Unintimidated Ministry (Part B)

This alliance was a deadly alliance because what it did is it joined a political entity with a more religious entity. That made them deadly and in the end it paid off for them. In the end this political influence reached the ear of Pilate who was the force of Rome and they had Christ crucified.

This is how they wanted to destroy him. And this is just the beginning. It's going to just continue on until finally Christ decides it's time to be crucified.

To hear more information about Cross Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. Today, Pastor Rick continues his message called Unintimidated Ministry in Mark Chapter 3. Verse 5.

I'm going to pause here. You don't want your pastor being into the newspapers all the time. I have to stay focused on pastoring. And so no, I don't want to know too much about what's going on because that will take me away from what I'm centered on.

I want to know what's going on in the scripture. And that will apply to everything in life. It's not putting your head in the sand. I don't think anybody can actually, I don't even think ostriches put their heads in the sand. Alright, back to verse 5.

If one of you know about ostriches doing that, I'm good. Verse 5. And when he looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, he said to the man, stretch out your hand, and he stretched it out, and his hand was restored as whole as the other. The look of Christ, when Peter betrayed Christ, Christ looked at him there after Christ was arrested. Well, that look wasn't wasted because Peter saw it. It would have been wasted if Peter did not see it.

Well, Peter saw this, and that's what he remembers as he's telling the story to Mark. He looked around. He was angry, but is heartbroken at the same time. There's this flood of emotions in Christ. He was angry with their utter heartlessness and their proclivity towards violence against anyone who dared stand against them, how stubborn they were. I mean, if you could see somebody heal somebody like this, would you?

You know, I'm going to beat this guy up, first chance I get. But that's how they thought. He was angry with them because they caused unnecessary harm to others and their own souls. He says being grieved by the hardness of their hearts. He was saddened by their condition.

Because he couldn't reach. What will you do if the will is so stubborn that it refuses the evidences laid before it? And the evidence does not have to be signs and wonders. It could just be truth.

If you know someone who has come to Christ because of truth, not because of signs and wonders, then you understand that no one has an excuse. That if you can do it, so can others do it. And he said to the man, stretch out your hand.

Everyone is watching. He's calling the man to participate in this particular miracle. And he stretched it out.

Now this man had to make a choice. He was either going to be intimidated by the Pharisees, whom he knew were watching this, or he was going to listen to Christ. And of course he listened to Christ. He stretched out his hand. He managed to do this. We don't know the extent of his handicap, but we know it was there. And his hand was restored as whole as the other with a room full of witnesses. Verse 6, then the Pharisees went out and immediately plotted with the Herodians against him how they might destroy him.

It's the dumbest thing. I mean, a sane person would have said, now that's impressive. And I would like to know more about this.

This person is helping people. We've heard what he's preached, and he's never preached outside of the scripture. But that is not what happens. Again, because they could not control him. Now the Herodians, they were a political group with a religious flair. They were the ones that supported Herod Antipas, who is the one that will have John the Baptist beheaded. These two groups, or these two stooges of groups, had little in common. In fact, the Pharisees and Sadducees, they would have really not appreciated these people like the tax collectors because Herod was half Jew, you could say, and half Edomite.

It was mixed. And they didn't care for him, but it worked. It was tolerable for the Jews with Herod Antipas.

But when it came down to his righteousness, there was nothing about him righteous at all. This alliance was a deadly alliance because what it did is it joined a political entity with a more religious entity, and that made them deadly. And in the end, it paid off for them. In the end, this political influence reached the ear of Pilate, who was the force of Rome, and they had Christ crucified. This is how they wanted to destroy him.

And this is just the beginning. I mean, it's going to just continue on until finally Christ decides it's time to be crucified. So they will overlook their differences if it will just get Jesus out of the way. Both groups played the religious game in God's name. Jesus warned about their influence. We'll read this later in Mark chapter 8. He charged them, that's his disciples saying, take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. These Herodians represented Herod again. And so Christ is saying, watch out for their evil influence. Don't be oppressed by those guys.

