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Mark Sermon

Seeing the fruit of authentic faith – Mark 7:1-23

[1] Now when the Pharisees gathered to him, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, [2] they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. [3] (For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly,[a] holding to the tradition of the elders, [4] and when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash.[b] And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.[c]) [5] And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” [6] And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written,

“‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; [7] in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ [8] You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.”

[9] And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! [10] For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ [11] But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God)[d]— [12] then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, [13] thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”
[14] And he called the people to him again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand: [15] There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him.”[e] [16], [17] And when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable.

[18] And he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, [19] since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?”[f] (Thus he declared all foods clean.) [20] And he said, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. [21] For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, [22] coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. [23] All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

Growing up I used to dread the second last day of VBS. On the penultimate day, we would have an altar call where the speaker would invite all the students to come up in front of everyone and say “I rededicate my life to Jesus and accept Him as my personal Savior.” Now there are a lot of things that are theologically wrong about that statement but I didn’t know all that when I was young. Because I was a very shy kid, coming and standing in front of a thousand children was scary for me! There were others who were confident and eloquent and they would speak for 5-10 minutes.

There were some others who were super confident, who would brag about the number of gang wars they’ve been part of and it wasn’t a testimony at all but just an opportunity to talk about how “cool” their life was. But not me! I totally found myself at a very uncomfortable place but I didn’t want to be the only person who didn’t go up and say the magic words so I did it year after year.

Once I remember asking my oldest sister, “Why do we need to go up and say that statement every year when we know that our life is going to remain the same? We are going to return back to our same life and do the same things once we are back home”.

Even though I was a kid and an unbeliever, somehow I still knew that this didn’t make sense. If we know that we are faking it, wouldn’t an all-knowing God see through this? Would God find superficial religion acceptable? Surely not. We keep hearing about sincere, real faith. What does authentic faith look like? I think there are 3 things we can learn from this passage.

1. We must Renounce superficial religion (v1-5)

[1] Now when the Pharisees gathered to him, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, [2] they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. [3 ](For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly,[a] holding to the tradition of the elders, [4] and when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash.[b] And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.[c]) [5] And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?”

Jesus at this point has been performing ground breaking and stunning miracles! He miraculously fed over 10,000 people. He walks on water and all the people who even touch the fringe of his garment are healed. This by itself should be something that people should take note of. He’s not an ordinary man. He’s sent by God. Instead you find the Pharisees and scribes who come from Jerusalem trying to find out some fault in Jesus and his disciples. They accuse them of eating with hands that are defiled.

Now let me clear it out at the start. Their issue wasn’t regarding hygiene or cleanliness. Their issue was regarding the ceremonial washing traditions that the Pharisees added over the years. It wasn’t in the OT law. These were man made traditions. They took offense at the fact that Jesus’ disciples weren’t observing the tradition of their elders. And the word “defiled” means unholy and unclean.

In other words, they alleged that Jesus’ disciples were sinning and making themselves unholy by not following these traditions. Suddenly their understanding of judging someone as holy or unholy was on the basis of their own traditions. That was the main problem.

Now I know most of us as we are hearing this would think that the Pharisees and scribes were probably fools to go and tell Jesus this. No man in their right mind would have the guts to go and do that. Let me remind you that the Pharisees and scribes were the most zealous, pious and learned men of their time. They knew the Scriptures inside out. They weren’t crazy. If the most religious people of that time could stumble in this way, I think we have good reason to be wary of the attitude of superficial religion in our lives. How can we identify this in our lives? I think this passage gives us two hints:

1) You’ll find yourself imposing thoughts and rules over people that aren’t prescribed in Scripture.

You’ll find people say things like you need to pray at 3AM in the night. That’s when you can have the most powerful prayers. Truly mature Christians will pray during those hours. Does the bible command us to pray? Yes, but it doesn’t tell us that we need to pray during a specific time to see God answer prayer.

