A TOUCH FROM JESUS

W. Dickson

Matthew 8: 1–4; 17: 4–8; Mark 7: 31–35; 8: 22–26

Somebody said to me before a gospel meeting recently, ‘I trust that someone will get a touch tonight’. Have you ever had a touch from Jesus? Have you known the unforgettable experience of having a touch from Jesus? Or have you come and gone, and never had a touch from Jesus? I want to speak of these persons in the passages we have read who had all a touch from Jesus, and of the wonderful effect it had upon them. With them, of course, it was physical, and some say, ‘Well, the day of miracles is past’. I do not think so. The day of miracles has not passed by any means. There are living miracles in this room at this time. We are counting on the Spirit of God effecting some more miracles tonight in persons getting a touch from Jesus.

So we commenced with this leper who came up to Him and did Him homage. What is a leper in Scripture? I want to be simple and do as much as I can to illustrate the simple words that are in the Bible. Well, a leper is a sinner. Are there any sinners here tonight? The gospel is for you. The gospel is for the sinner. Of course it is for the saints too, but the gospel is for the sinner here tonight. The leper is a sinner, but grace can save the sinner. We love to go over that ground, a sinner saved by grace. Now here was this man, a leper, and he uttered a cry, “Lord, if thou wilt, thou art able to cleanse me”. That cry came from that man’s heart. Have you ever cried from the depths of your heart to Jesus? Have you ever felt the burden of sin so heavy, so devastating in your life, that you came to the point that if you did not get it settled with Jesus, the outlook was dark and uncertain? He says, “Lord, if thou wilt, thou art able to cleanse me”. The gospel is to tell you that Jesus is willing. That is the gospel; to tell you that God is willing. You can write across the New Testament—God is willing, is willing to bless you, and to bless you tonight. And it says, “And he stretched out his hand and touched him”. Now this word, if I may refer to it, means that He handled him freely.

Now when did that take place? When did Jesus identify Himself with man’s sinful state and departure from God? It was on the cross. Let me tell you again of that precious work, the only basis on which God can come forth in blessing to man. Jesus on the cross bore sin’s burden so great, at that time when the majesty of the throne of God was at stake as to whether God could bless man and overlook righteousness. A blessed Man came in, the Lord Jesus, and on the cross that great work was wrought out which gave God a basis for blessing the vilest sinner. Think of it, the vilest sinner! And, of course, we are all in that class if we really take it to heart. Beloved Mr Darby said somewhere, ‘That He died I could possibly understand, but that He died for me, I will never understand’. Would you take that to your heart tonight that for you the leper, unclean and away from God and with nothing but eternal judgment ahead of you, our Saviour took the sinner’s place? He bore the full weight of divine judgment, all that was due to you. Instead of it being placed upon you for you to meet it, when you have not the power or ability to meet it, that blessed Saviour Jesus met it in its full, unmitigated weight. It rested upon Jesus, and He bore it; sufferings untold our Saviour went through.

‘Suff’rings unfathomed for us has Thou known’ (Hymn 4). Our blessed Saviour went that way and He touched you, He touched humanity, He touched the sinner in that wonderful act of love when He laid down His life.

Have you had a touch? Do you mean to tell me you have come time after time to the gospel meeting and you have gone out untouched, unaffected, just the same? One can hardly credit it. One can hardly believe it, that a human heart could be untouched by the work of Jesus, the immensity of it, the grace of it. No wonder the believer sings—

‘How sweet the Name of Jesus sounds

In a believer’s ear!’ (Hymn 54)

It says, “And immediately his leprosy was cleansed”. I do trust that someone will leave this room tonight with that happy joyful feeling of being cleansed, the burden lifted, the load for ever gone.

So in Matthew 17 we find another remarkable touch. May I apply this scripture for this occasion? Peter said, “Let us make here three tabernacles: for thee one, and for Moses one, and one for Elias”. One very significant feature of the present trend of things is that men are searching around for alternatives. Man will do anything to get an alternative to Christ.

Somebody told me in America recently that statistics which the Government had compiled indicated that there were four hundred different religious sects in New York City. Four hundred! Four hundred ways of life. Not three tabernacles, four hundred tabernacles, if you like. But let me tell you this, beloved hearers—God has no alternative to Christ to offer you, none. He is the only Man that God has to present to you, Christ Jesus. I know the children at school are taught lessons in what is called ‘comparative religion’. Where did

that phrase come from, ‘comparative religion’? There is no such thing as comparative religion. “This is my beloved Son ... hear him”, that One. That is the gospel, “Hear him”. He is speaking to you tonight. He has touched you in grace, and He is speaking to you tonight and He is telling you, ‘I am able not only to save you from your sins, I am able to fill your heart with joy and peace, to give you hope and an outlook to the glory’.

