Part 5 - The Gospel according to Mark

Transcript (Auto-generated)

Well good morning everyone good morning um if you've got your Bibles in I'm sure you do hope you do please open or click through to Mark's gospel we um have been involved in a series which is going to take us through to Christmas in um looking at Mark's go El and um it's so appropriate that we do say in the lead up to Christmas when we focus on the Lord Jesus my concern is of course is that we're just seeing taking Snippets from here and there and um and that of course in itself is good but sometimes we can lose the overall um impact of the uh of the whole book and I'd encourage you somewhere along the line to sit down and to read the whole of the Book of Mark all through in one sitting it doesn't take long I did it this morning um I don't do that to brag or Bast or anything but just to point out that if loer can do it um you can too and uh it took me um didn't time it but probably less than an hour I'm sure just to get the overall picture and the theme which is being taken here is um from right about the middle of Mark's gospel where the um where this question is asked Jesus as the questions of his disciples who do you say that I am Mark's gospel is a good book it's a book of movement uh as I say it's only 16 chapters and there's one word which occurs again and again 41 times I think from memory and that's a word immediately and so it's this action something is about happen and immediately this and then something else and immediately something else so it's this this action-packed book of uh of the life of um of the Lord Jesus starts right the beginning of jesus' ministry and uh so this theme is taken who do you say that I am from around the beginning in Mark 8: 27- 29 when Jesus is talking with the disciples and he's saying who's everybody say that I am and the disciples respond well some say this and some say that and uh a number of options are given and then he HS it he says but who do you say that I am I want to put that to each of us this morning and to me as well is that we hear all these sorts of things all sorts of descriptors about the Lord Jesus and we can say well what's everybody saying about Jesus but in the name of Jesus I want to say to you and to me this morning but who do you say Jesus is you see this is all about identity and identity in our day and age is so important we hear so much about identity hear about it negatively about identity theft as well don't we and um just everywhere we go people want to know without a doubt who we are and um so we've got to have PIN numbers and all sorts of things my phone when I hold it up it recognizes my face yep that's the ugly one will open up the Fame for this Blake uh it won't do it for any of you other good-look ones but it will for me um on other devices it's my fingerprint and so it recognizes my fingerprint but it won't recognize yours and of course we have problems with that from T to time as you're aware that an underwent uh chemo a couple of years ago one of the side effects of the chemo she was told was that she' lose her fingerprint and uh so that's certainly happened happened and so even today I checked with her this morning on her device which um goes on fingerprint uh still W open for her try Toes or something I don't know whether that would do any different or something but uh but this whole idea of identity is important it's important for a number of things that distinguishes who we are but uh but an identity is both descriptive and prescriptive that is the identity describes who I am but it also gives some indication that if this is who this person is this is how they will behave and so it's important that we look at this whole area of the Lord Jesus when Jesus says well who's what's everybody saying about me and that was just the leading question to come to this core question about who do you say that I am and so when you go home and you read through the Book of Mark in this one sitting do so through that framework of okay I'm reading this to discover what the Bible what the gospel of Mark what it's saying about Jesus and it's amazing you get this just this tremendous picture of the Lord Jesus as you read through about who he is and uh what he what he does what he can do not only what he does back then then but what he can do for you and for me today so in this series we've been looking at this whole area of identity about who is Jesus who do you say that I am and so far we've um as the church we've considered these these topics the kingdom of God that Jesus is also forgiver healer grower and this one's in yellow you know it's in yellow cuz that's what we're looking at today that Jesus is King and so we are looking at this passage of scripture which is set before us today in Mark chapter 6 and I wish we could actually had time to read all 29 verses but we don't have the time today to read it all but perhaps if I can just give you a bit of a glimpse the um uh the passage is actually just from verse six but the first five verses I think are also key for us as well because in chapter 6 and verse one it says Jesus left their went to his hometown accompanied by his disciples so when the Sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue and many who heard him were amazed where did this man get this these things they said who is it who is this man as Jesus is talking then if we go down to verse six Jesus went around teaching from Village to Village calling the 12 to him he sent them out 2 by two and gave them authority over evil spirits these were his instructions take nothing from the for the journey except the staff no bread no bag no money in your belts wear sandals but not even an extra tunic whenever you enter a house stay there and stay there until you leave that town and if any place will not welcome you or listen to you shake the dust off your feet and when you leave as a testimony against them