WORTH THE EFFORT (Mark 2)

I. Go Out of Your Way to Recognize a Face in Crowd

^{Mark 2:1} A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. ² They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them.

II. Go Out of Your Way to Give Someone a Lift

³ Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. ⁴ Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on.

III.  Your Out of the Way Faith Activates Christ’s Forgiveness and Healing

⁵ When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” ⁶Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, ⁷ “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”  ⁸ Jesus said to them, “Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’?  ¹⁰ But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the man, ¹¹ “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” ¹² He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all.