“A Case of Identity”
Mark 3:20-35 / Ezekiel 33:12-20
12 November, 2006
There is a Sherlock Holmes story, from which I borrowed the title for this message, which tells of a woman with a substantial inherited income who is engaged to a quiet Londoner who has recently disappeared. She enlists Holmes's detective powers to locate the man, but Holmes is barely challenged by what turns out to be quite an elementary case. The solution to the case hinges on the true identity of the fiancé, one Mr. Hosmer Angel. As it turns out, the “Angel” proves to be a devil.
Some time back there were a series of commercials for a credit card company where well-known personalities attempt to pay for merchandise by check and are turned away by the clerk because they can’t provide a proper form of identification. Secret identities are vital to superheroes, concealed identities to many criminals; more recently the ease by which identities can be stolen has created a whole new wave of confusion. Commercials that portray victims of identity theft, using a voice-over of the thieves. One’s identity is very important; either protecting it or recovery from loss or damage to it can be a life-long endeavor.
Over the last 100 or so years there have been scholars (and others) who have been saying that what we are told about Jesus in the Bible should be considered more legend than history—the so-called “Quest for the Historic Jesus” has sought to distinguish the man, Jesus of Nazareth from the “Christ of faith” who was developed later by his followers. Liberal theologians within mainline denominations claim that there are other ways to God besides Jesus Christ; that Jesus himself was not the only Son of God, but more of a highly enlightened holy man; a prophet and a teacher who lived and died like any other man, even having a wife and children. In recent years this “Quest” has been popularized by books like The Da Vinci Code, Holy Blood, Holy Grail, The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Judas, The Jesus Papers, and the on-going work of the “Jesus Seminar” and its members. All these continue to work against the Truth.
Jesus is the great divider: of history, of truth from error, reality from opinion, even friends and family.
Jesus divides the believers from the unbelievers.
Jesus divides the Christians from the non-Christians.
Jesus divides the righteous from the unrighteous.
As we can see from today’s text, this is not merely a contemporary issue. The first followers of Jesus—beginning right after the resurrection of their Lord--were faced with the same issue. In fact the early church Fathers coined a phrase in Latin that expressed the meat of the matter: "Aut Deus Aut Homo Malus." It means that Jesus was “either God, or He was a bad (evil) man.”
‘He was thus hated and reproached by his own
visible people: John i. 11. “He came to his own, and his own received him not.”
And he was principally despised and hated by those who were in chief repute,
and were their greatest men. Indeed the hatred was general. Into whatever part
of the land he went, he met with hatred and contempt; in Capernaum, and
Jericho; in Jerusalem, which was the holy city, even when he went to the temple
to worship; also in Nazareth, his own city, among his own relations, and his
old neighbours.’[1]
Mark has woven the three groups together in what is sometimes called "the sandwich form": first the crowd, then the family, on to the religious leaders, back to the family, and back to the crowd. Although three distinct groups are identified in the passage, it is basically about two types of people: 1) those who want to live their lives without having to accept the claims of Christ, which interfere with their own agendas; 2) those who recognize Jesus for who He is and desire to follow Him in obedience to God. The first want either to banish him from their lives.
We read last week that multitudes were coming to Jesus, pressing in, overwhelming him so that it was necessary for Jesus and his disciples to retreat to a boat. Now we see that even at their home base in Capernaum Jesus did not even have time to eat or rest.
As Mark describes it, members of Jesus’ own family believed that Jesus is so consumed by his perceived mission that he has become a fanatic, has gone “beside himself”, looney, crazy. This would have been the view of his brothers, who didn’t yet believe the claims of Jesus. It is most likely that Mary felt that her firstborn son was merely fatigued and wished to take him home, away from the excitement and strain, so that he could get rest and proper food. In either case, somehow Jesus’ family heard what was going on with the crowds and came to take him home—to “arrest” (take hold of) him. We will come back to them in a little while.
The second group, the religious leaders of his day, said that Jesus was inspired by the devil. Pharisees from Jerusalem made the considerable journey to Galilee to look into this Jesus movement. These men were scribes, experts in the Jewish law. They admitted that Jesus had an extraordinary spirit at work in him. They couldn’t deny the things Jesus was doing, but they would strive to discredit the holy source of his power. They would malign the Son of Man, deny him any valid religious credentials if they could.
There was an increase of demonic activity in Judea when Jesus came on the scene; a clash of kingdoms, truth versus lies, life versus death. Jesus was identified by evil spirits, and He silenced them. The nature of the conflict was clearly defined.
‘And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, "He is possessed by Beelzebub! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons."’ (3:22)
Jesus counters that charge with a marvelous bit of logic, in the form of a parable:
"How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. In fact, no one can enter a strong man's house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can rob his house.” (3:23b-27)
In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus
begins his ministry by going ‘into Galilee,
proclaiming the good news of God. "The time has come," he said.
"The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!
(1:14b-15)"’ Jesus came not only to proclaim the Kingdom of God but
also to bring it to the people of God, those for whom the Son would give his
life. Quite frequently Jesus did this through direct teachings and parables,
but most often it was his actions that demonstrated the nature of the kingdom
and declared his identity as Messiah. Jesus divides the kingdom of God from the
kingdoms of this world. He can even invade the household of Satan. Colossians
2: 15: "Having disarmed
principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over
them in it."
Jesus is the only One who can
bind the devil, and he has already done it. Jesus bound the devil even in the
days of his ministry and thus made it possible for himself to cast out these
unclean spirits and to plunder the house of Satan and release those he had held
captive for so long -- humanity. So the
explanation the Pharisees gave for Jesus success in healing and casting
out demons was ridiculous. Not only ridiculous but dangerous. The religious leaders ought to be able to tell the
difference between God's work and Satan's
work. If they couldn’t, then they were very poor leaders, to be pitied but not
followed. If they wouldn’t, that is, if they were bringing a false accusation
against Jesus, then they were very bad leaders, to denounced and cast aside. “Woe
to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light
for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.”[2]
Yet Jesus gave them an out, a warning to
watch their words.
