Autoshop Ministries - K2K 9/27/26 Sermon - From Blurry Faith to Full Vision

Let's get— I'll pray and then we'll get us— we'll get, we'll get started with the word that I feel like the Lord has on my heart for today. Father, in the name of Jesus, thank you so much, uh, for the opportunity to serve your people. God, first and foremost, we're grateful that you woke us up, that you brought us here, God. But we also know that you have a plan, that we're not just floating through life, and this isn't a coincidence, God. We are here on purpose for a purpose. I pray that today that would be abundantly clear, God, that this Sunday would be life-changing. God, nothing short of it, God, because we know that you are still in the business of doing miracles and you will draw all people unto yourself. So do just that, God. I get out of the way so you can have your way. In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Let's go. Here we go. Mark chapter number 8. I want to go to Mark chapter number 8. If you have a

Bible, if you don't, that is totally okay. If you are like 6 bites deep into an omelet, continue to eat your omelet and eggs and everything else, and I'll read it for you. But I'm going I'm gonna be in Mark chapter 8, and I'm going to start in the 22nd verse. 22nd verse, it says this: And they came to Bethsaida, and they brought a blind man to Jesus and implored him to touch him. Taking the blind man by the hand, he brought him out of the village, and after spitting on his eyes and laying his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything? And he looked up and He said, I see men, for I see them like trees walking around. And then again, he laid his hands on his eyes and he looked intently and was restored and began to see everything clearly. Can somebody say clearly? And he sent him home saying, do not even enter the village. I want to talk to you today from this title, I Can See Clearly Now. I can see clearly now.

I don't know if you realize this, but I have on glasses, right? And I haven't had on glasses on any of the other months that we've been doing this because I scratched my eye yesterday. And so that's why one eye is more red than the others. It's not because I'm sleepy. How many people in here like wear glasses or corrective lenses like contact lenses? Okay, all of us, right? So we are— maybe you have the same story. So I guarantee you that I have a different reason or a different story for how I started wearing glasses in the first place than anybody else in the room. I promise you. When I was in first grade, there was this girl that I liked, and she had on glasses. And I figured, you know, like every 6-year-old boy in first grade, I figured maybe if I have glasses, she'll like me back. So the next time I went to the eye doctor, I lied on my exam as a kid. Now, this takes some supreme strategy. Now, in that, my mom

should have seen that I was a strategist at a very young age. She should have been like, you know what, wow, the fact that he could see that in a classroom and wait until his next eye exam and remember that then says that this boy is special. I'm not bragging on myself, I'm just saying. And I lied on my eye exam so that I could get glasses, and I got glasses, and I wore them, and it actually messed up my eyesight ever since. And well, I've been wearing glasses ever since, and I'm 33. So anybody else? Y'all, y'all do the same thing? No? Oh, okay. I was figuring that. I mean, I thought maybe I would have one other person that lied on an eye exam in the first grade to get glasses. But, um, and that was interesting about that experience is we all know what the eye exams look like. You see the big letters on, on top, and they get gradually smaller and smaller and smaller. Well, I remember seeing all of these letters and it's like, E, you know, I don't know why E

is always the first letter, but it's E. Then it's like the next line, the next line, they're like, go to line number 5. And then I'm just like butchering this on purpose. I can see them clearly, but I don't, I don't speak about it clearly. Well, I'm gonna put a pin in that because I want to come back to the Bible. This man is blind that we encounter in here, and we don't know the man's name, but we know his condition. And here's what I love about the Bible when it gives us individuals where we don't know their name, but we know their condition because we get to put ourselves in their place. When we're reading the Bible and we see somebody who doesn't have a name, but we have their condition, you get to put yourself in their shoes. So for a second, I want you to put yourself in this blind man's shoes. I want you to put yourself in this blind man's shoes. So Jesus, is, is, is on the way into the city and they beg Him and they implore

Him. They say, they plead with Him and say, hey, can you, can you heal this guy? So we know clearly that Jesus is— can Jesus can do miracles and He always has done miracles at this point. But they said, can you touch him? So this tells me that they have evidence that they know if Jesus touches somebody that they'll be healed. And before we even move any further about what this actual message is about, I want to challenge us because this is a ministry. This is a ministry. So since this is a ministry, and since I am your pastor, I'm going to challenge you like your pastor. I want people in here to go out and get people to bring to Jesus too, because you have seen, and maybe you, maybe you don't know it yet, but you're on the way to knowing it. But you've, you've seen Jesus be active enough in your own life where you get to say, you know what? I've seen You touch others. I've seen I've seen you do miracles. I've seen you heal. It's time for me to bring somebody else.