Once I had a brother who was telling me that we need to have 3 different types of bible study times during the day. One is our daily devotion, the other is a deep, in depth study of a passage and the third is where we just read a bunch of chapters or books of the Bible together to understand the overall context of the Bible.

Now all these things are great. We are commanded to read and study Scripture but if you’re using these 3 specific times as a mandate to judge another person’s faith, then you might be imposing your own thoughts and rules over what’s prescribed in Scripture.

2) You’ll find yourself constantly being critical of other people’s spiritual lives and judging them on the basis of your man-made rules

If you are constantly thinking about what this person is doing right or wrong, if you are constantly being critical of what’s right or wrong in a church, it’s quite possible that you may be struggling with this sin. As a believer we need to be discerning and there is a place for correcting our brothers and sisters in Christ but it’s all done in a context where we are spiritually involved and invested in the person’s life.

I want us to really think about this seriously. Do we see these two symptoms in our life? We might think that we are more spiritual than the others because we are better at observing these man-made traditions. It might make us feel more righteous but let’s recognize that this is plainly superficial religion. And this is something that needs to be renounced if you want to see authentic faith.

2. We must allow God’s word to Reveal our hypocrisy (v6-13)

[6] And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, “‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; [7] in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ [8] You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.” [9] And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! [10] For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ [11] But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God)[d]— [12] then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, [13] thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”

We see Jesus using Scripture twice in this passage in order to reveal their hypocrisy.

Jesus quotes the Scripture from Isaiah to tell them that they think they are worshiping God but it’s all fruitless. Why is it fruitless? Because they reject the commandment of God and hold on to the tradition of men. And then Jesus gives another example from Scripture. In the OT in many places God commanded the people of Israel to “Honor their father and mother”. You see that in the 10 commandments and also later where God says if anyone reviles or curses their father or mother they are to be put to death. Honoring parents is very serious in the eyes of God!

But the Pharisees created a tradition where people could avoid and neglect giving financial support to their parents. All they had to do is say that this money is “Corban” – it is going to the temple treasury and they were exempted from taking care of their parents. They blatantly defied the actual commandment of God in order to establish their tradition. That’s the issue of superficial religion, it places our rules and our traditions above God. In essence we are more concerned about obeying our traditions rather than obeying God.

So how do we come out of it? We allow God’s Word to reveal our hypocrisy. The word hypocrisy actually means “pretender” like a stage actor. Superficial religion means that we are constantly pretending to be better than what we truly are. When we spend time with God’s Word, what it does is it cuts through our pretending and our acting and reveals what’s really in our hearts.

Hebrews 4:12 says For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

Let’s ask ourselves this question, are we allowing God’s Word to reveal the hypocrisy in our hearts each day? Are we being open to the areas in which God shows us that we are pretending?

For example that prophecy from Isaiah: Jesus first quotes Isaiah when he says “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me;” Doesn’t this convict our hearts of the times on a Sunday morning where we are singing these wonderful songs of love and praise to God but our hearts are far from him? We are singing “It’s all about You, Jesus” and yet our hearts say “It’s all about everything else”.

Once we allow God’s Word to reveal our hypocrisy, it should lead us to the next point.

3. We must repent of the real heart issue (v18-23)

[18] And he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, [19] since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?”[f] (Thus he declared all foods clean.) [20] And he said, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. [21] For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, [22] coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. [23] All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

Why do people cover themselves with superficial religion? So that they can conceal what’s truly there in their hearts. What’s really in our hearts? Evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness!!

Man isn’t inherently good but bad according to these verses. You and I by nature are capable of the worst of atrocities in the world and the most horrific expressions of sin. What do we do to cover it up? We create our own rules and traditions so that by observing them we don’t have to feel bad about our true state.

We criticize and pull people down so that we can look at them and think we are better off. Let’s remind ourselves that before a Holy God these efforts are merely filthy rags (Isa 64:6).

