Sermon Manuscript

[Video:  “Miracles - Bumper” - 0:30]

“Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”  (pause)  This question was asked by Jesus to a woman near Bethany, a small town located two miles from Jerusalem.  A question he asked before performing the most powerful miracle the world had ever seen.

Because three days before these events Jesus had been with His disciples when a message was brought to Him.  A message which said, “Lord, the one whom you love is ill.”  But when Jesus heard this message He said to His disciples, “This illness does not lead to death.  It is for the glory of God so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”  A strange and confusing statement to say the least.  Even more confusing is what happened next.  Because Jesus stayed put for two days before saying to His disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”  To which His disciples said, “Those who tried to take your life are there and you want to go back to that place?”  So Jesus said, “Are there not twelve hours in the day?  If anyone walks in the day he does not stumble because he sees the light of this world.  But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.”  Another confusing statement.  But then He got to the point and said, “Lazarus, our friend, is asleep but I go to wake him.”  The disciples then said, “Lord, if he has merely fallen asleep then he will recover.”  So Jesus explained, “Lazarus has died and for your sake I am glad that I was not there so that you may believe.”  Then they left with Him saying, “Let us go also so that we may die too.”

When they arrived they found out that Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days.  And when Mary was told that Jesus had come she ran to Him and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  A pretty strong accusation to say the least.  And then she began to weep.  As she did so Jesus was deeply moved and greatly troubled.  So He said, “Where have you laid him?”  To which they replied, “Lord, come and see.”  Then we read that Jesus wept.  He felt the emotion of the moment and the pain that death had caused and it resonated with Him so much that He, too, wept.  Then He continued.

And arriving at the tomb He noticed that it was a cave with a stone rolled in front of it.  All of this should sound familiar if you know what will later happen to Jesus Himself.  So Jesus said, “Take away the stone.”  And Martha said, “But Lord, by this time there will be an odor because he has been dead for four days!”  And that’s when Jesus asked the question.  That’s when He said to her before the crowd words which would resonate with her and all who heard them for the rest of their life.  He said, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”  

Then it happened.  Then it took place.  After praying to God, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!!!!”  And a man who had been dead, wrapped in linen cloths, and buried in a tomb sat up, stood up, and walked out of the grave!  His hands, his feet, and his face still wrapped in burial cloths.  And so Jesus said, “Unbind him and let him go.”

It was the most amazing miracle that Jesus ever performed.  And it proved once and for all that He was the Son of God and had the power of God.  The power to perform not just miracles but any miracle.  Including raising a man who had been dead for four days up from the grave.

And yet as amazing as that miraculous healing was it only foreshadowed what He would do Himself.  Because after suffering and dying on the cross He would raise Himself up from the grave.  He Himself would be resurrected.  And that resurrection power that He demonstrated on the day He raised Lazarus from the grave and raised Himself up from the grave has been given to you and to me.  To all of His followers.  Resurrection power.  The power to miraculously heal.

Sounds too good to be true?  Maybe like a “get rich quick” scheme or a used car salesman?  Because it should!  And yet… it’s true.  Because within the pages of the Bible we read of a time in the life of someone who demonstrated that same power.  The power to raise a person from the dead.  So I want us to examine his story and to learn from it this morning.  And as we do so I’m going to later challenge you to stop and consider how you, too, have been miraculously healed and how you, too, have access to that very same power.

So let’s get started.  If you have your Bibles, turn with me now to the book of Acts chapter 20.  Today we’re going to be examining just verses 7-12.  Only six verses.  Six verses found within the book of Acts which changed everything.  As always, if you would like to follow along with us online you can do so by using our app.  It’s called Church Center.  So if you open up our app and click on Sunday Services followed by Message Notes you will find everything that you need for our time together this morning.

