Touched By His Power Series

OPEN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW5OBrB4MRM (0:0 thru 1:52 - where the speaker begins to introduce next video) The video describes how chemicals are used to create the different colors in fireworks.

How many of you knew that stuff? Isn’t that cool? All those beautiful fireworks on the 4th of July - and it’s all because they mixed different chemicals together to get the wonderful and vibrant colors.

(PAUSE – shifting from a joyful look to one of puzzlement)

Did you know that fireworks are dangerous? Do you know why they’re dangerous? Yeah - it’s because they mix…all those different chemicals together to create an explosion. That’s why they have to have a license to set off those huge fireworks displays and that also why there needs to be a fire department on hand during the shows.

There is explosive power in those fireworks, and if they’re not handled properly – they can be dangerous. They have a power that needs to be respected; a power-needs to be controlled by someone who knows what they’re doing

In our text this morning we read an interesting statement about POWER:

We’re told that “… POWER came out from (Jesus) and healed them all.” Luke 6:19

Now, that caught my attention, because this isn’t the only time that POWER was mentioned when speaking of people being healed by Jesus

Luke 5:17 says “On one of those days, as he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting there, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem. And the POWER of the Lord was with him to heal.”

In Luke 8:43-46 we read the story about “… a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years, and though she had spent all her living on physicians, she could not be healed by anyone. She came up behind (Jesus) and touched the fringe of his garment, and immediately her discharge of blood ceased.

And Jesus said, ‘Who was it that touched me?’ When all denied it, Peter said, ‘Master, the crowds surround you and are pressing in on you!’ But Jesus said, "Someone touched me, for I perceive that POWER has gone out from me.’”

The Gospel of Mark 5:30 tells the story of the healing of this woman and says it a little differently: “Jesus, perceiving in himself that POWER had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my garments?’”

It says Jesus “perceived” that power had gone out from Him. Now I MIGHT be wrong here… but when Jesus healed this woman it almost seems as if He was taken by surprise when she touched Him. But hold that thought in the back of your mind for a couple moments and we’ll get back to it later in the sermon.

The first thing I want you to notice in this passage is this: “…(there was) a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases. And those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. And all the crowd sought to touch him, for power came out from him and healed them all.” Luke 6:17-19

People came to Jesus because they wanted to be touched by Him. They wanted the power to come out from Jesus to change their lives.

You know… that’s why many of us are here today. This is not a “religious ritual” we’re going through here. Yes, we sing and we pray and we take of communion and we listen to a sermon, but the real reason we’re here to be touched by Jesus. In fact, that’s why we became Christians. We wanted Jesus to touch us. We wanted HIS power in our lives. We came to Jesus so HIS POWER could change us and so that we’d have His POWER TO OVERCOME the difficulties we face.

When Jesus really touches you… He fixes you inside. He changes who you are, He cleans up what you’ve fouled up, He fixes what you’ve broken in your life. And that’s why many of us are here. If we do this "church thing" right… we can lay hold of the power that Jesus can give us.

So, the first thing I want to see is that the touch of Jesus can give us God's power. The next thing I want you to notice in this passage is this: “… power came out from him and healed them all.” Luke 6:19

In Mark 5:30 - it says pretty much the same thing: “… POWER had gone out from him”

Where did that power come from? That’s right - the power came from Jesus. My point is this: if you want God’s power in your life you need to get it from Jesus. Too many people (even Christians) believe they have sufficient power in their lives to handle whatever comes there way and so they don’t bother to have Jesus touch their lives. But it’s not true.