Don't think there's something redeeming about them. You watch them, continues here in verse 6, how they might destroy him. Again, this squadron of fools. This is what Peter preached about Christ. He wanted to set the record straight to those he was converting through his preaching, the Gentiles in this case. He says how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. What Peter says when he later on preachings, this is the Christ that I'm preaching to you. This is the Christ that was so hated by the religious leaders that was supposed to have the keys to Messiah. They were supposed to say to the people, ideally this is what they were supposed to do, this is how Messiah. And whether he wants to wipe out the Romans or get crucified, it's up to him. He's the leader.

He's the king. And they didn't even come close to that. Their real motive was envy that led to hatred. The pretext was zeal for the law. They pretended to be zealous for the Sabbath. They will pretend to be zealous for the Sabbath with Paul and for circumcision and for the dietary laws, and Paul will hack away at all that. They'll chop it all.

It doesn't matter what you eat. Just give thanks to the Lord who's so far ahead of these people. Today we have them in the church. We have Christians who still try to drag other Christians into food fights and Sabbath arguments and just the legalists.

We're free from that. We're not a sect of Judaism. Judaism to us is obsolete in Christ. We are followers of Jesus Christ, not the law of Moses. However, we do not follow Christ without the law of Moses. We just follow Christ with the law of Moses, rightly interpreted for us by Christ through the Holy Spirit.

Their zeal for the law again was not genuine. The fact that proves that is by them joining up with these Herodians, Herod Antipas. They needed that secular power if they were going to do Christ in, and they knew that, verse 7. But Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the sea, and a great multitude from Galilee followed him and from Judea. Okay, so Christ knows these people are against him, and so instead of saying, you know what, I've got problems in life now, I'm going to back down with ministry. I'm going to stop serving. I'm going to go hide somewhere away from these people. He just sort of relocates his ministry because they're a distraction, and then he ramps it up so much that the amount of people that came out could never be forgotten by anybody that was part of this.

They'd never seen anything like this. It was prudent of the Lord to distance himself from these fact haters, and we read here, and a great multitude from Galilee followed him and from Judea. We've got to take verses 7 and 8 together to make the point. Jesus withdrew, verse 7, with his disciples to the sea, and a great multitude from Galilee followed him and from Judea and Jerusalem and Idumea and beyond the Jordan and those from Tyre and Sidon. This side, and a great multitude, when they heard how many things he was doing, came to him. You see the conjunctions?

Six times, and it's a polysyndeton, and this place, and that place. It's driving the point home that people from all over the land were coming to see Christ. Why weren't the clerics doing it? They were still to try to get him.

The entire country. They were agog with excitement. They were so happy. They were like, I can't believe you got to come see this. Could you imagine? It's like he's walking into a hospital and everybody walks out of the hospital healthy now. It's hard to imagine this, but this is precisely what took place. So the Lord said, okay, clerics, keep the synagogues.

I'll take the multitudes. His preaching and doing wonders, however, did not protect him. Ultimately, it will land him on the cross.

But that again was by design, not by accident. They did not prevail. When Christ was crucified, Satan lost. Verse 8, and Jerusalem and Idumea and beyond Jordan, those from Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude when they heard how many things he was doing.

Yeah, because no one had done anything like this before. That's when people were coming out from all of these places. Jerusalem is the one that were coming. And Galilee was where he was. Jerusalem, people from Jerusalem, that's the seed of Israel's theological elite and the intelligentsia of their people, highly educated people wielding great cultural influence throughout the land. That was where the famous teacher Gamaliel, who Paul sat under, that's where Gamaliel was. That's where the corrupt priest Annas and his son-in-law Caiaphas, who were very much part of the crucifixion, that's where they dwelled. You see why Jesus, when he was approaching Jerusalem, he says, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one that kills the prophets and stones those who were sent to her, how often I wanted to gather your children like chicks.

But you were not willing. Also in Jerusalem, however, were leaders who were soon to be heroes to us, Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea. Joseph of Rama, we covered that Wednesday, that's where Samuel was from. These two men, if they could be converted at the preaching and teaching of Christ, being members of this group of clerics, being members of the Sanhedrin, what was the excuse of all the others? Would they stand before God after the moment of death? Would they stand before them and say, how was I supposed to know he was the Messiah? Because God would just count on Joseph and Nicodemus figured it out, what's your problem? This is the way it is to this day and we should preach these things in the workplace. When I worked in the workplace, I would preach these things. I would take away their excuses and they would either like me or hate me.

