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The Good News of Jesus

11/02/2008 - Let Down By Your Friends, Mark 2:1-17

This week I've been thinking a lot about the people in my life who have brought me closer to Jesus. And I'd have to start with my mother and the influence that she had on my life. My mom came to faith in Christ shortly after my brother and I were born. She didn't grow up going to church, she wasn't part of a church until a friend invited her to visit the church that she attended. Her friend said, "They have a good Sunday School and I think the boys will like it." And so my mom took my brother and me to that church where the Bible was taught each week and we could hear stories about Jesus. I grew up there and to this day my mom and brother are still part of that church community.

I think of youth leaders, especially in high school, that had a real impact on me and challenged me to put God first in my life especially as I was thinking about a career and what I wanted to be when I grew up. I think of the pastor whose teaching ministry had a big influence during my college years and created a real hunger in me to learn and study the Bible. And then there were my church friends that I hung with and got in trouble with, a group of four guys that called ourselves "The Raiders" and our goal was to sabotage every meeting we were a part of! Yet through it all God used those friends to bring me closer to Jesus. And some of those guys are still in my life today and keep encouraging me to follow Christ.

And I bet if you thought about your spiritual journey there would be people in your life that have influenced you as well, maybe invited you to Valley View or Young Life or some other place where you heard about Jesus. They're part of your personal story of faith. That's the way it should be. That's the way God wants it to be. He wants us influencing others and being influenced by others who are following Jesus. There's nothing quite as exciting as being part of someone else's story of faith.

And this morning we come to a passage in the gospel of Mark where we see a group of people stopping at nothing to bring their friend to Jesus. If you have a Bible turn with me to Mark 2.

Mark 2:1-2 A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. ²They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them.

Jesus is now well into his public ministry and has begun to develop quite of following. In Mark 1:39 we read that he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons. Jesus had taken his kingdom tour on the road along with Peter and Andrew, James and John. And he visited synagogues all around Galilee, which were like small local churches for the Jewish community. And as a traveling rabbi he would read the scrolls and explain them with authority. And then as the Son of God he would validate that authority by driving out demons, telling them to "shut up," and healing the sick and cleansing lepers and doing things that frankly had never been done before by anyone, anywhere.

And he got so popular that he couldn't even walk down the street without being mobbed. Like Tim said last week Jesus the Rabbi became an overnight celebrity like Joe the Plumber. But Jesus didn't want to be a celebrity so he looked for ways to get away from the press. The last verse of Mark 1 says, As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.

But Jesus couldn't get away. He couldn't hide. Which is why he got up early, when it was still dark, to be alone with his heavenly Father to be reminded that he was loved. And last week Tim talked about the importance of solitude for each of us in our walk with Christ.

But now he enters a home in Capernaum and of course it's packed out, standing room only. In fact, people are jammed in the door and leaning through the windows and Jesus is talking to them about the kingdom of God.

I love that Greek word for "preached" in verse 2. It's actually the word for dialogue or conversation. Jesus is not preaching at these people from behind a pulpit. Instead, he's sitting there, talking to them, dialoging with them, answering questions about the good news of the kingdom. And these people are hanging on every word as would we. They're hearing about the kingdom of God from the King himself. How cool is that!

And while Jesus is talking there's a noise up on the roof. We've made a lot of noise on this roof over the last few weeks. And ceiling tiles start falling down and dirt and sticks and big chunks of dried mud start hitting people. Look at verse 3, Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. ⁴Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on.

Now imagine the scenario. Four guys hear that Jesus is in town and one of them says, "Hey, let's go see Jesus. I hear that he's an amazing teacher who does some incredible things." And two of the others say, "Sure. Let's go! We're there!" But the fourth guy says, "Wait a minute. Let's not just go by ourselves. Let's take our friend with us. I've heard that Jesus can heal people and maybe he can even heal our buddy. Wouldn't that be awesome!?"

And so on their way they head over to their friend's house and say, "Come on! You're coming with us! We're going to see Jesus!" And the guy has no choice. He can't walk. He can't get away. In fact, he's had no choice his whole life.

He's paralyzed and stuck to this mat 24/7. His whole world is defined by a three foot by six foot piece of burlap that he calls home. He eats on that mat, sleeps on that mat, urinates on that mat, begs on that mat. He's imprisoned to that mat and nothing can be done for him medically. There's no surgery that can help him. No medicine. No physical therapy. He has no hope of ever leaving that mat.

His whole life he's been dependent on someone else to feed him, to clothe him, to carry him, to move him, to change him, and to bathe him. The only thing he can do is beg and hope people drop enough coins on his mat to keep him alive for one more day.

