Jesus Cleans Us: a sermon about a woman with a blood issue for 12 years

The following was emailed out to my church Friday evening:

“Imagine being ill for 12 years and the despair of not only suffering through your disease for so long, but the added pain that even your family would not hug you, hold your hand, or even touch you. In the time of Jesus, this is how women were treated when they had any bleeding issues. They were considered “unclean” and untouchable. Please join us this Sunday when guest speaker Mark Sohmer, Missionary with Open Air Campaigners, teaches from Mark, chapter 5, where Jesus encounters a woman who had constant bleeding for 12 years. Jesus forever changed this woman’s life in the way he responded to her. Additionally, we’ll see that all of us are “unclean” in God’s eyes, and like the woman in Mark, chapter 5, we’ll see that we need the cleansing God gives only when we reach out to Jesus. Please invite your friends and loved ones this Sunday. The gospel will be preached, so let’s pray with expectation that God brings people to salvation this Sunday.”

Please feel free to forward the YouTube link, or the MP3 link, or the link to this blog to anyone you think would be blessed by it. I believe this message is very appropriate for unsaved friends, especially those who might be suffering.

If you want to see or listen to the sermon, just scroll down and you can do that. But if you want some background info on why the service was an amazing work of God, here it is:

When I teach or preach, I usually write down ahead of time every word I’m going to say. This is not uncommon for Pastors and Seminary Professors to do. It is called “manuscripting.” Of course I deviate a bit from my manuscript, but for the most part, I try to stay close to it. I do this because I’m dealing with God’s Word, and I don’t want to make mistakes. I also do this because if I speak spontaneously, I am apt to say something inaccurate.

For the longest time Shelby has been encouraging me not to be so dependent on my notes. “You know the passage,” she’ll say to me. “Teach it from your heart!”

But I like my notes. I like my manuscript. It makes me feel comfortable.

God took away my notes this week.

On Tuesday evening I was in a car accident and taken to the Emergency Room. I’m fine, but I didn’t get home until 2:30AM and was in a lot of pain on Wednesday, so I didn’t do any preparations. Then I had a few doctor’s appointments and had to spend a lot of time with the insurance company, repair shop, and more. I literally did not have time to manuscript my sermon. So I wrote down an outline, and prayed, prayed, prayed. I was so scared without my manuscript to hold onto. Instead I had to depend on the Holy Spirit speaking through me. And WOW did He! It was one of the most amazing things. I give the Spirit of God complete credit for what happened at LifeWay Church on Sunday. It was an amazing time.

As an example of the responses, I received this email (I removed names):

“Mark, great job yesterday. [Name removed] and I were able to minister to a first time visiter (named Judi) and she rededicated her life to the Lord – she said it was your message that prompted her to walk forward!! She will be having surgery on her neck (cancer) in April and she put the request for prayer on her connect sheet and we got it to [name removed]. Holy is the Lord!!”

I’m in amazement. That email, along with so many other encouragements, has been prompting me to praise Jesus!!!

If you’d like to watch the sermon, it is available via YouTube below. Contact me if you want me to mail you a DVD. 🙂

Here is the video:

Here is the Audio. Right-click on the “speaker” or the title of the sermon to save the file to your computer.

Jesus Cleans Us; a sermon from Mark 5:25-34 (52 min’s, 22 sec’s)

Thanks and God bless you!

in awe of Jesus,

Mark

———————————–
10 out of 10 people die.
Are you ready?
Find out at: http://Luke-15.org/Jesus/
Please consider this as there is nothing more important.

The Sohmer Family
Reaching people from around the world
in Boston and New England
with Open Air Campaigners
http://Luke-15.org
http://oacusa.org