Jesus in Action (Part A)

A pastor wants to come and encourage the flock to serve the Lord, to instruct them from the scripture what God is looking for from us. But in pointing out what God wants, you have to also point out what offends God. And that has a way of offending people who are not ready to receive what God has to say.

No matter how nicely you say it, no matter how you hand it to them, if their heart is adamant, if they are hard against God, they will turn on you for preaching these things. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the Gospel of Mark.

Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the Gospel of Mark chapter one with a brand new study called Jesus in Action. We are in the Gospel according to Mark chapter one.

We will take verses 35 through 45. Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, he went out and departed to a solitary place and there he prayed. Simon and those who were with him searched for him.

When they found him, they said to him, Everyone is looking for you. But he said to them, Let us go into the next towns, that I may preach there also, because for this purpose I have come forth. And he was preaching in their synagogues throughout all Galilee, and casting out demons. Now a leper came to him, imploring him, kneeling down to him, and saying to him, If you are willing, you can make me clean. Then Jesus moved with compassion, stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, I am willing, be cleansed.

As soon as he had spoken, immediately the leprosy left him, and he was cleansed. And he strictly warned him, and sent him away at once, and said to him, See that you say nothing to anyone, but go your way, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing those things which Moses commanded as a testimony to them. However, he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the matter, so that Jesus could no longer openly enter the city, but was outside in a deserted place, and they came to him from every direction.

We are seeing Jesus in action, and that is always exciting and informative for our own walk in Christ. I think a pastor wants to come and encourage the flock to serve the Lord, to instruct them from the scripture what God is looking for from us, but in pointing out what God wants, you have to also point out what offends God, and that has a way of offending people who are not ready to receive what God has to say. No matter how nicely you say it, no matter how you hand it to them, if their heart is adamant, if they are hard against God, they will turn on you for preaching these things. Now that's true whether it is from a pulpit to an assembly, that there are some that will be offended and not receive, or on an individual level. We're warned about even this in the scripture. Paul writing to the Corinthians said, But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, nor can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. So we should not be surprised, but that doesn't make the work any easier.

In fact, it can just still, it sometimes causes perplexity. But it is the Word of God that has to go forth, and that's what we're looking at here in Jesus in action. We're going to see that the emphasis with him is God's Word, what God has to say. How did preaching the Word of God become secondary in churches of God?

It is very sad. It's so with some Christians, not interested in the verse by verse, they're not interested in what the Word says. They want experience, feelings, I don't know what's going on, but may we be mindful of these things and see if we can turn them into something useful for the kingdom. That God would not only minister to us in his great patience and mercy that he has for sinners, but that it would also flow through us towards others. That we would learn how to preach the Word firmly without backing down, but not maliciously.

Now sometimes to reach someone you have to be sarcastic. The prophets did it, Christ did it, the apostles did, and we do too sometimes. So to be in tune with the Holy Spirit allows us to discern the spiritual things. It is a mark of our salvation that God speaks to his people. Jesus said, my sheep will know my voice. In time, as you serve Christ, you also learn the voice of the devil. You also learn that when he speaks he condemns, he strikes, he looks to hurt and to wound, but Christ is always looking to move forward, to press towards the mark of holiness.

Through encouragement, through sometimes rebuke, but even in his rebukes there is power and it is the power of love. So, looking now at verse 35, now in the morning having risen a long while before daylight, he went out and departed to a solitary place and there he prayed. This is Sunday morning, Peter is telling this story to a man named John Mark and he is telling him many years after decades, a couple of decades at least, after the events. And so as he is telling this story, he is remembering that Jesus stayed in my house in Capernaum. The day after he preached and cast out demons and healed people, the town was just astir with Christ. But that morning, before any of us got up, and we are fishermen, we rise early to get to work, he beat us up by a long shot and we interrupted him. That is what is coming out in the story. We got up looking for Jesus expecting him to be ready to sit down at the table and talk with us first before the multitudes would come, but he was gone. It is very human part of the story. He never forgot how it was having Jesus Christ in his home and he never forgot how he interrupted the devotional time of Jesus Christ too.

It is almost comical. It says, having risen a long while before daylight. Some are quick to say, we all need to do this. They are quick to chasten believers for not rising up early and doing this.

Jesus did not rebuke them. He did not say, how come you did not get up with me? You need to do this tomorrow. Imagine a mom, all of the responsibility she has in a home, little children around and all the things that you think she is going to get up before everybody like this and spend all these hours and maybe some of you can do it, not everyone.

I tried years ago. Found out I would fall asleep. I mean if you get up too early. It is important that I again repeat myself having risen a long while before daylight to pray, to have his devotional time.

He does not rebuke others for not doing it. But I do also believe that following Jesus excites in us a desire to do this and if you can not meet him in the morning, meet him at some other point in the day. But have that devotional time and do not let anyone take that from you.

