Oct 23 2016 - Mark 2-3 - The Dark Force of Bad Religion - by Mike Marette

Lord, thank You for the chance to worship You and be in Your presence – You are with us. This deep love You have for us in our circumstance and context and situation – nothing can take it away – we can rest in it and be grateful for that. Help us to hear what You would have to say in Your word – that we have needs and You have a message for us – help us to hear the voice of God – what an awesome thing – to hear the voice of God. Amen.

Cindy and I want to thank all of you for your generosity and support. We are grateful for each of you – it was encouraging and humbling.
We are in Mark – going through stories in Mark – so there is not a lot of time between now and advent. Jeff filled in last week – two weeks ago, I mentioned that Mark’s introduction – An introduction to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Christ is not Jesus’ last name – but Christ means Messiah – a specific person anointed by God to liberate Israel from the oppression of her enemy. The people of Israel expected a military and political leader to liberate them from the oppression of Rome. All of their lives, they felt that this leader like David who drove the Philistines out – would drive the Romans out. In every way, though, Jesus accomplished this work of the Messiah – a spiritual liberator, not political – who liberated His people from spiritual oppression. This runs through the entire gospel of Mark. There is the confrontation between Jesus and Satan and his demons. We also see that Satan is not the only dark force of evil that Jesus confronts.
Eph. 6:12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Jesus confronts the political forces of his day, the religious authorities, the cultures, and the institutions of His day.
The devil is the god of this world. The Bible says that over and over. Yes, God is the Creator and Ruler of all – but at this time – Satan has authority – he told Jesus – I have authority to give you all the kingdoms of the world if you would worship me. As a result of this – there is this power of evil – and Satan himself is engaged in that.
Our struggle is not against flesh and blood – not individuals – not politicians or those running for office – but behind the structures of this world, there is Satan working through all of that.
Reviving Old Scratch By Richard Beck– Old Scratch is an Old English Term for the devil – When the scripture says, “Against the rulers and authorities” this is focused on the physical, structural, human authorities – and later talks about the evil forces – “If you are struggling to get your head around that notion – let me share two metaphors that might help: think of an ant colony – no single ant has a blueprint of the colony in its head. We observe order and pattern, than once established has causal effects on the ants. A pattern emerges that exerts a downward force upon its parts – but this casual force cannot be located in or reduced to any of the parts being affected. If you could ask the ants, who is in charge here? they would be stumped. No single ant is the Wizard of Oz running the show behind a curtain. Instead, the wizard is everywhere, an unseen force at work in every microscopic interaction between the ants, organizing and directing their behavior. And the Wizard of Oz is much older than the ants. As the lives of ants begin and end, the pattern organizing them persists, outliving the individual ants. The ants die, but the Wizard lives on.”
Satan and his power of evil is kind of like the Wizard of Oz – this unseen thing working through this world to work evil. Jesus came to overcome that and to destroy that. Jesus does battle in every sphere with that.
One practical way we see this is in things like social media and the Internet. Social media is a neutral thing – but you can see evil working through it. It creates a culture of people who say things they should not against people they should love. You see it spilling over everywhere in our world.
What is becoming of us? This is always the way it has been! Now it comes through our televisions and computers. And we as Christians need to recognize it for what it is – not that we don’t do social media, but not the way everyone else does it.
My son said – I can’t wait for the election to end so I can start liking my friends again.
I am a blog guy – and it is just as bad there. So my help for you – “Does stating my opinion enhance my witness to honor Christ and adorn Him?”
Jesus’ Confrontation with Religious Power – the Dark Force of Bad Religion
Mark 2 – this comes in the context of the call of Matthew – the tax collector.
16 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?” 17 And hearing this, Jesus *said to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Some call these Pharisees ‘scribes’ – they were sincere, Bible believing people. We think of Pharisees as miserable and evil. But everyone who lived then - would have said – WOW – they are so devout. They memorize the Bible and try to live it to a T. But what is scary – they became a force for darkness. That should stir us and challenge our hearts. The way they did that is seen right here – their attitude toward sinners and tax collectors. They categorized people. What bad religion does – is oppresses people with shame and guilt. We have all experienced some bad religion in our lives. Shame and guilt – categorizing and excluding.
Jeff explained last week – the lepers having to shout ‘Unclean’ – and many others who were unclean and you weren’t to be with those people – tax collectors and sinners were filthy people and Jesus had dinner with them!
Three aspects of bad religion
1) Focused and centered on what we are to NOT do.
