In the sermon titled 'The People in Darkness Have Seen a Great Light,' Scott Brown explores Matthew 4:12-25, emphasizing the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy about the coming of Jesus as a light in the darkness. The narrative highlights Jesus' movement from Nazareth to Capernaum after John the Baptist's imprisonment, fulfilling the prophecy from Isaiah that the people in darkness have seen a great light. Brown discusses how Jesus calls His first disciples—Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John—by the Sea of Galilee, inviting them to become 'fishers of men.' The sermon emphasizes the transformative power of Jesus' ministry, which included preaching, teaching, and healing, and His role as a deliverer from darkness. Brown also examines the concept of darkness and light, contrasting the worldly reliance on 'wizards and mutterers' with the truth of God's word. He calls believers to follow Jesus genuinely, engage in evangelism, and forsake the love of darkness. The sermon concludes with applications that challenge listeners to examine their own lives for attachments to darkness, to follow Jesus wholeheartedly, and to commit to being fishers of men, spreading the light of the Gospel.

Our text this morning is Matthew 4 verses 12 through 25. Now when Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he departed to Galilee. In leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and upon those who sat in the region in shadow of death, light has dawned. From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And Jesus, walking by the Sea of Galilee, saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. Then he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. They immediately left their nets and followed him. Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets. He called them, and immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.

And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people. Then his fame went throughout all Syria, and they brought to him all sick people who were afflicted with various diseases and torments, and those who were demon possessed, epileptics and paralytics, and he healed them. Great multitudes followed him from Galilee and from Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond the Jordan. Dear Heavenly Father, Dear Goddess, we sit and listen to your word this morning. I pray to your God that we would be like these men who hear Jesus and begin to follow Him.

That we would leave father and mother, that we would leave profession, that we would leave all things behind, and we would take up the tasks that you have given us. That we would love no other thing but you and nothing greater than you. Amen. In Matthew's order of events here, what we find is that somehow he thinks it right to move from the temptation of Christ onto an event that happens an entire year later. And what has happened is that the Lord Jesus has been tempted by the devil.

And the devil has done what he desires to do to all of his children. And that is to try to make darkness seem so sunny, to put a different name on it, to just make it look so helpful and so good. And so Matthew comes in and he begins to speak about the true nature of darkness and also that Jesus Christ is the one who delivers from darkness. What we find in this whole passage here is that Jesus Christ comes and delivers those who are in darkness. And this is the heart of the passage of Scripture.

And just to understand the way that Matthew plays this out, In the first section in verses 12 through 17, he talks about a people who sit in darkness, who are in a realm of darkness. They're in a region of darkness and light comes to them. So he speaks broadly about people. And then in the next section, in verses 18 through 22, what Matthew does is he talks about four men who are rescued from darkness. And then after that, in the final section, in verses 23 to 25, the Lord Jesus goes about all of Galilee delivering people from darkness, particularly the poor, particularly those who have terrible afflictions.

And so the whole theme that Matthew is bringing to us is the theme of the beauty of the work of God to deliver from darkness. We read in Isaiah that this is all about signs and wonders. The greatest sign and wonder is a person who's been delivered from darkness. And that's the subject of this text today. What we find here is talk of light and darkness, healing and the beautiful ministry of Jesus Christ to call men out of darkness and into his glorious light.

And so we pick up the story here in verse 12. Now when Jesus heard that John had been put into prison, he departed to Galilee. So John, this is obviously, this is obviously a period of time long beyond his temptation. From the time of his temptation to the time that John is thrown into prison is probably about a year. I'm not exactly sure how many months, but it's some distance in time.

And from the time that Jesus has been tempted by the devil, We find him, he's already performed the wedding at Cana and then he has, and he said that there's somebody who brings out the best wine last. And he's already met with Nicodemus and said to him, you must be born again. He's already met with the woman at the well and said, if you knew who spoke to you and about this water that gives life. And He's already stood up in the synagogue in Nazareth, in his very own hometown, and has said that, I've been appointed to preach the gospel to the poor and delivery of the captives. And he's reading in the prophet Isaiah, and he says, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.

The Lord Jesus has already gone into the temple and turned over the tables. So a lot has happened. Word is spreading about the Lord Jesus. And there's a lot of conflict in his hometown, so much so even that he hears about this other conflict where John the Baptist is thrown into prison. He's thrown into a prison high on the mountaintop in a terrible howling wilderness on the east side of the Sea of Galilee and John has been taken there and he'll do his last battle there.