Now in the days we live in, there are you know you can say bookworms and tapeworms. There are those that read books or in their devotional time, there are those that listen to CDs or online messages of mine only. You laugh. So he went out and departed to a solitary place it says and there he prayed. Not that he is inferior to the father, not at all. He is equal with the father but he is equal, he is also eager to be alone with the father.

That is what comes glaring off the page. Is Christ the son of God? Wanting to be alone with God the father. This is also prophetic. Isaiah called this oh I do not know 900 years earlier. Isaiah 50 verse 4. The Lord Yahweh has given me, speaking of this is a messianic verse, he is speaking of Messiah. The Lord Yahweh has given me, that is the Messiah, Christ, the tongue of the learned. That I should know how to speak a word in season to him who is weary. He awakens me morning by morning, he awakens my ear to hear the learned. And then of course Isaiah continues to develop the prophecy of the Messiah.

But here we see Christ waking up early in the morning to be with the father. Now looking at verse 36 and Simon and those who were with him searched for him. It reads as though it was frantic.

Where is he? I mean they couldn't, they were so excited I'm sure when they went to bed and were looking forward to waking up that word searched in the Greek is an emphatic word. In fact, another Greek writer and classical Greek uses the same word to signify troops in close pursuit of the enemy. Just hunting them down.

So it's an emphatic word is my point. That's not the meaning, there's no conflict here, but what is emphasized is that this was a serious search. They were looking everywhere while he was praying and having time with the father. Of course, Simon Peter always where the action is. Others always seem to join his initiative. He was that kind of a man.

He is the one telling us the story through Mark. I have to say in reading this that they searched for him everywhere. There are times in the Christian life where you feel that it is impossible to find Jesus. That you are frantic for him.

You want a word for him. You want some sensation from the throne of God to come across your heart and fortify you for whatever it is you're facing or take it away completely. And it doesn't seem to come. Others join you. They pray with you. They pray for you.

Or they share the same experience. That's what faith does. It continues its desire for Christ. Whether we lay our eyesight on him or not, we search for him in our heart. He knows that. He's not gone anywhere. He is right there. Faith knows that. Verse 37, when they found him, they said to him, everyone is looking for you. He could have said, well not everyone. Then Peter looking back, when he tells this to Mark, repeating myself for one purpose, he's saying, I interrupted him.

I started the search. There he was praying with his father and here I come with everybody is looking for you. Conversation with God prepares us for conversation with others. That's what we're learning by watching Jesus in action. If I talk to God in earnest, according to the Scriptures, on God's terms, I will learn to talk to people on God's terms. It's called ministry.

And not just pastoral ministry, Christian ministry, as Christians, as believers. And I said, Peter, learn this lesson. Acts chapter 10. God separated Peter. Peter was going to give him a vision. And Peter was interrupted. Acts 10 verse 9, Peter went up on the housetop to pray.

He wanted to be alone with the father just like his master taught him. While Peter thought about the vision, the spirit said to him, Acts chapter 10 verse 19, behold, three men are seeking you. Everyone was seeking Christ that day, that morning.

This afternoon, these men are seeking out Peter. And there we read again in Acts, God speaking to him, arise, therefore, go down and go with them, doubting nothing for I have sent them. So Christ doesn't say, what are you doing interrupting me? I'm trying to, can I have a moment here with my father?

Does not do that. He engages them, lays out no guilt, just moves forward. True fellowship with God is willing to be interrupted if people need something. It's like a parent, like a loving parent. How many times do the kids interrupt? You can't count. When God made up the word infinity, he had children in mind and their questions.

Everyone is looking for you. That would be John and Andrew and James and others that were moved by the miracles in Capernaum because they embraced the miracles, the benefit of his miracles. They had so much to learn, his followers, but many of the people, they would not learn any more than seeing the miracles. That's as far as their faith would go, was a hunger for more miracles. They rejected his call to repentance and that's why I started off saying that preaching looks to reach people. It tells folks what offends God.

Many people are doing those things and they don't want to stop and so they turn on the one that points it out and we should be ready for that and not slow down by that. One of my prayers for myself is, Lord, help me to just think the way you think, to feel the way you feel, because my feelings get in the way of everything when they don't line up with what I've learned from you. These in Capernaum, many of them, were saying, Lord, heal me, help me, but whatever you do, don't preach to me.

I don't want to hear the religion. You meet people like this. Whatever you're going to do, I don't want to hear this Christ stuff. Sometimes maybe a Christian has gone before you and has so messed up the field of ministry that that person doesn't want to hear Christ anymore and you're going to have to switch gears. That's one of the lessons from the book of Nehemiah. Before the ruins or before the construction begins, the ruins have to be removed and sometimes those ruins are caused by Christians who may mean well but have just made the other side angry by trying to jam the gospel down their throats. Not a good idea to put a track in someone's sandwich hoping that they'll take a bite and get saved.

