Jesus chooses His disciples, Mark 3: 7-19

Mark 3:7-12  Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and [also] from Judea, and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him.  And He told His disciples that a boat should stand ready for Him because of the crowd, so that they would not crowd Him;  for He had healed many, with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him.  Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout, "You are the Son of God!"  And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was.

The crowds came to Jesus near the Sea of Galilee from distant places. Yet it seems that the crowds were attracted to Jesus more because of His miraculous works than because of His message about the kingdom of God. They were interested in receiving healing, being miraculously fed food, and seeing Him cast out demons. And so they were coming out to Him, following Him, thronging around him so much that it seemed they would almost trample Him.

It is great that people are attracted to Jesus. But if their focus is on what physical blessings He can do for them instead of His spiritual blessings, they will not follow Him for long.  And there are a lot of people today that are attracted to Jesus because of what they think He might do or what they want Him to do for them.  If they think He gives them what they want, healing or prosperity or whatever, then they might continue to follow Him as long as the crisis continues.  But if in time they find that He doesn’t give them what they want, then they lose interest.

The demons seemed to be giving Jesus honor as well.  They cried out when they saw Him, “You are the Son of God.”  But Jesus didn’t want them announcing who He was.  Jesus didn’t want lip service, especially from demons. And the demons weren’t going to worship Him.  They just wanted to expose Him in a way that they hoped would protect themselves.

So Jesus withdrew from the crowds again, this time going to the mountain to be alone in preparation for calling the 12 disciples.  Luke tells us in his parallel account that Jesus spent the night in prayer.  He was always in communion with the Father. And prior to this choosing of His disciples, Jesus prioritizes that necessity of communion with the Father, and He prays all night until dawn.

Mark relates this event starting in vs 13, saying, “ And He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted, and they came to Him. And He appointed twelve, so that they would be with Him and that He [could] send them out to preach,  and to have authority to cast out the demons.  And He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter),  and James, the [son] of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, "Sons of Thunder");  and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot;  and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.”

The common tradition of the church, particularly the Catholic Church, has been to portray the disciples as extraordinary men. But in fact, they were the complete opposite.  They were what you might call common men, ordinary working class men, without any religious  or educational, or social credentials whatsoever. In fact their backgrounds were very diverse.  Today the word diverse is a code word for the liberal agenda.  And I don’t want to imply any sense of that to these men.  I would actually point out that from the standpoint of contemporary diversity, Jesus deliberately seems to choose all men, and all men of one race.  So we can dispense with any sense of Jesus trying to be politically correct or fit  the social template of diversity that we see in politics and corporate policies and in advertising today.

So we know for sure that four of them were fishermen, possibly as many as seven, but four for sure.  But other than that, there was little that they had in common with each other. There really is no reason to assemble these men together, no reason for them to come together, live together, work together, and minister together apart from the purposes of God.

They were very ordinary men in every way. Not one of them is renowned for scholarship; not one of them is renowned for his speaking ability; none of them was a theologian. They were outsiders  from the standpoint of the religious establishment of Jesus’ day. They didn’t have any particular natural talents. They don’t appear to have been intellectual giants. They had not studied under a renowned Rabbi.  They did not have seminary degrees.

They also came from different political backgrounds. One of them was a Zealot,  part of a radical group determined to overthrow the Romans. Another one was a tax collector. He would have been on the opposite end of the spectrum. He was someone who bought a tax franchise from the Romans and then collected taxes from the Jewish people to give to the Roman government. He was considered a traitor to the Jews. So those two would have absolutely nothing in common.

Other than the four fishemen, the rest may have been tradesmen, craftsmen, or farmers of some kind. They were virtually all from Galilee, with the exception of Judas, who was Judean.

They were personally selected out of the many disciples that followed Jesus. And Jesus identified who they were. They didn’t apply for the job; He chose them for the job. He called them – He knew them as only God could know them. He knew all their faults long before He chose them. He knew their weaknesses; He knew their failures; He even knew Judas would betray Him. He chose Judas anyway, gave him all the same privileges and blessings He gave the others.

So you’ve got these 12 nondescript, ordinary, band of eclectic men brought together by Christ. And from a human perspective, the whole program of the kingdom of God to take the gospel to the world depends upon them.  There’s no Plan B; there’s no second string in case these guys don’t work out. They’re going to be responsible for relating divine revelation. They and their associates are going to write the New Testament.  According to Ephesians 2:20, they’re going to be the foundation of the Church.  And it all depends on 12 men whose most notable characteristic is that they were just plain, ordinary men.  The most noteworthy thing about them was that they were known to have been with Jesus.

So Mark says, “And He appointed the Twelve: Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter; and James, the son of Zebedee, and John, the brother of James – to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means sons of thunder; and Andrew; and Philip; and Bartholomew; and Matthew; and Thomas; and James the son of Alphaeus; and Thaddaeus; and Simon the Zealot; and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.”

