Robert Morris - Signs
So we're in a series called, "A Way in the Wilderness", and what we're talking about is we're coming out of Isaiah 35, which is a Messianic chapter, and it's telling us what the Messiah will do when the Messiah comes, but we know the Messiah's already come. All right? And this weekend, the title of the message is Signs, that when the Messiah comes, or He has already come, we know, but Isaiah's telling us when He comes, He'll do signs and wonders. He'll bring signs and wonders with Him, all right? So, we stopped at Verse 4 last week, so this week we're gonna start at Verse 5. Isaiah 35:5 says, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy".
So, what he's saying is the Messiah's gonna come with signs and wonders. Now, I want you to understand something. It's natural for God to be supernatural. That's normal for God. I'm going to say something. The first part of this sentence is tongue in cheek. If God wakes up in the morning, He's going to do a miracle that day. And obviously, He never sleeps or slumbers, but He just does miracles. It's normal. God does signs and wonders. Jesus did miracles when He was on this earth. But, here's what we need to know and we need to remember, that the Bible tells us Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And, there were miracles going on, signs and wonders, before Jesus ever came to this earth. God was doing miracles.
So, I have three points that I want to share with you. Here's number one, God does signs and wonders. God does signs and wonders. And I love that word, wonder because what I think it means is, is that you can't figure it out, you just have to wonder about it. I don't know why God decided to say, but signs and wonders are all through the Bible. And the reason I'm saying that to you is because for some of you, your mind is one of your greatest assets and one of your greatest liabilities, because you have to figure everything out, and I just want you to know you can't figure out God. You just can't. You can learn about Him and you can get to know Him, but God is infinite. So, God does signs and wonders.
So, let me show you a few Scriptures about signs and wonders.
Exodus 7:3 says, And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt. Here we have the second book of the Bible and God talking about signs and wonders.
Psalm 135:9, He sent signs and wonders into the midst of you.
Daniel 4:3, How great are His signs, and how mighty His wonders!
And then, Acts 2:22, Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs, which God did through Him in your midst.
Acts 2:43, Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. So, they keep going.
Romans 15:18, I will not dare to speak to you, this is Paul talking to the Romans, to any of those things which Christ has not accomplished through me, in word and deed, to make the Gentiles obedient - in mighty signs and wonders. Paul did signs and wonders. Of course, God did them through him.
Hebrews 2:4, God also bearing witness both with signs and wonders, with various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit. Now, I like this just because I just want to say that some people will say gifts of the Holy Spirit have passed away. They say miracles and wonders have passed away, signs have passed away. Okay. The only problem with that is, is that God has not passed away. So, what God does hasn't stopped either. God is God. He can never stop being God. God is a God of the miraculous. So, just don't believe any theology that tries to tell you that God doesn't do miracles anymore, because God has to do miracles, because God's God! That's just God is God! That's just what God does.
So again, years ago, God just... I don't know what happened, but somehow God put it on my heart. We met this family and they couldn't conceive, and I prayed for and I'd been reading in the Scripture about how God opens wombs, and I'll show you those Scriptures in just a moment. And so, I just prayed that God would open this woman's womb, and she got pregnant. Then before you know it, there was another, and then another, and another. And so, anyway, years and years ago, probably around 35 or 36, because I'm not quite sure how old my nephew is, but Debbie's sister and her husband, who are now members of our church and wonderful people, but they were trying to get pregnant.
And so, we were staying with them for a vacation or something, and Debbie just said, Hey, Robert prays for ladies that are trying to conceive, and it's just God has just given him faith in this area. Would you like for him to pray with you? And she and her husband both said, "Absolutely, we'd love that". You know? And so I prayed, but while I was praying, I heard this statement, and I've learned to just say what I hear when I pray and trust the Lord. And so I said, You will have a son in less than a year. Now, you think you've got a year there, but you really don't. You've got three months.
