Following Jesus (2)
Scott Bayles, pastor
Blooming Grove Christian Church: 1/8/2017
If you were with us last week, you know we began a sixteen-week journey that will take us through the deserts of Palestine, along the shores of Lake Galilee and the Jordan River, and into the cities of Nazareth, Bethlehem and Jerusalem as we follow in the footsteps of Jesus.
The Gospel of Mark will be our tour guide on this journey, as we strive to see Jesus more clearly. As I mentioned last week, at just sixteen chapters, Mark is the shortest of the four Gospels. It’s also the first, written as early as 45 AD. And Mark wrote it as a fast-paced, action-packed drama, making it the ideal starting point for anyone wishing to follow in His steps.
Last Sunday, we witnessed Jesus’s introduction to the world. John the Baptist built anticipation for Jesus’s arrival, preparing the way for the Lord’s coming and announcing both the worth and work of Jesus. But when Jesus finally stepped onto the stage, allowing John to baptize him in the Jordan River, the heavens split apart, the Spirit of God drifted down onto Jesus, and the voice of God proudly proclaimed, “This is my beloved Son, who brings me great joy!”
Soon after that stellar introduction, Jesus meets Simon Peter and his younger brother Andrew along the shore of Lake Galilee and calls out to them, “Come, follow me…” Simon and Andrew didn’t hesitate; they left their nets and theirs boat and immediately set out to follow Jesus who begins preaching from town to town, healing the sick and casting out evil spirits. That brings us to Mark 2.
If you have a Bible or an app on your phone, go ahead and open it up to Mark 2:1-12. While I would love to include every detail of Jesus’s life in this series, even Mark’s Gospel—as short as it is—has far too much material per chapter for me to pack into one twenty minute sermon. So we’ll just be focusing on the first twelve verses, which should be familiar to many of you. In this unforgettable story, I want to highlight three attributes of Jesus beginning with His popularity!
• POPULARITY OF JESUS
By the time we get to Mark 2, Jesus is already more popular than the Beetles. Throngs of fervent fans followed him everywhere he went. From town to town, from shore to shore, they would walk miles just to catch a glimpse of him. So as Mark begins this chapter, he writes:
When Jesus returned to Capernaum several days later, the news spread quickly that he was back home. Soon the house where he was staying was so packed with visitors that there was no more room, even outside the door. While he was preaching God’s word to them, four men arrived carrying a paralyzed man on a mat. They couldn’t bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, so they dug a hole through the roof above his head. Then they lowered the man on his mat, right down in front of Jesus. (Mark 2:1-4 NLT)
What a comical sight this must have been! Honestly, it sounds like the kind of harebrained scheme you’d see on a television sit-com.
Now, scholars tell us that homes of that day had a unique flat roof made of wooden beams that rested on the walls of the building. These beams were placed about 3 to 4 feet apart and were covered with thick branches, brush, reeds, mud, grass and clay. The resulting layers on top of the beams would measure from 4 to 6 inches thick. Wealthier homes, such as this one, often had ceramic-like tiles on top that helped in diverting the water from the rains.
So as word gets out that Jesus is in town, these four guys just grab their buddy and carry him across town. Of course, when they get to the house where Jesus was staying, the place is so packed with people they couldn’t get through the door. Just imagine crowds of admirers peeking in through the windows, camping out on the lawn, and having a tailgate party in the street! It must have been like showing up to Walmart on Black Friday before the doors are open or to the newest Star Wars movie on opening night. But these guys would not be deterred.
They don’t care if they throw their backs out carrying their buddy around.
They don’t care if they ruin the roof.
They don’t care if they interrupt Jesus’s sermon.
They were willing to go to any lengths just to get to Jesus.
Wouldn’t you like to have friends like that? But what I want to underscore is not the persistence of the four men, but the popularity of Jesus. Everywhere he went, Jesus was surrounded by admirers, devotees, fans. People wanted to be where Jesus was—to sit in his presence, to listen to him speak. Up until now, Jesus wasn’t healing anybody. He wasn’t giving away free food, like when he feed the five thousand. Rather, this crowd formed just to listen to Jesus. Mark says, “he was preaching God’s word to them.”
There was something about Jesus that attracted people. He had a magnetism about him—his voice was comforting, his kindness compelling, his joy contagious. Jesus drew a crowd like free hot dog day at Busch Stadium!
My question is—If this is the house of Jesus, shouldn’t it be was so packed with visitors that there’s no more room, even outside the door? A crowded, cramped church building is an indication that the Spirit of Jesus is in this place. But someone has to spread the news. Marks said “the news spread quickly” that Jesus had arrived. News doesn’t spread itself. When you come through those doors and experience Jesus in this place—you’ve got to tell someone about it. Dig a hole in the roof if you have to, but there is nothing better you can do in your life than bring your friends to Jesus.
In addition to his popularity, this story goes on to spotlight Jesus’s position.
• POSITION OF JESUS
The moment this paralyzed man descends from the ceiling, everybody knows why he’s there. He wants to be healed. But this is where the story takes a peculiar turn. Mark writes:
Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, “My child, your sins are forgiven.” But some of the teachers of religious law who were sitting there thought to themselves, “What is he saying? This is blasphemy! Only God can forgive sins!” (Mark 2:5-7 NLT)
Rather than healing the man, Jesus does something scandalous—He forgives him of his sins. What sins? I don’t know and it doesn’t matter because we’ve all sinned and fallen short of God’s glorious standard. We’re all guilty and we all need forgiveness, but that forgiveness can only come from God.