Not that I know of anybody who's ever done that, but it paints the picture that I want it to paint. How many, again, turn on the preacher, the pastor, the individual Christian for preaching the same things that Jesus preached? I don't get it. People come to church, churchgoers. They come to church, they hear what Christ says, and they get angry at the pastor for saying what Christ says as though the message were negative and yet you have others that come and they love every word. It's the same thing that happened on the cross to Christ. One thief heard everything Christ said and so did the other.

Only one received him. No pastor is without sin. He too has to hear what's being preached. He too has to hear the condemnation of sin and he deals with it. And so do other believers. Truth does not change because we don't like it. It demands conformity every single time. The truth of God does not back down.

The standards are high. But also with that truth is the immense love and patience of God, his willingness to stoop down and work with us. You say when I hear these messages on repentance, when you single out the sins that I'm guilty of or I don't want to hear about, what should I do if I feel that way? You go to the Lord. You tell him, Lord, I'm having a hard time accepting your truth.

I want this to change. I want to love what you have to say. I want to receive everything you have for me and to work through me. Save me from my rejection of you.

That's what you do. Maybe you're a saved soul with a lost life. Your life is lost because of your lifestyle.

Your lifestyle disagrees with Christ and he doesn't, as I said, does not back down. Or maybe you're just a lost soul. You've never given your life to Christ and you're lost because God's truth doesn't appeal to you. You're missing out. Satan is selling you damaged goods.

He's selling you parachutes that don't work and you won't find out until you make impact. It'd be too late. That is the message that we get from our scripture to the lost souls who hates being told you are a sinner, though they can't deny it. I want to come up.

I would love to come up into the pulpit and say, now I know there are those of you that are sinning. Don't worry about it. You'll be all right. God died for nothing.

It doesn't matter. Sin like you want. In fact, recite this prayer. The Internet is my shepherd. I shall not want.

It makes me to lie down warm and cozy with lies and things that would destroy my soul. How do you reach the loss? If we could come up with a simple answer, we'd put it in a bottle and we'd give it away for free. But it's not that simple. It's no surprise that we have saved souls with lost lives and we have lost souls with lost lives. It is a real battle and Christ came to deal with these things and he says the first step is personal and so we see him praying. The second step is to act, to do something based on that time with the Father, that time with God, to have time with people. And then the third step is that he's going to preach. After he engages, after they engage him and find him and say where have you been?

We've been searching for you. People put great effort into hiding their sin, to redefining their sin, to ignoring their sin, to excusing their sin, to attacking those that preach against sin. This is what we also preach. Repent therefore and be converted. That your sins may be blotted out so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, Acts chapter 3 verse 19. My sins blotted out, that is the greatest thing about me.

The best thing about me is that my sins are blotted out through the blood of Jesus Christ, through what he has done on his cross, his resurrection and return and who he is and so much more. Would you rather believe fellow sinners or those who are trying to tell you what God says? So the fight goes on and we look now at verse 38.

I'm skipping sarcasm I should tell you and it's hard because there's that belief that sometimes sarcasm is very effective but too much sarcasm just over does it. So I'm going to move to verse 38. And he said to them, let us go into the next towns that I may preach there also because for this reason I have come forth.

Luke adds, they tried, Luke chapter 4 verse 42 talking about the same incident, they tried to keep him from leaving them. So he says I have to go to Galilee and preach. No, no, stay here in Capernaum. This is the place.

Oceanfront or seafront, lakefront property, all the fish you can eat. I must preach he said, not, notice what he did not say. I must go do miracles. I must wow people.

I must sing songs. Nothing wrong with those things in their place but they are not secondary or rather they are secondary. Preaching is not secondary. Preaching is primary because what do you have if you do not have what God said?

What are you left with? Listen, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir can sing beautiful songs as they renounce who Jesus says he is, as they tell you the scriptures are not enough. Some guy with sunglasses had a vision, special sunglasses, and he wrote it all down and you are supposed to just swallow it whole. It is not enough to have songs, to see wonders, one must preach. They could not comprehend this apparent indifference on his part when they, everybody has been looking for you, stay here. And he said I have to go other places and I have to preach.

Much of that went over their heads. Miracles on which these people of Capernaum place so much importance that he does not even mention them. In fact, too many miracles creates an appetite for more miracles until it drowns out what God is trying to say, which is a miracle in itself. The preaching of God is a miracle. How many believers of Jesus Christ have gone to their graves and never really saw what these people saw in the terms of miracles? Almost all of us. We do not see the lepers cleanse, Jesus walking through the streets healing people like the numbers that John in his gospel says.

There are so many you could fill the libraries of the world there would not be even enough space. So evidently the emphasis in scripture is not on the miraculous things but the miraculous truth. And that's what he is emphasizing here when he says that I may preach, verse 38, there also because for this purpose I came forth. To preach the gospel, that's the way his emphasis is on getting the word out. What do you have if you have a group of people who have wonders and miracles but no word of God? What do you have if you have a group of people who have the word of God and no miracles?

If you just have the miracles and no word of God, what does it profit a man if you gain the world, your health, whatever it is, and still you lose your soul because you never got your life to line up with what God wants. 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.