And if we can, let's see, is this slide up here? So do I just, oh there we go, okay, excellent. I just want you to be able to see the geographical issues that are actually implied by this passage of Scripture. First of all, Jesus goes up to be baptized there in the Jordan River, just north of the Dead Sea. And then, he's driven into the wilderness on the eastern side of the Dead Sea.

Do you see where he goes there? And then he goes back to Galilee, and then he moves to Capernaum. So that's the trail that the Lord Jesus is taking here. And a lot has happened from the time of his temptation up until the time that he hears that John the Baptist is thrown into prison. And there John the Baptist will stay until his final execution.

And so Jesus is now departing to Galilee. And then in verse 413, and leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea in the regions of Zegulon and Naphtali. And so he goes there on the one hand because he hears of the danger because of what has happened to John the Baptist. The word that Matthew chooses to use for Jesus departing is actually the word for escape. I mean, he was getting, he was hightailing it out of there.

But that wasn't the only reason he went. He went Even though there were earthly historical things going on, there was something greater going on, and that is God is in control of history. God is in control of where you live and who gets put into prison and all the things that happened there. While There may be threats and different things going on in the daily skirmishes on the face of the planet Earth. There's something so much bigger going on.

That was true of Jesus, and it's true of you, and it's true of you, and it's true of everyone in this place. That God is doing something greater than what is happening just in the momentary collapses and disappointments and joys and births of babies and all kinds of things that happen. There's something greater happening And that's what we see demonstrated here in this verse, that while Jesus is fleeing, there's also something that's happening. God is fulfilling what he has said by the prophets. And of course, what is quoted here is Isaiah chapter 9, where Matthew quotes, The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles.

The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and upon those who sat in the region and the shadow of death, light has dawned." So here, this is being spoken of, that it might be fulfilled. If you look at the region that Jesus has come to now in Capernaum, it fits the prophecy. This area that Jesus was going to was an area that had people that possessed an unusual level of disobedience. And in the eighth century, it's prophesied that they would be destroyed and Tiglath-Paleaser came in and he did his work there. So as and then there were other judgments as well on this land.

But let's go, in order to understand what's being said here, of course, what do we do? We turn in our Bibles to Isaiah chapter 9. Because Matthew is not throwing away words, he's not just picking something out of a hat, He's collecting up a prophecy that meant something and that was going to be fulfilled in every single detail. So let's go back to Isaiah chapter 9, and we really ought to back up into chapter 8 to see what is being said here, what is on the prophet's mind. Because what is on the prophet's mind is what Jesus will be fulfilling here in his ministry, And it's the same thing that He's fulfilling in our lives, as He's done signs and wonders in us to help us to love the light and hate the darkness.

We began to see the destructiveness and the horrible nature of darkness, and we turned to the light because God gave us the ability to see the beauty of the light and how good it was. And so that's what the prophet is speaking of here. So if you back up to verse 16 in chapter 8 of Isaiah, Please turn in your Bibles there so you can see the flow of thought. Because there's a continuous flow from this first part in Isaiah all the way, you know, many hundreds of years ahead in the passage of Scripture that we're in now. So what's this all about?

Well, the people had rejected the testimony, meaning they rejected the Word of God. That's why in verse 16 Isaiah writes, bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples. That's what's going to happen. He's prophesying a time when the law of God would be sealed up among His disciples. Literally, the law would be put in their hearts, as it is in the time of the Gospel.

And I will wait on the Lord who hides His face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in Him." So here there's a period of time intervening in which God is hiding His face from His people because of the wickedness of their hearts and how it's working itself out. And then in verse 18, He says, Here am I and the children whom the Lord has given me, we are for signs and wonders in Israel." Now, what this says is that this prophecy is about those who are His children and are signs and wonders. I don't know if you ever thought of yourself as a sign and a wonder. But this is what Isaiah is saying, is that God created people for a sign and a wonder. If you ever want to know why God created you, He created you for this reason, to make you a sign and a wonder.