Jesus, will you, will you heal my family member? Jesus, will you heal my friend? Jesus, will you heal my coworker, my employee, my admin, my secretary? I got to bring some people to Jesus because I know what he can do. This is actually not a buffet where we walk in and eat as much as we have and say, okay, I'm full. How about you? Nope. Sorry. This is actually more like takeout. And we say, look, we've got some food. I got enough to take with me so that I can give to somebody else. It's more like a food kitchen, a food pantry where people get to walk in and we walk in and we get what we need, but it's also available for others to get what they need as well. This is why we exist. So I want to challenge you to say, don't let it stop here. Take it from here. Amen. Now I want to get to, to the, the whole vision thing in here, because it's kind of a play on words. So now that you're in this man's position, point number 1 I

want you to, to see is that God sees us. Why is that important? Because there are so many other spaces, other religions that are trying to tell you and teach you how you get to God. But before we get anywhere, you have to understand how powerful it is that the God of the universe already sees you. He already sees where you are. He already saw what you would struggle with. He already saw what the issue would be that you would wrestle with throughout your life. He already knew what problems you would have, and He factored that into the equation when He called you. He knew that at this age you would do this, and in college you would make that decision, and in marriage you would do this, and in parenting you would miss it here, and He still called you any way. He sees you. I love that we serve a God that is not so high that He doesn't see us. As a matter of fact, His name is Emmanuel, which means this: God with us.

I love that Jesus dwells among us. I love that the Holy Spirit lives within us. I love that we serve a God who sees you. Because when you understand that somebody sees you, and I don't mean like, oh, I can look at you like I'm looking at you in a room. I'm talking about seeing you in a way of intimacy, knowing who you truly are. When you understand God knows you, God sees you, God embraces you, you stop hiding from Him because He knows it anyway. You say now, now you don't make a mistake and run away from God. Now, when you have deficiencies, now when you have blindness, you run to God because you get to say, you know what, Lord, I don't have to be afraid out here. I would rather run to the one who knows me best, who sees me best, who formed me, than to run away from You as if I can protect myself. God sees you. He sees you when you're crying yourself to sleep. He sees you when you're worried about the bottom line.

He sees you when you're making a decision on whether or not to open up another store. He sees you. He sees you when you're trying to mend some, some broken relationships in your life. He sees you. He sees you when you're trying to reach out to your kid that you didn't have the best relationship with, but you, you're more mature now. You're older and you're, you're trying your best to make this connection happen again because you want to be involved in their life and you want to be involved in your grandkid's life. He sees you. He sees you. He sees when you struggle. He sees when you're up. He sees when you get the win, when you're celebrating, when you hit that moment, that finish line, you feel like, finally, we did it. He sees you. And the beautiful thing about God seeing you is it's actually the fuel you need to see everybody else. God sees you. But now, because God sees us, we can see clearly. That's my second point is now we

see clearly. Let me go back to the Bible on the story, because I want to explain grace. And this is what we're going to get to in here, the grace of God. Jesus touches this man and He takes the blind man by the hand, because the blind man obviously can't see. He takes the blind man by the hand. And He walks him out of the village. He walks him out of the village. Why? Because sometimes in order for God to do a work in your life, He's got to remove you from the environment you were comfortable in. So He, He walks the blind man out of the village and says, hey, I'm going to do something for you, but we got to do it over here. We, we're not going to do it over there. We're going to do it over here, we're not going to do it over there. I got to, I got to remove you from that environment, right. I got to remove you from that mentality. Yeah, I'm going to do something in your business, but it's going to take you

making an investment to learn some things that you're not comfortable with. Yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to do a miracle in your finances, but it's going to take you budgeting a way that you weren't necessarily comfortable with. You, you were, you were a little more frivolous, I need you to be a little more frugal. I'm going to have to move you out of an environment. Yeah, I'm going to do a miracle in your relationship, but it's going to make you be a lot more uncomfortable than you anticipated. It's gonna require both of you guys to go sit down in therapy and for you to apologize about those mistakes, not just do some new things and act like they never happened. So Jesus takes the blind man and He moves him from his environment. But here's the thing. The Bible says then He touches the blind man's And he spits on his eyes. And then he said, what do you see? He said, I see men and I see them walking like trees. Okay,

