Dharius Daniels - Medicine From The Master

Well, let’s go to the Word of God. We’re in part 10 of a series on Jesus called «GOATed: Jesus is the Greatest of All Time.» We will be looking at Matthew chapter 9, verse 9, which reads as follows from The New International Version. The scriptures are on the screen: it says, «As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. 'Follow me, ' he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many—somebody say many—many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, 'Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners? '» That’s how they said it. On hearing this, Jesus said, «It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice, ' for I have not come to call the righteous but sinners.» This ends the reading of God’s Word. I want to tag the title of this text and talk about «Medicine from the Master.» I like that title. I’m going to give him a title again, and I want y’all to clap like we’re Baptists because that’s a Baptist title right there. I want to tag a title to this text: «Medicine from the Master.»

Several years ago, my wife, on Christmas, gave me, at that time, the most current iteration of a video gaming console—it was the Xbox One. I was grateful for this gift. God spoke to her and told her to release this gift and sew it into the man of God’s ministry, and I wanted to be a good steward, yes sir, of the gift. So I played that game until times got better. Yes sir, I played it in the morning, I played it at noon, and I played it in the midnight hour. I played that game. I played Madden on that game. I played 2K—talk about it—on that game. I played Assassin’s Creed. Wait a minute. On that game, I played Call of Duty. I played that game until times got better, uh-huh.

One day, I walked into my oldest son’s room, and he had that same console. I noticed he had the controller in his hand, but he wasn’t playing a game; he was watching a show. So I looked at him and said, «Seth, how do you do that?» He said, «How do I do what?» I asked, «How are you watching TV with the Xbox controller?» He said, «I’m watching Netflix on my Xbox.» I said, «What? What are you watching?» He said, «Dad, you can do more than play games on the Xbox; you can watch shows.» So he took his controller and proceeded to show me how I could go and download an app and watch a show on what I had just been playing games with.

I had an epiphany at that moment. I realized I had received a free gift that I wasn’t fully using. Someone who loved me purchased this gift for me, and I freely received it without fully using it. It took someone teaching me how to fully use what I already had.

Some of you may be wondering how this story relates to this sermon, and I want you to know that what happened with the game and me happens with God and some of us. There’s a gift we freely received—God’s gift of salvation—but many of us have freely received something we’re not fully utilizing. There has been the underutilization of salvation because of a misunderstanding of what salvation actually is. Many of us are just playing the game when we could be watching the show. Salvation is more than a one-way ticket to heaven; it includes a benefit package on Earth. I’m going to say that one more time: many of us have benefit packages we don’t fully use because salvation is not just a one-way ticket to heaven; it’s a benefit package on Earth.

Salvation isn’t just one thing; it’s one word used to describe many things. My God, did you hear what I just said? When I get salvation, I don’t just get salvation. When I get salvation, I get justification. What is justification? It’s a legal term; it is a declaration of innocence. Somebody should have said amen right there! It is a divine acquittal. It isn’t that you didn’t do the crime; it’s that God dropped the charges. I was guilty, but though my sins were as scarlet, He washed me whiter than snow.

Salvation isn’t just salvation; salvation is regeneration. This is a supernatural rebirth of our spirit. God doesn’t just make bad people good; He brings dead people back to life. I’ve been born again. Salvation isn’t just salvation; salvation is redemption. Redemption means to be bought back; it is when someone reacquires what they previously possessed. It’s when one recognizes that what has you doesn’t own you. It may have you, but it doesn’t own you. Redemption means to buy back what always belonged to me.

I don’t know about you, but I found myself in some seasons and situations where some things had me that didn’t know me. Depression had me. Anxiousness had me. People-pleasing had me. Am I talking to anybody that’s ever been in the hands of the wrong thing? But Jesus paid it all; all to Him I owe. He redeemed me, bought me back. Salvation isn’t just…