Isn’t that the same thing that happened in the Garden of Eden? Once Adam and Eve sinned, they realized they were naked and tried to cover themselves with fig leaves. They knew they were condemned the moment they ate of the fruit. Guilt entered their hearts for the first time and they tried to cover up their sin.

When God confronted them, His intention was to bring them to confess so that he could give them a better clothing. An animal was sacrificed/killed in order to provide Adam and Eve with a better clothing to cover their shame.

And when we think about our own sin, deep rooted sin from our hearts….God doesn’t want us to cover ourselves with superficial religion. Those are filthy rags & fig leaves. Instead God is drawing us to confession so that He can give us a better clothing – the pure robe of His Son. This was purchased by Jesus Christ dying on the cross for our sins and rising again on the third Day.

I really hope that’s what you find encouraging today. My intention wasn’t to just talk about this sin and leave it there. I hope it’s driving us all to repentance. Authentic faith is one where all of the outer layers are peeled off and where we come to God not concealing ourselves with superficial religion but rather repenting of the real issues of our hearts.

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Faith Quest

Can I have a tattoo on my body?

As much as there is to say on this matter I think the article below helps us to think through cultural issues and law. At the root of this questions lies the question What makes me acceptable to GOD? Let me say this. At the foundation of christian belief is this truth; the only thing that makes us acceptable to GOD is the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Faith in Him is the only thing that makes us acceptable to GOD. If you have not explored the christian faith I encourage you to read the gospel of JOHN. It will be a beautiful gift for you I promise! With that said enjoy the article!

TATOOS & SCRIPTURE by Joe Thorn

Tattoos have an overly simplistic stereotype as well. People out of touch with what is happening today might still think that only sailors, bikers, and convicts get ink, but the reality is very different. This art form has gone mainstream and is now found on soccer moms, CEO’s, honor roll students, officers, and well… just about every kind of person out there. But the popularity of a cultural trend does not mean it is good. We need to be biblical, wise, and careful in all things.

Some people have done a quick search in the bible for “tattoo,” found Lev 19, and determined that tattoos are off-limits. But I always point people to two passages of Scripture that can help us start to think through the issue.

Lev 19 and Idolatrous Tattoos
You shall not make any cuts on your body for the dead or tattoo yourselves: I am the LORD.(Leviticus 19:28 ESV)

This prohibition falls in with several others given to Israel to separate them from the Canaanite pagan practices around them. The cutting of the body was related to the religious mourning process when relatives died. Tattoos may have been made in the same vein, also associated with specific idols and false religions. God calls Israel, as his Nation, to look different from the pagans around them, and many of these commands had more to do with associated pagan beliefs than the actual practice (cutting the sides of the beard, verse 27 for example).

Isaiah 49 and Divine Tattoos

Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me. (Isaiah 49:16 ESV)

In Isaiah 49:16 God is assuring his people that he will not forget them. He cannot forget them. Just as a nursing mother cannot forget her child, neither can God forget his children. And he then uses an illustration that surprises some. He figurative spreads out his hands and says, “Look, I have written your name on my hands.” This is most likely a reference to a kind of tattoo, a mark made with indelible ink. Of course God does not have actual arms, and therefore he does not have any real ink. But the point is clear enough. He uses a picture his people will understand. “How can I forget you when I have tattooed your name on my hand. I cannot even put my hand to work in anything without being reminded of you and the promises I have made to you.”

Some scholars even suggest that Jews began tattooing their hands to remind themselves of the temple and the Lord. (see Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., & Brown, D. Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; and note Is. 44:5)

We need to look at more Scripture, and we need to work through a few issues, but as we start it looks like God doesn’t condemn tattoos in and of themselves. Such marks, when connected to pagan theology and worship, were forbidden. But, God appears to have found them to be a fitting picture of how he remembers us.