So, the Lord has taught me when I prophesy something that the next step is to pray earnestly, and so I prayed earnestly, you know, for the next few months. But, here's the thing. I said, In less than a year, you'll have a son. Eleven months, two weeks later, she had a son. And then, she got pregnant again very quickly, and then she had a daughter. Then she got pregnant again very quickly, and their children were like, first, second, and third grade, you know - sophomore, junior, senior. You know, they were that way, just a year apart, and all three of their children. But when she got pregnant the third time, she called Debbie and said, Tell Robert to stop praying.
So, number one, God does signs and wonders. That's just normal. That's normal for God. Here's number two, God heals spiritually. He doesn't just heal physically, He heals spiritually. And it's very important for us to know this, because I want to just talk to you about something. It said the blind are gonna see, the deaf are gonna hear, the lame are gonna walk, and the mute are gonna speak. Would it be all right if God healed your spiritual lives? And I just want to tell you, that's pretty important when you can open this book and it jumps off the page at you, and you see that this is a spiritual book written by a spiritual being to spiritual beings.
It's pretty fun, and it's fun when you get to hear God. God opens your spiritual ears and you can hear God speak something to your heart. And it's fun when God heals your lameness in an area of your life and you can walk in the Spirit in that area, and it's fun when God looses your tongue when you're afraid to speak to people, and now you can speak to people and share about your faith in Jesus Christ. And in Acts 2, when God loosed their tongues at the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, it says, They heard them speaking the wonderful works of God in their own languages. Are you all following me?
So, we want God to also do it spiritually. So I want to show you something about this to let you know that if you're saved, the Messiah's done this for you. He's made you whole. He's made you whole. So, in Luke there's a story about ten lepers that God healed. You've probably read the story. And one leper, who was a Samaritan, the other nine were Jews, came back to say thank You. And then, Jesus says this. Jesus answered and said, Were there not ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner? And He said to him, Arise, go your way. Your faith has, now watch this, made you well. One version says, made you whole.
Now, this "made you well" is one Greek word. These three words, "made you well", or "made you whole"... Now, ten of them were healed, one of them was made whole, made well completely - made whole, spirit, soul, and body. It's a Greek word. It's pronounced sode-zo - sodezo. But, it means to be made whole - to be healed, spirit, soul, and body, to be made whole, to be made well. And, this word is in the New Testament 110 times, this Greek word, sozo. Think about this, 85% of the time. 93 out of 110 it's translated save or saved. As a matter of fact, here's one of the most famous verses, and this is the word sozo. Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be made whole.
Okay, here's why I'm telling you this. If you've called on the name of the Lord, then He's already opened your spiritual eyes. He's already opened your spiritual ears. He's already healed your lameness. He's already loosed your tongue. He's already done this for you. It's like last week when I was saying the Messiah brings strength, but here's how you receive that strength in your everyday walk. Here are some things you need to do. Okay. So, I want you to know God has already made you whole. He's already done that because you came to Jesus on the cross. So, let me just show you a few verses on opening your spiritual eyes and ears.
Jeremiah 5:21, Here this now, O foolish people without understanding. See, you don't understand if you don't have your spiritual eyes open. Who have eyes and see not, and who have ears and hear not. Ezekiel 12:2, Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a rebellious house, which has eyes to see but does not see, and ears to hear but does not hear. Remember, by the way, when Paul, who was called Saul before, on the Damascus Road he meets Jesus. He's blinded, literally, in the natural. "But when Ananias comes and lays hands on him", Acts 9:18, "Immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he received his sight at once".
Well, he not only received his physical sight, he received his spiritual sight. Because when you read the writings of Paul, some of the things are pretty hard to understand is what the Bible says, and this guy began to see in the Spirit, and I think it's fantastic when God opens your spiritual eyes. So, but Jesus talked constantly to His disciples about you have eyes, but you can't see, and I've preached on this in several different types of series that our spiritual eyes can be opened. You have eyes, but you can't see.
Now, I've thought about this because ladies, to me, can see things many times that men can't see, and I'm not just talking about in the spiritual. They can see things in the spiritual, but sometimes they see things in the natural. For instance, I will look in my closet for a certain shirt. I will go through every shirt individually, looking for it. And then I will say to Debbie, Sugar, I know that shirt's here, but I can't see it. She walks in and says, It's right here. Okay. So, then she said to me one time, You have eyes, but you can't see. Okay. But I've decided it's not just that she can see things, I think she can make things appear that aren't there!
