Hating and Loving Christ (Part B)

Christ is of course developing the story and the apostles are telling it and what they're saying is there's this outpouring of love on the Lord and he took issue with anybody criticizing her for this apparently extravagant devotion. No other love is to be greater than the love we have for Christ.

That's not always easy because we can't see Christ as we can see some of each other, our children for example. Today, Pastor Rick will continue his message called Hating and Loving Christ in Mark Chapter 14. Usually when people lie it's because they're under some pressure, their image or maybe they don't want something found out, it's always wrong you shall not bear false witness and I think that any Christian that is comfortable lying is in serious trouble. Their hatred of Jesus began when he defied their unholiness in public because they were pretending to be holy men with their robes and how they'd walk around, strut around and criticize everybody else and be these celebrity characters and Christ called them out. He exposed their hypocrisy and they are now going to kill him for it. These same men when they died they stood before Jesus forever doomed. As far as we know none of these characters repented and the ones that would have repented would have found mercy. Luke Chapter 13, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and you yourselves thrust out.

Man, that's scary. Apart from me I never knew you. On this case though these were not pretending to have known him. Revelation Chapter 1 we read, Behold he is coming with clouds and every eye will see him even they who pierced him. Now that is a direct reference to the Jewish people but it does not leave out these characters. To those Jewish hearts among the Jews who approved of Christ's death comes judgment. Thank God there were Jews that did receive Christ. It's not anti-Semitic.

These are the facts. Peter who was a Jew and loved the Lord and is in heaven never lost sight of who these guys were and after Christ ascended to heaven and Peter began to come to the front of Christianity and began to preach with boldness. He let everybody know that they plotted the death of the Holy One of Israel. Acts Chapter 2, him being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God.

You have taken by lawless hands and crucified and put to death. Peter is saying the prophecy was fulfilled but it was your choice to be against God. God was going to fulfill this prophecy.

It is an interesting thought. Judas was a pawn of Satan and also of God. God in the sense that God is in control.

He is sovereign. You are free to be wicked but not, not out of God's control. Acts Chapter 3, Peter continues. Would you deny the Holy One and the just and ask for a murderer to be granted to you and kill the prince of life whom God raised from the dead of which we are witnesses. So there's Peter and he is holding them accountable and many of the priests were converted at his preaching but he never forgot. We should have some of that.

This should be sermons preached and experiences in Christianity that we never forget, that we use to the glory of God in our lives. It says here in verse 2 and put him to death. These guys played for keeps, did they not? That's what they were going to do. They wanted to put him to death and they did. They wanted it not only to be death but they wanted it to be shameful and painful. They did not want a quick execution. Verse 2, but they said not during the feast lest there be an uproar of the people. This is very important to the sovereignty of Christ and God who of course Christ being God the Son. They said not during the feast.

They wanted to wait till the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread was finished because all the men were required to be there and they wanted the multitudes to be diminished before they pulled their act. But he was arrested at the feast in spite of them because they weren't in control. Just like right now the very hairs of your head numbers because God is in control.

Men were in control of their choices but never in control of the outcome. He overrules their plans forcing them to conform to his will. He controls every foe and bound them, the whole lot of them to cooperate with the fulfillment of his purposes, his plan for salvation. He had found those whose hearts were wicked and would not change and so he used them. Same with Judas Iscariot. God did not put a knife to the throat of Judas and say you will be a betrayer. When Judas was born a baby and his mother looked into his eyes, she did not see a traitor.

He was a child like everybody else but as he grew he decided to take that path of greed, that path of self and God honored him. It's always amazing when you treat adults as some, treat some adults as an adult and they're insulted. I mean you said X, Y, Z and I honored what you said. Now you're angry with me for honoring what you said.

How does that work? If I said you're lying to me or dishonored you, you'd come at me for that. Well, that's just how it is. All of this could have been avoided in the lives of these men who were cast out at judgment. All they had to do was side with Jesus Christ, the very thing they refused to do.

They would never give him the satisfaction of considering him a legitimate rabbi, let alone Messiah. And so we see him in control deliberately moving towards the cross, the will of the Father and his will. The plan was set for salvation, not allowing the wicked to choose the hour or the method or the purpose. Later he will drive Judas out into the night. When Judas goes out into the night John says, and it was night.

It's an intentional word to us. He will drive Judas out to earn his 30 pieces of silver at the hour of his choosing. Because again, he's going to send him out during the feast, not as his instructions were not, you know, wait till after the feast. Later he will also keep righteous Peter from interfering too when he says put your sword in its sheath.

It's not how we do business here. It says lest there be an uproar of the people. Part of the problem was the crowds considered Jesus Christ to be not only a miracle working prophet.

