Mark 1:29-39
There are steps everyone has to go through in life. Some of the steps we really don’t want to go through, like school. But if we don’t go through school, then we cannot do what we are supposed to later in life. I have to admit that there were occasionally classes that I didn’t want to go through in my college and seminary career. I really didn’t want to take the classical music class in college. Now, don’t hear that I don’t like classical music. I do listen to classical music in the car sometimes, and sometimes at home. I do like classical music. But there was a class at Wheaton where you had to know, intimately, all sorts of classical music. A quiz was the teacher choosing a random classical music record, dropping the needle randomly on the record, and we had to know who wrote it, what the name of the piece was, what movement within the piece-good heavens. Lots of stuff that, in grand scheme of things, is fairly unimportant. It’s good to know classical music, but it isn’t necessary completely. I mean, when I listen to it on the radio the announcers tell me who the composer was, what key it was written in, where the composer was when he wrote it, what he was thinking about that morning when he first got the inspiration for the piece, I mean everything I need to know.
There are aspects of everyone’s lives that we have to go through in order to live. No one likes to pay taxes, but it’s necessary. I hate the fact that these are all poor analogies. Because what we’re going to look at today is Jesus healing people. I get the impression reading Scripture that Jesus loved healing people. But he had a bigger job to do eventually. And if He were to have gotten pigeon-holed as being only a healer, that would have derailed His ministry. Jesus heals people out of His compassion, but it was His job to have compassion on all humanity, from then til the end of time and heal what ails us all deepest, our alienation from God. So His healing ministry is a step Jesus must go through, but He cannot remain just a healer to us or to the people back then. He had to become their Messiah, their Lord and Savior. Let’s take a look at the text for today; it is my hope it will help us deeper understand Jesus; more than just a healer, but a healer and doer of wondrous deeds as well. Mark 1:29ff
As soon as they left the synagogue, they went with James and John to the
home of Simon and Andrew. 30 Simon’s
mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told Jesus about her. 31 So he went to her, took her hand and
helped her up. The fever left her and she began to wait on them.
32 That
evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and
demon-possessed. 33 The
whole town gathered at the door, 34 and Jesus healed many who had various diseases. He also
drove out many demons, but he would not let the demons speak because they knew
who he was.
35 Very
early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and
went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him, they
exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!”
38 Jesus replied, “Let us go
somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I
have come.” 39 So he
traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out
demons. [1]
Let’s pray.
Before we head too deeply into today’s text, I want to
orient you a little. We’ve started series in the Gospel of Mark, the Goods News
according to Mark. Mark was the first gospel completed, perhaps as many as 10
years prior to Luke and Matthew, which were both written anywhere from 15-25
years prior to John. In addition to being the first completed, Mark was likely
used by Luke and Matthew as they wrote their accounts of Jesus life. Mark has
rough Greek in it, it is not as polished as Matthew, Luke or John. John has
really nice Greek. It was what we often used to practice translating in
seminary. In any case, I had always had the impression of Mark that it was
almost like a rough draft-it wasn’t too be taken as seriously as the other
gospels. I mean, it tells the same stories, but goes into less details, it is
much shorter than other gospels, so I must confess that of the 4 gospels, it
was probably my least favorite. That is, until a conference I attended last
year.
I haven’t completely bought in to everything the teacher
said that week, Dr. Ken Bailey, but through his work I’m beginning to see Mark
on a much deeper level. And to me, that’s a lot of fun. I haven’t completely
bought into all his theories about the text, but he brings a fresh set of ideas
and a deeper understanding of the culture in which Jesus lived, so as to
understand the text of Scripture. I have his outline of Mark, an I have been
using that to write sermons with. So during this sermon you’re likely to see
passages in Scripture outlined more than normal, which hopefully will be
helpful as you read Scripture on your own. I would strongly encourage you to
read Mark as I preach through it. I’m certain you’ll get more out of it that way…let’s
take a look at the first section.
As soon as they left the
synagogue, they went with James and John to the home of Simon and Andrew. 30 Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed
with a fever, and they told Jesus about her. 31 So he went to her, took her hand and helped her up. The
fever left her and she began to wait on them.