they went out and they preached that people should repent they drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them then verse 14 we are invited in this uh sermon today to do this contrast between Jesus is King which we've just read about and now Herod is King because it says from verse 14 King Herod heard about this for jesus' name had become well known some were saying John the Baptist has been raised from the dead and that is why miraculous poers are work in him others said he's Elijah and still others claimed he is a prophet like one of the prophets long ago when Herod heard this he said John the man I beheaded has been raised from the dead guilty conscience at work here Herod himself had given orders to have John arrested had him bound and put in prison he did this because of herodias his brother's Philip's wife whom he had married for John had been saying to Herod it is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife so herodias nursed a grudged against John and wanted to kill him but she's not able to because Herod feared John and protected him knowing him to be a righteous and holy man when Herod heard John who was greatly puzzled yet he liked to listen to him finally the opportune time came on his birthday Herod gave a banquet for his high officials the military commanders and the Leading Men of galile when the daughter of aradius came in and DC she pleased Herod at his dinner guests the king said to the girl ask me for anything you want and I'll give it to you and he promised who with an oath whatever you ask I will give you up to half my kingdom she went out and said to her mother what shall I ask for the head of John the Baptist she answered once a girl hurried into to the king with the request I want you to give me right now the head of John the Baptist on a platter the King was greatly distressed because of his Oaths and his dinner guests did not want to refuse her so immediately sent an executioner with the orders to bring John's head the man went beheaded John in the prison and brought back his head on a platter presented it to the girl and she gave it to her mother on hearing this John's disciples came and took his body and laid it in the Tomb now just go back to verse 12 about the disciples went out and preached they drove out many demons and then this part about herod's sort of just in Brackets in there if we pick up from verse 13 and duck down to 30 it's a report back the apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught we know that God always blesses the reading of his word well we're looking at this whole area about Jesus being a king and we know that time and time again uh the Bible describes Jesus as king so in a while Christmas time no doubt these words will uh come to to mind about the the wise men coming to uh to Herod and uh they said asked this question in Matthew Chapter 2 and verse two where is he where is the one born what king of the Jews so right from the beginning Jesus was known as king and then you might recall that when Jesus was being crucified that uh there were those round about mocking Jesus as he was on the cross and uh they were mocking him teasing him and crying out look at this character and the one of the cries they're calling out was hail King of the Jews and you'll also remember that uh there's an inscription on the cross above Jesus head which uh pilot had said uh said that it was common for the crime to be written this written in these three languages where it is said that he is Jesus is the king of the Jews you might remember that the crowd said no just say that he said that he was King of the Jews Pilot's response is what I have written I've written um so there are these three statements but there are many many others that we could turn to in the gospels and elsewhere in the in the New Testament which assert this uh this this reality that Jesus is king So Right from his birth through to his death and everywhere else PR prophet prophetically and so many other times Jesus is referred to his King he what we need to understand very clearly is that archaeologists will never find a Coin um with the with the picture of Jesus on it because uh Jesus kingdom is uh Jesus said my kingdom is not of this world so yes Jesus is King but not King in the way that we might in an Earthly way understand him as being a king of uh king of a country so when Jesus is when we're talking about Jesus as king we're talking about him as being a king in the in the spiritual realm and uh for us who are spiritual being it's important that we acknowledge him as our King all these other things but to also say that Jesus is King now in this passage these first um 29 or 30 verses that we have read There are three three scenes as it were um that we can look at this section breaks up into three areas so versus 1 to six6 is about the crowd so I just read a little bit about that and then there's this second section where it talks about Jesus as king about how he's functioning is King with his disciples and then there's this other section about about King Herod and what he was like in verses 14- 29 I want to look at these in these three sections look at all three but I want her to leave King Jesus to last so look at the crowd at Herod and then devote most of our time going to have to talk very very quickly uh but try to spend a bit more time when we're talking about King Jesus so when we look at at the crowd in these verse first six verses we um Jesus is teaching in his own area in his own Hometown and everybody is saying who on Earth is this character who does he think he is it's a question of identity and they point out the is what he is saying is is just full of wisdom and what he's doing performing all these Miracles is that he's he's doing Mighty things and so there are these two things that have that are questioned about Jesus the things what he says and secondly what he does time and time again we see