Just a reading of the names gives us some inkling about the group; there are a number of nicknames included in the list. Nicknames sometimes indicates a certain characteristic of a person. And by the way this is only one of four lists of names of the disicples/apostles.  Matthew, Mark, Luke and Acts all have lists.  There are a couple of times when the names are changed up a little bit so that sometimes they were called by their given name, and sometimes they were called by their nickname. It was Jesus who nicknamed Simon as Peter. It was Jesus who nicknamed James and John as Boanerges. And then  some of them had picked up other nicknames. Thaddaeus isn’t really a name; it is a nickname.

But one important question is why were there 12 of them? Well, the short answer is that it parallels the 12 tribes of Israel. In the old covenant the promises were made to the 12 tribes and they all had an inheritance.  But this is the new covenant, and Jesus is showing that there is a new paradigm in the way that the new covenant will operate. The old system of the old covenant will be done away with.  In Revelation it tells us that in the New Jerusalem, there are 12 foundation stones, and each stone is engraved with the name of one of the 12 apostles.  What that signifies is that the old dispensation to the Jews has been replaced by a new dispensation of grace administered by the apostles to all the nations of the world.  And their doctrine and preaching will be the means by which the church is built.

So in a sense, Jesus is repudiating the existing religious system of the Jews and showing that the kingdom of God will be given to all the nations through the administration of the apostles. The choosing and commissioning of the Twelve was a judgment on Israel’s corrupt leaders. If you look at Luke 22:28 for just a moment, I think it confirms that. Jesus says to the disciples, “You stood with Me in my trials; you didn’t forsake Me. And just as My Father granted Me a kingdom, I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table, in My kingdom and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”

With the coming of the Messiah comes a new covenant. With the coming of a new covenant comes a new leadership. The Pharisees, the scribes, the Sadducees, the rabbis, the priests, they were false teachers, all of them. They misrepresented the Old Testament; they misinterpreted the law,  they corrupted the people. And Jesus said of them “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.”  So they are replaced. And they are replaced by an unlikely group of 12 guys, none of whom comes out of the religious world. Not one was a rabbi. Not one was a scribe. Not one was a theologian. Not one was an academic, a priest, a Pharisee, a Sadducee – not one – which is to demonstrate Jesus’s repudiation of  the religious leadership of the Jews.

But these were the men that Jesus chose. Verse 13, “He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted.” Choosing who would become His apostles is a sovereign work of God just like salvation. These men would live with Jesus for the three years of His life. They were there for His ministry. They were there for His death, even though they deserted Him when it happened. They were there to see Him risen from the dead. They were firsthand eyewitnesses of His life, death and resurrection. And they were the first generation of  preachers who preached the gospel of salvation by grace, through faith in Christ, based on His work on the cross and His resurrection. And so Jesus calls them to be with  Him.

And by the way,  I have said it before that the problem with the church today is not a lack of ministers, nor a lack of churches, but I believe the problem is that a majority of pastors in the pulpits of churches today are not called by the Lord to be a pastor.  They were sent by a denomination, they might have been called by a pastor search committee, but they are not called by Christ.  And if you haven’t been called by the Lord to preach the gospel, then you will not be gifted to preach the gospel.  Gifted, not in the sense of talented, but in the sense of empowered by the Holy Spirit.

So these men were called by Christ to be His inner circle of disciples who would after His death become His apostles. And the key to understanding what His intentions were comes in verse 14. He appointed 12 for two reasons: so they would be with Him, and that He could send them out to preach. Now, if they were going to be sent out to preach, first they had to be with Him to learn from Him. So, it’s a simple, two-fold purpose: they had to be with Him so He could send them. They weren’t going to be able to be sent effectively if they hadn’t been with Him and been trained effectively. They started out as learners. “Disciple” is the word in the Greek, mathētēs, which means learner or student. And they will eventually become apostles, in the Greek, apostellō. Apostellō means sent ones, messengers.

So what is it they are called  to do? Verse 14, “He appointed twelve so they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach.” Send them out to preach. Jesus was a preacher. John the Baptist before Him was a preacher. The prophets were preachers. And now this is going to be the first generation of gospel preachers, new covenant preachers. What is a preacher? Someone who proclaims. And their message is to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom of God.

1Cor. 1:21 says, “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not [come to] know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” Preaching the truth of the gospel is God’s plan to bring people to salvation. It looks like foolishness to the world, but it’s the wisdom of God in operation.  I was telling someone the other day that 30 years ago you typically had a couple of Christian radio stations in the region of the county you lived in.  And the format for those stations was that they had preachers who preached messages all day long.  But for the most part those types of Christian radio stations don’t exist anymore.  Now you have radio stations that just play music all day long.  It’s hard to find preaching on Christian radio anymore.  And I’m afraid that has contributed to the lack of sound biblical doctrine of a lot of Christians today.

So if the disciples were to preach the gospel of the kingdom of God, then it’s necessary that God gave confirmation that they are speaking the truth of the gospel.  So in vs 15 we read, Verse 15, “He gave them authority to cast out the demons.”  Irregardless of what you might see on television, normal humans do not have authority over the demonic world. 

