Romans 13 and November 6

As election day looms ever larger here in the US, i think there are two equal and opposite errors we are at risk of falling into. As we view this election through our Christian glasses, we are tempted in two ways to either put too little, or too much emphasis on what happens on November 6th. Romans 13:1-7 is the simply, Christlike, Spirit inspired, Pauline antidote to both of these ills.

It Does Matter Who Wins. Jesus Is On The Throne
Like most error, this is dressed up with just enough truth to make it palatable. Yes and amen, Jesus was, is and will be on the throne. Though all the world run against Him, He will not be overthrown. Good news my friends, good news! But not responsibility absolving news. Jesus is on the throne, i won't look both ways before i cross the street. Jesus is on the throne, i won't fill my car up before my long journey. Jesus is on the throne, i won't tell my wife i love her. It's a nonsense isn't it? Because Jesus is on the throne we are motivated to live as responsible citizens, using our rights and privileges as we can. Because Jesus is on the throne we can vote, fully confident, and joyfully so, knowing that His hand is in and behind everything we do. Romans 13:2 tells us that God appoints authority, and if we resist authority, we resist Him. Don't resist God, Jesus is on the throne, pray and vote!

If [my preferred candidate] doesn't win God's not going to bless us
If option one put too little stock in elections, option two puts too much. If option one had a wrong view of God's sovereignty, so does number two. This election represents a quandary on many levels, not least politically and morally. Politically because, even though we might believe that the incumbent has been a disaster in almost every category, is the opponent any better? If the President is Blair, his challenger is IDS and William Hague. The Republicans are almost exactly where the Tories were ten years ago. And morally. It's pretty obvious that one candidate's policies are more driven by what we find in the Bible than the other, neither do anything to hide their point of view, we must be very careful about attributing a Biblical worldview to a Mormon. Whoever wins, 'he is God's servant for your good.' (verse 4)

I can say these things as someone who can't vote. Even though I undergo taxation with no representation, seriously America, someone should do something about this injustice! I can say these things as an outsider on the inside. Someone who loves the southeastern United States, without forgetting the dangers of living in the Bible belt.

How do we approach November 6th? Confidently, joyfully, hopefully and prayerfully. Knowing that whatever happens, God's Kingdom is advancing with the preaching of the Gospel. And hey, even if your guys don't win, at least those dreadful campaign ads will be off your TV!

Like a Mustard Seed

'Who're Kansas State? The Wildcats?'

'Oh what happened to New England...did they get a safety?'

Both of these statements were uttered by my wife last weekend, and both of them were exactly right. The athletics mascot for Kansas State University is the wildcat, and New England were awarded a safety (the closest thing in American Football to an own goal) in their weekend win over the New York Jets.

How did Rachel know those things? We don't follow Kansas State, they're hardly ever on TV, and we've never been to Manhattan, Kansas, where the school is located. She just knew who they were. The Patriots/Jets game was on in the background in a restaurant, and i've never gone over the finer points of the some of the NFL's more obscure rules with her. She just knew it's hard to get to 16 without a two point play in there somewhere.

I asked Rachel how that happened, and she said after a while things just sink in. And i suppose they do. We still have some ground to cover i suspect. She's probably a bit shaky on the genesis of the Wycome/Colchester rivalry, and might have some trouble in picking out Dave Carroll in a crowd, but after three years of marriage, we're getting there.

Jesus says this is what the Kingdom of God is like. Mark 4 represents a shift in Jesus ministry. No longer teaching plainly in the synagogues, but parabolically in the countryside. This is judgement on those who see but don't perceive and hear but don't understand. Suddenly, for those on the outside, everything is in a parable. Why is this rebel rabbi giving farming advice, and poor farming advice at that? Why isn't he condemning Rome and setting up in Jerusalem? Everything in a parable.

He tells us that the Kingdom of God, and in particular our growth in it is like a mustard seed. The smallest of the seeds producing a plant out of all proportion to it's size. It starts small, but when it's grown it's the largest of all the plants. Just like the Kingdom. Who would have thought that this ragtag bunch of men from the wrong part of the country would change the world? And yet they did. Who would think that 10,20,30 minutes alone in the Bible each day would change our hearts? And yet is does. This is the Gospel way isn't it? From small and insignificant comes the big and glorious.

