You are very kind even to not walk out on crazy man's head. Yes was raised in Northern Ohio and for this weather used to feel warm Seven years in Jackson, Mississippi and ten years in Arkansas has changed my way to him too It is freezing, but we are in mark chapter one verse 14 through 28 And before we read I want you to think about this fact that how you answer questions moves you in a particular direction inevitably this is a fourth week of the semester right and You are here because you answer the question where am I gonna go to college and having chosen Arkansas? It meant you moved away from family and friends that you moved here You have a new set of friends or you're beginning to have a new set you have new expenses and a new life How you answer the question always shapes a new direction? Some of you are asking and you know trying to figure out the question, you know, should I date this person?
Can I date this person would this person date me if I asked them who should I marry well that that that changes your life Should I could are you after night has changed your life It's just always like that and here's the thing there is no more important question for you and I then Why did Jesus come to this earth and how you answer that question? Changes us and puts us in an interaction How will you answer that question the gospel mark people basically answer that question in one of two ways? they either Begin to love him or they begin to hate him they either begin to be drawn to him or they begin to reject him and walk away You can't just ignore Jesus. He doesn't let you Ignore him and so you're either going to begin to love or begin to hate Who he is what he stands for and a part of it is going to be shaped by what you understand?
He came here to do and if you understand he did it for you, and so let me invite you to consider Jesus tonight from March chapter 1 You're getting a verse 14. This is God's word now after Jesus was arrested. Excuse me. John the Baptist was arrested Jesus Came into Galilee reclaiming the gospel of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand Repent and believe in the gospel Passing alongside the sea of Galilee he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon passing a net into the sea where they were fishermen And Jesus said to them follow me and I will make you become fishers of men Immediately they left their nests their deaths and followed him going on a little farther He saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother who were in their boat mending the nets and immediately he called them And they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him And they went into Capernaum and immediately on the Sabbath He entered the synagogue and was teaching and they were astonished at his teaching for he taught them as one who had authority and not as the scribes And immediately there wasn't their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit and he cried out What have you to do with me Jesus and Azar have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are the holy one of God, but Jesus rebuked him saying be silent and come out of him and the unclean spirit convulsing him Crying out with a loud voice came out of him and they were all amazed so that they questioned among themselves saying what is this a new teaching with authority? He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him and at once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding re of Galilee and then this is God's word. What is Mark? Tell us about Jesus three paragraphs three big ideas Get the broad brush strokes He tells you that Jesus is the king and he tells you what his message is in verses 14 and 15 He tells you about his disciples and 16 to 20 and tells you about his power in 21 to 28 So I want you to think about that message what it means to be the disciple and that power tonight in the first place Jesus is the king and as the king he comes to bring a message that's designed to bring you joy And we've been saying this all along, but it bears repeating Jesus says repent and believe the good news and people tend to hear You're wrong you're bad.
You're you're worthless And you got to believe me even though you don't like me and that is not what Jesus is saying here There is bad news, but there's also good news the bad news is that you are so lost God himself had to leave heaven to Confine you but the good news is you are so loved God himself left heaven to come find you and the good news here is Jesus is using a very specific word used It's a combination of two words ongoing meaning news and with a prefix on it that means joyful and it's a word that says News that brings joy. It was a word used back then not in the everyday newspaper kind of way But for example, we have a copy from ancient history of the gospel of Caesar Augustus Okay, what is it saying? It's okay. It's about his birth and his coronation Okay, big news world transforming events in this person Okay, the gospel of Caesar Augustus or or another example of the use of this word is like when Greece was invaded by Persia and Greece won the battle of marathon For which runners were sent From which we get the idea of running a marathon They sent these heralds out these evangelists out these bearers of good news to go to other cities Like the Sparta and announce we fought for you and we won for you and you're free.