Matthew 10:1, paralleling this, says that when Jesus sent them out, He gave them authority over disease, to heal all manner of diseases and over demons. They were given divine power to minister in the physical world and the spiritual world.

So, the Lord gave the Twelve power over disease, power over demons, that wherever they went to preach, the new covenant gospel of salvation by faith in Christ, when they spoke, people would know it was the truth of God because of the confirming evidence of supernatural power. 2 Corinthians 12:12  says “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.”  I believe scripture indicates that this was specific to the apostles, during the apostolic age as they laid the foundation of the church and church doctrine.  Once their specific ministry was done, I believe the scriptures indicate that those gifts faded away when they died.

Now I think that’s an important point to emphasize. You have people running around today who claim to be able to heal people. Who claim to be able to cast out demons. You see them all the time on television and youtube. But one thing that always marks these men, the common denominator is they all have bad theology. They all misinterpret the Bible; they all misrepresent the Gospel. So the question is why would God authenticate false teachers? If the Lord were to reinstitute that power for some reason, you can be sure that whoever it is, their theology will be biblical, because God doesn’t authenticate false teachers.

Now finally, I want to look really briefly at each of these men. First Simon. He is always first on every list of the disciples. Jesus gave him a nickname: Peter which means Rock. And the only time Jesus called him Simon was when he was acting like his old self. He was the closest to Christ, the spokesman, the leader, the most notable preacher. He’s the dominant preacher in the first church in Jerusalem.

And then there’s James the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James. These brothers we already met in chapter 1. Jesus called them; they were fishermen. Their father Zebedee is mentioned often, some think that he might have been related to the high priest in some way because John is able to enter the courtyard of the high priest during Jesus’ trial.  But we don’t know for sure.  Their mother is also mentioned as asking Jesus if her boys could sit on His right hand and the left hand when He sits on His throne.  She was the original helicopter mom.

But Jesus gave a nickname to these two also. To them he gave the name Boanerges, which means “Sons of Thunder.” We see perhaps the reason for that nickname when they asked if they could call down fire from heaven to burn up their critics. I feel the same way sometimes.

And then there was Andrew and Philip. Philip is the leader of the second group of four. He’s from Bethsaida. So, He probably knew the four before Him. After him we have Bartholomew. Bartholomew is not really a name. “Bar” is son of, and “Tolmai” is a name. So, he’s the son of Tolmai. His actual name was Nathanael – Nathanael. Nathanael means God has given.

Then there’s Matthew also called Levi. We met him in Mark chapter 2. The tax collector hated and despised by everybody, considered a traitor to the Jews.  Then there’s Thomas. According to John 11:16, he was a twin called Didymus, meaning the twin. He is often referred to in contemporary Christianity as Doubting Thomas because He doubted whether or not Christ had actually risen from the dead.

Then there’s James the son of Alphaeus. We don’t know anything about Alphaeus and  we don’t know anything about James. But he’s always the first name in the final group. His mother is mentioned in Mark 15:40, as someone who follows Christ. There he is called James the Less. Another nickname, maybe it means Little James referring to his stature.

Then there is Thaddeus, but his real name is Judas son of James. “Judas son of James” is his official name in Luke 6:16 and Acts 1:13. He is even referred to in John 14:22 as “Judas not Iscariot.” I’m told Thaddeus means “momma’s boy.” Not exactly what you would want to be named. And then there’s Simon the Zealot. He is called Simon the Cananaean. And some people think that means the Canaanite; it doesn’t. It’s from a Hebrew word which means to be zealous. He was a Zealot, a political activist.

And last but not least, Judas Iscariot who betrayed Him. A Judean, perhaps the one with the most noble heritage. He was the one who was the treasurer of the group, because he loved money.  He betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. That would have been the equivalent of about 120 days of wages.

So what an interesting group. Nobody could have predicted that they would turn the world upside down. They became the recipients of divine revelation. They were the true teachers of sound doctrine, the apostles’ doctrine. They were the foundation of the Church, Ephesians 2:20. They were the early edifiers of the believers. He gave to the Church first apostles, prophets for the work of the ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ. They became exemplary of virtue. The New Testament calls them holy apostles.Their message was confirmed by signs and wonders and mighty deeds. 

And I suppose that the lesson we can take from the calling of the apostles is that the Lord uses imperfect people to perfect His kingdom, He calls the ordinary to do extraordinary things.  He uses people just like you and me, if we are willing to follow Him, to join with Him and learn from Him.  1Cor. 1:25-29 “Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble;  but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong,  and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are,  so that no man may boast before God.”

Lord of the Sabbath, Mark 2:18-3:6

I’m going to try to cover three events today in the ministry of Jesus which spans two chapters in Mark.  That’s maybe an optimistic goal for me to accomplish in the time I have.  But I think all three of these events have a common theme as I hope to show you. And what they have in common is Jesus’ dismissal of ritualistic, ceremonial laws which purport to have their basis  in scripture, that purport to be the proper exercise of religion,  but in fact are man’s additions to the law of God. 