We should read the Bible persistently and confidently, knowing that by it we're being changed. As quickly as we like? Probably not. But Christian growth isn't downloadable. It comes slowly, first the blade, then the ear,  then the full grain. But come it does. Isn't that encouraging? Just because we don't see something doesn't mean it's not there. Not in the Kingdom anyway.

Martin Luther knew it, he went and preached and then came home to his friends, trusting in the work of the Word. Isaiah knew it, and told us that the Word would not return void. We need to know it too, and keep those mustard seeds being planted in our hearts.

The Rebel Loving Lord

In Luke 24 Jesus explains to two of His disciples how the whole Old Testament is about Him. I like to think that He spent a lot of time on that walk to Emmaus talking about Isaiah. Isaiah is the Gospel. In sixty-six chapters the prophet unfolds holiness, judgement, sacrifice and grace, almost as explicitly as anyone in the New Testament does. Isaiah 30 is a great example of this.

If we read verses 19-33, who do we meet? We meet the Lord who teaches, and restores and fights for His people. He teaches them when to turn right and when to turn left, He restores them like a beautiful garden, and He fights for them and overcomes their enemies, earthly and cosmic, forever. I love the mixture of intimacy and fierceness in this passage. The intimacy of the one who whispers 'right' or 'left' in our ears, the gentleness of the one who plants and waters and gives growth, and the fierceness of the one whose arm will be seen in furious anger.

This would be an astonishing passage if it were addressed to a covenant keeping people. To a people who observed Passover  didn't trade on the Sabbath  didn't worship bits of wood or indulge in whatever sinful fancy came their way. This sort of God would be a remarkably gracious God if He was teaching and nourishing and fighting for a people who loved Him and honoured Him. How much more should our minds be blown and our hearts be warmed then, that this God is offering all this to a people with their back turned to Him.

Go back a page, and look at 30:1-17. What's happening? The stubborn children of Israel, under attack from Assyria have gone to Egypt for help. Chapters 28-31 contain some of Isaiah's most passionate preaching. He implores his listeners to trust in the Lord, not in chariots, to hope in the One who brought them out of Egypt, not in Egypt. But they don't listen. They rush to Egypt, they take treasure, they give themselves totally to Egypt, totally to what their flesh can see. And it's a disaster.

Sennacherib marches on through Judah, burning up town after town. Only the miraculous intervention of the Lord Himself stops them razing Jerusalem. And this happens because Hezekiah finally sees sense, and finally repents.

Verse 18 is the hinge on which this great chapter turns.The Lord waits to be gracious. He knows repentance is coming, and Isaiah promises his listeners that it will be received. In fact the Lord loves to show mercy to sinners, He loves to display His grace, the apex of His glory. He doesn't wait passively, He's not sitting around anxiously hoping that Hezekiah will lead His people in repentance, but He will wait until the right time to show Himself mighty, and gracious, and glorious.

In Mark 2:17 Jesus tells us that He came not to call the righteous, but sinners. Sinners like Judah in Isaiah's time. Sinners who worship idols and turn to Egypt. Are you a sinner? Do you feel like your rebellion has taken you far from the grace of God? Great! That's the one qualification for entry to the Kingdom! Only repent, and the Lord will teach you, in this life and eternally. The Lord will nourish you, and you'll enter paradise, the Lord will fight for you, and finally overcome the enemies that Jesus disarmed on the cross.

Let your mind be blown, and let you heart be warmed by this God, the rebel loving Lord.

Every Morning: War

True for me, true for John Piper, probably true, to a greater or lesser extent, for you:



Every Morning There’s War in the Piper Household from Desiring God on Vimeo.

Twelve Ordinary Men

I'm enjoying taking a long look at Jesus as i aim to preach through Mark's Gospel verse by verse with my teen group. We started slowly, but as Mark picks up the pace, so have we. Last week we were in Mark 3:7-35 and i was struck by how Mark weaves his narratives around his themes.