so let me give you a little bit more biblical context. If the blind man can see men and see them walking as trees, that means he has a point of reference. That tells me this man has not been blind his entire life. He knows what the environment looks like. So he sees, but it's not clear yet. And here's where the grace comes in. Jesus takes the man by the hand, puts His hands on his eyes and says, do you see anything? He says, no, I see men walking the streets. He would have been satisfied being able to see at all. The blind man went from darkness to being able to see, but just not— it was a little blurry. The vision was a little off, but the grace of God is, I'm not going to leave you at 50%. So here's what Jesus does. I'll touch you again because I need you to be fully restored. I need you to be fully healthy. I need you to go from being blurry to clear. I need you to go from able to healthy. I don't want you to just be

able to move, I want you to be healthy. Has anybody ever had a surgery? Anybody ever had a surgery like on a knee or like got sports injury? Imagine if you tore your ACL or we see these things in sports where athletes will tear a ligament. If they just had the surgery, the ligament will be fixed. But if they never went to PT, they would never have wholeness and the full mobility in that ligament again. So it's not just that they had the surgery. It's not that just that Jesus did the surgery. It's now he has said, I need to touch you again and take you through another process so that you don't only have sight, you have full vision. You don't just see what's out there. I want you to be able to see clearly. What does that look like in our personal life, Devonte? I'm glad you asked. And in our personal life, that looks like, Lord, I'm trying to get this right. I've missed it. I've made some mistakes. I've been the prodigal.

I've been the one who's run away. I've been the one who's run away directly from You. I've run away from my community. When things have gone wrong and things have gone bad, I've shifted gears and said, I'll turn this way, I'll turn this way. I'll do everything everything but focus back on You. And Jesus says, yeah, I know. And I'm not shaming you for that. I'm inviting you to a new place so that I can fix your vision. But I don't want to just give you vision. I want you to see clearly. And when you see clearly, friends, you see that God was there the entire time. When you see clearly, you see that Jesus didn't touch him 2 times. He touched him 3. 'Cause the first time, He held him by the hand. The second time, He put hands on his eyes. The third time, He put His hands on his eyes again to make sure that he could see clearly. The first touch was, let me get you out of that community so that you can be in proper community. The first touch was about community. The first touch

was about togetherness. The first touch was about intimacy. I gotta get you close to me first. And Jesus is going to grab us by the hand so we can be close to Him first. But then after the first touch, when He's— when we're close to Him, after the first touch, when He's walking with us, after the first touch, when we're moving from one location to the next, after the first touch, when we move from one environment to the next, one terrain to the next, the first touch is about intimacy. The second touch is about correction. And this is the grace of God. That He says, I want you to be close before I fix anything. And even if it never got fixed, I want you to be close to Me anyway. Even if you never were perfect, I still want you close. Even if you never got it all right, I want you close. Isn't it interesting that when I think about Exodus chapter number 20, Where we start to see different law. We don't see the— we see the commandments. The first part of it is not thou

shalt. The first part of it is, I am the Lord your God that delivered you. He's saying, listen, I bring you out first before I correct. Why? Because grace embraces before it fixes. Grace embraces you. Grace is embracing you this morning. Some of you have had a rough night. Some of you have had a rough few weeks, a rough few months. And you think that you're here because this was cool, or you saw a poster, or you saw a post, or you've seen some clips. And this is not just something cool for you to attend. It's not a, not a perfect attendance box that you check off. This is something that God put in place on purpose. For you. He had you in mind when he, from the beginning of time, he knew what today was going to be and he knew who was going to be in this room. And he said, there's going to be some people in the room, Devonte, that I've been waiting to encounter my grace. They've been beating themselves up

about decisions they made years ago. The Bible says that I throw your sins as far as the east is from the west. Anybody got a ruler to tell me how far the east is from the west? He's, He says, I remove it. The Bible says in Romans 8, there is now no condemnation for those of us who are in Christ Jesus. That means no shame. That means no beating yourself up anymore. The grace is the distance coverer. The grace is that big cosmic eternal ruler. Between who you are and who God wants you to be. That's grace. The grace— this picture, yeah, the blind man got his sight, but there's a bigger and a deeper meaning here. It's that the grace of God covers the gaps, the gaps between seeing blurry and seeing clearly. You know, when I got my glasses, I told you I put a pin in it. Now, when I went to the optometrist, they have this like machine, right? I'm not talking about the machine that everybody hates, the one that it blows the

air in your eye. I still don't even know what that's for. Like, I don't understand how you blowing air in my eye is gonna help my eye. You know what I mean? Anybody else? Like, oh yeah, no, like, I like that feeling. No, I'm just kidding. But they had this machine and they, they put the machine on your eyes and you look through it and it's like way out here and they adjust each lens for your eye. And it's even worse if you're like me and you have an astigmatism and one eye is worse than the others, but It's like, okay, so we're gonna go through these lenses. So they'll cover this one, this one black, and it goes 1, 2. Which one is better, 1 or 2? And, uh, 2. Okay, cool. 2 or 3? 2, 3, 2, ah, 3. Then they go, okay, 3, 4, 3, 4. Then you're starting to get confused at this point. You're like, bro, what? I don't know. Like, uh, let me see it again. Wait, go back to 2. But They are fine-tuning every detail until