Fortunately, they didn't beat me up. Edumia, he mentions here, this is a territory that is south of Hebron, in the area between Hebron and Beersheba, and these are the Edomites. They were on the east side of Jordan, but after Israel and Jerusalem was conquered by the Babylonians, many of them colonized this area, so they were a mixed people. So what Mark is saying here wasn't only Jews coming out to see Christ. There were other peoples in the land that were coming out to be touched by him and to be healed by him. And I firmly believe there were non-Jews being healed by him too.

I mean, it's a multitude. Sorry you're not Jewish, I can't heal you. That, of course, was not. He made it difficult on a one-on-one because he was extracting faith. The Greek Syrophoenician woman whose daughter was demon-possessed, he said, I'm not giving what's for the kids to the dogs. And she said, yeah, but the puppies get the crumbs. And he said, right on. And go, your daughter has been healed.

Then there was, of course, the woman. I mean, on and on, Christ, his ministry, his magnificent ministry. There is nothing, if you look at the life of Christ seriously, you have nothing against him. He is blameless. He's like no other.

He does all things well, we are told, in the gospel. Anyway, he also mentions here and beyond the Jordan. That's the Trans-Jordan, the east of Jordan. That's where the two and a half tribes of Israel had decided to stay. They were largely mixed at this time. Again, Mark making the point that the Gentiles were part of this too. Some of the Bibles may call that area Perea, but the Trans-Jordan is a proper phrase. And those from Tyre and Sidon, two major Phoenician cities that dominated the Mediterranean Sea in its shipping. Nebuchadnezzar couldn't conquer, you know, we covered that in Daniel. But anyway, the more Gentiles is my point. They were coming.

It's pretty far away. A great multitude. This is the fruit of Unintimidated Ministry, which is the title. By the way, the title to this morning's message is the Unintimidated Ministry, because we need that in these times. We need to say, I'm not afraid of you.

You need to be afraid of what I have to say. I'm the one that has the power in what I say about Christ and the power of the gospel message. Paul said, you know, the power of the gospel, because it goes beyond this life.

Consequence of rejecting it or the reward of receiving it. This great multitude. So much for the Pharisee-Herodian coalition.

Couldn't stop this. When they heard how many things he was doing, they came to him. And so the miracles now were the big draw for the multitudes of people throughout these regions, these lands, the whole land. Many were too shallow to go deeper into his teachings.

Some just could not for very, you know, the hard workers and many illiterate. In John's gospel at the end of chapter two, we read that this is earlier chronologically than these events here. This is when he was in Jerusalem. Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover during the feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs, which he did. But Jesus did not believe himself to them because he knew all men and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for he knew what was in man.

So that's what we have here. He knew that many of these people were shallow, and yet he doesn't chase them away. He ministers to them. So many lessons for us as individual Christians and our relationship to people who need to be preached to. Not preached to in the sense of corrective preaching. That's the role of the pulpit, actually, primarily, not exclusively. But the preaching of the gospel. What do the pastors want? They want the congregation to be fitted, to be armored up, to go into the world and preach the gospel. And then bring people to the church to receive the lessons. So we're going through the gospels, the person of Christ.

I hope we go through Acts' neck, the power of Christ through his disciples. But a church needs the precepts. We have to get the rules, because many Christians will come up and ask a question that has already been dealt with in the scripture. When I say, we don't do this or that, or we do it this way, they don't like it, but they don't understand. This is what we've been told to do in the scripture. That's why we do it this way.

How do you get everybody onto that page? Well, you can't get them all, but you have to do it. And so, yeah, I don't like preaching the precepts so much.

It's a lot of wrestling, but it's necessary. Anyway, what do you say? Well, sorry, I know I made you look down and you'll look up.

I don't know. Not on purpose. Except for Frank.

Is Frank here? Verse 9, so he told his disciples that a small boat should be kept ready for him because of the multitude, lest they should crush him. He was sure to have an exit plan.

Sound thinking. He's God. He could have just said to everybody, get back. But he doesn't do this. He takes precautions. He doesn't, you know, no, I'll just do some miracles. And Christ never did meaningless miracles or miracles for his own sake.