I
don’t know if you remember from last week, but we talked a little about what is
called a chiasm in the text. A chiasm is a form of Jewish writing. Western
culture puts our main point at the end or the beginning of a paragraph. Either
we start off with a theme sentence and then support our claim, or we draw out a
logical conclusion. But a chiasm is different. The main point is the middle
point, as the text builds to that middle point, and then it builds away from it
out of the paragraph and into the rest of the text. In the text, Jesus and his
newly called 4 disciples head to Peter’s house. Peter’s mother-in-law lived
with him, which was common. The first point, and the last point of the chiasm
is Jesus, James and John; guests have arrived at the household. It is the duty
of the women to serve the men, both then and now in the Middle East. In fact,
it was that way in Kenya this summer. And no, I didn’t get used to it. So I’m
still okay. This is not to say that women in that culture were powerless; but
one of the jobs of a woman was to serve guests.
The
chiasm starts with guests, and moves to the second and second to last point;
the fever. Peter’s mother-in-law has a fever, and at the end, her fever is
gone. The middle of this chiasm, the main point of this little chiasm is Jesus
touching the woman and lifting her. Mark wants his reader to hear that Jesus is
a caring person; this is a man who touches the sick and broken, a man who will
hold the hand of a woman He is not married to, and lifts her up. This is a man,
Mark wants His readers to know, that can do this for you as well. This Jesus is
the kind of person who still touches the broken and hurting, I want you to see
for yourself. Mark highlighted this in his gospel as one of the first miracles.
He has cast out demons, but that’s only helpful if you have a demon. What if
your problems are more ordinary? Jesus is there for you too. When it’s hard to
pay the rent, when the day has been long and tough, when you’re hurting, Jesus
is there. He is the lifter of our head. This is not only a man with authority,
a holy man, but a man who cares for people.
That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and
demon-possessed. 33 The
whole town gathered at the door, 34 and Jesus healed many who had various diseases. He also
drove out many demons, but he would not let the demons speak because they knew
who he was.
35 Very
early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and
went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him, they
exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!”
38 Jesus replied, “Let us go
somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I
have come.” 39 So he
traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out
demons.
Dr. Bailey has proposed a chiasm for this section as
well, but to me, it’s a little more suspect than the others we’ve seen so far.
He seems to feel the middle of the chiasm is Jesus prayer. The beginning and
the end have people healed in a place (Capernum at the beginning and Galilee at
the end). Then the other part is all the people, near the beginning all the
people come to the door (the whole city) and at the end everyone is searching
for Jesus. This means the main point is Jesus prayer, surrounded by a
description of what happened after people learned that Jesus was a bonafide
healer. He healed Peter’s mother-in-law, and word must have gotten out fairly
quickly. Once the Sabbath was over, and people were free to travel and move
about, then they all rushed right over to Peter’s house. He healed many people,
cast out demons, and wouldn’t let them speak. You’ll notice that Mark doesn’t
get into the particulars, at least not yet, about the various people that were
healed and exactly what happened. He will do that later, but now, still in
chapter 1, Mark is still introducing his main character, Jesus the Christ. He
is a man with God given authority who healed a lot of people in Capernum. And
if you want, you can go check it out.
I want you to notice that Mark is giving places and
events. There were many who were healed. Certainly if this didn’t happen, it
would have been fairly easy to debunk. A reader could go to Capernum, not too
far a distance from anywhere in Israel, especially given the overall message of
Mark, that this was the Messiah, and in His sacrificial death all who believe
in Him receive eternal life. For a message like that, so revolutionary, so
important, I hope people did go check out Mark’s account of what happened.
There would have been people, remember Mark wrote only about 20-30 years after
Jesus death. There would still have been people in Capernum who could confirm
Mark’s version of events.
Mark, I suspect, is pointing out to his readers that the
people first exposed to Jesus ministry of teaching and healing recognized this
was a man with considerable power. But even though He has considerable power,
He is still dependent on God the Father. Mark also wants people to know Jesus
is not like other holy men who would pray in public, yelling to God in the town
square, showing off how holy they are, but would go off by Himself to pray to
God, to commune with the Father. This certainly is a very different sort of
religious figure than the people in Israel had seen before. This is a Messiah
with power to heal, with authority to teach on His own, and with the authority
to call disciples.