So, God not only heals naturally, God heals spiritually as well. So, here's number three, God opens wombs. Now, this is scriptural, God opens wombs. Now, I'm gonna show you something at first and you may wonder why I'm showing it to you, but I want to explain it to you. If you remember, Abraham lied about Sarah being his wife because he thought they would kill him, and Abimelech, the king, took her into his harem, but he didn't sleep with her. And of course, God shows up in a dream and, you know, says to him, you're a dead man, you know, to Abimelech, and he obviously gives Sarah back. But, Genesis 20:18 says, For the Lord had closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.
Okay, so not only does God open wombs, it says God closes wombs. Now, please, please, I've got to explain this. Well, this was for judgment, but listen to me. If you're a believer in Jesus, God would never close your womb for judgment - never, because Jesus has already taken your judgment. If you don't hear anything that I ever say in no matter how many years you attend here, please understand this. If you're a believer in Jesus, God will never punish you for your sins, because He already punished Jesus. He's a just God. He cannot punish two people for the same sin, and so many times we think this. We're on the way to work and we get a flat tire, and we think, yes, yes, I didn't have my quiet time this morning, so, I see, God.
You know, You're punishing me for not having my quiet time. And then it starts to rain and we're like, oh, nice touch. That's a nice touch, God. Okay, you didn't get a flat tire because you're under the judgment of God! Let me give you the theological reason you got a flat tire - a nail. But if you're a believer, God is not punishing you for your sins. There's no sentence of guilt against you, because God said it. So if you've had difficulty conceiving, listen to me. It's nothing you've done wrong. It's nothing you've done wrong. You've got to know that, because God doesn't do that. He punished Jesus for all of our sin. Okay?
So, but I want to show you another place where He closed a womb and talk about where God might close a womb for a season. I want to show it to you, 1 Samuel 1:5. But to Hannah he, that's her husband, would give a double portion, for he, that's her husband, loved Hannah, although the Lord had closed her womb. Now, He wasn't punishing Hannah, but the Lord had closed her womb. Okay, so why would God close a womb? Well, I know some people that could not conceive and adopted, and right after they adopted, they conceived. But you've got to remember, if you're a believer, God's working all things for good, and God wanted that child raised in a Christian home. And so, He may have worked those circumstances out for you to consider something you wouldn't have even considered. Are you following me?
So, you've got to always look at God according to His character and His nature. Another reason that God might close a womb for a season is that He was waiting. I'm gonna say it this way: He was doing a work in Hannah's heart, because He needed Samuel to grow up in the temple and learn to hear God's voice from an early age, and Hannah was so grateful she dedicated him to the Lord then. See? So, He was doing a work in her heart during the time, but here's another thing. God needed Samuel born at the exact time to anoint David as the king of Israel. See, God, He wants your child born at exactly the right time to meet the right mate.
See, there are so many reasons that God does things, but they're all for our good. That's what you have to know. When Debbie was in the second grade, at the end of the second grade the teacher said there were some areas that she just felt like it'd be better if she would repeat the second grade. It wasn't like she failed, but the teacher said it would be better if you would, because of these areas, and I don't remember what those areas were right now, so she was held back a year. Okay. What you may not know, and I have to be careful how I say this, is Debbie is a little older than I am.
So, 11 months and 1 week, okay? So, for three weeks of the year we're the same age, and so it's a really fun thing that I get to do for 11 months and 1 week. But I've told her several times, You know, when you're 100, I'll only be 99. But, here's the thing. She was put back one class, but that was my class. I might not have ever met her. And so, what seemed like a bad thing to her at the time was actually God just arranging things for what He wanted to do in the future. It was for her good and for my good. You follow me? So, God opens a womb.
Now, let me show you some Scriptures about Him opening wombs, and of course, we know He opened Hannah's womb.
Genesis 29:31, When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, He opened her womb; but Rachel was barren.
Genesis 30:22, Then God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb.