As you turn there let me remind you that today we are continuing within a series of messages simply called Miracles:  Nothing is Impossible.  A series where we’re examining the miraculous power of God.  The power to do anything at any time, anywhere.  And in week one we learned about God’s miraculous power itself.  Then in week two we examined God’s miraculous power to deliver us.  And today we’re examining His miraculous power to heal us.  But not only to be healed but also to heal.  To heal others should God call us to do so and allow us to do so.

Last week Paul had been in Ephesus when he was delivered from a riot.  Chapter 20 then begins by telling us that he and his traveling companions leave Ephesus and travel to Macedonia and Greece and then later to Troas.  Troas is a city located in the northwest corner of the modern day country of Turkey.  So that’s where Paul is when the events that we’re about to read take place.  OK.  So here’s what happened.  Acts chapter 20, verse 7, says:

7 On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. 8 There were many lamps in the upper room where we were gathered. 9 And a young man named Eutychus, sitting at the window, sank into a deep sleep as Paul talked still longer. And being overcome by sleep, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead. 10 But Paul went down and bent over him, and taking him in his arms, said, “Do not be alarmed, for his life is in him.” 11 And when Paul had gone up and had broken bread and eaten, he conversed with them a long while, until daybreak, and so departed. 12 And they took the youth away alive, and were not a little comforted.

Alright.  So let’s break this story down.  We are told in verse 7 that “on the first day of the week” the church was gathered together in Troas “to break bread”.  Don’t miss the importance of that verse.  This verse teaches us that the apostles and disciples made it a practice to gather as a group on the first day of the week.  So if you’ve ever wondered, “Why do churches worship on Sunday?  Why do Christians gather together on Sunday morning to worship?”  It’s because in the New Testament we read that believers gathered together on “the Lord’s Day” or Sunday.  From the very beginning, the very birth of the church, we read in Acts 2:42 what happened right after the Day of Pentecost.  It says:

42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Then later in Acts 2:46 it says this.  We read:

46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

So from the very beginning the early church was devoted to gathering together to listen and learn from the apostles, to fellowship, to the “breaking of bread” or communion, and to praying.  And that’s what’s happening here in chapter 20.  Paul and the other believers are gathered in homes to listen and learn, to break bread and take communion, and to pray.  We also read in 1 Corinthians 16:1-2 that tithing and giving money is also appropriate.  So all of these practices were performed from the beginning by the early church and continued to take place over and over again.  And especially on Sunday or the Lord’s Day.  The first day of the week when believers would celebrate together the resurrection of Jesus.

Alright.  So at this time Paul is gathered together with other believers on the first day of the week.  And notice that verse 7 also says that “we were gathered”.  So who is “we”?  This is the second of four “we” passages in the book of Acts and it means that Luke himself was there on this particular evening.  Luke wrote the book of Acts and occasionally he shows up in some of the stories because he was there.  And he was there on this occasion.

So Paul, Luke, and many others were gathered together and Paul was planning to leave the next morning.  So he prolonged his speech until midnight.  Paul goes late into the night.  Maybe we should try that here?  I get people tapping their watches like this when I go 5 minutes over!  I’m just kidding.  It’s probably only my wife who does that!

Anyway, Paul goes late into the night and a young man named Eutychus falls asleep while sitting on a window ledge.  Young people do have an amazing ability to fall into a deep, deep sleep.  I used to be able to do that!  Why is it when you get older that it seems like you wake up at 6 or 7 AM no matter what time you go to sleep!  Frustrating.  But this young man named Eutychus falls asleep.  The term “young man” suggests an age of about 20 because he was beyond puberty but before marriage.  And one odd detail of this story is that his name means “Fortunate” or “lucky”.  I’m not sure how lucky he is based upon what happens!  But maybe he’s lucky that the Apostle Paul was there!  Because as he falls asleep he falls down from a third story window!  I did some research and in the first-century a story was about 10 feet tall so this young man fell 30 feet to the ground and landed with an awful “thud”.  And when this happened everyone rushed down to him and verse 9 says that he was “taken up dead”.  In other words, he was dead.  He was not passed out or knocked unconscious.  Eutychus was dead.  And these details are being given to us by Luke who was a doctor.  So Luke knew this man was truly dead.