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Mark Sermon

Trusting in times of trouble – Mark 6:45-56

Good morning! If you have a Bible with you this morning, please turn with me to The Book of Mark and chapter 6. As you know, we’ve been studying The Gospel of Mark for several months now and we’ll be looking specifically at verses 45 – 56 this morning.

I know this is a well known text (the account of Jesus walking on the water). And our tendency is to move quickly past text with which we are very familiar. But, I want to encourage you to not do that with this passage. There are things in this text that God showed me this week that were new to me and, if we are willing to look at it with fresh eyes, I believe that you will see some things new as well.

After all, we need to remember that the Word of God is active, it’s dynamic, it’s alive. It is always speaking in fresh ways into our circumstances. So, let’s not move quickly past this well known passage. I want to read our text in a moment. But first, I want to remind us of where we’ve been over the last several weeks.

Jesus was with His disciples around Capernaum performing some incredible miracles. After that He returned to His hometown of Nazareth with His disciples where He met skepticism & unbelief. Jesus used that context to send out His followers into the surrounding villages to heal the sick & proclaim the gospel. As Mark is telling us about that, he stops and explains what happened to John the Baptist (you’ll remember that Herod had him beheaded).

Mark then comes back to the account of the disciples returning to Jesus after going out to proclaim the gospel. That’s where we read about the feeding of the 5,000 (which was probably 10,000 or more when you factor in women & children). That’s where we pick up our verses; right at the end of Jesus performing the miracle with the fishes & loaves. This is what Mark records beginning in verse 45:

[45] Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. [46] And after he had taken leave of them, he went up on the mountain to pray. [47] And when evening came, the boat was out on the sea, and he was alone on the land. [48] And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them. And about the fourth watch of the night[a] he came to them, walking on the sea. He meant to pass by them, [49] but when they saw him walking on the sea they thought it was a ghost, and cried out, [50] for they all saw him and were terrified. But immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.” [51] And he got into the boat with them, and the wind ceased. And they were utterly astounded, [52] for they did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened.

[53] When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. [54] And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized him [55] and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was. [56] And wherever he came, in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and implored him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment. And as many as touched it were made well.

This is a pretty incredible story, isn’t it? Where I’m from we have what we call “fishing stories.” Do you know what a “fishing story” is? It’s the clearest form of exaggeration known to mankind. A fisherman will say, “I caught a fish this big!” And somehow the fish gets bigger & bigger the more times the fisherman tells the story. The point is that stories tend to get more sensational as time goes by. They get exaggerated as they are re-told over & over again.

Let me be very clear: this IS NOT one of those stories! This is Mark’s account of what happened that day. It has been inspired by the Holy Spirit and it is a part of the inherent, infallible, objectively true Word of God. Which means that this went down just like Mark says it went down.

And, when we read it for what it is, we get a pretty incredible window into the character of God and how we works in the lives of His people. In other words, these are things that should have a huge impact on how we live and how we relate to God.

For clarity, I’m going to break this down into 3 sections that track with how Mark lays this narrative out for us. And I think you’ll see very quickly how relevant these things are for our lives.

  1. The disciples find themselves in trouble
  2. Their circumstances allowed for their testing
  3. They experienced Jesus care & provision in their weakness.

Let’s dig down on each of these points and see the glory of Jesus and the beauty of the gospel in these verses. First, the disciples find themselves in trouble. Look again at verses 45 – 48. “Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. And after he had taken leave of them, he went up on the mountain to pray. And when evening came, the boat was out on the sea, and he was alone on the land. And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them.”

There are a couple of things we need to dig a little deeper on here. This account is also in Matthew & John and they refer to this as a storm. But, what’s interesting is that this was a particular kind of storm that is unique to the Sea of Galilee. In fact, it was called a “Searah”.

The fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were afraid of this type of storm. It’s the same type of storm that we saw back in Mark chapter 4 when Jesus was taking a nap on the boat. And Mark explained that the disciples thought they were going to die.