And what's the sign and the wonder? That the testimony of the law of God would be bound up in your heart, and He would do His signs and wonders as a result of it. And then we move to verse 19. And when they say to you, seek those who are mediums and wizards, who whisper and mutter, should not the people seek their God? Should they seek the dead on behalf of the living?

He says, no, to the law and to the testimony, if they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no what? No what? No light. No light in them. That's a critical term in our text in Matthew.

So what the prophet is saying is that the people are trusting in the wizards and the mutterers. They're going to Egypt for advice. They're going to Babylon to get their lifestyle. They're resting on this worldly principle that the mutterers and the wizards are giving them instead of the law of God. And let me just suggest, there really are only two ways in this world.

There's light and there's darkness and you are either in the newspapers of the wizards and the mutters or you are in the papers of the Word of God. There are only two ways. And all of us as we are desiring to continue a life as signs and wonders before God are in a process of cleansing and sanctification in our trust in the wizards and the mutterers. Because we still have their voices ringing in our ears. The wizards and the mutterers are always there to speak to us.

But there's something greater. And whenever a disciple of Jesus Christ points out a wizard and sends him running, a sign and a wonder has happened. So the whole issue here is the people are trusting in wizards and mutterers. Instead of the law and the testimony. The two are being set in juxtaposition to one another as opposites, as two completely different ways of living.

And Then in verse, he says, there's no light in them. And then in verse 21, it says, they will pass through it hard-pressed and hungry. And it shall happen when they are hungry, that they will be enraged and curse their king and their god and look upward. Then they will look to the earth and see trouble and darkness, gloom of anguish, and they will be driven into darkness. So this is a picture of people who have been driven into darkness because they've set aside the law of God.

They preferred the hipper, cooler, seemingly lighter, you know, more interesting counsels just like the devil did with the Lord Jesus Christ. He's trying to make darkness look and seem so sweet and so disarmed and not with any teeth, not something that would chew you up and spit you out into eternal damnation. So that's what's happening here. Now remember, if you remember, if you were with us when we were studying Deuteronomy, we get to the chapter of the curses of Deuteronomy, what we find there is that those who set aside the Word of God are being driven into madness and blindness and confusion of heart and no one is there to save them. That's What you get when you trust the mutters.

So I hope you see what Matthew is bringing forward here. He's speaking of a people who've set aside the law of God and it is what has driven them into darkness. Whenever you find a culture that's rejected the Word of God, that culture is being driven into darkness. Anytime you find people who say, well, I don't need the law of God to run my family, my government, my church, you have the people that are headed toward a culture of darkness. And so Matthew is bringing this whole context of Isaiah chapter 9 to us.

Now let's get to 9 verse 1, Because he continues to speak of a change. Nevertheless, don't you love that word in Scripture? Nevertheless, God saves his people. You're lost in darkness and sin, but for the grace of God. And so in 9, that's what we get, nevertheless, the gloom will not be on her who is distressed.

As when at first he lightly esteemed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward more heavily oppressed her by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan in Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light, And those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them light has shined." So what Matthew is saying is this is that. When Jesus goes to Capernaum, it is what Isaiah the prophet is saying. And it's about light dawning upon those who are in darkness. Now, the wonderful thing about God is he has mercy upon those who have fallen into darkness, and he reaches out to them.

Here, the Lord Jesus reaches out to a people in this region, all throughout the region. And we'll get to what that means for us later. But he's reaching out to this region, and light is dawning upon the region. And then he brings his light and dawns it upon four men who also will be emissaries of light in the world. And then he takes that same light and he heals the sick and he raises the dead And he casts out the demons.

This is the work of Jesus Christ in the world, and this also is our work. So then we read that, light has shined upon them. And then verse 3, you have multiplied the nation and increased its joy. They rejoice before you according to the joy of harvest, as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. And so, this speaks of the effect of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and that is that joy breaks out.

In your presence is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. One of my favorite verses in all of Scripture. And so the coming of the Gospel is the coming of something else that's so helpful and so wonderful. Anyone who has been converted understands that He turns your gloom into joy.

He turns your mourning into dancing. And He gives you so many reasons. And it's a sign and it's a wonder that God does in the human heart. And then verse 4, for you, this is the Lord Jesus Christ, you have broken the yoke of His burden. Jesus said, take my yoke upon you, For my burden is easy and my yoke is light.