in the in the Bible that the test of uh of authenticity of a person is what a person says and what a person does and here the the crowd Jesus uh Jesus uh neighbors everybody else is there erasing these two things about Jesus about what he says and about what he does now I put in there another reference in Matthew Matthew 11 verse 4-6 and what that uh what that reference refers refers to is this is that when John the Baptist is in prison and uh Jesus is out doing all his public Ministry John the Baptist is in prison and he's thinking I wonder whether I have identified Jesus for who he re really is I wonder whether he is truly the Messiah that I've been proclaiming and so John the Baptist sent some of his disciples to to Jesus to ask him that very question Jesus are you really the Messiah the one who John the Baptist our um our teacher is proclaiming and here in this passage um Jesus says to John the deci John the Baptist disciples go back and tell him two things what you're hearing and what you're seeing so these two things are standing out here again about Jesus um go and tell John the Baptist who's in prison who can't see these things so Jesus didn't directly say yes I am but go back and say here are the things that we're hearing these are the things that we're seeing and what we hear and what we see certainly affirms that Jesus is the Messiah or in today's language for the sake of this sermon he is uh he is a king now who is this teacher in on that level but what about the status because they knew this character Jesus um he's a trade um this tells us that he's a carpenter Carpenter's son he's a local we've known him as he's growing up um His Four Brothers half Brothers of course uh because uh Jesus didn't didn't have an Earthly father but but here here are half Brothers of Mary and Joseph there's four of them that are named and also sisters so it's in the plural so we don't know how many we don't know their names here but uh so at least Jesus is is one of seven um or or more probably but uh but who is this man who's he really think that he is we we just see him as as a local and um and so uh so this whole aspect of identity about Jesus in the crowd is being asked who is he's saying these things and doing these wonderful things and yet he's only just the local boy he's only just the local boy that we've known since he's just a little Tacker um cute little fellow whatever and uh and growing up and we read In this passage the response of people to Jesus then the response that we read in verse one of chapter 6 we've got the disciples following Jesus so they f following him just not only physically but following his teaching and everything else but there's this other descriptors here about how people responding many were astonished most were offended by what Jesus had said and many did not believe so that's a crowd so in they're looking at Jesus that's how say well we see him just as a as an ordinary character one of the local Lads of trade and uh but he's doing these things that's how some say by the way about Jesus well he's just a person all these things but so what but then we move on to this other section about Herod we skipping over Jesus we're going to come back to King Jesus bit about King Herod now I'm wondering whether you realize that there are many herods in the Bible so how many herods wory so this title Herod actually refers to a dasty that uh that existed around this time around judea's ruling Judea as this family the word Herod means heroic but they anything but it was a dysfunctional family uh corrupt Gathering Power uh immoral all sorts of things and so here are a pile of herods that are mentioned in the Bible says Herod the Great he's the one who um who tried to kill Jesus you know had all the babies um killed at that time when Jesus was born then there's Herod arala Herod the tetr Herod Herod the king a gripper read about him in Acts 121 and then later on there's a gria the son of Herod AG gria so you see Herod the tetrach is in yellow you know wise in yellow because he's the one we're talking about today so Herod Herod uh Herod gripper uh sorry Herod antias who we are looking at today so just try to picture this about Herod Antipas let me just read it and um if you want to do a family tree of this family just set aside some time and it puts shows like those of Our Lives to shame not that I've ever seen it but what I hear about or anything else like it let me just read this her antias divorc his an Aban wife her name was something U anybody who's thinking of having a baby daughter there's a potential name for you Fus or something like that so he divorced so Herod Antipas divorced his wife the daughter of aritz I four the king of the naans to marry herodias who is for only the wife of his half brother Phillip so you got that picture that clearly so but herius happened to be their niece anyway so she was the niece of both of them married to one uh and uh Herod anass divorced his first wife from a foreign country uh to marry her um the marriage offended his former father-in-law the naban king and so and uh and alienated his subjects by the way aritas IV subsequently invaded and defeated Herod antias um so you're getting some idea of the picture of this uh this Herod family um just that's just a snapshot of just this one character all this sort of thing was going on in all of it but in in comes John the Baptist to confront Herod Antipas and says this um what you're doing is wrong by God's standards by God's word by the way John the Baptist you know you're probably aware well you may or may not be aware that inustrial Baptist pretty small fry but worldwide Baptists are big fry there's more Baptists around the world than most other denominations um and actually there are a lot of Baptist denominations go by the name Baptist which are separate denominations in themselves so I think like in the United States where there's Baptist prolific