Following Jesus (13)
Scott Bayles, pastor
Scripture: Mark 12:28-34
Blooming Grove Christian Church: 3/26/2017
Jim Dunn was serving as the pastor of the First Baptist Church, and his wife, Gladys, was very friendly and welcoming to people. One particular Sunday when the sermon seemed to go on forever, many in the congregation fell asleep. After the service, to be sociable, she walked up to a very sleepy looking gentleman. In an attempt to revive him from his stupor, she extended her hand in greeting, and said, "Hello, I’m Gladys Dunn." To which the gentleman replied, "You and me both, lady!"
I hope you’re not “Gladys Dunn” when you leave here this morning; rather, I’m glad you’re here and I hope you are too.
For the past few months the Gospel of Mark has been our guide as we follow in the footsteps of Jesus. We’ve seen Jesus heal the sick and cast out demons. We’ve heard him debate the religious elite and command a storm to be still. He’s been rejected by his neighbors but embraced by the masses. He’s walked on water, fed thousands, and radiated heaven’s light on the mount of transfiguration.
Last Sunday, in Mark 11, Jesus triumphantly entered Jerusalem on the back of a donkey. The people cheered and threw their coats and palm branches on the ground before him as if to create a red carpet. Afterward, Jesus chased the moneychangers and merchants out of the Temple and cursed a fruitless fig tree, symbolic of Israel’s barren spiritual lives.
Building on the theme of Israel’s sin, Jesus begins Mark 12 with the parable of the evil farmers. It’s the story of a man who planted a vineyard and leased it to tenant farmers. When it came time to harvest the grapes, the owner sent a servant to collect his share of the harvest, but the tenants grabbed the servant beat him up and sent him back empty-handed. The owner sent another servant, but they treated him the same way. Finally, the owner decided to send his son, thinking, “Surely they’ll respect my son.” But the tenants brutally murdered the son and threw his body out of the vineyard. The parable indicts Israel for rejecting God’s prophets in the past and predicts the violent execution of Jesus himself. But, Jesus adds, Israel won’t get away unpunished. He concludes, saying, “The owner of the vineyard will come and kill those farmers and rent the vineyard to someone else.”
This parable, along with the fig tree, loomed like an ominous cloud on the horizon. Jesus knew that judgement was coming for Jerusalem and the religious leaders—the Pharisees—knew that these stories were aimed toward them. So they ramped up their effort to discredit Jesus. Religious leaders of all sorts publicly confronted Jesus with trick questions, trying to trap him into saying something stupid, illegal or unpopular. But, one by one, Jesus responds with wit and wisdom.
Then, right in the middle of Mark 12, we read one of the most significant conversations ever recorded. If you have a Bible, or an app on your phone, open it to Mark 12:28-34. I want to look at this conversation in three chunks, beginning with the guy asking the question.
• THE ASKER
Who is this guy and what makes him different from Jesus’ other interrogators? Mark writes: One of the teachers of religious law was standing there listening to the debate. He realized that Jesus had answered well, so he asked, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” (Mark 12:28 NLT).
Right away Mark identifies this guy as a “teacher of religious law” or as the more literal translations put it: “a scribe.” Scribes in ancient Israel were educated. men whose business was to study the Torah, transcribe it, and write commentaries on it. Since the majority of people in those days were illiterate, they were also hired to write legal documents or even personal letters. The scribes took their job of preserving Scripture very seriously; they would copy and recopy the Bible meticulously, even counting letters and spaces to ensure each copy was correct. We can thank Jewish scribes, like this man, for preserving Scripture from generation to generation.
However, many of these scribes became professionals at spelling out the letter of the Law while ignoring the spirit behind it. The scribes were hypocrites at heart. They were more interested in appearing good to men than they were in pleasing God, which is why they were in constant conflict with Jesus. But there was something different about his scribe.
He had a question. A question that tickled the back of his brain. A question that kept him up at night. He wants to know “of all the commandments, which one is most important?” You see the Pharisees recognized over six hundred Torah laws from Genesis to Malachi and they often argued over which laws were weightier than others. Some rabbis tried to differentiate between major and minor laws; others between moral, civil and ceremonial laws. Still other taught that all the laws were equally binding and it was dangerous to make any distinctions. The heart of this issue is what matters most to God. To the scribe, this wasn’t a trick question. He wasn’t trying to trap Jesus. He really wanted to know.
So he’s standing there in the Temple Courtyard listening to this debate unfold between Jesus and his colleagues. Maybe he was even cheering the other Pharisees on at first. But then he starts listening to Jesus’ answers. Really listening. Often in public debates, people have their minds made up ahead of time. When the dust settles they’re just more entrenched in the view that they held at the beginning. But this guy actually listened to what Jesus had to say. He recognized Christ’s wisdom and insight. He opened his heart and mind to Jesus’s teaching.
This scribe knew the Scriptures better than any of us here, but Jesus knew the Author. If anyone could answer his question it was Jesus. I wish we were all a little more like this scribe. Not only was a he serious student of God’s Word, but he genuinely cared about God’s priorities. He longed to know what mattered most to God. And he figured out that Jesus could give him the answer he sought after.
That leads us to the next part of this conversation—the answer.