There's a burden of the devil. There's the yoke. Everybody has a yoke Everyone's walking around with the yoke on let's be very clear about that You either have the yoke of the devil or you have the yoke of Jesus Christ that's it There are only two yokes in the world. And he says, you've broken the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor as in the day of Midian. For every warrior's sandal from the noisy battle and garments rolled in blood will be used for burning and fuel for fire.

Verse 6, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder. And his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. That actually means that things get better, brothers and sisters. His government of peace will continue to expand like a mustard seed does.

Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from this time forward and forever. And don't miss the last line in verse 7 because I really believe that this is such the heart of what we see in the Lord Jesus as we see him move throughout Galilee. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. Remember when he cleared the temple it was said the zeal of the Lord has accomplished this. Well the same thing here with all of Jesus' ministry.

This passage of Scripture is about the zeal of the Lord to bring light into darkness and the beauty of it and how wonderful it is to be found in the light and to have the darkness broken. So Matthew is referring back to this passage of scripture. So when we read this in verses 15 through 16, we understand that this is that. Now there's a time of breaking of the powers of darkness that he is doing signs and wonders that have to do with this fact that a people in darkness have seen a great light. Now if we had time this morning, this whole sermon would be about light because over this week I think I read every passage of scripture that related to light and darkness that I could find.

What a rich and wonderful study it is to consider this whole matter of light. God has given light for such good purposes. And just let's rest on this one thought. Jesus Christ says, I am the light of the world. I am the light of the world.

OK, so We move into the next section here, where Jesus is calling his disciple. Well, we can't leave yet. Verse 17, from that time, Jesus began to preach and say, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. So you recognize that phrase because it was what John the Baptist was also doing. So the Lord Jesus Christ is walking in fulfillment of what was prophesied before and demonstrated in John the Baptist himself, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And this brings us really to, I think, one of the most wonderful meditations about God and the Word of God, And that is that God is so kind to show us the way things really are. While the mutters and the wizards are trying to help diagnose your problems, how they're trying to unpack your psychological problems, how they're trying to figure out what kind of co-dependency or whatever is you're suffering from. God is so kind to cut through all the drivel and all the darkness and all the madness and all the confusion of heart and he goes right to the heart of the matter of every human problem, and that is repentance. Repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. If there's a message that you're preaching in this world and it doesn't include repentance, you're just slapping band-aids on cancer.

But God gives us the cure. The hymn writer called it the double cure. Save from death and make me pure. Here is the secret of life, repentance. And when you think about the problems in your marriage, you just have to recognize that all of your problems in your marriage, you can trace them back to sin.

You have a problem in your work life, you're struggling with this or that, there's always sin lurking somewhere in the mix. Always. We see through a glass darkly, we have all these ways of thinking that are so wrong, We've listened to the mutters and the wizards for so long that we don't diagnose our problems right. Plus, we're so self-congratulatory. We're constantly stroking our own egos.

We're trying to make ourselves seem better than we really are and so we miss the real cure and that is repentance. And that's at the heart of every single problem that any of us have here in this room because we were born in sin. Thankfully, God is continually delivering us. He is adding more light to our darkness. And this is such a wonderful thing that's spoken of here.

That he's preaching, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. What's the kingdom of heaven? The kingdom of heaven is the rulership of Jesus Christ. Rulership in your heart, rulership in the world, and rulership forevermore. So it's kind of a telescopic sort of rulership that applies to everything.

So then, after Matthew declares that light has come into darkness that the people who are sitting in a region of darkness have seen a great light. So before we leave this section, let me just ask, is there anyone here who has not seen the light? Have you not tasted the kindness of the Lord? Has your gloom been dealt with by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ? Have you experienced what he's talking about right here?

I pray that God will open up your heart. We know that only God can open up a person's heart, but I pray that you will seek him with all of your heart. So then Jesus calls his disciples. This is such a fantastic section, so well-known. Jesus is walking by the Sea of Galilee.

This beautiful place, I believe it was Josephus who said that about three million people lived in the vicinity of the Sea of Galilee, that there were over 200 villages around the Sea of Galilee. So it was highly populated, but it was beautiful. Today there's not very much there at all. But at that time, apparently, there were many, many people living there. And Jesus is walking by the Sea of Galilee.

