Spiritual Blindness

The title of today's sermon is Spiritual Blindness, which I actually have to give a big thank you to, Umberto Mejica, who has worked on this with me, for bringing this to the forefront. Have you ever had temporary blindness? Anybody? Yes? What from? Camera flash? Yes? Any others? Yes? Retina detachment. That's serious temporary blindness. Looking straight at the sun? You got a blackout? Well, you probably deserved it, but... But it's not every day that your wife would do that to you. Welding? Welding. You looked at the little dot too long, didn't you? Yes. As a matter of fact, I can bring that up, because I was in high school in a welding class, and because I thought I was so good, I just started holding the mask instead of putting it on and spot and found that out. Also, I had LASIK surgery 20-something years ago, and when I did, I was blinded for 24 hours, almost 36 hours. They made you put this mask on because they did the surgery on your eyes. But it was amazing, because once I could take that off, you even had to tie this thing around your head so you couldn't scratch your eyes at night because they would itch so badly.

But when I took the mask off, it was amazing, because I was so nearsighted, you couldn't see very far. All of a sudden, I could see so well. It was just like, wow, this is incredible!

I found out something different this past year when I came down with shingles, because I lost for a matter of weeks 90% of my vision and my right eye. And so, I had to put this drops in, and drops didn't work, so you had to put the salve on, and it was like just a big blur. And that went on for quite a few weeks until I actually gained 90% of that back. I only lost 10%, which is nice to have. But I so remember, I was 20-something years old, working construction, and we were cleaning up one day by the glass, where we cut glass and did various things, and it was really slow, and storm was coming in.

So, I was sweeping up the glass fragments, the very little thing, and I didn't think anything about it, so I took it outside on our loading dock to put it in the trash can, and when I did, this huge gust of wind came up and just blew it all in my face. It got in my eyes, both of my eyes, and I, oh, it was terrible pain, but the worst part, I could not see anything.

So, they took me to the optometrist, and they had to get somebody else to come in, and they had to remove these little glass slivers from my eye.

And they said, well, you're going to have to wear these that were dark-covering for two or three days, have this mask.

And I began, oh, wow, what if I don't get my sight back?

What woman is going to want me? Of course, that's how you think when you're in your twenties, right? All you men know.

Well, that was serious, but I took it off, and finally I could see.

You realize that everyone in this room has had various types of blindness at different times in your life.

Little Genesis back there was like all of us, because doctors say for the first thirty days or so, maybe even forty days, that a baby can only see eight to twelve inches in front of it. Everything else is blurred. Imagine that.

We were born that way. Do you know what's amazing? We, most of us, were born spiritually blind.

Spiritually blind! The only issue is we didn't know it! We didn't know. We were spiritually blind. I didn't.

I grew up, my parents went to this church and this church, so we quit going to churches.

And it was until later we found something that was unlike all the other churches.

Paul had the same experience, you remember? Wrote to Damascus, right? And Paul had to be blinded before he could see the truth.

You see, as a Pharisee, because he actually referred himself as a Pharisee of Pharisees, right?

As a Pharisee, he had twenty-twenty vision. He could see everything perfectly through one lens, the lens he had been taught.

He had to be brought to his knees, because otherwise he was not going to be able to see. I had an incident this week, as I went to Lowe's to pick up some tubing this week for the house.

And as I was going through one aisle, a man with a cane, like this, came down the aisle, and as I turned, I said, Oh, excuse me, because I almost ran into him as he was finding his way through.

And he said, Can I help you? I said, No, I don't think so. Can I help you? He said, No, you were looking for something.

He's actually blind, and he works at Lowe's. He worked in that area there.

And he knew where Maysing Bart was. What I asked him, Well, do you know where this is? Yes, it's on the fifth row over here on the sixth row.

Would you like me to take you to it? No? No, I think I can find it. Thank you.

Amazing! Well, you know, more amazing than that is how God has healed our spiritual blindness.

Because a lot of times we do not realize what a blessing it is, as we heard about in the sermon at. Let's go there. 1 Corinthians 2. Read from the New Living Translation, this verse. 1 Corinthians 2 and verse 14. It said, But people who aren't spiritual can't receive these truths from God's Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them, and they can't understand it. For only those who are spiritual can understand what this Spirit means.

Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others for who can know the Lord's thoughts, who can know enough to teach Him. But we understand these things because we have the mind of Christ. Have the mind of Christ.

Not everyone has that. Are we thankful enough? Are we thankful enough?

Go over to 2 Corinthians, if you will, with me.

See, Paul is talking about this because Paul understood blindness. He understood spiritual blindness. He understood physical blindness.

And God had to physically blind him to get him to be able to see spiritually and take away that spiritual blindness. 1 Corinthians 4 and verse 3. It said, If the good news we preach is hidden behind a veil, it is hidden only from people who are perishing.

Satan, who is the God of this world, has this new living translation, blinded the minds of those who don't believe.

Spiritual blindness. They are unable to see the glorious light of the good news. They don't understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is in the exact likeness of God.

Verse 6. For God, who said, Let there be light in the darkness, has made this light shine in our hearts so that we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. Verse 16. That is why we never give up.

Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and don't last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever. So we don't look at the troubles we can see now. Rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen.

For the things we see now will soon disappear, will soon be gone. But the things we cannot see will last forever. Because we know things seen are proof of things unseen.

Blinded. Spiritual blindness. Do we understand it?

Is that why it says that we walk by what? Faith and not by what? Sight. We walk by faith and not by sight. We look at someone with a cane and dark glasses and we say they're blind. But how can you tell when someone is spiritually blind? Not as obvious, is it? Because they can really throw out these words. They can really throw out these names. And they can look all pious. Even Christ says, don't look at the Pharisees. Don't do as they do because they love to stand on the corners. Oh, God!

And everybody said, oh, they're righteous. Boy, how impressive is that? Remember Samson? Samson had to be blinded before he could see spiritually.

Samson is one that, as Romans 8 says, he set his mind on the things on the earth instead of up above.

That's why Paul says, set your mind on the things above, not on the things of his earth. Samson could not do it until he was blinded. Because why? 1 John 2 says, you know, there's these things and they really affect a man.

The lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. He had them all. But God wasn't done with them. So he had to learn. How about us? Well, we have to learn. Why don't we learn to be thankful for having this spiritual vision that we have for understanding?

I'd like you to go with me to Matthew. I'll read from the New King James now. I'd like you to go to Matthew 20. Incredible story here. Matthew 20.

So think about it. If you were once blind, but then you could finally see how appreciative would you be?

Would you? I think so. If you had to lose one of your senses, which would it be if you were given a choice? If you were given a choice of which one you wouldn't want to lose, what would it be? Right? I think most of us would.

Because we are so led by what we see, we're so influenced by what we see, a big part of our life is brought around by or pulls us by what we can see. People love to travel around the world and see various things. Why? I want to see that before I die. You hear anybody go, I want to hear that before I die. No. Scene is very important. Matthew 20. Matthew 20 and verse 29.

Talking about Christ here in his disciples. Now, as they departed from Jericho, a great multitude followed him. So they were in Jericho, the city of Jericho, and they were going to Jerusalem. But as they were leaving the city of Jericho, which is like 15 miles northwest of Jerusalem, but it's all uphill as you take that road. So it was going to take a good day and a half, two days to get back. But while they were in that city of Jericho, it says, Hmm.

So to them, as Jericho was called the city of roses, because at that time it had roses growing everywhere, and it was a beautiful city. One thought, not so much today. But the city of roses to these two blind men didn't mean a whole lot.

They were brought to beg. They were brought down to begging for a living, that somebody might help them because they were blind.

And then it says, Then the multitude warned them that they should be quiet, but they cried out all the more, Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David! Why did everybody say, Shut up? Be quiet. You ever thought about that? Why? Here are these poor blind men? Here they're yelling, Hey, hey!

Well, for one thing, they were calling him Son of David, which was a Messianic term.

It was a title that the Messiah had come because it was predicted, in the words. And they knew that this Messiah would be able to heal. They were looking for Him.

And you also have to remember through history that Jericho was a city of the priests. It's where most of the priests lived. Whoa! Wait a minute, you're crying out. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You're showing disrespect to these priests. Be quiet!