You see to be a paraplegic in Jesus' day meant you had no life. In the Roman Empire handicapped babies were often left outside to die. At one point, Rome actually had a law on the books that said, "Quickly kill a deformed child." There was no room for invalids.

And in Israel, where this man lived, if you were paralyzed you were also stigmatized. In other words, the reason something was wrong with you was because you had done something wrong and you were getting what you deserved. So instead of getting pity this poor man got nothing but distain. "I wonder what he did to deserve that?" people thought. "God's making him pay now!" And you know what he probably believed that too.

So this poor guy has no money, no job, no influence, no family, no future, no life. He has nothing except four amazing friends who are determined to bring him to Jesus. Thank God for friends like that! Do you have any friends like that? People who cared enough about you to bring you to Jesus. Or maybe you are a friend like that to someone that needs to know Jesus.

And so they pick him up and take him to the house where Jesus is and it's packed. Even the handicap spot's taken. And they think, "Oh nuts! We missed our chance! We should have come earlier?" And then one of them says, "Wait a minute. I've got an idea. Follow me." And he leads them up the fire escape and out on to the flat roof where he starts ripping off the shingles.

Now in those days, outside stairways were very common and people would often go up on their flat roofs especially at night to catch the cool breezes off the Mediterranean Sea. So that wasn't unusual. But what was unusual was that they started digging up the roof with their bare hands and installing a skylight! They dug through the mortar and in between the crossbeams and made a hole just big enough to slide their friend down on his mat and on to the floor right in front of Jesus.

And so everybody stops and looks up at the hole to see these four faces staring down wondering what Jesus is going to do next. Meanwhile, the homeowner's on the phone to his insurance company wondering if this mess is going to be covered under his homeowner's policy!

What will Jesus do? WWJD! Is he going to be upset that they interrupted his teaching? Maybe he was in the middle of some riveting story or a powerful point he was trying to make! Or maybe he'd be ticked off that they damaged the roof of this house? We just put a new roof on this place and I don't want anybody ripping it up!

Look at verse 5, When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, "Son, your sins are forgiven."

Whoa! Jesus doesn't say anything about the roof or about the interruption to his teaching. Instead, he focuses on these four guys and their disabled friend. Everybody else was looking at the hole in the ceiling and the four guys who better fix it before they leave. But Jesus sees their faith. He sees how concerned they are for their friend and how their faith drove them to take a real risk and do something radical.

Everybody else was looking at the floor and this handicapped man's shriveled up body, but Jesus was looking past his body and into his heart. And so he turns to the man on the mat and says, "Son, your sins are forgiven!"

And everybody goes, "What? His sins are forgiven? What's that about?" And his four friends are thinking, "That's not why we brought him here. We brought him here to get healed."

But Jesus was healing him, the same way that his forgiveness heals us. He wants to heal this man inside and out. He wants to heal his heart because his heart is filled with anger and bitterness and resentment and jealousy and guilt and all the same stuff that fills our heart too, the junk that Jesus forgives when we believe in him.

He says, "Son," or as Luke puts it, "Friend, you're clean. You're forgiven. You're right with God. God is not upset with you. You're not getting paid back for something you've done wrong. You and God are okay now!"

Those were the most powerful words this man had ever heard in his life. His sins are forgiven just because of his faith. He doesn't have to go to Jerusalem and appear at the Temple and confess to a priest and present a sin offering and all the things that the Jewish Law required. How can this be? That's the question on everybody's mind. That's what the religious types in the room were thinking.

Look at verse 6, Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, ⁷"Why does this fellow talk like that? He's blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?"

And you know what? Before we come down too hard on these teachers of the law they were absolutely right. Only God can forgive sins. That's true. They just didn't realize that God was standing in the middle of the room covered in dust from the hole in the roof. You see, if you sin against me I can forgive you of that sin, but I can't forgive you of all your sins against everybody else because I'm only human. And if Jesus were only human what he said was blasphemy. But Mark is trying to show us in his gospel that the Messiah is more than human. In fact, he even knows what we're thinking!

Look at verse 8, Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, "Why are you thinking these things? ⁹Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Get up, take your mat and walk'? ¹⁰But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins."

Which is easier to say, your sins are forgiven or get up and walk? Both are easy to say, but which one's easier to validate? If you say your sins are forgiven you can't validate that. You can't see them being taken away. But if you say get up and walk something better happen. That's tougher to pull off because the guy is either going to get up or just lay there.

Look at verse 11, So he said to the man, ¹¹"I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home." ¹²He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, "We have never seen anything like this!"