How and why is Jesus different from any alternatives? The difference is that Jesus as to His Person is God. The fact that Jesus Christ is God is the foundation-stone of Christianity. There could be no blessing, His blood would have no efficacy, if He was not God. “And the disciples hearing it fell upon their faces, and were greatly terrified. And Jesus coming to them touched them”. This is peculiar to Matthew’s gospel. After that touch would Peter ever think of three tabernacles? No. His epistles show that that touch affected him and he spoke of the holy mount. That touch affected Peter, and the glory of that time remained in his heart in all its blessedness. Have you had a touch like that? Is there any other man in your vision, any other person but Jesus? Oh I trust you will get that touch tonight, that you will dismiss every alternative from your mind and fix your heart and mind on Jesus. One of whom the Father says, “Hear him”. Oh, we heard the voice of Jesus today! There were a few of us gathered here in this room this morning. We did certain things, but the glory of the time was that we heard Jesus, we heard Him speaking to us. We heard Him telling us of the Father’s glory, telling us of the wonderful blessing His love has secured for us beyond death for ever.

In Mark’s gospel we come to these other touches, and here in chapter 7 was “a deaf man who

could not speak right, and they beseech him that he might lay his hand on him. And having taken him away from the crowd apart, he put his fingers to his ears”. I would call your attention step by step to the manner in which the Lord Jesus dealt with this man. First of all He took him away from the crowd apart. In other words, you must not allow any influence to interfere with your personal contact with Jesus. Then He put His fingers to his ears. Why was that? It was a reference back to the garden of Eden, a reference back to the time when Satan spoke to the woman; that was where the departure took place—‘Has God said?’ Man’s distance from God relates to the time when Satan got the ear of Eve. It says, “He put his fingers to his ears”, as much as to say, to open up the channel for the word of God, for the gospel, for the glorious tidings of Christ. “He put his fingers to his ears”—a different message altogether. Oh, do not listen to what the devil would tell you. If he gets hold of your ear after the gospel meeting and says to you, ‘Not tonight; perhaps next week, but not tonight’; do not listen. The Lord would put His fingers into your ears with a view to the truth, and the truth of God, getting into them for blessing.

Then it says, “And having spit”; that is another reference to the deity of Christ. It was a divine Person; the spittle speaks of what He was essentially as to His Person. An honoured servant of the Lord was asked, ‘Who was it who died on the cross? Was it God or was it Man?’ He replied, ‘The Man who died is, was, and ever will be God’. It also says, “He touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven he groaned, and says to him. Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And immediately his ears were opened, and the band of his tongue was loosed and he spoke right”. Are you speaking right? What does speaking right involve? Speaking right

involves that first of all you confess Jesus Christ as Lord. I remember a young brother asking one of the Lord’s servants in a meeting, ‘Who do you confess to? Do you confess to God or do you confess to men?’ I waited with great interest on the reply. He said, ‘Both’. That is wonderful. You confess to God, you say, ‘He is my Saviour. I have had a touch tonight’.

Then you confess to men, ‘Jesus has touched me. He has opened my ears and He has opened my lips; He has given me a touch’.

In the next passage, in Mark 8, there is a blind man and they beseech Him that He might touch him. “And he led him forth out of the village, and having spit upon his eyes” (a repetition of what we have already dwelt upon) “he laid his hands upon him, and asked him if he beheld anything. And having looked up, he said, I behold men, for I see them as trees, walking”. We sometimes undervalue that first touch, but it was a touch, and he saw men, as trees, walking. He saw something. He was like the man in John 9 who said, Once I was blind 99

but now I see. Can you say that? Once I was blind but now I see. Once the darkness enshrouded me, but now the light, the light of the glory of Christ, shines in my heart. Men “as trees, walking” is a suggestion that things were not clear.

Now there are many believers, many Christians, like that. They are not clear. They will tell you about the blood of Christ that saved them from judgment, but if you raise the question with them as to the Spirit, they are not clear as to whether they have the gift of the Holy Spirit. A certain lack of clarity is in their minds as to the truth. There are thousands of believers in this world at the present time whose only understanding of the gospel is that Jesus died upon the cross. Blessed fact! Thank God for every one for whom Jesus died

upon the cross. “We preach Christ crucified” (1 Corinthians 1: 23)—but we also preach Christ glorified. That is the second touch, Christ glorified. Oh, do you know that Man in the glory? Have your eyes been affected like Paul’s? He said, “I have suffered the loss of all, and count them to be filth, that I may gain Christ”, Philippians 3: 8. He had had the second touch; he saw everything clearly, everything was in its right perspective. In other words, he was a Christian not only going to heaven, but one coming from heaven. These are the Christians you like to meet, those who are coming from heaven every day and spreading the influence of a glorified Christ and telling forth the worth and greatness of the Saviour.

May we all get a touch tonight. May none of us leave this meeting tonight just the same way as we came in. May the Lord in His grace not permit that, that any go out as they came in, for His name’s sake. Amen.

Preaching in Melbourne
24 November 1985