If you've ever been there, or if you've ever seen pictures of it, I've only seen pictures of it. And it's beautiful. It looks like such a fantastic place to walk. And there, Jesus is walking by the Sea of Galilee, and he saw two brothers, Simon, called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen." So here he comes upon these two brothers. We know from the Gospel of John that he's already known these brothers, you know, way back, back, you know, back in near the time of his baptism, because Andrew was there, apparently, from what we can gather from the Gospel of John, and he went and got his brother.

So this is, so Peter and Andrew are not new to this. They have known of the Lord Jesus Christ, they have seen John, And it's most likely that they've already heard his preaching and they understand what's going on. But there they are, they're fishing, they're doing what they do, actually casting a net into the sea. And he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. They immediately left their nets and followed him.

So this encounter with Peter and Andrew was a very important encounter. When Peter and Andrew said, yes Lord, we'll follow you, they were signing their own decents. Peter would be crucified upside down by Nero, most probably. Andrew would be most probably executed in a similar way by Herod the First. So in following Jesus, they were sealing their own death warrant.

And they followed Jesus. And so, he said to them, follow me. So that was the command, follow me. A follower is one that goes behind. A follower is a learner.

A follower is not making it up on his own. A follower says what the Lord Jesus said about his Father. I do nothing unless I see my Father doing it. I say nothing unless I hear my Father saying it. That's what a disciple is.

The Lord Jesus has already taught his disciples by his own example in following his father, what it means to be a disciple. And so the command is, follow me and I will make you fishers of men." So there's the call to follow, but then there's help. He says, and this is very important for us to understand the language there, He says, I will make you fishers of men. This is what Jesus does with his disciples. Jesus Christ promises to teach his disciples how to fish for men.

And that's what he does. He teaches them how to do it. They walk together. They talk together. They pray together They're in the streets.

They're in the synagogues They're in the lonely places. They're in boats Sometimes it's Peters boats sometimes it's somebody else's boat, but they are walking together. This is the pattern of discipleship that Jesus Christ has established. The way that Jesus Christ is mentoring These men is the way that God desires for his disciples to also mentor, by walking and talking alongside. Instead of a talking head, it's a talking person walking and talking beside.

It's interesting. The English Puritans took this passage, and they applied it to parenting. And they said, if you take what the Bible has said about parenting, particularly Deuteronomy 6, Deuteronomy 11 and other places, if you take that and you ask the question, who is the greatest disciple maker, it's Jesus Christ. And what many of the English Puritans did was they said, this is the pattern for a father. This is how a father disciples his sons and his daughters.

He walks beside them. I just want to testify before you that this is the most wonderful way that anyone can disciple their children. It's been occurring to me, especially lately, as my son has grown older and is now out on his own, that my son and I, we walk together everywhere. And I was with a man and his two little boys yesterday and I watched this man with his little boys. And it just brought back a flood of memories of walking with my own son.

And I walked with him. And I taught him everything I knew. I wanted him to hear everything I heard. I wanted to show him everything I was doing. And he never left my side until about six months before he got married.

And I just want to tell you something. I am so glad that happened. And I commend it to you, brothers. Whatever you have to do to walk beside your children, you should do it. And I don't know how to work all the details out.

We live in a very strange economy that wages war against us. But Jesus says, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. This is the pattern for discipleship. I do agree with the English Puritans that the principle here is applicable for us in the discipleship of our own children. They say the Lord Jesus was walking with His children, and He was.

And He helps them. He makes them fishers of men. He walks with them so closely that he makes them that way. And you can't make them that way unless you're with them, at least quite in the same way that's described here. And so immediately they left their nets and they followed him.

In verse 21 we read, and going on from there, so he's continuing, he's walking around the Sea of Galilee. We don't know if it's the same day, it's probably the same day, but He saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father mending their nets. So here we have John the disciple whom Jesus loved and James. James would actually be the first martyr. And these two brothers, John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, and James were the sons of thunder.

Boanerges, the word that explains it. They were the sons of thunder. These were not quiet, milquetoasty guys. When they were on the road with Jesus and they were preaching the gospel and a runner would sit ahead to find a place for them to stay for the night. And nobody in that town would let them stay there.

And so the sons of thunder said, Lord, can we call fire down from heaven on this town? Well, the Lord Jesus wasn't actually compliant to that request, but they were the sons of thunder for a reason. And here they are, these these two brothers that were in the boat with their father Zebedee and they were actually mending their nets rather than fishing and he called them and, verse 22, and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. So there are many things that we could point out here about Zebedee. Most people believe that he was a family fairly well-to-do.