And yet verse 10 tells us that when Paul went down and picked him up he said, “Do not be alarmed for his life is in him.”  Now don’t miss that.  Verse 9 says that this young man was “taken up dead”.  But when Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, picked up that same young man he was able to determine that he was not dead.  That his life was still in him.  So Paul was able to raise this man up from the dead!  He was able to pick up this young man and bring life back into him.  Absolutely incredible!  And yet this happened before in the book of Acts!

Because in Acts chapter 9, verses 36-42, we read a story about a disciple named Tabitha or Dorcas who was from the city of Joppa, a city about 40 miles northwest of Jerusalem on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea.  And when she became ill and died they laid her in an upper room and sent for Peter.  Peter then came and went up into the upper room where people were weeping and mourning.  Just as Lazarus’ family members had been weeping.  So Peter told them to all go outside and then he turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, arise!”  And she sat up, stood up, and walked out of the room.  And where did Peter learn to do that?  Let’s see.  Where did Peter first see that happen?  Oh, yeah.  He saw Jesus do it!  And yet Peter somehow knew that in that moment he, too, had the power to raise a woman from the dead!  To simply say the words and to watch a dead woman come back to life!!!  He then “presented her alive” to the others just as Jesus had presented Lazarus alive to the others!!!  Incredible!!!

And here Paul is doing the same!  Paul is raising up a young man named Eutychus from the dead!  Paul is proclaiming this man who was once dead to be alive!  And after he was raised up Paul then presented him as alive.  And in verses 11 and 12 they all go back up into the third story room and continue to listen and learn from Paul.  My guess is that nobody sat on the window ledge this time!  But maybe they did?  Because clearly Paul had the ability to raise up someone from the dead!  It was an amazing miracle and one that Luke says at the end of verse 12 they took great comfort in.  They were greatly comforted by the miracle that had taken place.

You see, miraculous healings should always bring us great comfort and strength.  And as we look into this story and consider how this young man named Eutychus was healed we ought to see how it parallels our own story.  Because in many ways we are a lot like him.  So here’s three miraculous healings that we each experience through Jesus that this man’s story reminds us of.

First, we need a miraculous healing from our spiritual sleep.  While listening to Paul’s teaching Eutychus fell into a deep sleep and the same has happened to us spiritually.  All of us fell into a deep sleep spiritually at some point within our lives and needed to be woken up.  We needed for someone to wake us up and for our “spiritual alarm clock” to go off.  Because every person who does not follow Jesus is spiritually “dead” or spiritually “asleep”.  This is why Paul says what he does in Ephesians 5:14 when he writes:

14 for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

Wake up!  Get up!  Recognize what God has done for you in Jesus!  Turn to Him!  Accept Him!  Live for Him!  And understand that you are dead spiritually or asleep spiritually without Him.  We are dead spiritually without Jesus.  We are “asleep” spiritually and need someone to wake us up.  We need to be healed from our spiritual sleep.

Second, we need a miraculous healing from our sinful fall.  After Eutychus fell into a deep sleep he fell three stories down or about thirty feet.  But the truth is that when we sinned against God our fall was much, much, greater.  We fell from a right relationship with Him.  We sinned and turned against God which separated us from our Creator.  In that moment sin became our new “Master” and we began to serve it.  We no longer served God.  He no longer ruled over us.  Instead sin ruled over us.  And it became a sickness and a disease which destroyed us from the inside.  So God sent Jesus to set us free from sin and He became our new “Master”.  And Jesus set us free from both the “guilt” and “penalty” of sin.  Something Dr. Jack Cottrell from our book of theology at noon described it as the “double trouble” of sin.  It caused us to both experience the guilt and penalty or punishment of our sin.  But through Jesus and His grace we have received the “double cure”.  A miraculous healing that we desperately needed.