You're not slaves. You're free That's gospel. Okay, something has been done in history done for you in history and it changes your status forever It frees you and so Christianity is not like so many other philosophies of religions Which is just about giving you good advice to get a long well in life But it is about bringing you the news of an accomplished effect an accomplished event That was done for you So this is not about do this repentance and believing thing for Jesus to get something good It's about understanding something good has been accomplished for you And repentance effect is the way that you receive the gift The way that you enjoy the benefit So if this is really vital folks the king People tend to think well if Jesus is a king that he came to expect something from me And the point of the Bible is Jesus is a king who came to do something for me And we were talking in a small group just the other day about how it's so easy to get those things flipped Around and even in the language of Christianity in our culture we sometimes do this you'll hear sometimes the presentation of the gospel Jesus died on the cross for you he rose from the dead for you so that you could be forgiven now They'll say surrender all to Jesus and you can have this Okay In other words, it's a way of suddenly not intentionally often but it can get caught up in your heart And all confused when you hear surrender everything for him Give it all give your whole life to Jesus and you can be saved Okay, that's the opposite of the gospel The gospel is Jesus gave his whole life for you so you can be saved Just stand back and believe Just stand back and see the solids of the Lord and embrace it Okay, but look if you are at all like me There are kinds of places in your heart that haven't been fully surrendered to the Lord You know how you know that through of you? You're still saved You still don't love God with all your heartful strength in mind and love your neighbors yourself Every day which means there's parts of your heart which are still under self and are self absorbed Self-rule self-will Okay You need Jesus and Jesus surrounded for you Completely now it is true that believing in Jesus means not changes you and Jesus comes down to live in your heart And like a home that Jesus is building.
He's cleaning it up. He's renovating He's tacking on a room over there and a fireplace over there and a second floor over there to make it bigger and more expansive and more glorious Okay, and you're going to find as you get to know Jesus that he is Savior and Lord And so when he comes to you as the king and says the king of God is here He's me he saved you well if the king of this here is because the king is here Okay, and so it's not just the message that Jesus is Savior But Jesus is the Savior and king and we need all those two things together But but here's the point you and I don't make him Savior. He is that nor do you and I make him Lord He also is already Lord It's not like you get half of Jesus and abreast his saving Kind of work, but you don't get the other half which is his lordship work rather Jesus becomes for you both and over time The influence of his grace to you in salvation and the influence of his reign to you in his lordship Seeps more deeply into your heart and spreads its influence into your relationships Your sexuality the way that you you do school or not The way that you love your roommate or not Okay, and he begins to spread his saving information His grace is all that his kingdom worship So you and I do need to live learn to live under but you and I aren't saved by learning to live under him You and I are saved by Jesus who lived for you and that's good news Embraced That's the first thing then mark tells us about His disciples and Jesus here is presented to us as a king who came to gather a new community to build a new kind of community And and a community building the most unlikely kind of people Okay, so think about it in terms of our world right the prestige Of a country often depends upon the quality competence and excellence of its ambassadors This is why take the best and the brightest to represent america in foreign nations as ambassador Right unless you're a crony who's you know paid two hundred million dollars to get that spot But ordinarily you still have to be a good representative of america So in a world unlike ours say two hundred years ago back to its founding Where you and I couldn't turn on cb said and learn anything about nations around on the other side of the world Ambassadors came and all you ever knew about the nation they came for on was how they spoke With their language and dress and custom and eating habits were right they represented that nation And that's why people were picked to be ambassadors who had the best of manners the best of breasts the best of speech And so you would think wouldn't you that if jesus is the king of the kingdom of god He would come looking for who the best educated wealthiest most powerful most influential most well respected and you would be wrong Who did jesus come and call as his disciples? Fisherman Fisherman who were part of that universally poorly thought of a commercial blue collar Workforce Generally speaking poor and uneducated not not necessarily unintelligent but not well school Because they were going to work Uninfluential.