Mark's Gospel is written to answer Jesus' question to Peter in chapter 8. 'Who do you say I am?' Mark's Gospel drives towards the cross in a car marked 'kingdom,' and 'eucatastrophe.' How does Mark work out those themes in a narration as apparently straight forward as the calling of the twelve Apostles?

First of all, why twelve? John Macarthur sees this as judgement on Israel. The twelve tribes have been replaced by twelve men. As Jesus has taken refuge outside of the city because of the plot to kill Him, and expanded His ministry twelve-fold, so he tells Israel that He's moving on and starting again. It's these twelve, minus Judas, plus Mattias who have their names in precious stone around the Heavenly city. These men who have been directly appointed by God incarnate to carry on His mission. Not the Pharisees, not even Jesus' family, but these twelve men. The old has gone, the new has come. We new new wine, here are our new skins.

Jesus' family appears in Mark 3 as well. They come to take Him home in verse 21, thinking that He was out of His mind. Which is a fair assumption, given what He was doing. And then again in verse 31, asking for His attention to be on them. A perfectly legitimate demand in that culture. What is Jesus response? He tells His listeners that a new thing is happening, that the way into the Kingdom of God is now through faith and nothing else.

Who were these twelve men? Some of them we know fairly well. Simon Peter, James, John, Matthew and of course Judas. Some vanish from the pages of Scripture as soon as we hear their names. But this is a close group, this is a group where your name may not be your name. There's Simon the rock, James the short guy, the sons of thunder, Simon the zealot, who might have killed Matthew if they'd met under other circumstances. There's Thomas, the twin who doubted, there's Nathanael Bartholomew, and Thaddeus, which apparently means 'mamas boy.' And as always, as a constant and terrible reminder, is Judas.

Not noblemen, fishermen, farmers, people from the fringes of society. Not the intellectual elite, but Galileans. And Jesus says, 'such shall my Kingdom be.' Not for the people you might expect, but for those i call. Not for those who look good on the outside but for those who are changed on the inside. Out with the old, and in with the new.

It's easy to think that Jesus turned the world upside down, but He actually turned it the right way up. Mark uses something as potentially mundane as the calling of the Apostles to help us see this.

Loving Your College Town (by one who doesn't go)

It's nine years since i packed by bags and headed off to the University of Reading for the first time. In those nine years, basically everything about my life has changed, but there has been one constant. I've lived in college towns. Three as a student, two more working with students in Guildford and Reading, and now four in Greenville, home of East Carolina University.

There are disadvantages to living in a college town when you don't go to that college. A large percentage of the population get's younger that you every year. The roads are a nightmare. Some days it feels like there are people everywhere! But the positives far outweigh the negatives. So how can we love our college towns when we don't go to college?

In Greenville at least, maybe a third of the businesses would not be here if it wasn't for ECU. We have a huge bookstore and a number of national chain restaurants that wouldn't be here if thirty thousand students didn't show up every autumn. Now that's not the most important thing, and more independent places to eat might be nice, and yes, downtown's a dump. But those negatives are far outweighed.

Living in a college town presents a unique opportunity for ministry. In the football season 50,000 people (myself included) show up every other week to watch the ECU Pirates play. That's a great chance for churches to meet people and share the Gospel, and many do. College towns have a vitality, an ambiance that others lack. There are simply more young people around, and therefore more young people to reach. Churches in college towns have a unique opportunity and privilege. Tomorrows leaders are on our doorstep, how can we best reach them, and make sure that tomorrow's shapers of culture are shaped by the Gospel? Universities are mission fields and churches need to pray for them as such. Pray for students to be saved and added to the local church, pray for campus ministries to be Gospel centred and well attended, pray that the Gospel is advancing in your local university, just like you would for the rest of your town.

Yes, there are disadvantages to living in a college town when you don't go. But the opportunities far outweigh them. As we pray for our local schools, let's be thankful for these opportunities, and grab them with both hands.