And who knows what the loss of his sons meant? He lost them for at least the next couple of years, probably, and they followed Jesus Christ. Did they completely set aside their fishing? We don't know, but most probably they did, at least for that season. We do find them fishing again after the resurrection.

So they didn't set aside their trade. But the applying of their trade would have to be diminished greatly during that season of walking with Jesus Christ. So immediately they left their nets and followed Him. So the immediacy, the faithful, you know, instant in obedience was here in this heart that these men had. And in verse 23 we come to the next section, and Jesus went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.

Now, what we find is this pattern that the disciples are being exposed to in life. Jesus has just said, I will make you fishers of men." And they are being sent out now to be emissaries of light, of the breaking of the power of darkness. And what we see in these men is urgency, What we see is the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ. They are true evangelists and they have much to teach us about what it means to be evangelists. I have a grandson by the name of Knox Defender, and I love his name for many, many reasons.

But I love his name because of something John Knox said, And I'm teaching my grandson to say this, where he said, give me Scotland, ere I die. And that really captures the passion of the Lord Jesus Christ as he begins to move through Galilee. Give me Galilee. Give me Carazan. Give me Bethsaida.

Give me these towns and villages around the Sea of Galilee. And I would just want to ask all of us here, do we have that same heart? Do we look at Wake Forest and Rolesville and Raleigh and Zebulon? Do we have the eyes of Jesus for these towns? We live among towns just like Jesus did.

And we've been put here in the very same way. But what we find here in this next section is Jesus is moving about these towns. I mean, if there were 240 towns, That's a lot of towns. Jesus was moving along in those towns. He was on a mission to bring light into darkness, to preach repentance that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.

And so Jesus moves into a season of enormous activity. He was the greatest, itinerant evangelist that ever lived. I think he would make George Whitefield look like a lazy man. George Whitefield seemed almost bionic. He was preaching four to six times a day beginning at 6 a.m.

He went up and down the East Coast of the United States so that 80% of the people in the colonies had already heard his voice by the time he died. Now that's pretty amazing when you think about how scattered the people were in these colonies. Woodfield actually preached two evangelistic sermons on his wedding day. That probably wasn't the best thing to do, but he did it. We think of men like David Brainerd who said, Oh God, make my heart burn for the gospel for these people.

And he did, and he continued on in sickness and discouragement and in every kind of reversal you can imagine to evangelize the American Indians. But the Lord Jesus was of enormous activity in his evangelistic effort. Let me ask us this question. Do we have anything near this in this church? How about all of us collectively?

Can it be said that our hearts burn for these towns that surround us? And are we out and about in these towns, seeking and saving those who are lost? Are we hiding in our homes? Or we have such a nice, sweet homeschool family, and yet we don't even know the people that are around us. The Lord Jesus was going about all Galilee.

Now, When it says in verse 23, He went about all Galilee, the language that Matthew is using is just constantly going about. Teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing all kinds of sicknesses and all kinds of disease among people. Now, this brings us to what we'll just call the threefold ministry of Christ. Teaching, preaching, and healing. These were the three things that he was doing.

And he was teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom. So he was going into these synagogues. The synagogues were created after the deportations. Gatherings of Jews to study the Torah, to pray, to educate, to do a number of things were established. And they were scattered all over the region and all over the outer regions as well.

And they were the places where people gathered and that's where Jesus was going. The Bible doesn't say anything about the creation of a synagogue. But Jesus was going into the synagogues and preaching there. And he was teaching. That has to do with giving the facts, giving the details, the didactic points that need to be considered.

That's teaching. To say what is. And then preaching is a mighty appeal. It's a herald and an urgent call kind of communication. So there are both of these kinds of communications going on in this place.

And this is the kind of communication we would say should be going on among the people of God. There should be both. Not just one, But both, as the Lord Jesus did. And it says, and he was healing all kinds of sickness, all kinds of disease among the people, then his fame went throughout all Syria, And they brought to him all sick people who were afflicted with various diseases and torments and those who were demon possessed, epileptics and paralytics, and he healed them. Great multitudes followed him from Galilee and from Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and beyond the Jordan.

