Reformed Evangelical Synod of America

Posts Tagged ‘Gospel of Mark’

From Delusion To Discipleship

18th Lord’s Day after Trinity, Proper 25b

Numbers 12:1-15
Psalm 31
James 3:1-18
Mark 9:30-37

The call was unexpected. It was from an area code I did not recognize. I answered it to find a dear friend and mentor had suffered a massive heart attack and was not expected to survive. Later in the day, we learned that sometime today (10/11/2009) they will decide if he is brain dead and let his body die. When death greets us… will we be deluded or be a disciple?

Today, we read the second incident in Mark’s Gospel where Jesus predicts His death and resurrection. We have three incidents in Mark’s record of Jesus training His disciples and each time  – they just don’t get it!  Each time they are puzzled – even unbelieving – about what Jesus says. First Peter basically says “Jesus, you’re nuts!” This time they don’t want to risk a reprimand, but you can see what they’re doing – they’re arguing about who is going to be the top dog when Jesus’ kingdom comes. They seem to still expect Jesus to ascend quickly to an earthly throne and use the powers He has displayed in healing people and casting out demons to bring Israel’s enemies immediately to hell!

So when Jesus rebukes Peter for likely saying something just like that, now the disciples don’t say a word. Mark tells us that when Jesus talks about His death and resurrection, the disciples don’t understand what’s going on and are afraid. Those jobs they had lined up in their own minds as “Messiah’s Assistants”  suddenly seem jeopardized. After all, they figured that when Jesus whooped up, they were going to be exalted leaders like Daniel in Babylon or Joseph in Egypt. They figured they’d finally gotten in on something good and here’s Jesus messing up those dreams!

But this time, just like the last time, and just like the next time ( Mk 10:32-45), Jesus takes their confusion and tells them that they must move from their delusion to discipleship.

In a 12 Step Group you’ll say the “Serenity Prayer” that asks God to “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” That’s a prayer for people who can’t tell fantasy from reality because their sins and delusions have warped their ability to know what’s real.

Jesus’ disciples – just like us – are deluded about what’s going to happen because they have their lives already mapped out in their own heads. They are following Jesus but in their minds they are using Jesus because they have it all mapped out about what Jesus is going to do for them!

That’s why they’re fighting. They have competing ideas about which one of them Jesus is going to make the head man!

But it doesn’t work that way!

Jesus doesn’t call us because He’s putting Himself at our disposal! That’s a delusion! Instead He calls us to find our lives by following Him as He gives Himself. That’s discipleship!

As our Lord takes the disciples aside on this march to Jerusalem and to His death to tell them about God’s plan, these men cannot forget for one moment about what’s “in it for them” about being with Jesus!

As they are in their dream world expecting quick riches and power to come their way for their brief fling with following Jesus, Jesus again in Mark 9 tells them about His coming death instead. Before Jesus can be the “Son of Man” in victory in Dan 7, He must be the prophetic “Son of Man” portrayed in Ezekiel’s ministry who speaks to Israel’s sin and rebellion, who wanders and teaches like an exile to people who are still in exile though they think they are free (Ez 12:3). He’s speaking prophetic truth to people who are inventing their own prophecies and living in delusion (Ez 13:2). Jesus confronts those who erect idols in their hearts and teach their lies instead of God’s Word (Ez 14:3). Jesus will tell them what it means to be connected to God’s vine (John 15/Ezek 15). He speaks in parables and riddles (Ezek 17). He lets Jerusalem know their abominations (Ez 16) and groaned with anguish over their sin (Ezek 21/Luke 13:34). Jesus will be this “Son of Man” and He will be killed in God’s plan and in God’s plan rise to life!

Die? Rise? The prophet Daniel talked in terms of many rising (Dan 12) on the Last Day. But one man rise? It was confusing. Jesus was sounding increasingly like the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53…but surely the time of suffering was past and the time of victory is at hand!
Jesus says “No”! Wake up! Stop serving yourselves, stop thinking your brief flings of obedience and devotion suffice. When you can realize that Jesus does not exist to prop up your delusion and you exist to find your life in Him, you can escape your delusion and learn to delight in discipleship!

The salvation that Jesus gives us in this world and the next is a salvation that sets us free from ourselves! The first time Jesus brought up this topic last week in our studies, Jesus told them He would set them free if they would turn from themselves and turn to Him, if they would stop grasping for the elusive promises of this life and trust Him for joy in following Him where He was going!