you see properly. And if you look at that machine, it's actually how grace is working in our life. It's that Jesus is saying, okay, hey, we're going to move a little bit closer. We're going to move, we're going to fine-tune, we're going to tweak this, we're going to tweak this until you see me. Oh God, like, I love you, but man, like, man, your rules are tough. Let's adjust some things. Yeah, because I do have rules and ways that you need to live, but I am not about the rules more than I am about the relationship. So let's adjust it. Yes, there are rules for me to follow, but the rules are out of the relationship I have. Not I follow the rules so I get a relationship. I have a relationship, so these rules are telling me how I should live. Okay, so that's the 2 and the 3. 2, 3, we're clicking. Okay. Oh God, like, you know, man, I really see you like my dad and my dad left. My dad wasn't there, or my dad was a workaholic and was never around.

And man, I don't really have a relationship with him. So I understand this grace, Jesus, But I don't understand this Heavenly Father thing. Okay, let's adjust it. It's 3 or 4. Okay, so you, you, you think that I'm your earthly dad. And a lot of us do that. We take whatever experience we have with our earthly dad, whether good or bad, blow it up, stick it in the sky, and say, well, God must be the same way. So we say, oh, so you think because your dad wasn't available that I'm not going to be available? 2 or 3? 2 or 3? No, let me show you what I say in my word. My promise is that I will never leave you or forsake you. So let's adjust that to number 3. Okay. So now we have all of these different things. And as over time, grace is refining us little by little so that when we get to the end of our life, when we make it to the pearly gates and get to heaven, you finally say, man, I can see clearly now. God, I know what you were doing. I was— you were adjusting

every event, everything in my life, was making sure that I could be whole and complete. You weren't just satisfied with me being a 5 out of 10. You weren't just satisfied with me having a C+. You kept adjusting and tweaking and fine-tuning. And to be honest, chiseling does not feel good. Chiseling a stone does not feel good, but when the product is complete, it's beautiful. James chapter number 1 shows us this in verse 2. It says, consider it all joy, my brothers and sisters, when you encounter trials of many kinds, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. He's refining us little by little so that we can see clearly. Now we see our neighbors clearly. Now He says, okay, oh, if I, I need to touch you again, I need to heal you again. You need prayer again. You need another Auto Shop Ministries podcast again.

You need, you need a, you need a Bible verse. You need a verse of the day again. You need another recommendation. You need another lunch, another coffee with somebody that believes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. We'll adjust it. So that you can see clearly now. And when you see clearly, the goal is that you get to the end of life and you'll say, you know what? This was so much more about my intimacy with God than the rules that I made it, than the, the, the things that I tried to stay away from and live life like I'm walking on this tightrope. And I'm like, well, I don't want to step to the left and I don't want to step to the right. And if I step to the right, like God's going to be mad at me. And if I step to the left, it's like, no, The Bible that we read says, my grace is sufficient for you. It actually says this, my strength is made perfect in your weakness. So actually Jesus is inviting us with all of our

stuff, with all of our mess, and you messy. He invites us all into the space and says, hey, bring it all. Because my strength is made perfect in your, in your weakness. He says, I know it's messy, but you know what's more messy? The death He died on the cross so that you can be clean. It's a messy miracle. It really is. Spit in your eyes, that's nasty. But if that's what it's going to take for Jesus to help us to see clearly, I'll take the messy miracle. And maybe it's not spit in a hand in our eyes, but you know what it was? It was blood on a cross. It was a thorn in His side. It was being brutally beaten. It was a crown of thorns. It was being mocked and humiliated. That was a messy miracle too. And that messy miracle is the reason that all of us can be whole and perfect and complete in the eyes of Christ. We might not be perfect in our behaviour, but we're perfect because we wear the righteousness The goodness, the very

essence of God. And when He looks at us, He sees His Son. So no matter what you did, no matter how many mistakes you made, let Jesus keep adjusting things until you see clearly. So let's, let's move that mentality out. Let's move that pride out of the way. Let's move that anger out of the way. Let's move those vices that you've been using to cope out of the way. Let's, let's move the alcoholism out of the way. Let's, let's, let's move the gluttony out of the way. Let's, let's, let's move the doom scrolling and scrolling on your phone for hours. And let's move the gambling out of the way. Let's move some of that stuff out of the way because you need to be able to focus on the version of you I created. And the version of you I created, I don't regret. And somebody in here needs to hear that today. You're not an accident. When God made you, you weren't a slip out of heaven, an accident that fell to earth.