Well, that's what they did. They considered him a miracle working prophet. And a prophet means they preached the truth in holiness and righteousness. The people had this mindset from 1 Chronicles chapter 16. Touch not my anointed ones and do my prophets no harm. And if they tried to arrest Christ with the multitudes, they feared that the civil disservants would be disastrous for them. And even if the people did not get their hands on the leaders individually, the Roman authorities would. These guys are gangsters. That's how gangsters do business. They find someone getting away with opposing them, diminishing their prophets. They look to execute them, to put a hit out on them. Verse 3, and being in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard, pardon me, costly oil of spikenard.

Then she broke the flask and poured it on his head. You know as I read these words, as I'm reading the scripture verses, I want to say this, I want to say that. It's God's word so robust, but at the end of it, I hope when it comes my time to die if I die, that I'm still excited about God's word. If someone says, well you got about 30 minutes to live, well maybe I'm going to study something in maps and see how it relates to the prophets or something.

I want to go out defying death. I want to go out saying I love God's word in season and out of season because it is real, not because it has become a favorite pastime of mine. And I enjoy when I read the scripture and study the scripture, I forget all about the boneheaded things of life to some degree. Except when we talk about the persecution.

No, you have to keep it real. That's where I'm going with it. What good is a Bible study if it's not real? If it's just religion or if it's just something that's interesting. Well the story now moves from the haters of Christ to the lover of Jesus. It is the same story as found in John's Gospel chapter 1 with Mary of Bethany. There are some little differences, not contradictions, additions or omissions, yes.

But not contradictions. You might think so because John says six days before the Passover this happened in Bethany. But Mark just said, well two days before the Passover.

Mark's not even trying to keep the sequence. That was for what the Pharisees were doing and he injects this into the story because it's setting up Judas. He's saying this was the last straw for Judas Iscariot. When he finally decided he was going to trade on the Lord to the authorities, it was because his feelings were hurt, he was insulted.

And that's why he's injecting this and I hopefully develop this a little bit more. And incidentally for the Jewish writers, Old and New Testament to go out of sequence is typical. I don't know if it was that parchment wasn't available, like I made a mistake, I should have put that back there, but too late.

Here it goes. I don't know what it is sometimes or sometimes it's easy like this one is relatively easy. Because when you get to verse 10 and 11 you say, okay now I see why he's put it in. It makes absolute sense.

And so don't get caught up on the six day, two day thing if you have gotten there. Matthew does the same thing as Mark. Mark is almost identical. Just Matthew gives more. So I treat them as most commentators to as this event at Bethany matching the one in John chapter 12, not as a separate event.

Some do, not many. Continuing, he says at the house of Simon the leper. Some suppose that Martha was the widow of Simon the leper.

Well that would fit. If this is the same story as in John 12, the anointing with Mary, this would be Mary of Bethany. There are a lot of Marys going around in the Bible as you know, which is a variation of Miriam. Otherwise it is a different house and different story, but I don't believe that because the story is too close.

And the repetition would be redundant and not right. Anyway he sat at the table. This table that he sat at, there was no chairs, low to the floor, probably in a U shape. And in the middle of the U is where the servants would bring the food and place it on the tables. And so they're sitting on like recliners, couches around this U shaped table.

A woman comes in, Mary of Bethany, again is who I believe this woman is. And having this alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard. Spikenard is the Greek for pure nard. Nard is like nog. Egg nog? Who knows what it is?

No I'm kidding. I mean as a kid didn't you ever wonder what is nog? I mean, anyhow, this is costly oil. Nard, a plant that grows I'm told in India and Nepal up in that way and of course you make an essential oil.

Motor oil is essential too I should add. And they used it as an ointment and perfume for special occasions because it was so costly. Therefore, probably had been in the family a long time and you just break it out every now and then. Evidently, not often, maybe not at all because she breaks the flask. She probably could not get the seal off and she's about fine. And then she uses it unsparingly on the Lord which is an emblem of her devotion and love.

She doesn't care about the cost of the oil. To her, it is more valuable to show him love than to keep this up on the shelf. Then she broke the flask and poured it on his head.

Now John 12 says it's his feet. Well, she had enough to do both. And that is what she did.

Her love for him is going to memorialize this event. Not that she spent expensive oil if Judas is telling the story yes, but Christ is of course developing the story and the apostles are telling it. And what they're saying is there's this outpouring of love on the Lord and he took issue with anybody criticizing her for this apparently extravagant devotion. No other love is to be greater than the love we have for Christ. That's not always easy because we can't see Christ as we can see some of each other.

Our children for example. 1 Peter. Now remember Peter writing to Christians who were persecuted in 1 Peter. And he writes to them and he says, you know you didn't see Christ, I did, but you love him just as much as me. And he was taken by this. And so he writes, he says, whom having not seen you love, though you do not see him yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.

It struck him. Here's Peter in assembly singing worship songs with the people and he's saying, their intensity of love for Christ is matching my intensity and I walked with him. That is the work of the Holy Spirit. This unfair life that we face raises its Medusa head with questions and challenges about God and our faith and our love for him.