The Christian Life is a Delighted Life

Concluding my script for a recent message on 2 Timothy 2:3-8

One of my historical heroes is Jonathan Edwards, the great New England preacher of the 18th century. Edwards was not only and incredible preacher, but also a very quotable author. He once said that we should do everything we can in this life to obtain as much joy, as much delight, as possible in the next. Look at verse 6 with me.

What was life like for farmers in the first century? It was tough. Long hours, hard work, little visible reward most of the time. That sounds like the Christian life sometimes doesn’t it? We pray, and nothing seems to happen. We share the Gospel, and no one gets saved. we invite to church, and no one comes. Just like the farmer looking at his crop, after all the sowing all the watering he sees little growth, he wonders if his hard work is worth it. And so do we sometimes, if we’re honest. There’s so little growth in our family, in our Sunday school class, in ourselves, we wonder why we keep doing it.

Until, harvest time. One day the farmer wakes up and looks out, and his field is full of crops! There is his reward, the harvest that he has labored so long for has come, and he is delighted in it.
The same is true for us, as all three of these word pictures come together. If we are dedicated, if we are directed then we will be delighted, then we will enjoy a spiritual harvest that we can’t even imagine now. One day we’ll see Jesus face to face, and all our struggles will seem worth it in this life. Meeting Jesus isn’t something that makes us shrug our shoulders and say ‘it’s ok.’ Meeting Jesus will just about make our hearts explode for joy. In fact, unless we were held up by His grace meeting Jesus would simply overwhelm us. It will be worth it.

But maybe you think it’s different for Paul, you can understand his focus on Heaven given that his life was nearly over. But this truth, this final delight was what had kept Paul faithful throughout his life. In his letter to the Philippians he tells them that it would be better for him to go and be with Jesus, but for their sake, for the sake of his ministry to them, he has to stay. Paul knows that whether he is alive or not, Christ will be glorified. Paul knows that all his dedication in hardship and all his faithful directedness will pay off. And you and I are in exactly the same situation. We have to keep our eyes on the delight. That is our reward. As we suffer hardship, be dedicated because you will be delighted. As we follow direction, no matter how hard or counter cultural it seems, be well directed, because of the delight that will come at the end.
Dedicated like a soldier, directed like an athlete, and delighted like a farmer at harvest time, these are the three Ds of the Christian life.

The Christian Life is a Directed Life

The Christian life is dedicated, and the Christian life is directed.

Look at verse 5 with me. An athlete is in view here. An athlete does not win the prize on offer unless he competes according to the rules. Greek athletes who wanted to take part in the ancient Olympics had to train fro 10 months under supervision to make sure they were up to the task. When they competed, they had to stay in the rules. They had to stay behind the line when they threw, they had to run in their lanes. The same is true for us as we live as Christians. As athletes were directed by the rules of the Olympics, so Christians are directed by God’s Word.

You and I can’t simply make up our faith as we go along, we have to hold it up against the standard of God’s Word. Does this action bring pleasure to God, is that word acceptable to use, what should I do with my time, how should I spend my money? What we watch on TV, what we do at the weekend, how we treat our server at a restaurant. We don’t have freedom in these areas, we simply have to serve Christ according to His Word. We must strive lawfully in our life according to the Scriptures.

Why are we Protestant not Catholic? You need a good reason not to be a Catholic, you need a good reason to choose one church over another, with a different flavour on every corner. Are your decisions directed according to the Word? Is your life directed by the Word of God?

This is the link between verses 4 and 5. The more dedicated we are, the easier we will follow direction, and the more directed we are, the more dedicated we will become. Verse 6 tells us that this takes diligence, or hard work, or labour. Again, Paul knows nothing of easy Christianity, and neither should we.

The Christian Life is a Dedicated Life

The following three posts come from a recent sermon on 2 Timothy 2:3-8.

