Signals of the Soul
Mark 5:2-6
I. Introduction
A. There are various signs, certain signals, that are given by men who are prisoners of war, or floating helplessly on the wreck of a ship, or stranded in some way. Signals that make their presence and peril known to a busy outside world. Signals that plea for relief. Signals that plead for help for someone in trouble.
*The minute gun at sea is a volume in itself. The sound of the gun telling of a ship in distress.
*The poor rag or bed sheet fluttering from a tree top on a rocky isle in remote parts of the ocean tells of the despair of a cast away. The fluttering rag speaking of hopelessness and helplessness for those who have no other consolation but rescue from passers by.
B. Illustration:
One story of a Vietnam POW tells how that he would gather shiny quartz stones on a remote prison camp so that he could signal to passing US planes. He would carefully gather (during work detail) the stones and slowly worked to arrange SOS. The shiny quartz crystals reflecting the sun signaled his need for rescue. It was a signal of an imperiled person hoping to be seen by someone who could help.
C. These signals declare existence, and suffering.
They are faint declarations of someone imperiled.
And they become a hail or farewell, a petition or funeral notice depending on when they are recognized.
Some are seen and help arrives…
and some are noticed too late:
The last flare shot from a wreckage of an airplane. The flare recognized by those who are unable to reach the wreckage.
The cloth noticed hanging in the tree by a passing ship on the ocean, but on arrival the relief party recognizes only a skeleton lying under its wavering somber shadow.
II.)Body
A. There are likewise signals that are sent from the deep within a human being.
How? Because inside the shell of the human body is an eternal soul.
From the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.
(Every action originates in the soul.)
B. The Human Soul
*The soul is that eternal part of every person. Some have said it is the real you. Body and Spirit formed the Soul.
The Body returns to the earth … the Spirit to God who gave it … but the soul lives forever.
C. I don’t think that there is anything more isolated, invisible and imperiled than the human soul. When imprisoned, it is the profoundest of bondages. When shipwrecked, it is the worst of calamities.
D. It is so walled in by flesh and bone, that we cannot see it with the eye. It can be so buried in ignorance, and prejudice, and sin that one cannot get a word through the thick walls and locked confines in to where the soul is sleeping. It can drift so far in evil that we cannot send a message to it. It can so petrify with despair and wickedness that we have no hope of making ourselves understood by what seems a captive in a fortress of flesh. A person locked behind the iron bars and stone walls of sins prison.
E. Scientists and humanists may question the existence of the eternal soul and that immortal personality. They say that they cannot see or find any sign of this captive, this shipwrecked mariner, this invisible nature created for God and for a higher life … They don’t see the suffering soul, starving and perishing for lack of relief. They don’t recognize the soul isolated and without deliverance.
F. But there are many who mark the signals going up from the soul. They see the signal calling attention to a deeper desire of the soul and are trying to bring help and comfort and liberty to the imprisoned, the entombed and the castaway; swelling the population of heaven with their efforts. They recognize there are souls in human bodies and they must be rescued. In a sense they have the unmistakeable proof that there are prisoners in the silent castle of flesh and bone and a starving sailor on a rock.
Illustration:
Not long ago we took a Christmas trip to my home in Illinois. We witnessed a wreck outside Marshall, TX. When I got to the seen the man was unconscious and unresponsive. What do you do? All I knew to do while all the people were gathering around this dying man was to pray. And as I prayed a single tear ran down this man’s cheek. Unable to signal me verbally, unable to tell me who he was or if he had a wife and children, unable to tell me where he was going, unable to tell me if he was a believer ... he signalled a message.
My Message: Signals Of The Soul.
That singular tear was a signal … a message from within the shell of a human broken body. Unresponsive yet signaling.
Unconscious yet signaling. (The plea from within!)
G. The signal of a tear.
i. In preaching there are times when you strike a chord with something deep in the congregation. In faces and eyes filled with tears you see looks from people coming from the deepest and farthest away realm in man. It is a momentary glimpse at the soul’s communication. I have seen the faint glow of a distress flare on the horizon of their humanity. A fluttering cloth on the tree top of a distant shore. The eternal soul was waving a signal and plea for help.
F. There is also the signal of a deeper appetite.
i. There is a physical appetite. It is satisfied with meat and bread.
ii. Beyond this is a mental appetite. It craves information, it questions and receives answers; searches and receives answers; searches and obtains facts and has a satisfaction in knowing. At the ages of 2 & 3 children begin asking … Why?
iii. Back of this is another appetite … The stomach may be filled with food and the mind may be satisfied with information but the third appetite hungers still. It is not a hunger for the created but for the Creator.
G. The third signal is the distress signal of approaching ruin.
i. As the soul approaches this fearful catastrophe, it has signs of fluttering that are simply unmistakable concerning the coming disaster. No gun pealing mournfully through the stormy night more certainly declares danger and going down, than we are made to see that an immortal soul is perishing before our eyes. No leprosy leaping into the forehead of the sinning King Uzziah was clearer to the view of the shocked priests that stood around, than is the vision of a soul steeped in iniquity dying to God and truth before our eyes. No spectacle of a band of Cortez’s soldiers led bound by the Mexicans to an altar on a hilltop and murdered in sight of their horror-stricken comrades on the plain, was ever more evident than is the spectacle of immortal spirits led to the slaughter by the hands of sin, the world and the devil, and slain in full view of the world.
ii. Saul at the Witch of Endor
iii. Judas at the home in Bethany (Mary’s costly worship revealed a signal that something was wrong within Judas.)
III. Conclusion
A. He took not on himself the nature of angels but he TOOK ON the seed of Abraham.
Took on - the same (Gr.) word used in Matt. 14
Simon Peter walking on the stormy water.
He began to sink … He cried out: “Lord save me”
“And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught him…”
B. Maybe the alcoholic is signalling, maybe the adulterous is signally, maybe there are those here today ... signalling ...