He uses his servants that are with him in this church and many others in this day and age. We have armed security because we are afraid of being crushed by circumstances that we should have been prepared for. And it is just sound thinking. And those of you who have your homes, you know, you know that.

If you just lie in bed and said, I'll wait for food to fly into my mouth, what's going to happen to you? But a lot of Christians, they, you know, they kind of trust in miracles when they're supposed to be working. So verse 10, so he healed many so that as many as had afflictions pressed about him to touch him.

That word for afflictions in the Greek is scourge. And so he healed many that had been scourged by illnesses. Again, today God is not routine. The point was no ailment could withstand him. He was God the Son and nothing like that could stand in his presence. And this was the evidence for his messiahship that was just unprecedented and no one should have questioned him.

Not one Jew should have ever said you can't be the Messiah. But even John the Baptist will. But how does Christ answer John the Baptist? When John says, are you the coming one? Christ says, go tell John what I've just done. He'll figure it out. He's telling John, no one does what I do and I do what I do because of who I am.

And you know it. And we do, too. Verse 11, and the unclean spirits, whenever they saw him, fell down before him and cried out, saying, you are the son of God. Again, the Christian faith is exclusive in character. No other religion has these things. They don't even try. The Koran doesn't talk about miracles.

It's got none. Christianity says, Christ loves you. It's your choice. If you want to die rejecting him, that's up to you.

But if you want to live receiving him, what holds you back? So, Acts chapter 4, 12, nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. Christ is it.

And so, just one almost done here. I know we face all sorts of spooky things out there, this intimidation that is the principal point of this morning. First Peter, chapter 3, verse 14. Remember, First Peter is dealing with Christians who are persecuted.

And he doesn't fluff it for him. Ah, it'll be okay. He said, get in there and be Christians. That's what he says to them.

Second Peter, he deals with the heretics creeping in the church. But, First Peter 3, 14, he says, But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you are blessed. You are blessed. And do not be afraid of their threats, nor be troubled.

Peter's saying, don't be intimidated. You're blessed because you're suffering for righteousness' sake. Now there are some Christians, or people who say they're Christians, they suffer, but they're not being righteous. They're suffering for stupidity. Others just suffer for reasons we don't know about. I'm not trying to cover the point of suffering.

It's an age-old question that we accept as just a product of life in a cursed world. Philippians 4, Paul says, don't worry about anything. That's what he says. Christ would say it too.

When you hear, be not afraid, that means don't worry about this. James 5, 11, Indeed we count them blessed who endure. See, we lose sometimes. We keep reading, and sometimes we miss the point. We count them blessed who endure.

Does he really have to make any other comment about that? He does because we do need it, but that alone, be anxious for nothing, but in everything with prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And sometimes I say to God, why should I bother praying to you about this when I have been asking about this for decades? And Christ, of course, has already taught me because it is the obedient thing to do. And I have already said, I want to be obedient. And if I don't get my prayer answered, I can be obedient.

And I can continue to talk to him about anything. Verse 12, But he sternly warned them that they should not make him known. No way was the Lord going to listen to or entrust demons with the gospel message. So they knew who he was.

They were incredible witnesses. They were an unauthorized distributor of truth. They were not allowed to tell the truth. In chapter one, Jesus rebuked him, saying, Be quiet and come out of him. In other words, Jesus said, Shut up and beat it. That is what he said when he says, Be quiet. The Greek is be muzzled, put a muzzle on it and come out.

Leave. He has no interest in hearing what demons have to say about him. I'm really not interested what Hollywood has to say about Christ. I'm not interested in pictures of Christ that really are, you know, a guy with long hair that could be a fashion model dressed up in ancient garb.

I don't I try to be careful about who I listen to, what I drink from. Jesus does not need us. He would like us. He invites us.

And we certainly wanted his way. Thanks for tuning in to Cross Reference Radio for this study in the Book of Mark. Cross Reference Radio is the teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia. To learn more information about this ministry, visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. Once you're there, you'll find additional teachings from Pastor Rick. We encourage you to subscribe to our podcast. When you subscribe, you'll be notified of each new edition of Cross Reference Radio. You can search for Cross Reference Radio on your favorite podcast app. That's all we have time for today, but we hope you'll join us next time as Pastor Rick continues to teach through the Book of Mark, right here on Cross Reference Radio.