First we see in verses 3 and 4 that the Christian life is a dedicated life. Let’s read those verses together. Paul tells Timothy and us what to expect from being a Christian in verse 3. What word does he use? Hardness! Paul was not seeker sensitive tv evangelist. He didn’t tell Timothy, send me money, touch the screen and all your worries will go away. He tells Timothy that his life will be full of hardship if he’s serious about being a Christian. For Paul it meant a number of things that you and I will probably never suffer. 2 Corinthians 11 talks about his beatings at the hands of the Jews, his shipwrecks, the trouble he faced from his enemies every day, and soon he knew that this hardship would end in death. At this point in Paul’s life he was completely isolated from the outside world, chapter 1:16-17 tell us that Onesiphorus had to search diligently for him when he came to Rome, that, coupled with the fact that later on Paul describes himself the lowest ranked of all Roman prisoners, show us how much hardship Paul was undergoing as he wrote this letter. Timothy was suffering as well. He was living in Ephesus, one of the most sinful and difficult cities in the ancient world, he would have been tempted every day to give up on his faith. He was being attacked from within his church by false teachers and people who said he was too young to lead them.

You and I will probably never suffer life Paul and Timothy did, either in what we suffer from, or how much they make us suffer, but we face hardship as a Christian nonetheless. Maybe it’s the hardship of looking on helplessly while loved ones are sick, maybe it’s the hardship of seeing someone in your family fall away from the Lord. Maybe it’s the hardship of being the only Christian in your workplace. Whatever it is, sometimes, maybe even most of the time, our faith makes our life more complicated. But Paul tells Timothy, and us, that we have to endure this hardship. Why is that?

We have to endure because we are dedicated to Christ. Look at verse 4. Paul tells us that no soldier is entangled in civilian life. The word entangled is the same word used for a braid in a woman’s hair, and that’s a great picture isn’t it. When a girls hair is braided you can’t really tell where one braid begins and the other ends. Paul says we are not to be this way in our relationship with the world, we’re not to get caught up in it. Paul would have had firsthand experience of this, the solider guarding him never left him to go and sell bread at the market, he was dedicated to his post.

One of the hardest, but most rewarding activities is getting my Grandad to talk about the war. It’s hard because he doesn’t want to talk about it. When the war was over he put his medals in a box and got on with his life. But it’s rewarding to get these stories out of him because they illustrate the dedication that Paul was talking about. None of his stories involve him taking some time off to go shopping when the marines were invading Italy, or enjoying a week at the beach when he was in the northern Atlantic or stopping for pictures when he was preparing to invade Japan. Of course he got some leave to go and see his family, but while he was on duty, nothing stood in the way of his dedication. It was actually worse for his brother, who left home in 1939 and didn’t come back once before the war was over in 1945. Why did he do all this? Paul says, ‘to please him who hath chosen him as a soldier.’

Paul isn’t saying that Christians withdraw from the world and live in a monastery, but that we get our priorities the right way around. We live our lives to please not ourselves, but our saviour who enlisted us in the army. If we’re more interested in making money that please Christ, or sports that pleasing Christ, or celeb gossip than pleasing Christ, or our family or our kids’ grades then pleasing Christ, then our priorities are out of order. Paul said he counted all things as loss for the sake of knowing Christ. All things includes good things. There’s nothing wrong with your family being a top priority, but it must be the top priority. It must be put to one side to serve Christ. We must be dedicated soldiers of Him. A dedicated life is a life of loss. A life where we say no to good things so that we may say yes to better things. A life that is dedicated to Christ as our one passion.

When the World Laughs

Our Christianity has the appearance of being an adjunct or an appendix to the rest of our lives, rather than the main theme and driving force of our existence. We seem to have a real horror of being different. Hence all our attempts and endevours to popularise the church and make it appeal to people. we seem to be trying to tell people that joining a church will not make them so very different after all.

The world expects Christians to be different and looks to him for something different, and therein shows an insight into his life that regular church-goers often miss. The churches organize whist-drives, bazaars, dramas, fetes and that sort of thing so as to attract people. We are becoming about as wily as the devil himself, but we really very bad at it; all our attempts are hopeless failures and the world laughs at us. Now, when the world persecutes the church, she is performing her real mission, but when the world laughs at her, she has lost her soul. And the world today is laughing at the church, laughing at her and her attempts to be nice and to make people feel at home. My friends, if you feel at home in any church without believing in Jesus as your personal saviour then that church is no church at all, but a place of entertainment or a social club. For the truth of Christianity and the preaching of the Gospel should make the church intolerable and uncomfortable to all except those who believe, and even they should go away feeling chastened and humbled.