there's like 30 something last count different denominations who use Word Baptist somewhere in their name um in Australia there's mainly just Baptist like Queens s Baptist we're all under the Baptist Union of Australia or combined like that but you do find periodically and even locally that you'll find an independent Baptist Church as well what I'm saying this is that is that in all of these denominations there's one stream of um of Baptist who actually Trace their Heritage Trace it back and say we begin at John the Baptist that's rubbish um so just to put it politely so there's nothing like that at all so our Baptist denomination the Baptist commence in round about 1610 in in Holland that's another story for another day but uh John the Baptist enters in so what we know about John the Baptist is is that he's a man of God who confronts Herod because of the way that he's living but Herod Antipas had this wife herodias didn't like the idea of John the Baptist having a go at their marriage nagged him and nagged him and then subsequently John was put in prison so King Herod when we come looking at this passage and we're just looking at it very very briefly is this is said King Herod lived a life of chaos confusion and contradiction um his lust led him to disobey God so his lust for his wife so divorcing uh his wife to so he could marry divorce elsewhere and so on and the idea that um that that the daughter coming in his stepdaughter who is also his niece's daughter coming in and doing this erotic dance as well led him to disobey God and then he made this foolish promise to salomi his wife but here was this contradiction is that he acknowledge John the Baptist as a godly man with a Godly message of truth what he says and who he is um what he says and what he does is that he's acknowledges this and yet he has had this this contradiction in his life I'm hearing John the Baptist but this is the way that I'm living my life and so he makes this stupid stupid promise and makes it as a ve to his uh to his stepo it says whatever you want up to half the kingdom I'll give you and uh she goes to her mom uh and says what do I ask and he says she says asking for the head of John the Baptist is one way that I can get rid of him out of my life and so Herod is faced with this thing do I do what was right or do I do what was popular in fact you and I periodically are faced with that decision some of us some of you will be faced with those sort of decisions that were or in your neighborhood somewhere where you face with this decision well I do what's popular or I do what is right and uh he did chose not going to do what's right do what's popular um had John the Baptist beheaded but then it resulted in this guilt that he just couldn't get rid of he couldn't get rid of this guilt that was in his life and so when he heard about Jesus he thought for goodness sake this guilt what who Jesus really is is that he's John the Baptist reincarnated he's come back to life to haunt me because of the decision that I made um of course that logic is silly uh about John the Baptist being reincarnated but it just shows that the presence of a Godly person the presence of the Lord Jesus just sense the guilt we try to do away with guilt Herod felt guilty why because he was guilty and so that was what King Herod had to do that was the sort of life that he lived and so this is King Herod and place him beside now King Jesus we're going to have to go very very quickly to get through because I'm this is just introduction n it's more than that let me just say these few things about King Jesus in verses 7 to3 we've already had a look at a few things about him said about his birth King of the Jews where is this King we've read about it earlier on in this chapter about his local identity about the things that he did but now in this spiritual identity in verses 7-13 in 7-3 we have here is King Jesus at work here he is with his disciples and this is how King Jesus operated then and how he still operates today firstly there's this action reflection discipleship process where um in verse S where he uh has his disciples here and uh he sends them out it says calling the 12 Tom he sent them out two by two and gave them authority over evil spirits up until this point by and large of the disciples have just been following him and observing but now they're being sent out and uh and so there's this action reflection model how Jesus discipled people if you look back earlier in chapter 3 verses 13 and 14 it says there that Jesus called his disciples to him that they might be with him and that he might send them out so there's this this being with Jesus this this action and then Jesus sending them out come back and let's reflect I look around the congregation this morning I can see several people he whove had theological education in varying ways varying extents I'm sure every one of you here will agree with this that while the theological education is important and in some places it's necessary it is not the basis for Ministry because the basis for Ministry is always what being with Jesus and as I spend time with Jesus then Jesus sends me out and that's how it is that's a Jesus model of discipleship spend time with me and I will send you out and so um for all of us who are involved in Ministry it's important that we understand that it's not your education it's important God uses that we we need it but what's foundational is the time spent with Jesus and for all of us who uh who belong to Jesus we need to spend time with him and just be aware that from there he will send us out to do do something secondly we know about King Jesus is his authority delegated he gave them authority to do certain things um when Jesus has Authority delegated he only delegates Authority in specific areas for specific tasks and so it's not as though Jesus has given me Authority I can now do whatever I want to um Jesus Authority he gave