The first event is found starting in chapter 2 vs 18; “John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting; and they came and said to Him, ‘Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but Your disciples do not fast?’ 

It’s not clear from Mark’s gospel who is asking the question here. Matthew’s gospel though indicates that it is the disciples of John who come to ask Him.  Whoever asked it is not really the point though, rather the question is why are they fasting?  The law of God only prescribed one fast per year, and that is found in Leviticus 16, which is a fast on the Day of Atonement.  So the law didn’t require fasting other than that day.  But over time, fasting began to be practiced on other occasions and for other purposes. By the time of Jesus’ ministry, the Pharisees boasted of the fact that they fasted twice a week.

In regards to the disciples of John fasting, we are not really sure why they are doing so. It may  be that they had adopted the fasting practices of the Pharisees, or they might have been fasting in conjunction with their prayers about John the Baptist, who was imprisoned.  But the bottom line is that we are not told why. One thing we do know, the Pharisees fasted to be seen of men.  They put dust on their faces and clothes to draw attention to the fact that they were fasting, because they wanted to be seen as holy and righteous people.

It just so happens that we are in the middle of the season of Lent.  And it is customary for some churches to practice that.  One of the things they traditionally do is mark their forehead with ashes in the sign of a cross so that people will know that they are fasting.  Of course the Bible speaks nothing about Lent or 40 days of fasting. They somehow associate Lent with the period of testing that Jesus went through in the wilderness where He fasted for 40 days.  But the scripture never tells us that we are to do that.  

However, what Jesus does teach about fasting in the Sermon on the Mount is in direct opposition to the way most churches are practicing it.  Jesus said in Matt. 6:16-18  "Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites [do,] for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face  so that your fasting will not be noticed by men, but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees [what is done] in secret will reward you.”

So I am not opposed to fasting if it is done as Jesus spoke of it.  But I am not interested in practicing Lent which I think has as it’s only basis the tradition of the Roman Catholic Church.  And I for one do not want to follow their lead in regards to fasting or practically any of their religious traditions.

But notice Jesus’ answer to their question. Vs 19 And Jesus said to them, "While the bridegroom is with them, the attendants of the bridegroom cannot fast, can they? So long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.”  

Jesus compares His presence with His followers as being like a wedding feast.  Again and again the scriptures compare the relationship between Jehovah and His people, or Christ and His church with that of the relationship between a bridegroom and bride.  The idea that the friends of the bridegroom would be fasting while the the wedding feast was in progress is simply incongruous. In the same way, would it not be ill-fitting  if the disciples of the Lord were to be mourning while He is with them, performing miracles of deliverance and granting salvation?  This is a time for joy, for celebration, not for mourning.

But, Jesus says, the time will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. When Jesus died on the cross, when He was taken away from them, then in those days fasting would be appropriate. But as Jesus said in John 16:16, that would be but a little while. 

The comfort that we can find in this saying is that for those who are saved, there is not a sense of sadness, of sorrow that we are to embrace, but a sense of joy.  There should be no greater joy than knowing that your sins have been forgiven, that you have been betrothed to Christ, and that you are going to inherit the kingdom of heaven.  And furthermore, the greatest joy should be in knowing that the Spirit of Christ is in you, dwelling with you, and He will never leave you.  So joy and not sorrow should be the hallmark of our faith.

Now to further illustrate His point, Jesus uses two metaphors.  In the first, He says in vs 21 "No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; otherwise the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear results.”  Pretty clear picture, but what does it mean? Well, the second metaphor means the same thing. Vs 22 "No one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost and the skins [as well;] but [one puts] new wine into fresh wineskins.”

The meaning is this; that the new life of salvation which Jesus was bringing was out of line with joyless fasts. Old wineskins cannot contain the new still fermenting wine without bursting.  It must be put into a new wineskin.  The old covenant of rigid ceremonial laws and rituals cannot contain the new wine of salvation.  This new wine must be in new wineskins, or not trying to patch over the old with a new piece of cloth, but a whole new cloth.  So all things have become new, as we are told in Heb 10:19-20 “Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus,  by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh; let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith.”

Now let’s look at the second event, in which Christ deals with another ritual, another law that had been added by the Pharisees. Vs 23 “And it happened that He was passing through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples began to make their way along while picking the heads [of grain.]  The Pharisees were saying to Him, ‘Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?’”

Mark’s not necessarily following the historical events as they happened in chronological order here, but he is showing a connection in subject matter.  And as I said, this is another case of the Pharisees adding to the law, and observing and practicing something that seemed religious, but was in fact in opposition to the truth.  Commentators tell us that the Pharisees had taken the law of the Sabbath and broken it down into 39 principle works, and then subdivided them into six minor categories under each of the 39.  All of that to determine what could and couldn’t be done on the Sabbath. And they had extrapolated it out to ridiculous extremes.

