Saturday 21 July 2012

Sermon for Sunday 15 July 2012 Mark 3:13-35, REJECTION AND VICTORY, Bruce

Mark names 12 ‘Apostles’ appointed by Jesus, and makes their function clear. They are to be his close companions, and his ‘missionaries’. Jesus has now attracted such publicity that his own family has become involved. They are as dumb-founded as everyone else and conclude that he is ‘out of his mind’. The religious experts attempt to brand him as an agent of Satan, but are conclusively rebutted. Jesus has bound Satan (the ‘strong man’).

Are you in or are you out?  In this passage Jesus has contact with five groups of people - the crowds, those he calls as his apostles, his family, the teachers of the law, and us.

We have seen in previous weeks that Jesus has become famous far and wide for proclaiming that the kingdom of heaven is near and that we should repent.  He has demonstrated the power of God’s in-breaking kingdom by healing the sick, cleansing lepers and driving out demons.  In a society where there is no medical understanding as we would be familiar with it, crowds of people flock to be with Jesus and be blessed by him.

He chooses twelve - a significant number.  We today are not so caught up with the meaning and importance of numbers, but choosing twelve was almost a political statement that Jesus was restoring the wholeness, the completeness of the ancient nation of Israel.

And who were these twelve?  Peter, the leader, went on to betray him.  James and John are firebrands - warm-hearted people who always seem to be starting fights.  Matthew (if he is the same person as Levi) is a tax collector working for the Roman regime while Simon is an anti-Roman revolutionary.  And Judas ….

The twelve are far from ideal specimens, and any competent selection process today would filter them out.  Yet these are the people Jesus chooses to help him bring in the kingdom.. They are chosen to do two things.  They are to be WITH him.  They will live, walk, talk, sleep, breath with Jesus for the next three years.  And they are to be SENT OUT by him to preach and drive out demons.

After making his selection, Jesus hits a familiar problem.  A crowd hears that he is in town and mobs him and his disciples to such an extent that they cannot even get a meal.  To his family it must have seemed that religious zeal and devotion had tipped over into hysteria and delusion.  What was strange and wonderful when Jesus was a boy of twelve now seemed dangerous and embarrassing.  For his own protection they needed to take charge of him.  Have we come to terms yet with the fact that Jesus is not just a polite, gentle teacher who will do a little to make this world a little bit better?  Jesus is in fact a revolutionary, come to announce a new world order, where God is in charge.  He is not a comfortable person to have around.  All of our actions, our habits, our attitudes, are held up for examination and challenge.  If Jesus is in our lives, if we are encountering him and growing in him, then we cannot just carry on as before in the same comfortable way.  That is why some people would like to cordon Jesus off into a safe, manageable place where he is a teacher or a good moral example.

Others, of course, would like to reject him entirely.  The teachers of the law cannot deny that Jesus is performing powerful works of deliverance and exorcism.  As they cannot admit that his power has come from God, they are forced to postulate that Jesus instead is motivated by the power of the chief of the demons.  Jesus demolishes this first with common sense - if Satan is fighting Satan, then God’s kingdom must indeed be coming.  But second Jesus was proclaimed in chapter one by John the Baptist as the more powerful one who was to come, and revealed in the wilderness as the strong man who overcame the devil and his temptations; faced with the vanquishing of Satan, the only correct conclusion to draw is that Jesus the strong man has arrived.

Verse 28 is important.  We can be forgiven all our sins, and every slander we utter.  There is no limit to God’s forgiving grace, except in one case.  Those who see God’s forgiving grace and call it evil miss it.  They are in the position of one who will not receive a life-giving operation from the most gifted surgeon because they are self-deluded that the surgeon is a cold hearted killer.  They have placed themselves outside the circle of God’s grace.

Also outside are Jesus’ family who have now arrived at the house.  They send a messenger in to summon Jesus, who is seated inside with a circle of people around him.  Time for another shock.  In a society where loyalty to family is one of the highest ideals, Jesus cuts his family completely, saying that those who do his Father’s will are his true family.

Robert spoke last week about openness to God’s ways, and the implications that this has for the renewal of our building.  This week we see that underlying that, is the call to be with Jesus and share his life, and to be sent by him to preach and share his power with those around us.  We are to encounter him and grow in him.  We are to be a growing community of faith, open for all.  We are to live and breath his kingdom come, his will being done, on earth and in us, as it is in heaven.  The only response to the news that the kingly rule of God has arrived is to want to fall into line with it.

Discussion Starters

1. Who do we feel most sympathy for in this story - fallible disciples, sceptical and embarrassed family members or scandalised religious traditionalists?
2. What are some of the ways that we can experience being WITH Jesus?  Discuss how we can experience this today.
3. What does it mean to you to be SENT BY Jesus?  Discuss how this might work out in your circle of friends and acquaintances.
4. Do you submit to Christ as Lord?  Where do these words come from, and how do you respond to them?

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