them them authority to do this in the name of Jes Jesus you are to do this thirdly there's the absence of clutter don't take any all of these things but uh but just go simply say this to myself you know when I left home I left home at the age of 16 and everything that I owned I took in a little suitcase about so big nowadays if I'm to move it's like going to mean a big truckload stuff and I'm thinking you know I'm not as mobile as I was when I first left home at the age of 16 and uh many of you can talk reflect on that as well but I want to say this that it's not just the the absence of clutter physically but let's not let's clear away any baggage that might hinder us in our ministry for Jesus you know as I even this morning as I reading through the uh through Mark's gospel again and again I'm just surprised again and again about the Simplicity of Jesus if you want the kingdom of God then just come as a little baby what about little Noah there's nothing complex about that there's nothing complex about children if you were to receive the kingdom of God receive it like a child live it like a child there's no clutter with children if you want to be great in the kingdom of God then don't be like everybody else who wants to be great there's so much clutter if you want to be whatever just even be a servant or even be a slide just no clut it no baggage just take it simply so there is this this aspect absence of clutter number four acceptance uh the idea of acceptance and adversity realize this is that you won't always be received kindly as God representative then there's the action out they went and then there's the accountability and reflection in verse 30 out they went in the mission of King Jesus under his authority then they came back to Jesus and reported and reflected on that let me just uh say a few things very quickly if I can here's some lessons to learn identity always remains indispensable um somebody recently gave me a book on hermeneutics do you know what hermeneutics is uh hermeneutics in the the Christian senses is how do I understand how do I read the Bible and understand it um hermen unics is a detail thing I've been reading it I'm glad I don't have to study it I'm enjoying the book thoroughly on hermeneutics um I'm learning words reading words that I've never heard of before and having to learn them what does that word mean and it's so Det that when it is when we got to learn about meaning we've got to understand what do we mean by meaning so that's how detail this book is but what I found fascinating in this book is by two different authors two authors is that right at the beginning near the beginning it says this our society has exchanged Truth for relevance has Now talks about relevance rather than truth no longer does it highly regard truth but relevance is what's important nowhere has that been more clear than in our recent election um irrespective of what party and it seems to be all around the place that uh it doesn't matter about truth it's what's relevant um I was talking with somebody several several months ago and saying about you I just want politicians speak the truth and he sort of ridicu me in a sense in a nice sort of way yeah nobody expects politicians to tell the truth well that's a generalized statement because I'm sure I know that there are politicians of all parties who who uh who men and women of Integrity but you get the idea of where it doesn't really matter what truth what what's true here what's matter is that well is this going to get me of AG or is this going to be popular or whatever and so as a society this book is stated and I I agree with this book where it says that no longer do we worry about truth so much as we worry about relevance and what we discover here and what we've read today is this is that the crowd struggled both with truth and relevance what's this man saying but he's only uh just one of us so what's it really matter Herod he knew the truth he saw the truth but he opted for relevance this is what everybody else wants and I I just got to sacrifice truth to do what I have already promised and don't let don't let down my gifts uh my gifts and whatever but King Jesus time and time and time again we read this is that King Jesus is both truth and relevant it's truth relevant back then he is relevant today so we've looked at this passage and that's what the crowd says but let me come back to what the question is really about today this is what others are saying but what do you say what do you say about Jesus do you want to side with the crowd and say well Jesus it's just a man or maybe you want to be a bit like King Herod and say well I'm hearing all of this but it's just not relevant to me or if you come to that point in your life where you said Jesus is really my king and my savior you I don't know what sort of a life you're living at the moment it might just be going along with the crowd it might actually be a life of confusion and contradiction a life which is absolutely messed up like the Herod family but even if your life's like that I've got good news for you today King Jesus is able to help you thought through that and sort it out and bring you through to be his son his daughter today so that's a real question folk where do I sit in all of this heard what others are saying and even today tomorrow at work at school wherever I am the neighbors family I'll hear all sorts of things about Jesus over time but the real question is what do you say about Jesus and what are you doing about him let's pray you need some time to reflect even after the service you can just sit where you are and just do some reflecting and if you want to do that with somebody anybody up the front who's been up the front today be more than happy to spend some time with you reflecting and talking and praying with you speaking more about who Jesus really is today we honor you as our King as our Lord and our savior. Amen.