I’m actually familiar with this type of storm because my family used to live near Lake Tahoe in the Western US. This type of weather occurs when a lake is situated near mountains (as the Sea of Galilee was). What happens is a storm will build on one side of the mountain and will come down the mountain and hit the lake violently. It’s no ordinary storm!

So the disciples find themselves in trouble and they find themselves in trouble very quickly. By the way, isn’t that how trouble comes at us? It’s always quick, it’s always unexpected. These guys just participated in one of the most miraculous things you could imagine. They weren’t just witnesses to it, they were participating in it. They touched the bread, they touched the fish. As it was distributed to 10,000 people it just kept coming. And there were baskets left over at the end. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine what a spiritual high these guys must have been experiencing?

They probably didn’t want to leave. Which is why we have the language here from Mark; He says that Jesus had to MAKE THEM GET INTO THE BOAT. Have you ever had such a beautiful experience that you didn’t want it to end? It was so amazing that you didn’t want to leave? I think that’s what is happening here.

I can just imagine the disciples, as they got into the boat. Jesus has just said, “You guys get to the other side… … I’ll meet you there!” They’re probably sitting in the boat laughing and recounting what just happened. And then, after being on the lake for a little while, they would have noticed the wind begin to change.

And as the wind changed, they begin to labor at the oars, unable to make any headway. And now they find themselves stuck in the middle of the lake. They can’t go forward because the wind is in their faces and they don’t want to go back because they’re trying to be obedient to Jesus. They’re stuck! And then, here it comes — the Searah! It comes rushing down the mountainside! And, all of the sudden, after this beautiful experience with Jesus, after witnessing His power, after being obedient to what He told them to do, they find themselves in serious trouble.

Now, I’d like to pause here and say something that I believe is absolutely critical for us to understand. We tend to think that when we find ourselves in trouble, it’s because we’ve done something wrong. Do you know what I mean? We’re conditioned that way as children: “I’ve been disobedient so now I’m in trouble.” Jonah is a great example of this from the Old Testament. God called Jonah to something, Jonah refused and ran away from God, and he found himself in trouble.

But notice, in this case, that it was the disciple’s obedience that led to this trouble. I think there’s an important lesson here for us. Sometimes God leads us into situations where we desperately need Him so that we will learn to trust Him. It’s not necessarily that we’ve done anything wrong. He’s just choosing to do work in us.

Church, don’t be surprised if you’re following Jesus and you’re praying things like: “I want to be more faithful.” “I want to be obedient” “I want to be used by you.” Don’t be surprised if a storm is coming. Don’t complain when the storm comes because the Lord is actually answering your prayers. The storm is often the means of grace for Him to grow us.

Just think about your own life. How often do we believe that God is against us because we’re experiencing hardships in our lives? When, in fact, we know that God is always for us. And He’s actually using those hard things to lay the groundwork for our greatest good.

I believe that Jesus wanted to create a situation where the disciples would be tested, especially after such a spiritual high with the feeding of all of those people. He wanted to test them. That’s the second thing I want for us to consider: The disciples circumstances allowed for their testing.

Look again at what this says in verses 48 (starting right where we left off). “And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them. And about the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. He meant to pass by them, but when they saw him walking on the sea they thought it was a ghost, and cried out, for they all saw him and were terrified.”

Notice how Mark mentions “evening” in verse 47 and “the fourth watch of the night” in verse 48. That basically means that they’ve been in this storm for several hours. So, Jesus led them into this storm, He’s let them struggle for hours, and we know from verse 48 that He sees them; He knows exactly what’s happening. And then, after all of that, finally Jesus comes to them. Mark says that “He meant to pass by them…” Which is really interesting, isn’t it? I think that this little phrase is meant to teach us something very important.