Now, the reason I wanted to show you this part is, God listened to her. In other words, she prayed. You need to pray. You need to ask God. And, sometimes we have different personalities, and my personality is to kind of go for it. And I didn't realize this, Debbie's personality is not the same as my personality, and when we got married, I mean, I knew it was a little different, but we started growing and learning more things about each other. So, God gave me the names of both of my sons before they were born. He actually gave me the day that James would be born, the exact day. And so, God would speak to me, and so I knew I would have a son named Josh, and then a son named James.
When I thought we were gonna have a daughter, that was three years later, and then I started praying for a daughter, cause I wanted a daughter, and it was five years until we had Elaine. But, one of the things that happened was during that time I said to Debbie, Hey, when we pray for a daughter, I mean, are you with me on this? Are you agreeing? Do you not want any more children? Do you not want, you know. She said, No, I do, and I want a daughter. And then she said something that I just didn't realize that she was thinking this way. She said, I don't really want to pray about it, because if I pray about it I'll get my hopes up, and I might get disappointed.
And that's a very real sense that people have, and I want you to understand, ladies, it's important that you pray. It's important that you pray. Make your requests known to God. It's important. And I could show you many, many Scriptures, but I just want to show you one, Matthew 20:29-34. "Now as they went out of Jericho, a great multitude followed Him. And behold, two blind men sitting by the road, when they heard that Jesus was passing by, cried out, saying, Have mercy on us, O Lord, Son of David! Then the multitude warned them that they should be quiet; but they cried out all the more, saying, Have mercy on us, O Lord, Son of David! So Jesus stood still and called them, and said", now listen to what He said, "What do you want Me to do for you"?
They're blind! Have mercy on us, Son of David. "But He asked them, What do you want Me to do for you? They said to Him, Lord, that our eyes may be opened. So Jesus had compassion and touched their eyes. And immediately their eyes received sight, and they followed Him". Jesus asked blind Bartimaeus, What do you want Me to do? Jesus asked the father - remember, the father whose son was demonized. The father said, If you can do anything, and Jesus said - in essence He said, if I can do anything? He said, No, if you can believe, then all things are possible. And then he made a great response, and it's okay to say this to God. Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.
Jesus said to a man who was laying 38 years, "Do you want to be made well"? Why would He do this? Because it's important. I don't know why. I really don't know why. It's important that you ask God. You know, the Bible says He knows what you need before you ask. Here's the way we interpret that verse - He knows what we need, so don't ask. But, that's not what it says. He knows what you need before you ask - He wants you to ask.
So, remember I told you about Debbie's sister. Well, so, our niece, which is the daughter of Debbie's sister, a year and a half ago at Thanksgiving, Debbie and I were sitting across the table from them at a family Thanksgiving. And, they'd been praying and wanting to have a child. And, I started feeling compassion. Miracles start with compassion.
And I started asking the Lord, "Lord, do you want me to pray for them? Do you want me to prophesy? I just feel", and I felt like the Lord was speaking something to me. So I said to them, "I'm going to ask you a question and I know the answer, but it's important that you answer out loud". I said to each, to the husband and the wife, I said, "Do you want to have a child"? They said, "Yes". And I said, "You'll be holding your child next Thanksgiving". And this Thanksgiving, they were holding their baby. The baby was born October 29th, just a few weeks before Thanksgiving.
Jesus asked a lame man, Do you want to be made well? He asked the blind man, What do you want Me to do for you? I'm asking you today, what do you want God to do for you? God is a miracle working god. He can't change. Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. You're watching today for a reason - because God wants to do a miracle in your life. Maybe it's to heal you spiritually from something from the past that's kept you in bondage. Maybe it's like, as we prayed for ladies who wanted to have children who couldn't, maybe God wants to open your womb today. Maybe He wants to heal you physically. But I'm asking you, I'm asking you, what do you want God to do for you today, and I want to pray for you right now.
Lord, I pray for my brothers and sisters in Christ. I pray for miracles today. And Lord, we're not asking because of selfish reasons. We know that in the same way that we want to bless our children, You want to bless us, and that You are a God of miracles. So, Lord, we ask You for miracles today, in Jesus' name.