Oh, yeah, and he also that he also picks text collectors. We all know everybody loves those guys Okay, so why why does jesus come and pick what we might call the lowest in society Why paul tells you the first friend he is this is why he called you to be his disciple Because god chose the foolish things of the world To shame the wise and he chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong And why did he do that? So none of us get boast so nobody could say nobody could say god needed me I'm indispensable to the kingdom. You can say however god wanted me god loved me god was so gracious For me he called me into his kingdom, but you may not boast except to boast in the lord You cannot boast in yourself and I know you're a bunch of warriors here you like marines you like the elite of r uf Because you're sitting on a cold page But then we might also say but you were foolish about to come to an outdoor.
Are you up with that? kind of being like this so Listen don't make you highlight yourself as the point What's jesus up to In gathering this new community of the very unlikely Um, what's you up to? Well way back in genesis one to three tells us you and I were built to live in a perfect world Right where we're relationships were perfect with god and with everybody and everybody was supposed to get along We're all supposed to enjoy that community But we chose to be our own king and our own lord and all of our relationships unraveled at that point and life became then about me versus you Us against them let's gather over here and prove our superiority by not letting them gather over here with us right? Yeah, let's make them gather over there.
Brilliant. Okay, so jesus comes along that's the history of the world right tribalism Nationalism wars racism you aren't like me and i'm not like you and so we're not gonna love one another Jesus came to build a new kind of community that exists not For its own sake to confirm the fitness of its own membership But that would exist for him and for the sake of others follow me jesus says and i'll make you a person who includes others in the community But the church and r uf these are not clubs Looking for the prettiest with the best family and we're not checking the number of facebook friends You have to find out if you're worthy to be in this organization The church is the one institution in all the world that invites everyone to belong Andy which everyone shares this common belief what i don't belong here But jesus have mercy on me So jesus has changed your mind about the kind of community i'm gathering and then live in light of that So i would say to you do you have eyes to people to see people the way that jesus sees them Or do you write people off? Do you expect only certain types of people to be interested in him? Are you only interested in certain types of people?
Do you expect jesus to be only interested in certain types of people? Nobody is beyond his reach Nobody is beyond His ability to love them and rescue them and make them do his own to call them as a disciple As he did for you if you have been called And so jesus gathers as the king gathers the most unlikely people for this new community and last thing i want you to think about Have you looked at his message and his disciples as his power Okay, he's going to change everything people understand about the world here Um as he exercises his power To fight and conquer evil In verses 21 to 28 you have the story Okay, crazy to our ears of an exorcism of an unclean spirit As jesus confronts the spiritual forces of evil Now let's say this Every culture Every culture is characterized by stories and legends of a true king who will come back and defeat evil right There's a king who's going to come slay the dragon Or who will kiss us and wake us up out of the sleep of death or who will free us from the tower prison Okay, this is um But the true prince will put everything right this is all the fantasy literature that disneys made billions from right jesus is that true king jones is in first john three the reason the son of god appeared was to destroy The worst of the devil to defeat our enemy And so what's interesting in this passage it says is that um nothing about the content of what jesus taught doesn't tell you what his message was Um, it doesn't tell you how eloquently he spoke It just says that they were amazed at his authority and that does not mean they were amazed at his eloquence or intelligence It means they were amazed at his power When he preached even the exorcism itself is amazing. There's no magic wand. There's no ritual or incantation jesus just simply says be silent Come out and the spirits obey him now we should say this skeptics will say well This was easy for those people to believe two thousand years ago.
I mean, you know the spirit world They confused diseases and demons. So that's why they believe in this kind of thing. You know, this isn't this isn't um demonic spirit This is just absolute epilepsy or something like that the problem with believing that is if you go to mark the very next text is about Disease which jesus heals they do have distinguished healing from illness and what's in this text um, but still some people would say yeah, but you know unclean spirits a Invasive presence in this world bent on evil. I mean that sounds kind of like you know believing in aliens and science fiction stuff, right?