So what we find is Jesus is dealing with every kind of sickness and disease that you can imagine. And He's healing everyone, apparently, that He is with. Now, Does it mean that He healed every single person in that region? I don't actually believe that it means that. But when He lifted His hand to heal, they were healed.

All were healed whenever He lifted His hand. Not like us. Not like the Apostle Paul who said, I left trope and the sick in my letus. Do you think the Apostle Paul was praying that my letus would be made well? Of course he was.

He's just like you and I. When someone is sick, we pray for them that they would be well. In this sense, we are different from the Lord Jesus. When the Lord Jesus lifted his hand to heal, they were always healed, and they were healed immediately, and they were healed of everything that He was healing them of. And so there's a great distinction between the way that healing works with us and the way that healing worked with him.

He calls us to pray for the sick. In fact, if anyone is sick in the congregation, they should call for the elders of the church. And there should be confession of sin and the anointing of oil. Often people in a congregation, even our congregation, are way too slow to call the elders. Way too fast to run for the medicine cabinet and way too slow to call the elders of the church to pray.

Often we find out that people have had debilitating sickness and we didn't even know about it and they never called us. Or they might have said, we're sick, but we're not inviting you to come and pray. I don't know how long it's been since someone has called for the elders of the church to pray. It's been quite a while. Maybe this entire year has passed and not a single person has called for the elders of the church.

Do you think there's something wrong with that? I think there's something wrong with that. There's something about the way that we're thinking. The mutters, the wizards have been talking to us too much. And we don't rely on the things that God has given, the ordinary means of grace that God has given.

If anyone is sick among you, James 5 says, let him call for the elders of the church. Just saying this, I've just recalled a couple of occasions that people have called us to pray for them. Thank you so much for that. So it actually has happened, but I'm not confident that it's happened enough. And I'll have to say, I'm confident that it hasn't been enough in my own family.

There have been times that I've called for the elders of the church to pray for my wife or my children. But I have to confess many, many times, looking back, I should have called for the elders of the Church to come and pray for my wife. So Jesus is going about, He's healing all kinds of disease among the people. Notice He's healing the demon possessed, those who are tormented, and all kinds of very, very difficult problems that it seems that nobody knows how to fix. Often we come to things that we just can't fix.

We can't find a medicine, the doctors don't know what's wrong. What do you do? You cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the healer of all of our diseases. We know that He does heal sometimes and other times He chooses not to. He always answers.

He always answers prayers for His own glory. For some reason, he desires that we would suffer from time to time so that we would cry out to him. Maybe it's to help us to quit relying on the mutters and the wizards so that we have no other recourse except to cry out to him. That's part of what it means to follow me, to follow him. You're following him.

Notice that there are demon possessed, there are many demon possessed. It's commonly said, well where are the demon possessed around us? Well, I actually believe they're everywhere. I submit that most of the most popular rock and roll entertainers are demon possessed. Look at their behavior.

Look at what they say. Look at how they move. Look at the way they say the things they say. If you don't think that they're demon possessed, it's maybe that you've just heard the mutters and the wizards too much, and you think that somehow fits into the kingdom of God. No, it doesn't at all.

It fits in the kingdom of darkness. The ruler of darkness is working there. So there are far more demons possessed here all around us than I think that we're aware of. And one of the reasons we don't bump into them is because we're not evangelizing. We're not preaching repentance for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

You notice that Jesus is going to two kinds of places. He's going to the place where the religious people are, and he's preaching repentance. Because the people in the church often are found to be a mixed multitude. You should always preach the Gospel in the church. That's what Jesus was doing in the synagogues.

And then He was going out to the places of paganism. He was going out into the streets and the other places. Those are the two places that we should be going. Now next weekend there are some from this congregation that are going to go downtown Raleigh and they're going to cry out, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand at a gay pride gathering in this right in the center of Raleigh. And so it's right for them to do that.

They're in a public square to cry out for repentance, and the demons will respond there. The demonized are there. There. The demonized are there. Do you think the Lord Jesus Christ would walk by a gay pride event like that?

I think he would. And I think some of his disciples are going to do that next weekend. And I'm great, I'm so grateful for it. And then we read in verse 25, And great multitudes followed him from Galilee and from Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond as Jordan. I mean they were just flooding in to see what was going on, because God, God was turning light into darkness, darkness into light.