And what they were saying about the disciples is that they were reaping, by pulling off a head of grain as they walked through the grain fields. And  they were accusing Jesus of breaking the Sabbath because He was allowing or condoning what His disciples were doing. Of course the original law said nothing against plucking the grain with your hands.  That was permissible.  But the law did prohibit putting in a sickle to harvest grain on the Sabbath.

But Jesus wants to address the root of the question concerning the Sabbath, not just argue about some branch off the main trunk. So in vs25  He said to them, "Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry;  how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar [the] high priest, and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for [anyone] to eat except the priests, and he also gave it to those who were with him?”

At first glance that seems that what Jesus said has nothing to do with the Sabbath, does it?  But the application of the law is what Jesus is addressing.   What Jesus is saying is that the law regarding the shewbread was able to be put aside in case of need.  David and his men had nothing to eat.  They were starving and suffering from the effects of a long, forced fast.  But the shewbread was supposed to be eaten only by the priests.  But Jesus indicates that the need of David and his men was more important than the restrictions upon the shewbread.

So in the same way, was not Christ, who is the antitype of King David, able to set aside a regulation due to the hunger of His disciples and which was actually a totally man made regulation misapplied to the Sabbath law?

And to that point of Jesus being the fulfillment of the promise that the Messiah would be the Son of David, He says in vs 27 "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”  Not the Sabbath was made first but man was created first. The Sabbath was instituted to be a blessing for man, to keep him healthy both physically and spiritually. So the Sabbath wasn’t made to be a curse, but a blessing.

Of course, Jesus is the One who ordered the Sabbath.  He was the Creator of all things, according to John 1, and without Him was not anything made that was made.  The Creator of the Sabbath is without question the Lord of the Sabbath.  The sovereign ruler of the world, is rule of the day that He designated as a time of rest.  

But in that response, we are reminded of Hebrews 4:9-10 which says, “So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.  For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.”  The Lord of the Sabbath came to give us a rest that is greater than the rest that was portrayed in the Sabbath.  He came to give us a rest from our works, a salvation that is by grace through faith and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast. That is the rest from our labors, the rest from the condemnation of the law, that Hebrews is speaking of.  And I believe Jesus is speaking of that same Sabbath rest that comes through Him.  Thus He is Lord of the Sabbath. He is the Son of David, the Messiah, who ushers in a new way into the holy place.

One more event which is related to the law is found in chapter 3. Once again, it has to do with the Sabbath.  Ch. 3:1-2 “He entered again into a synagogue; and a man was there whose hand was withered.  They were watching Him [to see] if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him.”  The reference to  “they” which Mark speaks of is the Pharisees.  They are always hanging around, looking for something that they could criticize Jesus for, something to condemn Him for.

And it’s the Sabbath day, and Jesus and His disciples follow the practice of the Jews and worship God in a local synagogue. The practice was that when a visiting Rabbi was in attendance, He was given the opportunity to teach.  We can assume that Jesus was teaching, and the Pharisees were watching and listening to see what they could find to accuse Him over.

And Mark says there was a man there with a withered hand.  That might be an indication that something had happened to the man’s hand, maybe mangled in some accident. I think the cynical side of me can’t help but suspect that the Pharisees had brought the man themselves to see if they could get Jesus to break their Sabbath restrictions. But that’s supposition on my part.

In Matthew’s account, he says that the Pharisees asked Jesus, “is it right to heal on the Sabbath?”  They had actually taken the Sabbath laws so far as to say that you could not even heal a person on the Sabbath unless they were in immediate danger of losing their life.  I remember reading some time ago about the Orthodox Jews in Israel debating whether or not it was lawful to call 911 if someone’s house was burning.  I think I remember the story correctly.  I’m not sure what they decided. But how ludicrous is that kind of reasoning?  And Mark indicates that it got Jesus angry as well.  

So in vs 3 He said to the man with the withered hand, "Get up and come forward!" And He said to them, "Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to kill?" But they kept silent.  After looking around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, He said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored.

When Jesus asks them is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to kill, He is saying that because He knows their hearts.  Their heart is not compassionate towards this man.  And they are actually planning harm against Christ, even to the point of killing Him, as we will see in the next verse.

I don’t like to always jump back and forth between Matthew or Luke’s accounts in order to fill in the blanks, but I really like something that Jesus said in Matthew’s account that Mark did not mention.  Matt 12:11-12 And He said to them, "What man is there among you who has a sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will he not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable then is a man than a sheep! So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

Jesus is saying that the Pharisee whose sheep had fallen into a pit would be more concerned about his profit in the sheep than a restriction of the Sabbath.  Sheep were their income, and so they were going to make sure that nothing interfered in that.  But Jesus says that a man is much more valuable than a sheep.  He uses the word valuable because that is the metric of their concern.  A sheep is valuable to them, it’s the source of their income.  But a man who is disabled, he means nothing to them.