The “teachers of religious law” rightly recognized the implication of Jesus’s words. Only God can forgive sins, so if Jesus can forgive sins that means Jesus is God. Scripture declares what the scribes deduced—that Jesus is both man and God.
In the Gospel of John, for instance, we learn, “Before anything else existed, there was Christ, with God. He has always been alive and is himself God. He created everything there is—nothing exists that he didn’t make…. And Christ became a human being and lived on earth among us” (John 1:1,14, TLB). Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, is the answer to Solomon’s centuries-old question: “Will God really live on earth among people?” (2 Chronicles 6:18, NLT).
According to the Bible, the God who spoke the universe into existence stepped down from heaven and entered our world. The arms of a teenage virgin cradled him. Angels watched with wonder as the creator of the cosmos took his first steps. Jesus may have been pushed around by the neighborhood bully. He probably scraped his knees on the cobbled streets of Nazareth. One thing is for sure: Jesus holds the utterly unique position of being completely divine, yet completely human at the same time—fully God and fully human.
The scribes’ response to Jesus forgiving someone’s sin is completely understandable and appropriate, because either this Jesus fellow is a liar and a blasphemer or He really is God incarnate. The great theologian C. S. Lewis puts it this way in Mere Christianity:
“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
Before moving on from these verses, let me give you a little bonus point. This interaction also reveals the perceptiveness of Jesus. He knew that the man came for healing, but he forgave his sins first, because Jesus knows our greatest need. And isn’t that the kind of Savior we need? A merely human Jesus could love us and sympathize with our plight, but never save us. A merely divine Jesus would be so far above and beyond us that we could never relate to him or approach him. As the God-Man, Jesus is everything we need in a Savior—near enough to touch, strong enough to trust.
Finally, in addition to His popularity and position, Mark spotlights His power.
• POWER OF JESUS
ILL. The devout cowboy lost his favorite Bible while he was mending fences out on the range. Three weeks later a cow walked up to him carrying the Bible in its mouth. The cowboy couldn't believe his eyes. He took the precious book out of the cow's mouth, raised his eyes heavenward and exclaimed, "It's a miracle!"
"Not really," said the cow. "Your name is written inside the cover."
Miracles really do happen and Mark documents one of them right here. Knowing some of his guests were thinking Him a blasphemer, Jesus asks:
“Why do you question this in your hearts? Is it easier to say to the paralyzed man ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or ‘Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk’? So I will prove to you that the Son of Man has the authority on earth to forgive sins.” Then Jesus turned to the paralyzed man and said, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and go home!” And the man jumped up, grabbed his mat, and walked out through the stunned onlookers. They were all amazed and praised God, exclaiming, “We’ve never seen anything like this before!” (Mark 2:8-11 NLT)
This miracle was more than just a display of power; it was proof that Jesus really was who He claimed to be. Years later, Peter preached, “God publicly endorsed Jesus the Nazarene by doing powerful miracles, wonders, and signs through him, as you well know” (Acts 2:22 NLT). Miracles, wonders, and signs are three words the New Testament often uses to refer to the same thing. The word “miracle” refers to what was done; the word “wonder” refers to the effect a miracle had on people; and the term “sign” indicated the purpose of the miracle. These miracles were signs that the power of God lived in Jesus.
Jesus performed this, and countless other miracles, not only out of compassion for a paralyzed man, but so that onlookers might see and believe. Unfortunately, you and I weren’t there to witness them, so we have to rely on others’ eyewitness testimony about these miracles.
The four Gospels—written independently by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—together record more than three dozen specific miracles that Jesus of Nazareth performed during His ministry. The Pharisees had accused Jesus of performing miracles by the power of Satan, but they did not deny that He had performed them. The Talmud, a Jewish book of history and law, claims that Jesus was a sorcerer and he performed miracles through the dark arts. But the fact that the Talmud records that Jesus really did perform the miracles, inadvertently corroborates what Matthew, Mark, Luke and John claimed.
Craig Evans, who is considered one of the world's premiere historical Jesus scholars, says that "the older notion" that the miracle stories were the product of mythological influence "has been largely abandoned." He says, "It is no longer seriously contested… that miracles played a role in Jesus’s ministry."
The fact is—Jesus performed miracles of healing, miracles of nature, and even miracles of restoring life. And all of them were carefully documented by not just one, but four biographers who believed so fully that Jesus was the Son of God that they willingly died for their belief. The power of Jesus to perform miracles if compelling proof that He was, in fact, the Christ, the Son of God.
I think Jesus still furnishes proof for those who sincerely seek it. If you openly confess your qualms and questions to Him, there’s no telling what miracle he might perform in your life.
As the paralyzed man leapt this his feet and strutted out the door, the crowd was stunned, amazed and full of praise, exclaiming, “We’ve never seen anything like this before!” I get the feeling Jesus heard that a lot.
Conclusion
We’re only in chapter two, and already Jesus’s popularity is skyrocketing, his position as both God and man is firmly established, and his power to perform miracles is leaving spectators stunned. I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to seeing what Jesus will do in the coming weeks.
In the meantime, however, in the next paragraph, Jesus approaches a tax collector named Levi and invites him, “Follow me and be my disciple.” That invitation is for you and me as well.
Invitation
If you’re ready to follow Jesus, you don’t have to dig through someone else’s roof to get to Him. You can meet Him anytime in any place. In fact, as the rest of us stand and sing, you can stand and pray. Open your heart and life to Jesus and accept His invitation to follow where He leads. Let’s sing together church.