Martin Lloyd-Jones, March 20th 1927. From a sermon on Hebrews 13:14

As we prepare for Sunday, are we putting more effort into making the truth known in our towns and cities, or into making sure we get a good crowd of people who feel like we are respectable members of their society? The above quote is not to say that guests are unwelcome at church, (obviously!) but that they shouldn't be comfortable, it shouldn't be like going to a coffee shop with their friends. Something of the almighty and eternal must be bought to be bare on their consciences, something of the unique hope in Christ, or we have failed. If communion, or baptism, or church membership or anything that marks a line between church and world teaches us anything, it is that, in the best way possible, there is no real belonging to a church, until you believe, and when you believe, everything changes.

What is Communion all about?

This Sunday evening at Trinity we'll be celebrating Communion together. I was recently challenged to help the young people in our Teen Group understand and appreciate the significance of the Lord's Supper, and why it should be such a joyful, sorrowful, challenging time for us. Wayne Grudem shares seven things that Communion is supposed to teach us of and remind us of:

1) Communion teaches us about the death of Christ. The bread and juice are object lessons that show us the broken body and shed blood of Jesus. This is why when we take part in Communion we are proclaiming the fact that Jesus died for us.

2) Communion teaches us about our participation in the benefits of Christ’s death. When we reach out our hand for the bread and juice, we’re saying that the benefits of Christ’s death are for us.

3) Communion teaches us about spiritual nourishment. Just as food nourishes our body, so communion nourishes our spirit. Spiritual refreshment only comes through Jesus. Remember in John 6 He said that we must eat His flesh and drink His blood? This is part of what He is talking about. Communion helps us to remember and celebrate the fact that Jesus has died for us, and that refreshes us.

4) Communion teaches us about the unity of believers. Paul says in 1 Cor 10:17 that we who share communion together are one body, though we are many. When we come together to celebrate this we remember that Jesus has not only died for me, given benefits for me, and nourished me, but also the person sitting next to me.

5) Communion is Jesus affirming His love for me. Jesus invites you, personally to come to eat and celebrate, because Jesus loves you, personally.

6) Communion is Jesus affirming that all the blessings of salvation are reserved for me. The invitation he gives is also an invitation to enjoy the blessings of salvation. Remember we said we reach out for them because we need them? Well communion reminds us that Jesus gives them to us!

7) Finally, in communion, we affirm our faith in Christ. As we take the bread and juice we’re saying, ‘Jesus, I need you, I need your broken body and shed blood if I am to be saved.’ We remember that our sins were the reason Jesus had to die, and we proclaim that He died willingly for us. Sorrow, joy and thanksgiving are mingled together as we celebrate communion.

JK Rowling and Happy Endings

I've read a couple of reviews of JK Rowling's new book, 'The Casual Vacancy' yesterday (here and here. Some bad language in the second one). Quite apart from the fascinating thought that one of the most recognizable authors of our day can not seem to get away from the Biblical narrative, what seems to unite the two reviews is a problem with the lack of a happy ending.

There's no Harry Potter in Pagford, no one to overcome evil and set the world aright again. Not eucatastrophe, just catastrophe. Just racism and classicism and an ending that 'makes Thomas Hardy look like PG Wodehouse.' Something about a book, or a film, or any story, without a happy ending leaves us wanting more. Something about a story without redemption makes us feel like the story isn't quite finished yet. When the guy doesn't get the girl, somethings wrong. Why is that? Because the reality of the Biblical narrative is written into our hearts. We can't accept an bleak ending, we can't accept things not turning out alright in the end, because it's not true.


I used to tease Rachel because she just likes movies with happy endings, but now i've come to see that not only is she right to like happy endings, but that she's more in touch with reality because of it.