This is why Paul explains it in this way when he writes in Romans 5:10 that

10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. 11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

In other words, though we were once separated from God because of our sinful fall, we have now been reconciled to God because of our saving faith in Jesus.  We can rejoice because of our miraculous healing.  The healing we received because of our sinful fall.

And then third and finally, we need a miraculous healing from our second death.  When the people rushed downstairs and picked up Eutychus they found him dead.  But Paul picked him up and brought him back to life.  And that is a picture of what Jesus has done for us.  There is a second death.  The first is phyiscal.  We die physically because of our sins.  However, there is a second death that people can experience.  A spiritual death.  This is why John writes this in the book of Revelation, chapter 20, verse 14 when it says:

14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. 15 And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

You see in Revelation 20 the Apostle John is given a vision of the Final Judgment when God will judge the living and the dead.  And only those whose names are written in the Book of Life or who are saved will escape that second death.  The first is physical.  The second is spiritual.  And the second results in eternal damnation.  Yet, Jesus enables us to escape.  Because those whose names are written in the Book of Life are those who are in Him.  It’s the ultimate form of miraculous healing.  A healing that will last for all eternity.  A healing from our second death.

So the story of Eutychus reminds us of three miraculous healings we have all received in Jesus.  It reminds us of our spiritual sleep.  Just as he fell asleep we have fallen asleep spiritually too.  It reminds us of our sinful fall.  Because just as he fell from a great height we have fallen too.  And it reminds us of our second death.  Because just as he fell to his death we fell to our death but in Jesus we have been healed.  Miraculously healed from the effects of that second form of death.  And so just as the people were greatly comforted by the miraculous healing they experienced we ought to be greatly comforted too.

We should always be comforted by miraculous healing.  So let me ask you a question.  Where have you been healed?  Where have you seen a miraculous healing take place in your life or in the life of someone you love?  Several years ago one of our church family named Denise Dank had a miraculous healing when she received a double lung transplant.  So think about where you have been healed as we listen to her story.  Let’s watch:

[Video:  “Denise Dank - Story” - 2:42]

What an amazing story!  Maybe my favorite part was when Denise said, “In that moment I felt God saying, ‘I want you to know that this was Me.  I want others to know this was Me.  He waited until the odds were impossible so the miracle would be undeniable.”  

That’s so powerful.  Let me repeat that.  “He waited until the odds were impossible so the miracle would be undeniable.”  Can you relate?  Can you think of a time in your life when God waited until the odds were impossible so that the miracle would be undeniable?  Because in just a few moments you’re going to have an opportunity to share.  Up at the front to my left and right are two chalkboards.  After communion as we go back into a time of worship I want you to come forward and finish the sentence on each board it says:  “The odds were impossible when God…”  How would you finish that sentence?  When God mended my marriage?  When God fixed my family?  When God delivered me from my debt?  When God saved me from my sin?  How would you finish that sentence?  Think about it and let’s respond as a church family.

Let me wrap it up in this way.  Before Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead He said to Martha, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”  And prior to that Jesus, when He first arrived, had a conversation with Martha.  One in which she said, “Lord, if you had been here I know my brother would not have died.  And even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give to you.”  And Jesus said, “Your brother will rise again.”  Martha then said, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”  Then Jesus said to her, “I am the Resurrection and the Life.  Whoever believes in Me will live shall never die.  Do you believe this?”  And Martha said, “Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”  In other words, Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, I believe you are God’s Son and I believe You are capable of healing anyone including my brother.”  And with those words of faith Jesus then went and performed the greatest miracle of healing the world had ever seen.

Today Jesus asks you to believe the same.  He says to you and to me, “Do you believe?  Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”  In other words, did I not tell you that if you believed you would see miraculous healings all around you?  Today is the day to say to Jesus, “Yes, Lord, I believe.  I believe in your power to heal me.”  So…

Find the comfort you need by trusting in the miraculous healing power of Jesus.

Let’s pray.

[Prayer:  For God to help us to trust in Jesus’ power to heal us and the ones we love.]

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