You were planned. You were intentional. The Bible says, before I formed you in your mother's womb, I knew you. That means He had an idea that He would look in 2026 and He would see all of you here today. And since He knew that, it makes sense to me that He's given us this free gift of grace. Grace is the only gift that's available. And we don't have to pay anything for it. We get access to eternal life, and all you gotta do is receive it. Doesn't make sense to me. Doesn't really make sense to me based on the way that we do— we, we, we get access to eternal life, Based on a gift? Wait, so You gave me something and my ability to receive it then gives me access to You giving me more? That's not how a transaction works. I give You something, You give me something. No, Jesus is like, no, receive this. And if you receive this well, you can receive even more. But we don't have to understand to receive. We just say, God, thank You. The best way to receive

any gift is with the best gratitude, the best thanks you can muster up and say, Jesus, I thank You that You helped me see clearly now. I see that the vision is for us to be together. It's for us to be together, not just here on earth, but for eternity. Thank You for touching me the first time and holding my hand. For intimacy. Thank you for touching me the second time and giving me sight. But thank you for the third time too, for giving me vision. Thank you for bringing me out of the clubs, the bars, and casinos. And thank you for touching me the second time for being able to see why that was damaging to my life. But thank you for touching me the third time so that I can help other people stay out too. Thank you, Lord. For the first time, for me to, to take me out of that environment of, of overworking and overlooking other people. Thank You for touching me the second time, where I see that that's not how You've called

me to live, that everything is a missions field, everything is my ministry, and I can't overlook anybody. But thank You for touching me the third time to say, God, all of them are Your children. Just like me. And I need to be ones like the disciples that say, hey Jesus, we beg you to touch this man because we know what you can do. I wonder what would happen if we just started having those encounters with technicians and people that are bringing cars into a shop and you say, hey, you know what, I know I'm working on it, but can I pray for you? Like, I just really sense that. I wonder what would happen. I bet Houston would change pretty fast. I bet whatever city you're from would change pretty fast. I bet The U.S. would change pretty fast if we just started bringing people to Jesus, because we see clearly now that because He made a messy miracle on the cross, that we are living messy miracles. We get to be free. And actually, the rest of our

life is very clean. Would you bow your heads and close your eyes? Maybe you're in the room and one of these parts, one of these parts of the messages kind of stuck out to you, whether one of the scriptures or a story, or you resonate thinking about how many mistakes you've made. And I'm not here to condemn anybody. Maybe you resonate with saying, man, I remember being in a space where I needed another touch from God. Or you, you may feel like, God, You already touched me once. I don't, You don't need to do anything else. Like, You gave me one miracle. I'll just be satisfied with the one. I don't want to ask for anything else. And He's saying, No, I have more for you. Or maybe you're in the room and you don't know Jesus as your Lord and Savior at all. You don't know to ask any of these things. We're not here to shame you for that. We're here to make an invitation so that that's no longer the case. This will be the best decision you could

ever make. If you're in the room under the sound of my voice and you want to make Jesus your Lord and Savior, Whether you're in the room or watching online, you say, you know what, I, I'm ready. I'm ready to live God's way, but I know I need God's help. If that's you, I just want you to lift your hand on the count of 3. 1, the Bible says today is the day of salvation. 2, if you believe this message is for you. 3, hold your hand up. I just want to see anybody. I see you. Yeah, come on, come on. All right, you can put it right back down. Why don't we all pray this together? Because I say this every single time that I speak anywhere, we all need it anyway. Lord Jesus, I repent of my sins. Come into my heart. I make You my Lord and Savior. I know that I've missed it. But I'm so grateful for the messy miracle of the cross that saved a sinner I thank you that you will lay hands and touch me as many times as it takes for me to be whole.

So I give you my life. Holy Spirit, come into my heart as I follow you all the days of my life. In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Come on, can we celebrate the people that gave their life to Jesus today? Well, hey, listen, It is always a privilege to be with you all. No, I, this is, we don't take this lightly. This is the most important thing that we get to do. And I really hope that you're impacted, not only to continue to follow Jesus and develop that relationship and that intimacy with Him, but to bring others along too. There's somebody in our lives that still needs Jesus. There's somebody in our lives that we know the advice ain't cutting it. The phone calls aren't cutting it. There's somebody that we know, say, hey, listen, I don't know all the answers, but I know a man who can touch you as many times as it takes for you to see clearly. Thank y'all. I love you.