• THE ANSWER
In reply to the scribe’s sincere question, Jesus says, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.” (Mark 12:39-31 NLT).
The most important commands ever given—the absolute best thing you can do with your life—is to love God and love people. Both of these commands come from the Old Testament (Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18). They’re not new. They’ve been there all along. In fact, Jesus elsewhere says that Ten Commandments and all the other Torah laws are summarized in these two commandments. What matters most is love; love that’s both vertical and horizontal, upward and outward.
Jesus describes a love for God that’s all consuming, all encompassing, a love that touches every part of our lives—heart, soul, mind and strength. And we’re to love our neighbors, all of them—your husband, your wife, your kids, your parents, your friends, your co-workers, the teller at the bank, the checker at the grocery store, the liar, the adulterer, the bigot, the outcast, the reject, the loner, the partier, the atheist and the person in the pew in front of you—as much as we love ourselves.
In other words, love is God’s highest priority; his greatest commands. The apostle Paul underscored this when he wrote: “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-2 NIV).
In other words, life without love is blasphemy. A life without love is like a rainbow without colors or a sunset with no sun. As Leonardo da Vinci put it, “A life without love, is no life at all.” I think Jesus would have agreed. Jesus was all about love. He commanded his followers to love the Lord, to love one another, to love our neighbors, and even to love our enemies. More than anything else, Jesus urged his listeners to love God and love people. These two commands summarize all of Scripture. They pulse through the Bible like a heartbeat.
It’s clear that love was Jesus’ highest priority. It should be ours too. It doesn’t matter how many degrees you earn or how many plaques decorate your wall if you don’t love God. It doesn’t matter how successful you are or how much money you make if you don’t love your neighbor. It doesn’t matter what you accomplish, accumulate, or achieve if you do it without love. Love is essential to a life well lived.
So now the inquisitive scribe has his answer. But there’s still more to this exchange. The last part of this conversation is the application.
• THE APPLICATION
Once the asker heard the answer to his question, he could have simply said, “Thank you” and walked off. But he doesn’t. I want you to listen to his response. Mark writes:
The teacher of religious law replied, “Well said, Teacher. You have spoken the truth by saying that there is only one God and no other. And I know it is important to love him with all my heart and all my understanding and all my strength, and to love my neighbor as myself. This is more important than to offer all of the burnt offerings and sacrifices required in the law.” (Mark 12:32-34).
You know, every preacher likes to hear “good job, well said.” It strokes our ego a little bit. It provides some much-needed affirmation. But there is something even better than a hardy hand shake or a pat on the back. That’s when someone not only agrees with what I’ve said, but applies it to his/her life.
ILL. I once heard the story of a small country church where an elderly woman named Beatrice constantly criticized the other members of the church. Whenever the preacher made a point, she would look over her shoulder, raise an eyebrow, point her finger or jab her elbow into someone’s side. She’d even go up to people after church and say, “I sure hope you were listening to that sermon because I think it was aimed at you.” Eventually everyone grew tired of Beatrice’s finger-pointing and one by one they stopped coming to church. Soon, Beatrice was the only person left in the pews. So that Sunday the preacher locked his eyes on her and preached about removing the plank from your own eye and loving your neighbor as you love yourself. After the sermon, Beatrice approached the preacher and said, “Amen, preacher. You really let ‘em have it. It’s just too bad none of them bothered to show up!”
This guy starts off saying, “Well said. Right on!” But then he goes a step beyond that. He applies the answer to himself. He says, “I know it is important to love God with all my heart and all my understanding and all my strength and to love my neighbor as myself.” Do you see how he personalizes the command? It’s one thing to say, “You must love the Lord with all your heart.” It’s a whole other thing to say, “I must love the Lord with all my heart.”
It doesn’t do us any good to know God’s truth, if we don’t apply it to our lives personally. In this case, that means not only acknowledging that loving God and loving people are the most important commands, but actually practicing those commands. So ask yourself some questions and reflect on the answers.
Is God the focus of my affections?
Is my love for Him warm and real?
Does my love for God engage my intellect?
Is my faith and my love for God informed or is it just blind?
Do I put effort and energy in my relationship with God?
Do I love Him with my whole being?
How do I express love for my neighbors?
What am I doing to show the people around me that I love them?
How do these commands affect my attitude and actions? How can I apply them to my life? It’s up to each of us to examine our own lives and look for ways to personalize these commands, to carry them out in our daily lives.
Conclusion
One of the things I love most about this encounter is what Jesus says next. When Jesus saw how on-track this scribe was, he said, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.”
When we make love our highest priority, we draw near to God.
Maybe you’re like this “teacher of religious law.” Maybe you’ve grown up in church, learned the Bible, but you’re still seeking answers, still longing for something more, deeper, stronger, better. That something is the love of God. When we accept God’s love and live in his love, it empowers us to live a life of love—to keep the commands Jesus calls the greatest and most important.
Invitation
Next week, we’ll continue following Jesus through the Gospel of Mark.
In the meantime, I want to invite you to receive God’s love today and make love for God and people your highest priority. If I can help you with that, then please talk with me—you can talk to me after church, call me at home, or come forward now as we stand and sing. Let’s sing together.