Tolkien says: (the happy ending) denies universal final defeat, and insofar as evangeliom, giving a fleeting glimpse of Joy, joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief...When the sudden 'turn' comes we get a piercing glimpse of joy, and hearts desire, that more a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story, and lets a gleam come through.

Happy endings are true endings. Because Jesus has come, and lived, and died and lived, happy endings are true endings. How will the universe end? Happily ever after. This sounds like hopeless wishful thinking doesn't it? And it is, until we put our hands in His wounds and talk to the eye witnesses. If the resurrection isn't true, we're to be pitied more than all men, but if it is true, we can look forward to the happiest of happy ending.

Happy endings are true endings. Morning Glory was a film that was forgotten almost as soon as it was made, but we liked it. Why? Girl from nowhere gets dream job in city, she's given a tough deadline to make things come together in the face of adversity and...well you get the rest. It was a happy ending, and a true ending. We like happy endings because, as Tolkien said, they touch us somewhere deep, somewhere real, somewhere almost primal. Because they're true. Because in the wedding supper of the lamb, time itself has the happiest of endings.

The King for Losers

In teen church at the moment we're slowly making our way through Mark's Gospel. I'm enjoying Mark's pace and matter-of-fact way of communicating what he knows about Jesus. On Wednesday we were in Mark 1:40-2:17, and we'll see Mark help us to unpack what 'the Kingdom of God is at hand' means, and continue to drive us towards an answer to the question, 'who is Jesus?'

The final incident in this group is found in verses 13-17. Lets read them together. These verses sum up what Mark is telling us about Jesus in this passage. Jesus is back at home, walking by the sea, He sees a tax collector, Levi, who is Matthew who wrote Matthew’s Gospel, and He calls him to follow Him. Just like James and John and Andrew and Peter last week, he does. But what is a tax collector? He was the enemy, he was hated by both the Romans and the Jews, if the leper and the cripple were outcasts because of their disabilities, and the tax collector was an outcast because of his job. But Jesus is no respecter of tradition, or social opinion, or anything like that. He calls him and Levi follows.

And not just Levi, but any number of tax collectors and sinners come and eat with Jesus. Sinners here doesn’t really mean ‘the lowest of the low,’ it just means people who didn’t follow the covenant, people who didn’t wash their hands when they returned from the market for example. But still people low enough on the scale that it annoyed the Pharisees. Why was He with them? For the same reason He touched a leper and didn’t complain when a cripple bust through His roof! Because Jesus came to call the righteous, not sinners.

This is the Kingdom, and it belongs to the broken, the sick, the sinners.

It belongs to those who know they have a problem. It belongs to losers, it belongs to ‘them.’ Kingdom life is admitting you’re a sinner and coming to Jesus to sort it out. Kingdom life is admitting you’re not perfect and letting Jesus change you. Only Jesus can do this. Only Jesus can cleanse a leper and allow Him close to God, only Jesus can heal a cripple and bring Him close to God, only Jesus can deal with our problems as we bring them to Him, and bring the Kingdom of God into our hearts.

The Amazing King

In teen church at the moment we're slowly making our way through Mark's Gospel. I'm enjoying Mark's pace and matter-of-fact way of communicating what he knows about Jesus. Tonight we're in Mark 1:40-2:17, and we'll see Mark help us to unpack what 'the Kingdom of God is at hand' means, and continue to drive us towards an answer to the question, 'who is Jesus?'

But who is Jesus to have this authority? Well, we start finding out some more of His identity in 2:1-12, as He heals a paralytic. Let’s read it together. So picture the scene, Jesus is healing people, and His house is so crowded that no one else can get in. But these four guys have carried their friend on a mat from goodness knows where, so they’re not going to let that happen. So what do they do? They come through the roof. Just imagine being inside this house for a moment. You’re in line waiting to be healed, or maybe you’re just watching, and suddenly dust starts falling on your head, and pieces of straw float down from the ceiling…and sunlight starts coming through, and then, a disabled man is basically landing on your head! It must have been quite the commotion. But Jesus doesn’t let any of that worry Him. Not the fact that these guys have skipped the line, not even the fact that they’ve taken the roof off His house. Jesus says something simple, yet profound, something that starts the fight between the Pharisees and Him that would continue the rest of His ministry.