Okay, so let's have just a few moments of application. I have three applications for you today. Number one. These are three questions. I'm going to ask you three questions.

Is there any love for darkness left in you? Is there any love for darkness left in you? Is there any love for darkness left in you? Are there dark things that you're continuing to be attached to? Are you tempting the Lord your God by continuing to put yourself in the presence of some form of darkness?

Jesus said in Luke 11, take heed that the light which is in you is not darkness. In other words, that there are some sort of sunny looking things that are actually darkness. Do you listen to music that has darkness in it? Do you watch things with your eyes that has any darkness in it? If I used your car, is the radio tuned to darkness or light?

Or Would I find the preachers of darkness in the CD player? Is there any love of darkness left in you? If I went to your computer and searched the history, would I find that you love, that you had a love for certain kinds of darkness? I mean, you've turned to Jesus Christ. You don't love every single form of darkness.

You've pulled away. Well Keep pulling away. Jesus says, if your eye is dead, the whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness? Now, in this passage, we saw how tragic it is for people to set aside the law of God to prefer the mutters and the sorcerers to what God has said.

And I just want to take this whole passage that the people in darkness have seen a great light. To just urge us as the people of God to consider, is there any love for darkness? Paul said, have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. Paul said to the Ephesians again, for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, says Peter, a holy nation, a special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you, called you, he called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light." 1 Peter 2.9.

So the first question is, is there any love for darkness left in you? Waka's children of the light producing the fruit of the light which consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth, and exposing the unfruitful works of darkness. And then the second is a question, and again following really the contours of this text. Do you follow? Do you follow?

Taking our place among the learners, being submissive, going where He takes us, recognizing our problem, prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. There's an idea out there that people embrace that God leads them through their impressions and through their feelings. So I'm really asking, are you following? But what does that mean? What does it mean to follow Jesus Christ?

Does it mean that you wake up in the morning and you say, what, oh Lord, what should I do? Or does it mean that you are seeking what He has said to you? The primary way that God leads us is through His Word. And that's why Isaiah was talking about a time where the law and the testimony had been set aside. The leadership factor among the people of God had been diminished because they had set aside the law and the testimony and they wanted to be led by all kinds of other interesting things.

So the question, do you follow? Do you follow? And then third, Are you fishing? Are you fishing? God has established us as disciples to be fishers of men.

And I don't believe that Becoming a fisher of men is a gift. It's a calling and a responsibility. Some people are really gifted at it, but everybody's called to it by way of the pattern of Jesus. You can say, well, that's not my gift. What you're really saying is, I really don't care about what Jesus said to his disciples.

I don't really care what he was doing. I'm going to do what I like to do. No, do what Jesus likes to do. I mean, the question isn't really about a gift. It's really a question of, do you like the stuff that Jesus likes to do?

You know, when you became a Christian, didn't you want to do the stuff that Jesus wanted to do? Didn't you see how amazing it was? What He did and what it was like? And you said, I want to do the stuff that Jesus is doing. Jesus was a fisher of men and he called men to be fishers of men, and he's dedicating himself to teach us how to be fishers of men.

So we should be fishers of men. It's not all that complex. You don't really need the gift to be a fisher of men. You just need to want to do the stuff that Jesus likes to do. So maybe there are just all kinds of people going through your mind that you need to be praying for more, seeking more, having a conversation with more.

I can recall twice yesterday where I was so busy and I had an opportunity and I didn't take it and I was going to preach on this passage today. That's how sinful I am. I don't know how sinful you are. I don't know if you're as bad as that. But this passage is here for us.

It's for me, it's for you, it's for my whole family to help us understand that there's a really important question. Are you fishing? Are you fishing? So what we find here is that the People who were in darkness have seen a great light, and what a great light it is. The demonized are set free, the sick are healed, the dead are even raised by the Lord Jesus, And the light has gone.

And that's why God has sent us. That is why you're alive. You are alive to be a sign and a wonder. And what's that all about? It's the sign and the wonder that there's light in the world.

And that's what God has given us to do. Let's pray. Lord, I thank you for this passage again, so challenging and convicting. And yet we see our Lord Jesus Christ so full of light, bringing together his treasures of light and sending them out into the world. May it be true of us what was true of these four disciples that were called in this passage.

Amen.