There was a lot of DON’Ts – don’t go to movies, dance, listen to rock music – those are from the past – I was asking my son – what are the don’ts of today? The problem today is there may be no don’ts!
Preventative religion – Israel had been conquered because of their sin – so to prevent them from doing bad things – they had preventative religion. You don’t dance or listen to rock music because you will do drugs and get pregnant.
Bad religion of don’ts – God becomes an inspector. What did you do (wrong) today? That is some peoples’ view of God. Do you view God that way? That is how I used to view Him. God inspecting to see what we did wrong.
What is sadder – when God’s people pick this up – they become inspectors – the ones who start inspecting others. And you know – we have been around – or have been – those people! It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict the world of sin – not ours. And when you make it your job – it says that you are not trusting the Holy Spirit to do His job. That is massive controlism – I have to control God!
The language Jesus uses – compared to the Pharisees – not those who are healthy – but the sick – the same people that the Pharisees called unclean and sinners – Jesus said – they are sick – they are broken – they are wounded in need of healing. Sure, people are sinners. They know that. And as God’s people – we are to see them as sick and broken and wounded. Jesus saw all of them as people created in the image of God.
Sue mentioned last night – she has learned to see people whom God loves. And there is no one who doesn’t fit into that category.
John 3:16 – God so loved ‘some people’…? No. The world. Everyone. All living souls.
Philip Yancy – the supreme religious challenge is to see God’s image in the one who is not in our image.
That should wake us up.
One commentator – Jesus has a magnetic power to draw people who normally would have nothing to do with religion.
Jesus receives and that is what we want for our church – what our church should be – should have a magnetic power – we as people should have this power to draw people who would have nothing to do with things of faith. Jesus received and welcomed sinners and tax collectors on the front end. He does not categorize them as sinners – but calls them friends. And treats them as friends – and is accused of being their friends – then – on the front end – Come in, all of you! And on the back end – does the work of a physician and heals them. Once he welcomes them and receives them – he heals them.
Doctors enter the place of contagion. It is their job. If a person has a contagious disease, they are told to not go to work or school – lest they infect everyone. They are to go to a hospital.
Bad religion says – don’t come here if you are sick
Christ followers are physicians. The church is a hospital. The place where really sick people come. Instead of being infected by their sickness – Jesus infected people with GRACE and compassion. He lived and practiced absurd grace and we should do the same
2) Bad religion of not doing enough
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.”
You are not reading your Bible enough, witnessing enough, etc. – and when we have this as our view of religion – our view of God is that He is never satisfied. Some of you had parents who were never satisfied. Maybe you have experienced that. I have talked to a lot of people like that. I fear that I did that to my kids – but that was not the case in my upbringing. There are people who are dealing with this their whole lives. Then they believe that about God. We can’t love someone if we believe they are never satisfied with us.
Being a follower of Jesus – new wine and old wineskins – being a follower of Jesus is so radical and different than being religious that they should never be combined.
3)
Mark 2:23 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. 24 The Pharisees were saying to Him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 And He *said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry; 26 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?” 27 Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
3) Bad religion uses religious and moral conviction to shame and guilt others. It says – it is my job to convict you of your sins.
I heard someone explain it this way – it is like the Pharisees are hiding in the fields – and pop up with their Bibles in hand – AHA!
Like in Jurassic Park – where they had to run through the grass – getting picked off by the velociraptors.
People are running through the fields – and we are bashing them with our convictions. That is not to say that we shouldn’t hold convictions.
However – Matthew adds in these stories – Go and learn this – I desire compassion and mercy.
When they come quoting the Bible – you tithe and follow the bible, but you have missed the most important part of the Bible.
The key to understanding scripture is compassion and mercy.
When we talked about the Great Commandment – love God with your heart, soul, and mind – you don’t understand it – and here is why – Love your neighbor as yourself. It is easy to say the Shema – but it is hard to love your neighbor.
Let’s skip to the end.
Mark 3: 1 He entered again into a synagogue; and a man was there whose hand was withered. 2 They were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. 3 He *said to the man with the withered hand, “Get up and come forward!” 4 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. 5 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. 6 The Pharisees went out and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.
Wouldn’t you hate to be the one who had the hard heart? There is only one answer – DO GOOD! Heal the man!
Bad religion just wants us to follow rules – Christ followers do good.
Jesus startled people with love and grace.
As you read the stories – People are startled by His love and grace. It is shocking – the way He lives.
The question we need to ask ourselves – do we do that? I challenge you to startle someone with grace. Shock someone you work with – with grace – so that they are completely taken aback by it.
Let’s pray...