I tell you the
truth, all the sins and blasphemies of men will be forgiven them. But whoever
blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; he is guilty of an
eternal sin." He said this because they were saying, "He has an evil
spirit." (3:28-30)
Before you get frightened by those statements—though it may be that you need to—we need to understand what Jesus is saying here. It is a serious warning that Jesus gave to the scribes and the crowds. We might conclude from it that the unpardonable sin is charging that Jesus had an unclean spirit, or that the works of God are really the works of the devil. That may be part of it. But notice that they had not yet committed the unpardonable sin when they said Jesus had an unclean spirit.
"You are very close to committing that sin," Jesus says, "when you credit the work of God to the devil." That is very close. What Jesus warned them against was rejecting the witness of the Holy Spirit. And to whom does the Spirit witness? Well, all through the Scriptures the Holy Spirit is given to witness to the Lord Jesus. "He has come to bear witness to me" {cf, John 15:26}, Jesus said later on to his disciples, "and he will take of the things of mine and make them known unto you," {cf, John 16:14}. He came into the world "to convict men of sin," {cf, John 16:8}; "because they believe not on me," {John 16:9}. All the work of the Holy Spirit is designed to exalt and declare and define the work of Jesus. So to reject the Holy Spirit, to blaspheme the Holy Spirit, is to reject the Spirit's witness of Christ.
In the affirmation of faith we read that the Holy Spirit:
The Spirit applieth to us the
redemption purchased by Christ by working faith in us, and thereby uniting us
to Christ in our effectual calling. . . . convincing us of our sin and misery,
enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our wills, he
doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ, freely offered to us in
the gospel.
And as John Calvin put it,
“Now we shall possess a right definition of faith if we call it a firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”
So what Jesus is saying is that all blasphemies that you repent of will be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven because it puts you beyond repentance -- you won't be able to repent of it. If a sin makes it impossible for you to repent, then that is an unforgivable sin, because forgiveness is promised only to those sins from which we genuinely repent (cf. 4:12).
Jesus must be identified as either a liar, lunatic, or lord; deceiver, deceived (deluded), or deity. C. S. Lewis put it this way:
‘Among Pantheists, like the Indians, anyone might say that he was a part of God, or one with God: there would be nothing very odd about it. But this man, since He was a Jew, could not mean that kind of God. God, in their language, meant the Being outside the world Who had made it and was infinitely different than anything else. And when you have grasped that, you will see that what this man said was, quite simply, the most shocking thing that has ever been uttered by human lips. . . . I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him, "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.’[3]
Which brings us around to the family, who were on their way to rescue
Jesus from Himself and His critics.
Then Jesus' mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, "Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you."
"Who are my mother and
my brothers?" he asked.
Then he looked
at those seated in a circle around him and said, "Here are my mother and
my brothers! Whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother."
(3:31-35)
When we look at the crowd
gathered around Jesus, those He called his mother, brothers and sisters,
weren’t doing anything except sitting
and listening to Him. How could they be doing the will of the Father?
“This is the
work of God,” Jesus said, “that you believe in the one whom He sent…(John
6:29)”
Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. (John 1:12-13)
Jesus confers new identity on those who believe in Him and obey the will of God the Father, as when He chose and empowered the inner circle of disciples.
According to William Barclay, true kinship is defined by having:
· a common experience
· a common interest
· a common obedience
· a common goal
This is all possible only through a common call to discipleship, an intimate relationship with Jesus. The call comes from the Father and Son through the Holy Spirit.
What our Lord does point out very clearly is that when there is a conflict between what God says, the demands of God in our life, and the advice and counsel of our relatives according to the flesh, it is the Word of God and the Spirit of God which has primacy. It must be the deciding factor in our life. And though we are responsible to declare our decision with love and compassion and understanding, we must follow what God says. This is why Jesus said clearly and repeatedly, "If a man forsakes not his father and his mother, and his wife and his children, and himself, and even all that he has, he cannot be my disciple," {cf, Luke 14:26}. He makes that supreme claim upon us, having fulfilled it himself. And this is why on fairly numerous occasions he himself seems to ignore his ties with his mother and his brothers and sisters -- in order that he might be faithful to the calling of God.
John Piper, an evangelical scholar and preacher, wrote:
‘How should we live in view of this possibility? The fact that there is an unforgivable sin – that there comes a point in a life of sin after which the Holy Spirit will no longer grant repentance -- that face should drive us from sin with fear and trembling. None of us knows when our toying with sin will pass over into irrevocable hardness of heart. Very few people feel how serious sin is. . . .They are like the buzzard who spots a carcass on a piece of ice floating in the river. He lands and begins to eat. He knows it is dangerous because the falls are just ahead. But he looks at his wings and says to himself, "I can fly to safety in an instant." And he goes on eating. Just before the ice goes over the falls he spreads his wings to fly but his claws are frozen in the ice and there is no escape -- neither in this age nor the age to come. The Spirit of holiness has forsaken the arrogant sinner forever.’
The common people follow Jesus and sit at His feet. They
are fascinated by his teachings and by his actions. "Here are my mother and my brothers!" They
join Jesus in proclaiming the Kingdom of God, acknowledging
His rules and showing care for sick and
hurting people as the way of real
Life. This is our calling, too.
Believing in Jesus.
Trusting in Jesus.
Sitting at the feet of
Jesus.
Doing the work of God.