Would you be quiet? If this was your chance to be healed? Absolutely not.

They couldn't see Him, but I'm sure they had heard of Him. Was this their chance to finally be able to see?

Verse 32, So Jesus stood still and called them, and said to them, What do you want Me to do for you? They said to Him, Lord, that our eyes may be opened. Perhaps you have said that in the past. I know I have many times, and I will probably say it many times again as I study God's Word. Because I don't always understand everything. And I need Him to open my eyes. Because He did. He'll why? Spiritual blindness many years ago.

So Jesus had compassion, and touched their eyes, and immediately their eyes received sight. And they did what? Followed Him.

Do we? Always? Do we enough? Do we always follow Him? You think these men had any doubt about who He was? You think they, when they came into Jerusalem, as He walked through there? This, this is the Son of David. The Messiah has come. All those people had to wonder who knew them, who saw them standing or begging on the streets of Jericho all those years. And now they could see about their families.

We should be as thankful as those men. We need to give thanks as we study God's Word, and we don't have to go, Oh, I wonder what that means. It is a powerful thing because just like them, God had compassion on us, and we have received spiritual vision. I'd like you to turn with me. One of my first memory scriptures 30, 40 years ago was 1 Peter. 1 Peter 2 and verse 9. Who are you? Brethren, who are you?

Because it's because of who you are that you're not blinded. And He tells us, Peter does, who you are. He says, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. His own special people that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness. Have you done that? Into His marvelous light called us out of darkness, called us out of blindness. And let us see, but now my eye sees you. You'll notice a lot of great leaders in the Bible had to go through things before they could finally see God.

And see His path, see His way, see that light, because the light is what it's about. Who were once not a people, but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. We had God show us mercy. We are no longer in the dark.

So much nicer when you have light at night in the house, isn't it? Here occasionally we'll have a storm in the middle of the night, and something will happen, and you get up, and you flip on the light switch. No light. It's dark. And we do what? We stumble through things. How much stumbling did you do before God called you? Called you into His marvelous light, took you out of darkness, and said, Now they're mine.

They're mine. Like you go with me to John 8. John 8. John 8, verse 12. So then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, what? I am the light of the world. I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.

But wait a minute. So who's lying? Is John lying or is Matthew lying? Because in Matthew 5, the Sermon on the Mount, he says that you are the light of the world. It said, He said, Upon a hill cannot be hidden. Let your light so shine before men, that they shall see your good works, and glorify your Father. Are we the light or is Christ the light? Do you give off light? You naturally light up? Does the moon have light? Does the moon light up? We saw it, didn't we? Oh, well, how about it? It's a bright moon. It's a full moon.

It lit up the night. Does the moon have light? No. It reflects the sun. It has no light of itself. Brother, before Christ is in us, we have no light. But with Christ in us, we reflect the light, just like the moon reflects the sun. It's His light. Isn't that wonderful? We don't even have to generate it, because if He's in us, it is the light. And what does He want us to do?

He wants us to shine. Shine! Wow! That is powerful. So do you worry about other people? Because to some people, we're blind. We go to church on the wrong day. Right? You're blind! Are we? Are we really blind? Matthew 15. Christ knew this would come up. He did in His time. Matthew 15, verse 14. Here are these Pharisees. He said a few things, and His disciples came over and said, Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, Christ! Christ! Whoa, whoa, these are the leaders. Don't you know you offended them?

I'd like to see a smile on Christ's face. You think He worried that He offended them? He says in verse 14, Let them alone. They are blind, leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a ditch. Let them go. Don't argue with them. Let people with me find a pastor, and we're in a casual conversation, and they want to go somewhere that they want to teach me their way. I'm taught by the Bible. You want to teach me what some man taught them. I don't waste my time, and you shouldn't waste yours either.

