into the world. And because he came into the world, who we are and to where we are bound. Our Lord is so concerned, not for the mass, but for the individuals.

Not so much for the five thousand, but for the twelve. Not so much for the five hundred in Worthington, but for you as an individual. Are you hearing me? God wants you to have 20-20 vision as far as his Son's purposes in your life is concerned.

He wants you to take him as a reference point for all that you do, for all that you are. Because this mighty Son of God who came into the world has come to remove the curse, the spittle, all that's unpleasant and unlovely, to take it upon himself and to die there on yonder horrible cross for your sins and for my sins. And once you understand that, once it's sunk into you, once you've really been born again, once you really know what it is to sing ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven, then you'll take off spiritually.

All vision is not 20-20. There is sufficient to the lesser reading for salvation. But all the fullness of God, he wants to share with you and me.

I conclude with this. Listening to an American preacher, I should have gone to Manila to have heard him, and I couldn't get across as I told you, but I got the tape. My dear friend Tony Ford sent it to me.

The name of the pastor is Jack Hay. He wrote the song Majesty, and he was preaching to 4,000 Christian leaders in the world, and he brought a new word, and I identify with this. He says, I don't want to be known as a Pentecostalist.

I don't want to be known as an evangelical conservative. I don't want to be known as a charismatic. He says, in the Word of God you get a lovely term, and it's the term pleroma, of his fullness, of how we all receive.

Time and time again, you get the word pleroma, fullness. And he says, what I want to be is a pleromatic, a pleromatic. And I thought, brother, you've given me a title that I'm prepared to wear, because I won't wear any of the other options.

I want to know the fullness of God in my life. And that's what Jesus wanted for his disciples, and what he promises to you and me as we wait before him to restore our vision to a 2020 maximum. Let's bow our heads in prayer, and let's sing that song.

Open our eyes, Lord, and let us see Jesus, and reach out and touch him, and say that we love him. Open our ears, Lord, and help us to listen. Open our eyes, Lord, we want to see Jesus.

It's 4-2-0 if you can't see the overhead, but let's listen to the song for a moment being played. Of his fullness have we all received. Are you asking God for that in your life, my older friend? You need the Lord more now than you've ever needed him.

You family people, you're asking the Lord for fullness as you minister to your kids. You folks who are single, thank God for the tab family, but are you asking the Lord to be to you, a husband or a wife as the case may be, to minister into all the deficiencies in your life, to bring you doctrinally a fully understanding of his purpose in the world and his plan for you. So, let's sing the song as a prayer.

Open our eyes, Lord, we want to see Jesus, to reach out and touch him, and say that we love him. Open our ears, Lord, and help us to listen. Open our eyes, Lord, we want to see Jesus.

Open our eyes, Lord, we want to see Jesus, to reach out and touch him, and say that we love him. Open our ears, Lord, and help us to listen. Open our eyes, Lord, we want to see Jesus.

His wonderful face and the things of earth will grow strange, in the light of his glory and grace. Keep your eyes upon Jesus. Let nobody else, let nobody else take his place, so that hour by hour you may know his power.

Till at last you have run the great race. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Let nobody else, let nobody else take his place, so that hour by hour you may know his power.

Till at last you have run the great race. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Christ, for the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all.

Amen.