Now we learn the second crucial lesson about what it means to escape our delusion and become His disciples… It is the principle and practice of servant leadership.

Here’s the principle: To people like us who need to get over the delusion that Jesus exists to serve us and our agenda, we need to learn this lesson from Him – If you want to be the first among God’s people, be the servant of God’s people!

*Everybody wants to be known as a hero, but nobody wants to get shot at.

*Everybody wants to be known as a “Reformer” but nobody wants to get up to their neck in the manure that comes when you work with people.

*Everybody wants to be the one everybody looks up to, but nobody wants to do the work required of being a person people can rely on.

To people who wonder why God isn’t using them, why Jesus isn’t blessing them, why people aren’t taking them seriously in their Christian profession – Jesus says (and I say it in the most reverent way possible) “For Christ’s sake DO SOMETHING and get off your rear end!” Stop playing your mind games and cultivating your day dreams and DO SOMETHING! DO SOMETHING! DO SOMETHING FOR SOMEONE IN CHRIST’S NAME!

My friend Edwin Elliott said that when they ordain leaders in their church, they give them a broom. The last time I talked to him he was taking out the trash at the church.  Get out of your head and get into the world to do something for someone else in Jesus’ name.

Here’s the practice: So how does this work out in practice? We want it to mean that we are called to do something glamorous and well paid. If we are pastors we want it to mean that we are called to minister to stadiums full of adoring crowds. If we are church leaders we may want to consider our church “the best in town”.  We may find ourselves wanting to be noticed by people – to have our picture in the paper every week – to win a Nobel Prize for doing nothing.

But Jesus took a child and a set the child in their midst.  In that day, children were considered, weak, inferior, and a liability – the way pro abortionists talk about them when arguing for abortion as a way to cut the cost of the schools and the cost of government.

Jesus promised that if we welcomed weak, inferior, insignificant people and served them, THEN we would know what it means to serve as disciples and break free from our delusions and become disciples!

Here’s the promise: It’s hard to follow Jesus at times. We so desperately want – at times – to BE ANYWHERE ELSE but where God has put us. We so desperately want to be doing ANYTHING BUT the menial task God seems to have assigned us.

But Jesus has a promise for us in our misery.  He promises that when we serve and welcome the insignificant in His Name – in union with Jesus, empowered by Jesus, driven by the love of Jesus, trusting in Jesus to use us in our insignificance, when our following becomes the oneness with Jesus of repentance faith and eating His flesh and drinking His blood described in John 6 – then in that service Jesus will find their union with Christ and the Father deepened.

No it doesn’t mean that if you help someone in Jesus’ Name then suddenly that person becomes Jesus or is a Christian somehow because you helped them. But as we move out of our deluded self interest into the discipleship Jesus calls us too, we will know what it means to live as one with Jesus and the Father and the blessing of their nearness and what it means to rejoice in being the Father’s child.

Jesus promises that as we move out of our delusion into discipleship we shall find the joy of knowing Him and thereby enjoy all the blessings of the Father’s adoption (Gal 4:4-7) and come to  experience in and through our serving the nearness of the life of heaven (John 17:3).

If death should come and greet you today – and you should leave this world for your eternal reward – will you be found to be deluded, someone who played games with their life and played around with knowing Jesus, or will you be found to be a disciple who for the joy of Jesus’ promised nearness, had learned to be the one who lead by serving?

Audio version of this sermon preached at St. Andrews’ Church

Jesus Heals A Deaf Mute

A sermon from Mark 7:31-37.

It’s easy to come to one of the miracle stories of our Lord’s life and be jaded. If we’ve gone to church for a while, we’ve probably heard these stories a million times. So what? We’ve heard these miracle stories before you know. We’ve probably even prayed for miracles ourselves but nothing quite like what Jesus did has ever happened to us has it.

Familiarity breeds contempt, and unless we pay attention, familiarity with the stories of Jesus’ miracles can let us miss God’s message for us this morning. May God help us NOT to be so bored with His Word!