One of the first things you see after spiritual blindness is healed is a new and a greater understanding of the Ten Commandments. Don't we? We look at them, not just our cake words written on a piece of stone nobody can find today, but you begin to look at them in a new way as you begin to be led by the Spirit, brought to repentance, and you begin to examine these Ten Commandments as never before. Can you recite them? Hope so! That's one of the things we teach in the youth classes. So no matter where they are, 10 or 15 years from now, those youth will know the Ten Commandments. They've been taught over and over again. But it's not only our job to know the Ten Commandments, it's our job to know the what? The Spirit of the Law, so that we can show others, so we can live as Christ taught on the Sermon on the Mount. The Spirit of the Law, about lust, about anger, these things that He covered. There is a dark side in this world. We read about it in Scripture. And the dark side will, as they did in Christ's time, will refer to Him as a false prophet. They will refer to you as oddballs, religious nuts, lunatics, many words. And you are called as one a cult. Good? Now, do you know why you're a cult? I'm going to show you. I'll show you today why you're a cult, or why the world says you're a cult. And it's four very easy things that make you a cult. Number one, Trinity. You don't believe in it. You're a cult. You don't believe in it. I have this book, almost brought it, called Kingdom of the Cults, as it listed all these religious groups, and it covers 90% of everything except what the author was.

Everybody else was a cult. Except him and his group. Because you had to agree with everything they did. But the four main points that they bring out is, first one is a Trinity. We don't believe in a Trinity. It's interesting, as Mary was sitting there in the kitchen, and I was watching a video from Yale University. And it was a teacher teaching biblical studies at Yale. You can go online on YouTube and actually watch it. It's his whole year of classes from 2009.

He's a theologian. He studies Bible. But what's so interesting is, this wasn't for the Divinity School. This was biblical studies. So all he did was, if you took his class there, he brought you in, he sat you down and said, we're going to look at the New Testament in the Bible. And he gave them seven questions, the opening class. Is this in the Bible or is it not? And the very first one he went into was the Trinity. He said, no, it's not in there. It's not in there. And then he went into all the various things and someone would say, oh yes, no, it's not.

And so his whole class is taking apart the... because it's actually what it says, compared to what it doesn't say, what men have put in there. Now, the reason we do not believe Trinity... I did this last year. This is a teaching of the Trinity. It's very simple. It's simple to understand. Okay? You'll see this if you study any of the literature of people who believe the Trinity.

There is God, there is Christ, and there is the Spirit. Okay? That's all one. They're all one. God, Christ, and the Spirit. But the only thing is, they... encompass them so that this is it. This is it in the God family. And no one or nothing will ever be in the God family. They are so different, and so the three of them are together. Okay? That's the teaching. It's a short version. That's basically how they teach.

So you are basically down here, way down here, and you will never be part of the God family. Now, how do they explain some of the Scriptures where it talks about you are sons of God? Now, you are a family, you are heirs? They don't. They don't. And when you get into the real theological classes, this is described one thing, because you have so many questions because the Bible can answer it, that they come down to one word.

One word describes the Trinity. It's a mystery. That's it! Go and look! Take my word for it. I'm going to look it up. But because we don't, we are the cult. Because we said, that's not biblically correct. It's not true. And God wants the family. He's called us to be up here, not in this mess that they've created that's not biblical. Then the second thing, these four things to shine light on, is the Sabbath. What day is the Sabbath? We're a cult because we keep the Sabbath. Even though the New Testament has 58 times, it mentions the Sabbath, 8 times it mentions the first day of the week, and 6 of those are the very same day and the very same experience.

Okay. It doesn't. And if you go into the theological classes that the world teaches, they will actually teach you something. That the Bible doesn't teach Sunday worship. And that was brought in by the Catholic Church. Okay. You have to admit that because when you're in, when you're taking master's level classes or you're even taking fourth-year theology classes, you're going to find that doesn't match.

So you know what their answer is? Any day. Any day. Or if you want to be real religious, every day. Okay. Where did they get that? And where are the cult? You see what I mean? That's why, that's why we have to be thankful. Thankful for this. And sometimes we, as I've told this congregation many times, we don't even realize how many things we know.

How great it is because we've just been doing it for a while. We just take it for granted. And I'll meet somebody on the plane sitting beside me and start a conversation and they're like, Wow, where did you learn these things? Bible. Right? Third thing, the Ten Commandments. Okay. That's one of the things that keeps us, is we keep them. That makes you a cult. Because you don't have to keep them, because if you keep them, that means you're going with the works of the law instead of grace. So you can't have grace and you can't have works. You got to get rid of works.