Even though Jesus was known as a healer, that wasn’t His
primary purpose. But at least on historian from the time remembered Him as a
healer, primarily. Listen to Josephus, himself a Jew writing in the 70’s and
80’s AD. This comes from his “Antiquities of the Jews” 18 3.3 “Now there was
about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he
was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with
pleasure. He drew many over to him, both many of the Jews and many of the
Gentiles. He was the Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the
principle men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at
first did not forsake him, for he appeared to them alive again the third day,
as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful
things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named for him, are not
extinct to this day.”
What I want you to hear is that one of the things Jesus
is going to have to overcome is people who just want Him to be a healer, and
nothing more. Healing people is a part of Jesus ministry, but it was never
meant to be the totality. Healing people is a step that Jesus takes toward
fulfilling all the prophesy about Him, but also a step toward letting people
know exactly who He is. The healing is a signpost, point to who Jesus really
is, and where His power comes from. His power to heal comes from God, because
He is God. The ability to heal was a sign that the people in ancient Israel
should have been able to read. They knew the Messiah was to heal people, but
when it was right in front of their faces, some of them still missed Him. It’s
too bad that some people got caught up on a step of Jesus ministry, or a part
of it maybe is a better way to phrase it.
The truth is that Jesus came to preach. He came to
preach the coming kingdom of God, that God was coming close to them through
Himself. Already in the first chapter of Mark Jesus is having to move on to
other towns so that He can preach, and not just be a healer. Being a healer
isn’t bad. But it is less than Jesus came here to accomplish. Whenever there is
power there are usually hangers on that try to define and shape that power.
Look at our president, or in fact, any president. They all have advisors competing
for a moment of the president’s attention. Look at rock stars; all of them have
people hanging around them trying to move the star in a particular direction,
direct their power in a certain direction. Jesus was the same. There were
people that came just to be healed, and Jesus was often happy to oblige. But
Jesus mission was to accomplish more than just physical healing. All the people
that Jesus ever healed eventually got sick again and died. So in the grand
scheme of things, healing is temporary. But Jesus came not to do the temporary
but the permanent. Through Jesus sacrifice on the cross we are permanently set
right with God. We have been healed. The hole in our lives, the need we all
have to know God, has been healed by Christ, through His death on the cross.
And the healing we will all need someday, the healing of death, was taken care
by Christ as well. We are invited into His death, and His resurrection.
Jesus had to get out there and preach. That was His
mission at that time. But the truth is that He preached with everything He said
and everything He did. His healings were a form of preaching. His interactions
with the disciples were preaching as well. His ultimate act of love on the
cross was a sermon too. Jesus wasn’t one of those “Do as I say and not as I do”
sort of guys. He preached with His life; the way He honored the beaten down in
society, the way He touched and lifted up the sick, the way He tried to correct
the arrogant and mistaken, the ways He spoke on the mountain sides and to us,
Jesus life was a sermon. Everything in His life pointed to who He was. I wonder
if that is true of us. Does my life, does your life point to Christ? Are we are
living sermon pointing to Christ; that He is our Savior and we trust in Him
alone? And if not, why not? What is holding us back from preaching Jesus love
and forgiveness with our lives? Is it pride? If so, we’ve been told in
Scripture to boast in nothing but Christ. Is it embarrassment? Jesus said that
whoever denies Him, He will deny before the Father.
End: We all have to go through different parts of life
that can distract us from the main purposes of our lives. We exist to serve
God, to please Him, to live for Him. And absolutely, to enjoy God. And yet, we
can get distracted, many times by things that are good things. It’s good to
have kids that play sports, but that can distract us from living a life fully
sold out to God. It’s good to have a job you love, but if it gets in the way of
living life, maybe it needs to be pruned back. We can get so caught up in
doing, rather than just being before God. Our worth in God’s eyes does not come
from what we do. Our worth comes from the fact that God loves us. We do good
works, nice things for others to honor God, to respond to God, to tell God we
love Him through how we live our lives. But none of us should get caught up in
stuff that is less important. There are lots of areas of our lives where we can
get caught up, distracted from the things of God. That ought not to be. Pray this week, and ask God to show you
which are the parts of your life which are distracting you from Him. We all
need to be pruned back in our frantic activities, and make sure we are focused
on God.
Let’s pray.