Jesus could have told the man to come back tomorrow and skirted the whole issue.  But He knows that they will not be satisfied until they find something to accuse Him of.  Furthermore, He is not going to acquiesce to their false doctrine.  And so it says that He looks at them with anger, grieved at the hardness of their heart.  I think their hypocrisy is what angers him. That they care for a sheep because they see it as valuable.  But they don’t value a human life. And He is grieved because their heart is hardened.  As I have said before, I think they already had enough evidence to know that Jesus was the Messiah.  But they would not have this man rule over them, not even if He was the Son of God.  They wanted a Messiah of their own making, and Jesus was not what they wanted.

Well, the cure was instantaneous and complete.  The man’s hand was as good as new. I’m sure the man was overcome with joy that he had been healed. But the effect it had on the Pharisees was not one of joy, but only served to make them hate Him even more.  Vs 6 “The Pharisees went out and immediately [began] conspiring with the Herodians against Him, [as to] how they might destroy Him.”

The fact that a handicapped man was cured of his infirmity did not affect them at all. They cared not for this man, and cared even less for the Healer. Jesus had not only healed the man in opposition to their law, but He had also discredited them in public.  He had exposed their hypocrisy and their hatred.

And so Mark says they immediately went out and started scheming how they might destroy Him, and in that scheming they chose to partner with the Herodians who were known for their worldliness and sacrilege.  What an odd coalition.  It reminds me of the adage, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The Herodians were lovers of the political status quo, of the political party of Herod, and they saw a threat in Jesus and His followers and His talk of the kingdom of God. They wanted to perpetuate the kingdom of the Herods.  And the Pharisees were the party of the religious status quo, and they saw a threat in Jesus as overthrowing their authority and privilege and religious power.  And so they conspire together as to how they might catch Jesus in something that they can use to put Him to death.

Isn’t that ironic?  Jesus came to usher in a new way to be reconciled to God, to be forgiven of your sins, to be set free from the captivity of sin, given a new life, a life of joy and freedom.  And the Pharisees and Herodians wanted to keep the people under a system of bondage and despair, a system that could never give them rest, but only condemnation.

Thanks be to God that though it seemed in the short run that the enemies of Christ won when they crucified Jesus and put Him to open shame, yet on the third day He arose from the dead, testifying that God was satisfied with His sacrifice, and because He lives, we can also live by faith in Him, and receive everlasting life, fullness of joy,  and an inheritance in the kingdom of heaven. I trust that by faith in what He accomplished, you know the joy of your salvation, the freedom of new life in Christ,  and have committed to follow Jesus as Lord of the Sabbath.

God’s favor towards sinners, Mark 2:14-17

Last week we looked at the story of Jesus healing the paralytic man who was let down through the roof.  I refer to it that way, because that is the way most people would remember it.  But as I said last week, the most important thing about that event was not that the man was healed from his paralysis. But that Jesus forgave him of his sins.

The main purpose for which Jesus came was to preach the gospel of salvation.  To bring forgiveness to sinners and give them new life.  If you remember, I spoke of Jesus in that situation as being the Great Physician, who saw the heart of the man who was brought to Him, and He diagnosed the man’s condition, his greatest need, and that was his need for salvation. He was under the condemnation of death, and Jesus was able to forgive Him his sins and give him new life. 

 That is what Jesus came to do.  As the angels had proclaimed at HIs birth, “He will save His people from their sins.” His purpose in coming into the world was not to eradicate suffering and sickness.  But to provide the means by which men might be forgiven and give them new life.

Today we are going to look at another event in the life of Christ. I titled this message, God’s favor towards sinners. I don’t mean God’s approval of sinners, but His divine favor, or grace towards sinners. We tend to think that God’s favor is gained by our merit.  But sinners have no merit, realize that they have no merit, but yet are the recipient of divine favor.

So in this event, we see Jesus doing exactly that, showing God’s favor towards someone who was considered to be the vilest of sinners.  He calls Matthew, also known as Levi, the tax collector to be His follower.  Vs13 And He went out again by the seashore; and all the people were coming to Him, and He was teaching them.  As He passed by, He saw Levi the [son] of Alphaeus sitting in the tax booth, and He said to him, "Follow Me!" And he got up and followed Him.

Mark is known for his brief style of writing, of really only telling the highlights of the story.  But what must be understood is that there were a lot of things that had to have happened before and  during that short exchange.  First of all, the text implies that Matthew, or Levi, had heard Jesus teaching and preaching about the kingdom of God.  Perhaps Matthew’s tax booth was situated near the shore of he Sea of Galilee where he could tax the trade that went on there from the ships that were plying goods over the sea to their shores. And Jesus was preaching on the beach within earshot of Levi’s tax booth.

Tax collectors were people who had purchased something like a franchise from the Roman government whereby they taxed commerce and merchandise and travel and practically anything that moved, on behalf of the Roman government.  The Romans used these tax collectors to collect the taxes for them on various commerce, and allowed them to charge a percentage above the tax which was their fee.  The problem was that these tax collectors charged exorbitant fees far above what would be considered appropriate.  And so they were particularly despised. Not only were they despised in general, those who were Jews who obtained such a position were considered traitors to their own countrymen.  And so they were considered the worst of sinners, even unredeemable.  No one wanted to even speak to them.  They were looked down upon as as the scum of society.