It triggered my mind because we know that Jesus didn’t mean to go unseen. We know that because Jesus doesn’t fail at things. If He meant to pass by them and not be seen, He would have done that successfully. No, Mark means that Jesus intentionally passed by the boat so that they would see Him as He walked on the water. The question is WHY? Well, I think it’s for a couple of reasons.

Most obviously, to the point here, it’s because Jesus is testing them. He’s stretching them. In the midst of difficulty, in the midst of something hard, He’s showing them a lack of trust — a lack of belief — that He is in control of the situation. Notice how verse 52 says that the disciples “hearts had been hardened about the bread.” Apparently they had drawn the wrong conclusions about Jesus as He fed all of those people. I believe that Jesus wanted to give them a tangible lesson about trust & belief.

But I think there’s something else that Jesus wanted to show them, because He could have taught them that lesson from the land. Instead, He chose to walk on the water. You see, this is a clear demonstration of His power and it’s a clear revelation of His glory. It shows that even the molecules of water must hold up the feet of the Sovereign Lord. It’s the glory of the King of Kings on display.

I would suggest that this is Jesus revealing His glory to the disciples, and that’s why I think he intended to pass by them. I believe that Mark is intentionally drawing our minds to the mountains. Not just the mountain that Jesus was praying on, but Mount Sinai (Mount Horeb).

You might remember the accounts in the Old Testament of Moses & Elijah (the disciples would have remember them). In both of those cases, they are up on the mountain and God caused His glory to pass by them. Because, in both of those cases, they could not behold the glory of the Lord. They couldn’t experience it because of the gap that existed between the Holiness of God & their sin.

They would have needed a mediator to experience (to behold) God’s glory. They didn’t have that, so the Lord caused His glory to pass by them. Here we see Jesus (on a mountain), but coming down the mountain to display His power and His glory to sinful men. He reveals His glory by “passing by” the disciples on the water; which is what you would expect if you’re familiar with those Old Testament accounts. But then, something breathtaking happens, something different, something new. Where Moses & Elijah couldn’t behold the glory of The Lord, where they couldn’t physically be with Him because of the separation that sin brings, Jesus GETS INTO THE BOAT!

He doesn’t just pass them by to the point where they can catch a glimpse of His glory, He gets into the boat. He enters into their circumstances. He enters into the pain, and confusion, and uncertainty. And, in so doing, Jesus brings care and provision in their weakness.

What Jesus intended to teach the disciples (and what this text is meant to remind us of) is that Jesus IS THE MEDIATOR. Jesus IS IMMANUEL — GOD WITH US. Things are not like they were before. God is doing something new. He is doing something different than before. Where His glory would kill people earlier (because of the separation that sin brings), now, because of Jesus, people are able to behold His glory. And not just behold His glory, but be transformed by His glory in His presence.

You see, Jesus provision for the disciples is Himself. And He cares for the disciples with His presence. And the same thing is true for your life & my life. Jesus Christ is our righteousness. Where we could not exist in the presence of God because of our sin, Jesus took our sin upon Himself and gave us His righteousness in return. We can now exist in the presence of God!

Jesus Christ is our mediator. Where we could not behold the glory of the Lord because of our sin, Jesus is the propitiation for our sin. So that we can, “with unveiled face, behold the glory of the Lord, and be transformed into the same image…”

I believe these are the things that Jesus was revealing to the disciples, and it’s what He wants to reveal to us this morning. And it must shape the way we see everything in our lives; especially the difficulties, especially the hard circumstances, especially the storms in our lives.

I want to challenge each of us this morning to think about the circumstances of your life right now. Think about where God has you right now and ask yourself these questions in each of those circumstances:

  1. “DO I TRUST THAT JESUS IS IN CONTROL OF THIS?”
  2. “DO I BELIEVE THAT HE IS USING THIS FOR HIS GLORY & MY GOOD?”
  3. “DO I WANT HIS PRESENCE MORE THAN ANY OTHER OUTCOME?”

Those are the questions that will reveal the motivations of our heart.