Jesus is travelling far from Jerusalem – you know the place where the “experts” were sent from to trap Him and where He would be ultimately crucified. He’s travelling in a land who knew they were under God’s judgment.  They’d sided with the enemies of God’s people after they had been blessed by the Lord through Solomon. What betrayal! What traitors! Hear what the prophet says in Jeremiah 47:4 – “The time has come for the Philistines to be destroyed, along with their allies from Tyre and Sidon. Yes, the LORD is destroying the remnant of the Philistines, those colonists from the island of Crete.” NLT

So where is Jesus? He is not where the those who felt they were sure of God’s blessing lived, that is, in Jerusalem. Jesus was performing His miracles amongst those who knew themselves to be cursed. He’s walking among the Ten Towns (Decapolis) where the Gentiles are so thick the Jews of that region were considered “second class” because they lived some place defiled.

Have you ever felt you were some place which was so bad that, for whatever reason, Jesus could not reach you there? Some place so hopeless that Jesus would never visit where you find yourself stuck? Our Jesus walks today in the hopeless places – and however much they seem “God forsaken” –those who will receive Him may be surprised just how frequently He visits there just as He visited Tyre and Sidon.

While there were many in Jerusalem who did not notice His visitation – and were thankful whenever the news of Jesus died down – there were people who were eager for Him to arrive and when they knew Jesus came to supposedly “God Forsaken” places, they cried out for Him to visit their friend, perhaps a family member, who was a deaf-mute.  They begged for a miracle!

“Draw near Jesus!” they asked. Communicate your blessing and healing power. Touch our friend in his brokenness and weakness. Remove his humiliation! Heal him!

Who is the person who healed this man that day?

He is the one who touched a man whom many others would look at and ask “Who sinned? This man or his parents?” (cf.  John 9:2) He’s the one who dares to touch you and I in our squalor and weakness.

Jesus is the one who looks to heaven and beseeches the Heavenly Father to pour out blessing and healing in a land considered by the nice religious people as pagan to say the least. He is the one who at the Father’s right hand prays for us in our plight as well. That is why scripture tells us to consider this one who looks to heaven and intercedes for the broken and urges us to realize that He prays for us too: “Therefore [Hebrews says] He is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through Him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.” Heb 7:25 NLT

Jesus is the one who sighed as he draws near this pitiful man. Jesus groaned with the groaning all creation cries out with until the curse is removed (Rom 8:23; 2 Cor 5:2,4). He sighs for this man just as he wept for his friend Lazarus (John 11:35).

This one who weeps over sinners will weep over your plight, your struggles, your heart break when you cry out to Him.

Jesus commanded “Be Opened” and this man’s ears were open. A miracle happened at Jesus’ word.

And today when people cry out to this Jesus who said “Be opened” and the Deaf-Mute could hear and speak – this Jesus comes to shattered places and shattered lives and does amazing things for people who know they have no other option and they turn to Him!

Note the response of the people – when others will crucify Him, these people

They can’t stay quiet!

They acclaim Him as the one who fulfills Isaiah’s messianic promise:

Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.” Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. Isa 35:4-5 ESV

And guess what – It’s no fluke! In Acts 3:1-10 we read about a man who saw the Apostles and thought “money”.  Instead this lame man was healed.

That healing shows the messianic promise fulfilled in Jesus, persists wherever, whenever, and however Jesus wishes it to in order to spread His kingdom.

It’s no fluke, the One who drew near to hopeless people in a hopeless “God-forsaken” place did not die, nor did His power. He rose again and lives at the Father’s right hand interceding, praying and caring for all those who come to God through Him.

It’s no fluke, the One who drew near a hopeless man draws near to all the hopeless who cry out to Him!

He sighs over our tears and our plight.

He is waiting for us to stop seeking silver and gold as that lame man learned and He is waiting for us to seek His Name!

How do we pray in light of this truth?

How do we praise in light of this truth?

How do we witness in light of this truth?

There are some people who never get healed in this life. There are martyrs – like most of the Apostles – who died for their Christian Faith. And there are those who struggle in many different ways.

But just because these things are true, we must never forget who Jesus is and the mercy and love He delights to show those who will put their trust in Him.

Our problem, for the most part, is not that we trust Jesus too much. Overwhelmingly our problem is that we trust Jesus too little. We have preconceived notions about our lives and we have a view of Jesus that demands He conform to our will.

The mercy of Jesus though is no fluke. The greatest need in our lives each day – and the greatest need of those we encounter – is to learn to entrust ourselves expectantly, in childlike trust, to the One who touches the despairing in their squalor and restores them by to power of God  so that we become part of eternity’ s chorus of souls who will give Him praise!

Will you praise Him? Will you bow? His mercy is no fluke. Why do we daily treat is as such?

Here’s an audio version of this sermon preached at St. Andrew’s Church.