But I think we can assume that Levi had heard Jesus preaching.  He had been convicted of his sin, not only because of his sin, of taking advantage of people, of participating in highway robbery, but also because he knew he was an outcast of Jewish society, and thus felt that there was no hope for him.  The Jewish religion as it was practiced by the Pharisees in particular offered only condemnation, no possibility of salvation.  And so we can imagine Levi standing on the outskirts of the crowd clustered around Jesus as He preached on the beach, being convicted of his sin, knowing that he needs salvation, but dejectedly going back to his tax booth after Jesus finished preaching because he believed that he was outside of God’s favor.

But wonder of wonders, Jesus passed by his booth, and didn’t just walk past without looking at him as everyone else would normally do, but instead Jesus deliberately fixed His gaze directly upon him and said “Follow me.”  Jesus knew Levi’s heart.  Jesus knew Levi’s desire for forgiveness.

We can get a read on Levi’s heart by his response to Jesus.  He immediately got up and followed Jesus.  Luke adds the insightful detail in his gospel which is that “he forsook all” and followed Him.  He walked away from his way of life.  He showed true repentance by making a complete about face, forsaking everything, all the money, all the revenue that he would make, leaving his tax franchise business which probably had cost him a lot of money. In fact, he showed even more commitment to be a disciple than Peter and Andrew and James and John who could conceivably go back to fishing now and then.  But once he walked away from his franchise, he would never be able to go back.

True repentance is forsaking sin and going in the opposite direction. It’s like the verse we talked about in Galatians 5 yesterday morning at the prayer breakfast.  Walking in the Spirit is diametrically opposed to walking in the flesh.  Walking in the Spirit is walking in righteousness, whereas walking in the flesh is walking in sin. To turn and walk after the Lord was to forsake the past, forsake sin, and follow after righteousness. 

The other thing that must be understood as implied in the story is that Levi was forgiven. Inherent in the call of  Jesus  to be His disciple, is that Jesus forgives Him and cleanses Him from sin. Jesus said to him, “follow Me.”  Turn away from your life of sin and follow Me. Then as Jesus speaks to the scribes in vs 17, He says, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”  Again, we look at Luke’s gospel and read the added words, “but sinners to repentance.”

The call of God is to repent, to come to Jesus, to turn from sin and look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our salvation.  Jesus in John 16:8, speaking of the work of the Spirit, says,  "And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.”  And so we can be sure that the Spirit of God convicted Levi of his sin during Jesus’ message, and then at the call of Christ to follow Him, Levi repents and believes, forsaking all to follow Jesus.

Now we have further evidence of Levi’s repentance because he invites Jesus to his house that evening for a celebratory feast, and invites all his former associates in the tax industry to join him and meet Jesus.  Vs15 “And it happened that He was reclining [at the table] in his house, and many tax collectors and sinners were dining with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many of them, and they were following Him.”

Couple of things to notice there.  First, when you surrender your life to Jesus, you invite Him to be the Lord of all your life. You invite Him to be Lord of your home, Lord of your career, Lord of your social life.  Jesus changes all of you, not just forgives you of your sins so you can continue to live in your sin. But He now has first place in every area of your life.

Secondly, when Jesus forgives you and cleanses you and gives you new life, that joy of being reconciled to God, of being set free from sin and death, results in you wanting others to know the same Jesus.  It’s not some secret between you and God that no one is aware of, that your coworkers never see any evidence of, your family doesn’t see any difference.  No, not only are people aware that you’ve been saved, you want to share the good news with everyone.

I remember when I got right with the Lord almost 40 years ago when I was living in California.  The next day I drove into work with a friend of mine to pick up my check. On the way there, I was explaining to my friend what had happened to me.  He could tell something had happened and it turns out that a few months later he came to Christ at least in part, he said, because he saw the change that occurred in me.  

But when we came to the restaurant where we worked, all the waiters were sitting upstairs doing their sidewalk before the restaurant opened, and a couple of them started making comments about me, that they thought I was high.  And I remember telling them that I wasn’t high, that I had gotten right with God.   I must have had a joy on my face, a peace about my appearance that they thought could only have meant I was stoned. But God had given me a peace and a joy that surpassed anything alcohol or pot could ever do, and it was a testimony to them that I had been changed.

So Matthew has had this conversion through Jesus and He invites all his friends to have dinner with Jesus. And you know what happened? There was a revival in Matthew’s house. Mark says that there were many tax collectors and sinners there dining with Jesus.  And of course, Jesus didn’t miss any opportunity to preach the gospel.  And Mark says there were many of them and they were following Him.  They were forsaking their sin to follow Jesus.   

Listen, the hallmark of a revival is repentance.  It’s not an emotional outpouring.  The hallmark or revival is not some ecstatic experience by the attendees.  It’s conviction of sin and repentance.  When Jonathan Edwards preached his famous sermon “Sinners in the hands of an angry God” during the greatest revival this country has ever seen, what’s known as the Great Awakening, the hallmark of that revival was people groaning under the burden of their sin, crying out for forgiveness, repenting and weeping over their sin, and calling out “what must we do to be saved?”