What does He say? ‘son, your sins are forgiven.’ Who can forgive sins? Well look at verse 7 and hear the thoughts of the Pharisees? No one can forgive sins but God alone! And Jesus knows this, and He knows that He’s claiming to be God! Why does He do this? So that we might know that Jesus has authority on Earth to forgive sins!

Just let that sink in for a moment. Don’t let this become old or familiar to you. Jesus has authority on Earth to forgive sins. The leper could come close to God and be clean because His sins are forgiven by Jesus. The cripple could get up and walk home, His legs healed and His sins forgiven because Jesus has that authority. Jesus, this carpenter turned travelling teacher from the bad part of the country, has authority to forgive sins. Again, just like in chapter one, we see someone, this time the Pharisees, describing Jesus doing something that only God can do! Here comes the Kingdom of God, as sins are forgiven and the crippled walk. This is Heaven breaking out on Earth, and for the first time, we see some don’t like it. Jesus upsets the social and religious order. He doesn’t heal in the Temple, He hasn’t been to Pharisee school…and He claims to be God!

We need to be amazed, like the people watching in verse 12, who were amazed, and glorified God and said ‘we have never seen anything like this before. Does Jesus amaze you?

The King is here

In teen church at the moment we're slowly making our way through Mark's Gospel. I'm enjoying Mark's pace and matter-of-fact way of communicating what he knows about Jesus. Tonight we're in Mark 1:40-2:17, and we'll see Mark help us to unpack what 'the Kingdom of God is at hand' means, and continue to drive us towards an answer to the question, 'who is Jesus?'

In tonight’s passage we see three different encounters Jesus has with people on the fringes of society. People that we might regard as ‘them.’ People on the outside, people who are different to us. The three people that Jesus meets tonight are not the elite of society, in fact they are the sort of people that you would cross the street to avoid. So how would you think Jesus deals with those people? The unpopular, the unclean, the ‘them,’ of society? It’s an interesting question isn’t it? How does God Himself deal with people like that? People who we don’t want to deal with?

While we’re answering those questions, we have to remember the questions that Mark asks and answers all the way through this Gospel. We have to keep asking what all this means in light of the Kingdom of God, what does all this mean for Jesus identity as the Christ, how does this demonstrate that all Heaven is breaking lose? How do these encounters that Jesus has shape our view of Him and our view of people?

There’s lots of questions we have to answer tonight, so let’s get to work, and look at verses 40-45, Jesus cleansing a leper. Being a leper in first century Palestine was about the most miserable life you can imagine. Leprosy was incurable and contagious, and that’s a bad combination. What makes it even worse is that the Jewish leaders of the day had decided the leprosy was the judgement of God against sin. Lepers weren’t allowed to live in a town, they basically had to make a living in the city trash dumps. They had to wear a bell around their neck and call out ‘unclean, unclean,’ when they walked around anywhere. Neither family, nor society nor religion offered them anything. You can understand the desperation of this leper as he approaches Jesus. If you will you can make me clean. Jesus touches him and he is clean. Here comes the Kingdom of God, in the healing of the sick, in bringing Heaven to Earth.

Jesus takes this man’s skin disease. He is clean, and He takes the dirt from this leper. He’ll take it all the way to the cross, and die under it’s weight. But there’s a problem isn’t there? Now Jesus has touched a leper, everyone thinks He is unclean, so He can no longer enter a town openly, but even though He was in desolate places, people still came to Him ‘from every quarter.’ This leper could not approach God. So God came to Him. He was cut off from a relationship with God by His skin disease, you and I are cut off by our heart disease. Mark doesn’t record a lot of Jesus’ preaching, but shows us Jesus in action. Just as the leper is brought close to God by Jesus, so we are. Until Jesus makes us clean, we are all spiritual lepers, none of us can approach God, but now, because of Jesus, we all can. The Kingdom of God is at hand.