I mean, can I really believe in a devil a prince of darkness and Organizer an instigator of worldwide evil your culture saying there's no way we can believe in that the problem is How do we deny it in the face of the last 100 years of human slaughtering one another tribal warfare mass murder genocide serial rapists date rapists child abuse sexual and economic slavery That goes on every day in america the the slave trade of america How do you deny that there's evil in the world but there's wrong in the world and that it's pervasive Now in this text, I think it's fair to say that what's going one of them. Let me say this I'm not saying that this spiritual force of evil creates um evil In those who are good. I would argue that that these spirits were amplifying and exasperating The already present evil of the heart that the innate selfishness pride Imassurity fear in the heart kind of like this I think this goes on all the time kind of like in the lord of the rings Closing illustration and then a couple words and we're done remember the story of the lord of the rings right one of the main characters Does just this kind of thing what character is that the ring itself? I think I got this one from Tim Keller to be honest with you The ring he says and I think he's right has a distorting Perverting effect right it takes what's good and breaks it So what's whole turns into shadow So for instance elves turn into orcs kings of man become ring race Smeagle the hobbit becomes golem It takes a trait a dream a vision a hope a desire even good ones and makes them obsessive and excessive for evil purposes So smeagles love for the beauty of the ring turns him into an amazing skeleton of his own Boromiers patriotism and love of his country good things become under the influence of the ring the lust for power and domination Becomes the husk of an old man Frodo in his willingness to serve and accommodate the needs of others becomes Self-indulgent and self-pitying and even at the end refuses his best friend Sam's assistant assistance So he becomes willful and independent this guy who just wanted to serve the community and fellowship Kings who were meant to rule and govern and bring order in peace are devoured by their lust for power and become Vibrous weightless shadows of the men that they were this is what paulking is describing evil twisting perverting distorting the one in its grip Who was destroyed by it?
And here's the deal that danger is in all of us Because you don't have an unclean spirit being living inside you But you know deep in your heart something good has turned in on itself and become what it shouldn't be Love becomes self-absorption The admiration of beauty becomes the lust to possess The desire to be loved becomes the lust to be lost in after Enjoyment becomes addiction Abilities are abused in workaholism So when Jesus demonstrates his determination to deal with spiritual forces of evil to rid from our lives evil by his power and his authority It's good news friends. There is nothing in other words outside of your experience Nothing inside your experience I should say outside of the reign of Jesus. There is no pit Deeper than the power of Christ to find you Corey ten been once said the highest sin And the deepest despair together cannot baffle the power of Jesus And and uh Charles virgin the great Baptist preacher said it this way If you are sitting here in the midst of despair and you think Christ cannot reach You that you're captive to assume that you do not think he can take dominion over Then I tell you that the one who casts out demons heals epileptics and paralytics Instantaneously with a word is here for the healing of your soul So if your experience says to you you are dominated by your lusts Dominated by that which is in you which is not good and you feel powerless. Jesus says I am greater Than any power and I have come to set you free That's what I do for my people have a beautiful and sweet irony the gospel is this isn't it That Jesus came to set us free from evil and he did it not by the exercise of his power in destroying all those who do evil Because then we would be destroyed but he did it by giving himself and willing slavery To bondage to evil doers to be tortured by them To be nailed and enslaved upon a cross To become as it were powerless So that through his powerlessness, he might crush evil under his foot Take out its sting And poison and disarm its authority To rule in your life by his resurrection from the dead over evil Do you know the freedom are you beginning with the taste the influence of the freedom he designed for you?
Have you begun to taste the enjoyment of the community he brought you to? Do you know anything of the joy of the gospel? This is why Jesus came May he have his influence on us this part Jesus we need you we need you far more than we think we do Forgive us in our arrogance for thinking too highly of ourselves And we do Teach us to need you to know you to delight in you to find you to be our all in all in your name I pray Amen