I think in Mark’s understated narrative, it is more than appropriate to believe that the tax collectors and sinners in attendance that night were convicted of their sin, and they believed that Jesus offered forgiveness of their sins, by His authority as the Son of God.  And so many of them followed Him, presumably leaving their professions of sin, whether it be as tax collectors or prostitutes, or any other sins that defined the term sinners as understood by the Jews.

But notice the criticism of the scribes, the religious leaders of the Jews.  Vs16 When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that He was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they said to His disciples, "Why is He eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners?”

The Pharisees were kind of like the game “whack a mole.” They were always popping up. They were always hanging around, but not to learn, not to believe, but to find fault with Jesus. I think they had already hardened their hearts against the possibility that Jesus was the Messiah.  He wasn’t what they were looking for.  In fact, they weren’t looking for a savior at all. They wanted a military conqueror who would restore the political and geographical dominance of Israel and who would sit on the throne of David, and who would elevate them to positions of religious authority in the kingdom. That’s what kind of Messiah they were looking for. Not a Savior from their sin.  They were satisfied with their own sense of rightness.  They were self righteous.  They weren’t sinners like these wretched tax collectors. They were convinced of their own inherent goodness, but in fact they were rotten to the core.

So they are hanging around, watching critically everything Jesus does, and they are perhaps afraid to confront Jesus directly, so they go to his disciples and try to intimidate them.  They say "Why is He eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners?”

Eating a meal together, especially in that culture, symbolized fellowship, friendship, acceptance.  So they wouldn’t eat with anyone that they considered a sinner. In fact, they would avoid such people at all costs. They would go out of their way to avoid contact with them.  And they are indignant because Jesus is eating with sinners. But true to form, they use that self righteous indignation to try to undermine the faith of Jesus’ disciples.

Well, Jesus knows what they are saying, without having to actually hear them say it. He knows the hearts of man, because God sees the heart.  And His response is to answer their objections and at the same time render a condemnation upon their self righteousness.  He first uses an analogy to answer them. Vs.17 And hearing [this,] Jesus said to them, "[It is] not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.”

It’s a very simple analogy. Doctors minister to sick people. It was that simple. Jesus is the Great Physician, He is the spiritual doctor, and He needs to go to the people who need to be healed. If the Pharisees can see how sick with sin these people are - and they readily admit that, they know they are sinners, they condemn them as sinners - doesn’t it make sense that when the Savior comes, He goes to the sinners?

In Luke 19:10 Jesus said, "For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”  And Paul says in 1Tim. 1:15 “It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost [of all.]”

So His first answer is from an analogy, His second answer is from authority, end of verse 17. “I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners.” And Luke 5:32 adds, “but sinners to repentance.” To call, that is to call into the Kingdom, to call to forgiveness, to call to salvation.

The truth of salvation that must be accepted and believed in order to be saved, is that you are a sinner.  That all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  And when you recognize you are a sinner, and confess your sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  But forgiveness doesn’t happen until you recognize you are a sinner.  And as Jesus said to the Pharisees earlier in this passage in regards to the paralytic, “the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.”  He is able to forgive sins because He is God incarnate, and He would pay the penalty for sin through His death on the cross.

But the condemnation of the scribes of the Pharisees was that they didn’t consider themselves sinners in the least.  They thought they were righteous. They kept the law as they had defined it. They earned their self righteousness by their works which they did to be seen of men.  But their hearts were corrupt and desperately wicked.

Later on, in Matt. 23 it is recorded that Jesus exposed and condemned them for their sinfulness by saying  "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness."

But back to our story, Jesus said, I didn’t come to call the righteous, those that refuse to confess their sinfulness, that think that their self righteousness will be enough to enter the kingdom of God. They will have to stand before the judgement seat of Christ on the basis of their own merits.  But Psalm 14 says there is none righteous, no not one.  There is none that does good, there is none that seeks after God. And Isaiah 64:6 says, “All of our righteousness is as filthy rags.” These religious leaders should have known that. They should have been convicted of their sin and desperate for healing.  But they would not have this Man rule over them.

So it is today. This church, the believing body of Jesus Christ is not made up of good people, it’s made up of bad people. It’s not made up of people who think they’re righteous, it’s made up of people who know they are sinners. It’s not made up of the people who have worked to attain a certain acceptance with God, it’s made up of people who know they could never attain acceptance before God on the basis of their works.

We are sinners saved by the divine favor of God.  Given the righteousness of Jesus Christ in exchange for our sins, which He paid the penalty for by HIs death on the cross that we might be forgiven. Yes, Jesus has the authority to forgive sin, but the only sin He can forgive is the sin of those who know their sinfulness, confess it, and put their trust in Him as their Lord and Savior.

I trust that you have confessed your sin and repented of your sin and believed in Him that He has the authority to forgive your sins and give you new life, and having believed, you will follow Him, walk with Him, and abide in Him.