God knows that. And God says this, you know when you go through struggles and you don't understand and you're actually offended with God, why doesn't he do something? Jesus said this, blessed is he who is not offended because of me. The one that can serve me without explanation is the one that's going to be blessed.

Once they find out who I am, they'll trust that much first. But if they make it a condition of serving me, if they say, if Christ you are offending me, I can't serve you anymore, then you become Judas. It is profound. Beatitude is it not?

Blessed is he who is not offended because of me. Her Lord's enemies were out to kill him. I'm not so sure she knew it.

He knew it. He's the one that says she's doing this for my burial. She doesn't say that. She's just pouring love out on him.

She may have. She is saying this is all I can do for him anyway. I can just show up in love on him. To others it may be meaningless. We just saw our young brother just play the song for the Lord. That's the same spirit.

This is what I can do. These last acts of love and loyalty by various believers are in contrast to these acts of violence that are directed towards him. And it must have been bittersweet for Christ to see her loving on him, but knowing in a few days her heart was going to be smashed.

Isaiah says he is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. So the next time you're grieving how God's handling something, you understand he knew. He understood that too. He saw all the beggars, the lepers.

There were people he could not reach. He knew there were people that he would heal and they still wouldn't believe him. He knew that Judas would be used by him to do miracles, to hear his preaching and still rebel against him.

How do you not have a broken heart over something like that? Verse 4, But there were some who were indignant among themselves and said, Why was this fragrant oil wasted? John names him. John said this was Judas. John chapter 12, verse 6, This he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief and had the money box and he used to take what was put in it.

He was an embezzler, a thief. And so this protest is, Why is this oil being wasted? How do you consider it wasted if it's poured on Christ? Who asked you, Judas? He doesn't set doctrine for us, not positive doctrine. Some of the disciples appear to have sided with him, supposing that he knew what he was talking about. And so that's why when Mark and Matthew tell the story, they do not isolate it to Judas. John does.

He drills it down. Look, Judas was the one that started this. Some of the others kind of said, Yeah, that's a good point. Church troublemakers can be very effective leading people who did not come to follow them. You could say, you know, Peter could have said, if John joined in with Judas just for example, Peter could have said, What are you doing? We didn't come here to listen to Judas. We came here to listen to Christ. And thus leading people out of a church that God led them into happens too frequently. Seeds of discord amongst brethren, in which the Proverbs in chapter 6 make it very clear, God hates sowing seeds of discord amongst the brethren. If you know someone that's going to a church and they love their church and they're getting fed the word of God, don't try to get them to come out of their church.

Encourage them. Again, by this time he had been a long time embezzler. So he reasons, We could have sold all of this oil for a big profit. I would have had more to embezzle.

There would have been a larger kitty for me to take from. A pot, that is, of cash. So he was being slighted, and it was just starting. Verse 5, he continues, For it might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii, and given to the poor, and they criticized her sharply. She was criticized for loving on the Lord, for spending her money, her way, on her Lord. 2 Corinthians 9, So let each one give as he prospers in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loves a cheerful giver. She's not complaining. She's going to anoint his head, and that doesn't mean pour a drop on.

She's going to pour it on, and then his feet. Christian men who get to be advisors to the church, there's lessons they have to learn. Not all of the lessons of the business world, of business acumen and God's stewardship, they don't always match. For the church, it's not always about profit margins, the dollars. A church can be solvent and have profit secondary. We have enough to live off of, to do what we have to do. In a business world, that wouldn't fly. You've got to be at those margins, and that's understandable. I'm not saying one is wrong and the other is right.

I'm saying they're not an automatic fit. She noticed that they were ganging up on her, and so did Christ, verse 6. But Jesus said, let her alone. Why do you trouble her?

She has done a good work for me. I don't think that was his tone. I think he got a little sharp with them. I think he knew he was, I think he was intentionally provoking Judas, because he knew that he was going to be traded on the feast, at the feast, and not after. And this was the moment.

Now the bystanders could hear them murmuring in their criticisms, but they also heard him stick up for her, just like you do when you're confused sometimes, and the Holy Spirit comes along and encourages and says, I'm with you. You're right on this. But, you know, that's not enough. It's not enough to be right, as much fun as it is. There's more to it. You've got to learn how to use being right. Those who have discernment when they're right, and others do not have it, it's very painful, because no one's listening to you. In fact, they could be attacking you, your own brothers and sisters in the faith. Yeah, you're overboard with that. Oh, that's not going to happen.

And then it happens, and then nobody wants to come. You were right. Sometimes they dislike you even more for being right. Anyway, she has done a good work for me, he says. There are works by Christians that are outstanding, quite amazing, but there are also works that are not so good. So, the seven churches in Revelation, to each one Christ brings up works, and it's unfortunate that the five churches who were rebuked, he addressed, he said, you know, you're doing these works.

Well, to Laodicea, he said, your works, but to the others, he said, you're doing these works, but that's not enough. 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.