Because if you have works involved, you might think it's going to save you and then that's all wrong. You're a cult. Okay? And finally, the fourth one that makes us a cult goes back to the very thing that I wrote up here previously. Destiny. Destiny. Okay? Cult is your destiny. What happens after death? Okay? Everyone who is not a cult believes in one thing. That we become angels. They make movies on it.

They make TV shows on it. Of course it's right. We all become angels and we fly around. You know? And then you get your wings and all this kind of stuff. But you can't find it in the Bible. What is our destiny? Gods. Didn't mean to put that sign on there. Yes, gods. We're gods. Because we're born into the god family. That's our destiny.

It's easy. You can find it all through the Bible. We could build 10 sermons about it. And never cover all the scriptures. Because it's what the Bible says we are to become. Not Michael Landon. Not whatever her touch by an angel or whatever it is.

Because they can't get over the original because the Trinity doesn't support. So we have to be where humans and then angels are appearing and there's God.

And yet they bring out the scripture. Don't you know? You will sit in judgment of angels. Brethren, for us it's not hard to see. Why? Because we're not blind. Blinded. Now, do we have all the answers? Absolutely not. Okay. And if anyone stands up here and says he has all the answers, run. Run fast, run far. Don't stay in this room. Will we learn more? Will we know more? Absolutely. Scriptures abound. My thoughts are not your thoughts. My thoughts are so much higher than your thoughts. But what? We're being converted. We're being this conversion word.

We're being converted into Christ-like people.

It's just like the ice cube. Some of us have just been in the freezer longer than others. So we're not half-water, half-ice. But we're what? We're getting there. And it starts with studying this word. It starts with knowing who we are. It starts with the beauty of being able to see. 1 John 2, verse 11. 1 John 2, verse 11. Let's turn to verse 8. 1 John 2, verse 8. It says again, 2 John 2, verse 9. It says, 1 John 2, verse 9. He who says he is in delight and hates his brother is in darkness until now. You can't act one way. You can't say, Oh, wait a minute. I hate this person and still shine light. Even Christ said, You shall love your enemies.

So if he told you, Love your enemies, you sure ought to go love your brother. But you see, people thought, I'm good enough. And he's saying, No, you need more light. He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But he who hates his brother is in darkness. Darkness and walks in darkness. That's why it isn't just about the law, but it's about the law and love. The law is love. And you have to bring it all together, and the only way we can truly see is to see the example set before us in Jesus Christ. And have, read it, see it, and live it. Because he wants us to. He wants us to shine. But he, verse 11, who hates his brother, is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes to where you just don't really see.

You need one of these to find your way.

And God has called us out of this dark world. And he says, get rid of it. You don't need it.

Brethren, do we appreciate that? Do we appreciate it like we should?

One last verse as we wrap this up. I'd like you to turn to Ephesians 5 and verse 8. One verse. Very powerful. Ephesians 5 and verse 8. He said, For you were once darkness. You get that? For you were once darkness, not in darkness. You were once darkness.

Did we realize that? We were dark. Now, people say, well, wait a minute. I know they were pretty good people. No! God knew your heart, knew what you were about, and he still called you so that he would be glorified. It's always amazing because whenever you see these shows, and my wife used to love to watch these things, and she would watch them, I think, 23 out of 24 hours, I exaggerate, on HGTV and so forth. And they would show different houses, and they would remodel these houses. Well, I was a contractor, so I knew. There was something unique about building a house, and then see it from the foundation of where you actually dug the footer and you did all this, and you saw it come out. But there was something even more unique about taking an old, dilapidated house and rebuilding it.

Did it take more work? Absolutely! Right, Mike? Absolutely! But when you see it at the end, people are like, wow! Wow! Look at that!

See, we were the project. We were the old, dilapidated house that God called.

And he renovated us, didn't he? Yes. Bruce.

And it says, for you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. Walk as children of light.

Any more powerful words?

Are we thankful for our vision?

Thankful that we are not in darkness.

Thankful that we were healed from our spiritual blindness.

So, brethren, don't just be thankful.

This week, walk as children of light.