This man who spent his whole life shriveled up on this little mat, gets up on his two stick legs, no walker, no crutches, no physical therapy, no three months of rehab, just instant, total healing. Healing strength just flows through his body. And in stunned amazement the crowd parts like the Red Sea and he walks out right through the middle. They never saw anything like it. And his four friends are up on the roof high five 'n each other yelling, "He did it! He did it!" And meanwhile, the poor homeowner's still on hold trying to get through to his insurance agent and missed the whole thing!

Jesus has authority over demons and over disease and over leprosy and over paralysis. He even has authority to forgive sin because he's more than a carpenter or even a traveling rabbi. He's the Son of Man. He is God come in the flesh. And he can forgive your sin and he can forgive my sin through simple faith in who he is. When he saw their faith he said, "Son, your sins are forgiven." And thank God for the people in your life and in mine who brought us to Jesus to hear that message of forgiveness and may we be like the four friends who bring others to hear that healing message as well.

And so Jesus leaves the house and goes down to the lake. Look at verse 13, Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. ¹⁴As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.

Jesus is again surrounded by a mob of people as he's teaching down by the lake. And while he's walking along he sees a man named Levi or Matthew as he's called in the other gospels. And he says to him the same words that he said to Peter and Andrew and James and John, "Follow me."

And again we have one of these situations where it looks like Jesus has some kind hypnotic power. "Follow me" and Levi drops everything. But the truth is that this man most likely had been hearing about Jesus for quite awhile. He was a tax collector in Galilee and I think he had heard a lot of the buzz about this new rabbi in town who was doing amazing things.

And I think Matthew was just enough of a rebel to follow him. The fact that his name was Levi could mean that he was from the tribe of Levi and the Levites were the ones in charge of taking care of the Temple in Jerusalem. In fact, you had to be a Levite in order to be a priest.

And who knows maybe Matthew grew up disillusioned by the whole religious thing after seeing the corruption of the Temple and all the hypocrisy that surrounded it. We know that he knew the Scriptures. Later on he'll write the gospel of Matthew and it's is just filled with Old Testament quotations. He knew his Bible, but for now he's had enough of religion.

And so he chooses a different career track. He chooses a career where he can make a lot of money. He becomes a tax collector. He sells out to the Romans and buys the privilege of collecting enormous amounts of money from his fellow Jews. And they hate him for it.

Every month he has a quota that he has to collect for Rome with a Roman guard standing behind him, but anything he gets over that quota he puts in his pocket. So he sets the tax rate anywhere he wants and if he wants to buy a bigger house or get a newer car he jacks it up. And there were taxes on everything, import taxes and exports taxes, and taxes on how many axles you had on your cart and on the land that you own and on the grain that you grow, on the number of animals that you have and the amount of fish that you catch. It's very likely that Peter and Andrew, James and John paid taxes to Matthew and they hated his guts for it. He was a traitor and the face of Rome to them.

And so when Jesus says to Levi, "Follow me." These guys are like, "Oh no! You got to be kidding. Not him, Jesus, anybody but Levi!" And right here Jesus is teaching them the lesson that the kingdom of God is open to all people, even our enemies and those that we might despise.

So just like them Matthew walks away from a lucrative career. He leaves everything, but loses nothing. And immediately he invites Jesus and his friends over for a dinner party. He wants Jesus to meet all his despicable, tax collecting friends. And Jesus is delighted to go.

Look at verse 15, While Jesus was having dinner at Levi's house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. ¹⁶When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" ¹⁷On hearing this, Jesus said to them, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."

Jesus was on a mission and he still is. His mission is to invite all the sick to come to the doctor, not just the physically sick, but the spiritually sick, the ones who know they're messed up inside and need God's help. By "righteous," Jesus doesn't mean those who are righteous in God's eyes, he means those who are righteous in their own eyes. The self-righteous, the Pharisees in this case, don't need Jesus, but the sinners and the tax collectors do. They know they need help big time.

If you think you're healthy, if you think you're okay with God without Jesus, then he's not for you. But if you know you're a sinner and need God's grace and mercy and forgiveness in your life then he's your doctor. He's the one you're looking for. He can heal you inside and out. And he offers his services free of charge. No copay.

He picked up the tab completely when he died on the cross for you and me and satisfied God's wrath on our sin. "It is finished," he cried from the cross. Literally the word is tetelestai, "paid in full." And if you believe in Jesus your sins are forgiven, past, present, and future. They will not be held against you. And that's what this table reminds us of this morning. It reminds us of the precious price that Jesus paid for our forgiveness and if you believe in Jesus you are welcome to it.

FOR MORE INFORMATION about Valley View Community Church, feel free to contact us at info@valleyviewseek.org or call 610.631.2707.